On the 19th of May Grant's first assault of Vicksburg was repulsed with a loss of 942. Three days later he delivered his second assault, which likewise failed, at a cost of 3,199 killed, wounded, and missing. This drove him to the siege and put him in need of more troops; yet when, on the 25th of May, he sat down to write to Banks, it was with the purpose of offering to send down a force of 8,000 or 10,000 men if Banks could now provide the means of transport. But even while Grant wrote, word came that Johnston was gathering in his rear; and so the whole thing was one more given up, and instead, once again he called on Banks for help; and this time he sent down two large steamers, the Forest Queen and Moderator, to fetch the men. But Banks had now no men to spare; he too was cast for a siege; he could only echo the entreaty and send back the steamboats empty as they came. So the affair ended.
(1) "Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant," vol. I., p. 524.
CHAPTER XVII. THE FOURTEENTH OF JUNE.
Banks at once ordered up the ammunition and the stores from the depot at Riley's, near the headquarters of the day before, and early on the morning of the 28th of May established his headquarters in tents at Young's, in rear of the centre, and began his arrangements to reduce Port Hudson by gradual approaches. At six o'clock in the morning he sent a flag of truce to Gardner, from Augur's front on the Plains Store road, bearing a request for a suspension of hostilities until two o'clock in the afternoon, to permit the removal of the dead and wounded. To this Gardner at once refused to agree unless Banks would agree to withdraw at all points to a distance of eight hundred yards. He also demanded that the fleet should drop down out of range. Banks was unable to consent. A long correspondence followed, twelve letters in all, crossing and recrossing, to the utter confusion of time. At length, shortly after half-past three o'clock, Banks received Gardner's assent to an armistice extending till seven o'clock. The conditions were that the besiegers were to send to the lines of the defence, by unarmed parties, such of the Confederate killed as remained unburied, and such of their wounded as had not already been picked up and sent to the rear. The killed and wounded of the Union army, lying between their lines and the Confederate works, were to be cared for in the same way.
Arnold was ordered to bring up the siege train, manned by the 1st Indiana heavy artillery, and Houston to provide entrenching tools and siege materials. When all the siege artillery was in position there were forty pieces, of which six were 8-inch sea-coast howitzers on siege carriages, eight 24-pounders, seven 30-pounder Parrotts, four 6-inch rifles, four 9-inch Dahlgren guns, four 8-inch mortars, three 10-inch mortars, and four 13-inch mortars. To these were added twelve light batteries of sixty pieces, namely, six 6-pounder Sawyer rifles, two 10-pounder Parrotts, twenty-six 12-pounder Napoleons, two 12-pounder howitzers, twelve 3-inch rifles, and twelve 20-pounder Parrotts. The Dahlgren guns were served by a detachment of fifty-one men from the Richmond and seventeen from the Essex, under Lieutenant-Commander Edward Terry, with Ensign Robert P. Swann, Ensign E. M. Shepard, and Master's Mates William R. Cox and Edmund L. Bourne for chiefs of the gun divisions.
In the course of the next few days the eight regiments that had been left on the Teche and the Atchafalaya rejoined the army before Port Hudson, coming by way of Brashear, Algiers, and the river. This gave to the cavalry under Grierson one more regiment, the 41st Massachusetts, now mounted, and henceforth known as the 3d Massachusetts cavalry, the three troops of the old 2d battalion being merged in it; Weitzel got back the 114th New York; Paine recovered the 4th Massachusetts and the 16th New Hampshire of Ingraham's brigade, now practically broken up; and Grover the 22d Maine and 90th New York of Dwight's brigade, the 52d Massachusetts of Kimball's, and the 26th Maine of Birge's, while losing the 41st Massachusetts by its conversion into a mounted regiment. The 16th New Hampshire, however, had suffered so severely during its six week's confinement in the heart of the pestilential swamp that it was reduced to a mere skeleton, without strength either numerical or physical. It was easy to see that officers and men alike were suffering from some aggravated form of hepatic disorder, due to malarial poison. Many were added to the sick-report every day. Few that went to the regimental or general hospital returned to duty, while of the men called well all were yellow, emaciated, and restless, or so drowsy that the sentries were found asleep on their posts at noonday. This unfortunate regiment was therefore taken from the front and set to guard the general ammunition depot, near headquarters. Without being once engaged in battle, so that it had not a single gunshot wound to report, the 16th New Hampshire suffered a loss by disease during its seven months' service in Louisiana of 5 officers and 216 men—in all, 221; and nearly the whole of this occurred in the last two months. This regiment was replaced in Paine's division by the 28th Connecticut, from Pensacola.
Dwight was now given the command of Sherman's division, relieving Nickerson, who had assumed command the morning after the assault of the 27th. Dow being disabled by his wounds, his brigade fell to Clark. The 2d Louisiana was transferred from Dudley's brigade to Chapin's, bringing Charles J. Paine in command. Halbert E. Paine's division was withdrawn from the earlier formation of the right wing under Weitzel, and was established in position on Grover's left, covering the Jackson road and the second position of Duryea's battery at No. 12. Grover was placed in command, from the afternoon of the 27th, of the whole right wing, but Dwight's brigade, under Morgan, remained with Weitzel as part of a temporary division under his command, Thomas retaining the command of Weitzel's brigade. Finally, the 162d New York and the 175th New York were temporarily taken from Paine and lent to Dwight, who, directly after the 14th of June, united them with the 28th Maine of Sherman's division to form a temporary 2d brigade. At the same time he transferred the 6th Michigan to Nickerson's brigade, evidently meaning to take the command of the 1st brigade from Clark; but these arrangements were promptly set aside by orders from headquarters. The left wing, comprising Augur's division and Sherman's, now Dwight's, was placed under the command of Augur.
Along the whole front the troops now held substantially the advanced positions they had gained on the 27th of May. This shortened the line, and, as it was on the whole better arranged and the connections and communications better, Augur took ground a little to the left and held, with Charles J. Paine's brigade, a part of the field that had been in Sherman's front on the 27th; while Dwight, in closing up and drawing in his left flank, moved nearer to the river and covered the road leading in a southerly direction from the Confederate works around the eastern slope of Mount Pleasant and past Troth's house.
The cavalry, being of no further use to the divisions, but rather an encumbrance upon them, was massed, under Grierson, behind the centre, and assigned to the duty of guarding the rear, the depots, and the communications against the incursions of the Confederate cavalry, under Logan, known to be hovering between Port Hudson and Clinton, and supposed to be from 1,500 to 2,000 strong. Logan's actual force at this time was about 1,200 effective. Grierson had about 1,700, including his own regiment, the 6th Illinois, the 7th Illinois, Colonel Edward Prince, a detachment of the 1st Louisiana, the 3d Massachusetts cavalry, and the 14th New York.
As fast as the engineers were able to survey the ground and the working parties to open the roads, Arnold and Houston chose with great care the positions for the siege batteries, and heavy details were soon at work upon them, as well as upon the long line of rifle-pits, connecting the batteries and practically forming the first parallel of the siege works. The positions of some of these batteries, especially on the left, were afterward changed; but as finally constructed and mounted, they began at the north, near the position of the colored regiments on the right bank of Foster's Creek, and extended, at a distance from the Confederate works varying from six hundred to twelve hundred yards, to the Mount Pleasant road, across which was planted siege battery No. 21. The first position of siege battery No. 20 is marked "old 20," and the three formidable batteries on the extreme left, Nos. 22, 23, and 24, were not established till later, the attack of the Confederate works in their front being at first left to the guns of the fleet. Two epaulements for field artillery were thrown up on either side of the road at Foster's Creek to command the passage of the stream, but no siege guns were mounted there. The extreme right of the siege batteries was at No. 2.