The Great Republic by the Master Historians The Battle of Shiloh byBancroft, Hubert H.
[The military movements of 1861 and the opening period of 1862 in the East were
paralleled by as active operations in the West, in which the successes of the
Union armies more than counterbalanced the Confederate victories in Virginia. A
brief review of these operations is here desirable, as preliminary to a more
extended description of the important battle of Shiloh. Among the earliest
military movements were those which took place in Missouri. A convention in that
State decided against secession, and in favor of compromise. The governor,
however, at once proceeded to act as if the State had seceded, refused to
furnish troops to the government, raised a militia, and attempted to seize the
national arsenal at St. Louis. This was held by Captain Lyon, with five hundred
regulars. Several conflicts succeeded, and, as the governor still sought to
force the State into the Confederacy, a condition of actual war arose.
General (late Captain) Lyon defeated the State troops at Booneville, while, in
retaliation, the governor took it on himself to declare the State seceded and to
offer its aid to the Confederacy. General Fremont was now made commander of the
troops in Missouri. A battle took place on August 10, at Wilson's Creek, in
which Lyon was killed, while General Sigel, who had been sent to gain the
enemy's rear, met with a disastrous repulse. Each side lost heavily, and the
Confederates were unable to pursue the retreating Unionists. The armies on both
sides gradually increased, until there were twenty-eight thousand Confederates
and thirty thousand Unionists in the field. At this juncture Fremont was
removed, as a punishment for issuing on his own authority a proclamation
emancipating the slaves in his department. General Halleck, who eventually
succeeded to the command of the Union forces, compelled the Confederate General
Price to retreat to Arkansas. In February, 1862, General Curtis, at the head of
a Union army, pursued Price into Arkansas. On March 7 a severe battle took place
at Pea Ridge, in which Sigel completely routed the Confederate right, while on
the next morning their whole army was forced to retreat. This ended all
operations of any importance in Missouri and Arkansas. The bulk of both armies
was transferred to the east of the Mississippi, and a few unimportant contests
in Arkansas completed the war in that quarter.
Operations of more essential significance were meanwhile taking place in
Kentucky and Tennessee. The political action of the former State resembled that
of Missouri. The governor was of strong secession sympathies, but the
legislature refused to support him in his purposes. The Unionists of the State
were largely in the majority, and clearly showed their intention of supporting
the administration, despite the rebellious sentiments of the governor. Yet the
Confederate authorities felt it absolutely necessary to their cause to take
military possession of the State, which was invaded on the west by General Polk,
who seized Columbus, on the Mississippi, and by General Zollicoffer on the east.
The first engagement took place at Belmont, on the Missouri side of the river,
opposite Columbus. General Grant attacked and defeated the force at this place,
but was himself assailed by a strong force under General Polk, through which he
was forced to cut his way. Grant brought off his guns and some of those of the
enemy. His loss was four hundred and eighty men; that of Polk was six hundred
and forty-two.
These preliminary operations were succeeded by a vigorous effort on the part of
the Confederates to form a powerful defensive line on the rivers leading south.
Columbus was strongly fortified, to prevent the descent of the Mississippi,
while accessory forts were built on the Tennessee and Cumberland Rivers, just
within the borders of Tennessee,--that on the former river receiving the name of
Fort Henry, that on the latter, of Fort Donelson. An intrenched camp was also
made farther east, at Bowling Green in Kentucky, an important railroad-junction.
This camp covered the city of Nashville.
In November, 1861, General Halleck was placed in command of the Western
Department. He assigned to General Grant the district of Cairo, which also
included Paducah, at the mouth of the Tennessee. The Confederate line of defence
was placed under General A. S. Johnston. It was held by about sixty thousand
men, while the post of Columbus was so strongly fortified that the Confederates
believed that it would effectually close the Mississippi till the end of the
war. In this particular they were destined to be quickly undeceived.
The proposed Union plan of operation was the reduction of Forts Henry and
Donelson. For this purpose two armies were available, that of Grant at Cairo,
with seventeen thousand men and some ironclad gunboats, and that of Buell at
Louisville, with forty thousand men. Halleck believed that if these forts were
taken Columbus and Bowling Green must be abandoned, and Nashville fall into the
Union hands. On January 30, 1862, Grant marched southward from Cairo along the
Tennessee, the gunboats accompanying him on the river. On February 6 the
gunboats attacked Fort Henry, which was reduced so quickly that the Confederate
garrison escaped before Grant could get into position to cut off their retreat.
He had been delayed by excessive rains, which flooded the roads.
Attention was now given to Fort Donelson, which was a strong work, about forty
miles above the mouth of the Cumberland, with sixty-five pieces of artillery,
and a garrison which was increased until it numbered twenty-one thousand men.
Grant marched upon it from Fort Henry with fifteen thousand men, while the
gunboats went round by way of the Ohio. The attack was made on February 14. The
first assault by the gunboats and troops failed, but, as heavy Union
reinforcements were coming up, General Floyd, who commanded in the fort,
determined to abandon it and retreat. This design ended in failure. Grant had
now reached the scene, and, perceiving the position of affairs, he ordered a
general advance. This was pushed so vigorously that commanding points
surrounding the fort were seized and retreat became impossible. During the night
Floyd, with his Virginia brigade, made his escape by way of the river, and the
next morning the fort was surrendered. Nearly fifteen thousand prisoners,
seventeen thousand six hundred small-arms, and sixty-five guns were taken.
The effect of this great success was what Halleck had premised. The camp at
Bowling Green was immediately evacuated, and Nashville abandoned. Buell at once
occupied that city. Columbus, the "Gibraltar of the West," was quickly abandoned
by General Polk, who fell back to Island No. 10. The first line of Confederate
defence had been broken with remarkable ease and success. Nor did the
Confederate misfortunes end here. Zollicoffer had invaded eastern Kentucky with
five thousand men, and encamped at Mill Spring, in Wayne County. On January 17
he made a night-attack on the Union troops under General Thomas, encamped near
him. The intended surprise failed, and the Confederates were driven back,
Zollicoffer being killed. On the next day their camp was shelled, and there was
reason to hope that the entire force would be captured. They escaped, however,
during the night, leaving much material behind.
The next operations were directed against New Madrid and Island No. 10 on the
Mississippi, near the northern border of Tennessee. These posts had been
strongly fortified. General Pope commanded the assailing troops, and captured
New Madrid with little difficulty. Thirty-three cannon and much other valuable
war-material were here taken. Island No. 10 proved more difficult to capture.
Yet by cutting a canal, twelve miles long, across a bend in the Mississippi, the
gunboats were enabled to assail it on both sides, and Pope to transport his army
across from Missouri to Tennessee. The advantages thus gained rendered the
island untenable, and it was forced to surrender on April 8. There were captured
six thousand seven hundred prisoners, one hundred heavy and twenty-four light
guns, an immense quantity of ammunition, and many small-arms, tents, horses,
wagons, etc. This capture was achieved without the loss of a single life on the
Union side. The next battle took place between the Union and Confederate
flotillas at Fort Pillow, above Memphis. Half the Confederate fleet was
disabled. Soon after-wards the fort was abandoned, and the line of defence
carried south to Memphis. On the 5th of June an assault was made on the
Confederate fleet at that place. It ended in the capture or destruction of the
whole flotilla, except one boat, and the necessary fall of Memphis into Union
hands. Thus was lost the most important railroad-centre on the Mississippi
between St. Louis and New Orleans.
This rapid series of Union successes on the Mississippi was matched by important
steps of progress on the Tennessee. Grant had been ordered to advance on the
line of the Tennessee towards Corinth in northern Mississippi. A
misunderstanding with Halleck, however, resulted in his removal from his
command, which was given to General C. F. Smith. Sherman was ordered to advance,
and break the Memphis and Charleston Railroad. He failed in this, on account of
severe rains, and returned with some difficulty to Pittsburg Landing, which had
been occupied at his suggestion. General Smith being now taken ill, Grant was
restored to his command. Buell's force, of about forty thousand men, was ordered
to join him, to counteract the Confederate concentration at Corinth. Johnston,
the Confederate commander, becoming aware of these movements, determined to
attack Grant before Buell could come up, hoping to take him by surprise. The
Confederate advance began on April 3, with about forty thousand men. Grant had
thirty-three thousand on the field. Law Wallace's command of five thousand men
was at a distance, and unable to aid immediately in the coming battle. On
Sunday, April 6, the assault was made on Grant's outposts. The story of the
battle that followed we select from Swinton's "Twelve Decisive Battles of the
War."]
On the westerly bank of the Tennessee, two hundred and nineteen miles from its
mouth, is the historic spot of Pittsburg Landing. Its site is just below the
great bend in the river, where, having trended many miles along the boundary-
line of Alabama, it sweeps northerly in a majestic curve, and thence, flowing
past Fort Henry, pours its waters into the Ohio. The neighboring country is
undulating, broken into hills and ravines, and wooded for the most part with
tall oak-trees and occasional patches of undergrowth. Fens and swamps, too,
intervene, and at the spring freshets the back-water swells the creeks,
inundating the roads near the river's margin. It is, in general, a rough and
unprepossessing region, wherein cultivated clearings seldom break the continuity
of forest. Pittsburg Landing, scarcely laying claim, with its two log cabins,
even to the dignity of hamlet, is distant a dozen miles northeasterly from the
crossing of the three State lines of Alabama, Mississippi, and Tennessee,--a
mere point of steamboat freighting and debarkation for Corinth, eighteen miles
southwest, for Purdy, about as far northwest, and for similar towns on the
adjoining railroads. The river-banks at the Landing rise quite eighty feet, but
are cloven by a series of ravines, through one of which runs the main road
thence to Corinth, forking to Purdy. Beyond the crest of the acclivity stretches
back a kind of table-land, rolling and ridgy, cleared near the shores, but
wooded and rough farther from the river. A rude log chapel, three miles out, is
called Shiloh Church; and, just beyond, rise not far from each other two petty
steams, Owl Creek and Lick Creek, which, thence diverging, run windingly into
the Tennessee, five miles apart, on either side of the Landing.
On this rugged, elevated plateau, encompassed by the river and its little
tributaries like a picture in its frame, lay encamped, on the night of the 5th
of April, 1862, five divisions of General Grant's Army of West Tennessee, with a
sixth, five miles down the bank, at Crump's Landing. ..
The leading division of Buell's Army of the Ohio lay at Savannah, nine miles
down the river, on the other bank. Wearied that night with their four days'
march from Columbia, Nelson's men slept heavily. A long rest had been promised
them, to be broken only the next day by a formal Sunday inspection, and
leisurely during the week ensuing it would join the associate Army of West
Tennessee; for transportation had not yet been made ready for its passage of the
river, nor had General Halleck yet come down from St. Louis to direct the
movement on Corinth, for which it had marched. Behind Nelson, the rest of
Buell's army trailed that night its line of bivouac-fires full thirty miles
backward on the road to Columbia.
Silent in Shiloh woods yonder, within sight of Grant's camp-fires and within
sound of his noisy pickets, lay, grimly awaiting the dawn, forty thousand
Confederate soldiers. It was the third of the three great armies drawn together
that night towards Pittsburg Landing,--an army supposed by its fourscore
thousand dormant foes, from commanding general to drummer-boy, to be lying perdu
behind its Corinth field-works, twenty miles away. It had crept close to the
Union lines, three-fourths of a mile from the pickets, less than two from the
main camp,--so close that throughout the night the bivouac hum and stir and the
noisy random shots of untrained sentinels on the opposing lines
indistinguishably mingled. This stealthily moved host lay on its arms, weary
after a hard day's march over miry roads on the 4th, a day's forming on the 5th,
and a bivouac in the drenching rain of the night intervening. No fires were
lighted on the advanced lines, and, farther back, the few embers glowing here
and there were hidden in holes dug in the ground. Most of the men lay awake,
prone in their blankets, or chatted in low tones, grouped around the stacked
arms, awaiting the supplies which commissaries and staff-officers were hurrying
from the rear; for, with the improvidence of raw troops, they had already spent
their five days' rations at the end of three, and were ill prepared to give
battle. But others, oppressed with sleep, had for the time forgotten both cold
and hunger. ..
Ere the gray of dawn, the advanced line of Johnston's army, composed of Hardee's
corps, strengthened on its right by Gladden's brigade from Bragg's, stealthily
crept through the narrow belt of woods beyond which all night they had seen
their innocent enemy's camp-fires blazing. No fife or drum was allowed; the
cavalry bugles sounded no reveille; but, with suppressed voices, the subordinate
officers roused their men, for many of whom, indeed, the knowledge of what was
to come had proved too exciting for sound slumber. Bragg's line as quickly
followed, and, in suit, the lines of Polk and Breckinridge.
By one of those undefinable impulses of misgivings which detect the approach of
catastrophe without physical warning of it, it happened that Colonel Peabody, of
the 25th Missouri, commanding the first brigade of Prentiss's division, became
convinced that all was not right in front. Very early Sunday morning, therefore,
he sent out three companies of his own regiment and two of Major Powell's 12th
Michigan, under Powell's command, to reconnoitre, and to seize on some advance
squads of the enemy, who had been reported flitting about, one and a half miles
distant from camp, on the main Corinth road. It was the gray of dawn when they
reached the spot indicated; and almost immediately, from long dense lines of
men, coming swiftly through the tall tress, opened a rattling fire of musketry.
It was the enemy in force. The little band fell back in haste, firing as best
they might. Close on their heels pressed the whole of Hardee's line, and,
enveloping the left of Prentiss's camp, stretched in a broad swath across to the
gap between his division and Sherman's, and thence onward across Sherman's.
Instantly the woods were alive with the rattle of musketry right and left, on
front and flank. The Confederate batteries, galloping up on every practicable
road and path, unlimbered in hot haste, and poured their shot over the head of
the infantry in the direction of the tents now faintly gleaming ahead. The
startled infantry outposts, mechanically returning a straggling fire, yielded,
overborne by the mighty rush of their enemy, and then streamed straight back to
the main camps. The divisions of Sherman, Prentiss, and McClernand started from
their peaceful slumbers amid the roar and smoke of battle. The exultant
Confederates, creeping so long with painful reticence, now woke the forests with
their fierce, long-pent yells. The flying pickets served, like avant-couriers,
to point the way for their pursuers. And thus, with the breaking light of day,
overhung by sulphurous battle-clouds, through which darted the cannon-flash,
while the dim smoke curled forward through every ravine and road and enveloped
the camps, Grant's army woke to the battle of Shiloh. ..
At the height of the shouting, the forming of the troops, the spurring hither
and thither of the aides, the fastening of belts and boxes, and the dressing of
laggards, the enemy's advance with loud yells swept through the intervening
forest and burst upon the camps.
It was now about seven o'clock, and the resistance of the Union picket-line,
feeble as it necessarily was, had been of priceless service in gaining time,
while the rough and impracticable interval over which the Confederates had to
pass served to break up somewhat as well as to extend and thin their lines.
There seems to have been no special tactical formation, nor any massing of men
on a key-point: the key-point, if any there was, had not been discovered. The
movement, in short, was predicated on a surprise, and the method, to fling the
three corps-deep lines of the Army of the Mississippi straight against the Union
army from creek to creek, to "drive it back into the Tennessee." As for the
Union generals, overwhelmed with surprise and chagrin, they could only strike
back where the enemy struck, seeking above all to save the camps. Such was the
nature of the confused, irregular, but bloody series of conflicts which now
raged for three hours, during which time the Union troops succumbed, and yielded
the first breadth of debatable ground.
[Onward swept the Confederates, gaining ground, now on the right, now on the
left, till before nine o'clock they were in full possession of Prentiss's camp.
By ten o'clock the Union forces generally had yielded to the impetuous onset,
and the camping-ground of nearly the whole line was in the hands of the foe. The
plundering of the camps, which their generals could not hinder, detained them
for a time, while the Union commanders were doing their best to re-form their
broken lines. For five hours the battle went on confusedly, the Union troops
being forced slowly back to the Landing, the nature of the ground, rolling,
wooded, and cleft by ravines, enabling them to protract their defence. Both
lines were badly broken up, and the different brigades mingled, each side
fighting with no definite plan, other than to hold their ground on the one side
and to advance on the other. Later on, the Confederates made a desperate effort
to turn the Union left, capture their base at the Landing, and drive them down
the river. This effort was vigorously opposed, and during the hard fighting at
this point a ball struck the Confederate commander, General Johnston, wounding
him severely. He continued on this horse, unheeding the bleeding, and before
long reeled and fell from the saddle, quickly expiring. General Beauregard
succeeded to the Confederate command.]
It was now three o'clock, and the battle was at its height. Dissatisfied with
his reception by Wallace, on the Corinth road, Bragg, on hearing of Johnston's
fall, on the right, determined to move round thither and try his success anew.
He gathered up the three divisions already spoken of, and, with specific orders
of attack, flung them against Hurlburt, Stuart, and Prentiss. The assault was
irresistible, and, the whole left of the Union position giving way, Bragg's
column drove Stuart and Hurlburt to the Landing, and swept through Hurlburt's
camp, pillaging it like those of Prentiss, Sherman, Stuart, and McClernand.
Simultaneously, Polk and Hardee, rolling in from the Confederate left, forced
back the Union right, and drove all Wallace's division, with what was left of
Sherman's, back to the Landing,--the brave W.H.L. Wallace falling in breasting
this whelming flood. Swooping over the field, right and left, the Confederates
gathered up entire the remainder of Prentiss's division,--about three thousand
in number,--with that officer himself, and hurried them triumphantly to Corinth.
At five o'clock the fate of the Union army was extremely critical. Its enemy had
driven it by persistent fighting out of five camps, and for miles over every
ridge and across every stream, road, and ravine, in its chosen camping-ground.
Fully three thousand prisoners and many wounded were left in his hands, and a
great part of the artillery, with much other spoils, to grace his triumph.
Bragg's order, "Forward! let every order be forward;" Beauregard's order,
"Forward, boys, and drive them into the Tennessee," had been filled almost to
the letter, since near at hand rolled the river, with no transportation for
reinforcements or for retreat. Before, an enemy flushed with conquest called on
their leaders for the coup de grace. What can be done with the Union troops?
Surely the being at bay will give desperation. Unhappily, the whole army,
greatly disorganized all day, was now an absolute wreck; and such broken
regiments and disordered battalions as attempted to rally at the Landing often
found the officers gone on whom they were wont to rely. Not the divisions alone,
but the brigades, the regiments, the companies, were mixed up in hopeless
confusion, and it was only a heterogeneous mass of hot and exhausted men, with
or without guns as might be, that converged on the river-bank. The fugitives
covered the shore down as far as Crump's, where guards were at length posted to
try to catch some of them and drive them back. The constant "disappearance," as
the generals have it, of regiments and parts of regiments since morning, added
to thousands of individual movements to the rear, had swarmed the Landing with
troops enough -- enough in numbers -- to have driven the enemy back to Corinth.
Their words were singularly uniform: "We are all cut to pieces." General Grant
says he had a dozen officers arrested for cowardice on the first day's battle.
General Rousseau speaks of "ten thousand fugitives, who lined the banks of the
river and filled the woods adjacent to the Landing." General Buell, before the
final disaster, found at the Landing stragglers by "whole companies and almost
regiments; and at the Landing the bank swarmed with a confused mass of men of
various regiments. There could not have been less than four thousand or five
thousand. Late in the day it became much greater." At five o'clock "the throng
of disorganized and demoralized troops increased continually by fresh
fugitives," and intermingled "were great numbers of teams, all striving to get
as near as possible to the river. With few exceptions, all efforts to form the
troops and move them forward to the fight utterly failed." Nelson says, "I found
cowering under the river-bank, when I crossed, from seven thousand to ten
thousand men, frantic with fright and utterly demoralized." Of the troops lately
driven back, he expressed the want of organization by saying the last position
"formed a semicircle of artillery totally unsupported by infantry, whose fire
was the only check to the audacious approach of the enemy." Even this was not
all. The Confederates, sweeping the whole field down to the bluff above the
Landing, were already almost upon the latter point. Such was the outlook for the
gallant fragments of the Union army at five o'clock on Sunday.
[A precipitous ravine, near the Landing, now somewhat checked the pursuit, while
the Union gunboats at this point began raking the hostile lines. A powerful
battery was arranged along the ravine, forty or fifty guns being posted in a
semicircular line. At the same time the advance of Nelson's division, which had
just crossed the river, rushed forward to take part in the battle.]
Already now the Confederates were surging and recoiling in a desperate series of
final charges. Warned by the descending sun to do quickly what remained to be
done, they threw forward everything to the attempt. Their batteries, run to the
front, crowned the inferior crest of the ravine, and opened a defiant fire from
ridge to ridge, and threw shells even across the river into the woods on the
other bank. Their infantry, wasted by the day's slaughter, had become almost
disorganized by the plunder of the last two Union camps, and a fatal loss of
time ensued while the officers pulled them out from the spoils. The men, still
spirited, gazed somewhat aghast at the guncrowned slope above them, whence
Webster's artillery thundered across the ravine, while their right flank was
swept by broadsides of eight-inch shells from the Lexington and Tyler. "Forward"
was the word throughout the Confederate line. Bragg held the right, on the
southerly slope of the ravine, extending near the river, but prevented from
reaching it by the gunboat fire; Polk the centre, nearer the head of the ravine;
while Hardee carried the left beyond the Corinth road. At the latter point the
line was half a mile from the water, and four hundred yards from the artillery
on the bluffs. There were few organizations, even of regiments, on the Union
side, but a straggling line from Wallace's and other commands, voluntarily
rallying near the guns, was already opening an independent but annoying fire;
and these resolute soldiers were as safe as the torrent of fugitives incessantly
pouring down to the Landing, among whom the Confederate shells were bursting.
Again and again, through the fire of the artillery, the gunboats, and Ammen's
fresh brigade, and the severe flanking fire of troops rallying on the Union
right, the Confederates streamed down the ravine and clambered up the dense
thickets on the other slope. Again and again they were repulsed with perfect
ease, and amid great loss; for, besides their natural exhaustion, the commands
had been so broken up by the victory of the day and by the scramble for the
spoils that while some brigades were forming others were charging, and there was
no concerted attack, but only spontaneous rushes by subdivisions, speedily
checked by flank fire. And when once some of Breckinridge's troops, on the
right, did nearly turn the artillery position, so that some of the gunners
absolutely abandoned their pieces, Ammen, who had just deployed, again and
finally drove the assailants down the slope.
Confident still, flushed with past success, and observing the Union debacle
behind the artillery, Bragg and Polk urged a fresh and more compact assault, on
the ground that the nearer they drew to the Union position the less perilous
were the siege-guns and gunboats. But the commander-in-chief had been struck
down, and Beauregard, succeeding to supreme responsibility, decided otherwise.
Bitterly then he realized the lack of discipline and organization in his army,
entailed by the jealousy and ill-timed punctiliousness of Richmond. Victory
itself had fatally disordered his lines, and the last hard task of assault had
thrown them back in confusion from the almost impregnable position. Better to
withdraw with victory than hazard final defeat; for already the sun was in the
horizon, and the musket-flashes lit up the woods. The troops were all
intermingled, and several brigade commanders had been encountered by the
general, who did not know where their brigades were. Since darkness already
threatened to leave the army in dense thickets under the enemy's murderous fire,
all that was left of the day would be required in withdrawing so disorganized a
force. Buell could not have got more than one division along those miry roads to
the river. It was a day's work well done: to-morrow should be sealed what had
auspiciously begun. Thus reasoning, Beauregard called off the troops just as
they were starting on another charge, and ordered them out of range. Then night
and rain fell on the field of Shiloh.
[During the night Grant's army was heavily reinforced. Three divisions of
Buell's army, Nelson's, Crittenden's, and McCook's, had crossed the Tennessee by
Monday morning, while Lew Wallace's division of Grant's army, which had been led
into a wrong route in its march from Crump's Landing on the previous day, came
up at night-fall of Sunday. Twenty-seven thousand fresh troops had thus been
added, while Grant's disorganized troops were gradually brought back into
fighting trim. There were thus nearly fifty thousand men against about thirty
thousand left to the Confederate army. By half-past five the advance began,
Nelson and Crittenden marching steadily on the Confederate position. By six
o'clock the battle opened, and by seven the advancing Union line reached
Beauregard's front, where a determined resistance was encountered.]
The ground on which the Confederates stood was sub-stantially that of the camps
of Prentiss, Sherman, and McClernand, which, having been occupied in bivouac the
night preceding, now lay a little in rear of the line of battle. This line
stretched in front of Lick and Owl Creeks, and across all the roads so often
described. The dawn of day found the Confederates very much disorganized. No
time, however, was lost. The early advance of Nelson caused a rapid gathering
and assorting of the disordered and shattered fragments of Beauregard, who met
the onset with so firm a front that Nelson found himself checked. At length
Crittenden's division came up to Nelson's right, and Mendenhall's battery,
hurrying across, engaged the Confederate batteries and stayed the infantry
advance. Despite their fatigue, Beauregard was already hurling his concentrated
columns to an attack on his right; he had engaged all of Nelson and Crittenden,
and before eight o'clock had also fallen upon Rousseau's brigade of McCook's
division, which had just then completed its formation on Crittenden's right. At
eight o'clock, Cheatham's division, which had been posted hitherto, awaiting
orders, in the rear of Shiloh Church, was thrown in, in front of Buell, on
Breckinridge's line. The fire on the Confederate right, which had before been
hot, was now redoubled, and rolled across all three of Buell's divisions. So
severe was the artillery fire that Hazen's brigade was thrown across the open
field into the fringe of woods where two batteries were posted, in order to
dislodge them. Buell was then at Hazen's position, and in person gave the
command "Forward!" which ran echoing along the line and was obeyed with a cheer.
These troops had never before been in battle, but were in splendid drill and
discipline, and moved forward in the best possible order. They soon caught the
enemy's volleys, but did not slacken their pace; for it was a novel experience,
and they did not resort, like veterans, to trees or cover. Driving in some
outlying infantry supports, of whom not a few were sent as prisoners to the
rear, Hazen, after half a mile of advance, got upon the batteries themselves.
But at this moment the gallant brigade received a crossfire from both flanks
from the rallied enemy, and, being without support on either hand, was forced to
fall back, with a loss of one-third of its men. The sally had been a little too
impetuous, so much so as to break up the organization; but it was one quite
natural at so early a day in the war, and was a mistake in the right direction.
[About nine o'clock the Confederates succeeded in turning Nelson's left flank,
but were driven back, while Lew Wallace and Grant's other forces pressed heavily
upon their left, forcing them to recede. The ground at this point was hotly
contested, both sides gaining temporary advantages, but by one o'clock Nelson
had swung round the Confederate right and gained a firm hold on that part of the
field.]
Let us turn now to McCook. On Crittenden's right Rousseau's brigade was early
engaged, sustaining the attack of eight o'clock, and the heavier succeeding
ones. Meanwhile, Kirk's brigade and a part of Gibson's had been ferried across
from Savannah, hurried to the ground, and were deployed by McCook in short
supporting distance to the right and rear of Rousseau. Willich's regiment he
held in reserve behind his second line. McCook shared the varying fortunes of
the morning, till the gradual giving way of the Confederate right by ten
o'clock. Then Rousseau, finding his advance no longer checked, moved onward till
he encountered the troops withdrawn to the Corinth road from Nelson's front.
Here a fierce and long-contested engagement took place, the Confederates forming
in McClernand's camp, to which they clung with desperation, but which at length
they were forced to abandon to Rousseau, together with a battery captured the
day before, of which one section had been playing on Rousseau's advance. But, as
the Union line swept forward, McCook and Crittenden had become separated, and a
counter-attack on McCook's left threatened to turn it, and was the signal for a
fierce struggle. There then came a lull, and at one o'clock the battle began
with fresh fury. McCook had reached a key-point in the Confederate line, a green
wood about five hundred yards east of the church. Two batteries, one next the
church and the other nearer the Hamburg road, swept the open space with grape
and canister in front of the green wood, and the musketry fire was very severe.
Grant hurried forward what aid he could to McClernand, Hurlburt putting in the
remainder of his division, and Sherman appearing with his brigades. "Here," says
Sherman, "at the point where the Corinth road crosses the line of General
McClernand's camp, I saw for the first time the well-ordered and compact
Kentucky forces of General Buell, whose soldierly movement at once gave
confidence to our newer and less disciplined forces. Here I saw Willich's
regiment advance upon a point of water-oaks and thicket, behind which I knew the
enemy was in great strength, and enter it in beautiful style. Then arose the
severest musketry fire I ever heard, and lasted some twenty minutes, when this
splendid regiment had to fall back." Indeed, the conflict, arising on McCook's
left, had spread all along his front and over that of Crittenden. Willich's
regiment, having passed through Kirk's brigade, to the front, was thrown across
to the green wood, in double column on the centre, with the flank companies
skirmishing in advance. Then it received the overpowering attack which Sherman
witnessed. At this juncture Kirk's brigade got into position on McCook's left,
and Rousseau, who had expended all his ammunition in the morning's battle,
retired through it to the rear for a fresh supply. Gibson was next thrown in on
Kirk's left. For an hour a terrific contest went on, the Confederates holding
their position tenaciously, and some-times even taking the offensive. Finally,
at two o'clock, Rousseau's brigade again moved to the front, supported by one of
Hurlburt's brigades on the left and by McClernand on the right. McCook had no
artillery; but the three uncaptured guns of Wood's battery and two of
McAllister's were turned by McClernand and Sherman against the enemy. Finding
the Confederates at last giving way before him, McCook ordered a general
advance, and Rousseau's brigade, "beautifully deployed," says Sherman, "entered
the dreaded wood, and moved in splendid order steadily to the front, sweeping
everything before it." Indeed, the battle was already decided. At half-past one
o'clock, Beauregard had issued orders to withdraw from the field. The last
desperate fighting covered the attempt, and the final Union advance at two
o'clock was comparatively unresisted. The withdrawal commenced on the
Confederate right, in front of Nelson, and was transmitted to the left. At the
latter point, Lew Wallace had steadily swung forward, participating in the
varying fortunes of the day. His division also, at two o'clock, finding the
obstinate enemy giving way, burst through the woods, easily carrying all before
them. The Confederate retreat was conducted with perfect order and precision.
Half a mile distant from Shiloh Church, on a commanding ridge, a reserve,
selected for that purpose, was drawn up in line of battle for the expected
attack.
It did not come. Having wasted half an hour, the line was withdrawn a mile
farther. Here the artillery played for a time upon a small Union column advanced
in pursuit; but no engagement took place, and even this desultory firing ceased
by four o'clock. The battle of Shiloh was over.
[This battle was followed by a concentration of all the Union armies of the
West, and an advance on Corinth, General Halleck taking command. His army, in
round numbers, now amounted to one hundred and twenty thousand men. That of
Beauregard had been increased to about fifty thousand. The advance was made so
slowly and cautiously that the Confederates, who had decided to evacuate
Corinth, succeeded in getting out all their war-material before Halleck reached
there, on the 30th of May. The place was at once strongly fortified as a Union
stronghold. Shortly afterwards, on June 6, the naval battle at Memphis, above
described, took place, and that town was captured. All West Tennessee and
Northern Mississippi were now in Union hands, and highly-important progress had
been made in the labor of conquering the West and South. Grant remarks that up
to the battle of Shiloh he had shared in the general belief that a decisive
Union victory would cause the sudden collapse of the Confederacy. The stand of
the Confederates after that battle taught him differently. He perceived now that
complete conquest was necessary. Sherman seems to have been of this opinion from
the first.]
