I had many narrow escapes that day, but this was my closest “call” as a soldier of the C. S. A.
On our part of the field our forces had been successful, but the remainder of our lines had been defeated, and the fort had been so battered that those in command—Generals Floyd, Buckner, and Pillow—decided to surrender on the following morning.
General Forrest was advised of the plan, and he informed the commanders that he did not become a soldier to surrender and that he was going out that night and take as many of his men as would follow him. The backwater was from two to six feet deep, but this had no terror for our leader. We secured the service of a native to guide us, and by going in close to the Union line we found shallow water and no obstruction, and so we escaped to safety. The ground was covered with snow and the water was very cold.
Forrest led his troops to safety on this occasion under conditions which would have broken the will of any ordinary man, as he was to do many times in the years that followed.
CHAPTER IV
CORINTH AGAIN THE CENTER
ITH the fall of Donelson, the Confederate line was broken at the center; and Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston, then in command of all the Confederate forces of Tennessee and Kentucky, evacuated Columbus and Bowling Green and withdrew his army to the Memphis and Charleston Railroad, establishing a new line of defense, with Tennessee and Kentucky, thus early in the struggle, practically in the hands of the enemy.
Through Tennessee, North Alabama, and North Mississippi I returned to Corinth, which place had become the headquarters of General Johnston.