Some Thoughts, from studies on the ground and from the air, of the Principle’s of War and Grant’s Vicksburg Campaign

   Figure 1 A modern day Corps of Engineers tugboat tugging several MS river barges by Grand Gulf Park River overlook. This landing was the site of Grant's initial choice of landing of thousands of troops below Vicksburg. After a naval battle here in front of Fort Wade and Fort Coburn, he decided to land 12 miles south near a River plantation (where Bruinsburg  and the ruins of the Windsor planation are now, the site of the Hollywood movie “Raintree Country” in the 1950s with Montgomery Clift and Elizabeth Taylor) and approach Grand Gulf from the south. The confederate defences at Fort Wade and Coburn consisted of two powerful artillery batteries about 20 feet above the town.  Four Union ironclad gunboats fired back at the batteries and provided covering fire for the landing boats.  Up to the point of landing at Bruinsburg Grant still had the option of proceeding south to Port Hudson, situated a short distance up river from Baton Rouge and attacking there.  The confederate cavalry forces from Vicksburg under Col Bowen had to consider this possibility in terms of how many forces they deployed to defend Port Gibson. And, indeed part of the mission of Grierson cavalry raid to the west and south of Vicksburg was to draw Bowen’s forces to cover this possibility. If one drives the roads Grant had to use to attack Port Gibson from this plantation landing base, one sees why he had to circle back and take Grand Gulf from the east in order to establish his logistical trains from this river landing point. What roads there are through this forested area are only very steep up and down dirt tracks which wash out, can’t support the multiple passes of supply wagons and heavy artillery pieces, becoming impassible in the frequent MS thunderstorms that we have in this area during the Spring.

 

 

                                                                            Grant’s Vicksburg Campaign

 

This series of civil war battles was probably the overall decisive strategic and tactical campaign of the war.

 Most of the other battles were not as well thought out. They were variations on hasty organized frontal attacks organized quickly in a short period of time.

 

 

 

The European’s Napolean and  Clauswitz’s doctrine was studies in the 19^th century when Grant was a U.S. Army General

From wikepedia we have the following statement of Napolean and Clauswitz’s doctrines:

Napolean

Napoléon Bonaparte

Additionally, since their first appearance in English of the military maxims of Napoleon in 1831, all English translations have relied upon the extremely incomplete French edition of General Burnod published in 1827. This has contributed to the erroneous belief that Napoléon Bonaparte had pioneered the "Principles of War". Napoléon was a keen follower of famous military generals of the past, who influenced his thoughts greatly. Albeit, "The armies of today are based on the organization created by Napoleon [sic] for his Grand Army and it has been used ever since." ^[2] Since the mid-19th century, due to the influence of the Prussian Army, they have become a guide for many military organizations to focus the thinking of military commanders and political leaders toward concepts and methods of successful prosecution of wars and smaller military operations. Although originally concerned with strategy, grand tactics and tactics, due to the changing nature of warfare and military technology, since the interwar period, the principles are largely applied to the strategic decision-making, and in some cases, to operational mobility of forces.

 

 

Clauswitz’s initial essay dealt with the tactics of combat, and suggested the following general principles:

• discover how we may gain a preponderance of physical forces and material advantages at the decisive point
• to calculate moral factors
• make the best use of the few means at our disposal
• never lack calmness and firmness...without this firm resolution, no great results can be achieved in the most successful war
• always have the choice between the most audacious and the most careful solution...no military leader has ever become great without audacity

Based on the above, Clausewitz went on to suggest principles for tactics, the scale of combat that dominated European warfare at the time:

• The Defence
• The Offense
• The Use of Troops
• The Use Of Terrain
• forces are more effective in a concentric rather than in a parallel attack; attack concentrically without having decisive superiority in an engagement
• always seek to envelop that part of the enemy against which we direct our main attack
• cut off the enemy from his line of retreat

Clausewitz also included in the essay general principles of strategy by saying that Warfare has three main objects:

• (a) To conquer and destroy the armed power of the enemy; always direct our principal operation against the main body of the enemy army or at least against an important portion of his forces
• (b) To take possession of his material and other sources of strength, and to direct our operations against the places where most of these resources are concentrated
• (c) To gain public opinion, won through great victories and the occupation of the enemy's capital

• use our entire force with the utmost energy
• the decisive point of attack
• never to waste time
• surprise plays a much greater role in tactics than in strategy
• pursuit
• forces concentrated at the main point
• an attack on the lines of communication takes effect only very slowly, while victory on the field of battle bears fruit immediately
• In strategy, therefore, the side that is surrounded by the enemy is better off than the side which surrounds its opponent, especially with equal or even weaker forces
• To cut the enemy's line of retreat, however, strategic envelopment or a turning movement is very effective
• be physically and morally superior
• stores of supplies, on whose preservation operations absolutely depend
• The provisioning of troops is a necessary condition of warfare and thus has great influence on the operations
• independent action

Strategic Defense

• Politically speaking defensive war is a war which we wage for our independence

Strategic Offense

• The strategic offensive pursues the aim of the war directly, aiming straight at the destruction of the enemy's forces

 

 

Some reference books on Grant’s Civil War U.S. Army, Vicksburg Campaign:

“Memoirs” by U.S. Grant

“The Vicksburg Campaign” by Michael Ballard

“The Campaign for Vicksburg” by Edwin C. Bearrs

“Vicksburg Campaign: driving tour guide” General Parker Hill and Warren Grabeau

“An Illustrated Guide to the Vicksburg Campaign & National Military Park” by  Jeff Giambrone

 

 

 

Figure 2  Site of Grant's logistical supply base right on-shore from the river to the Grand Gulf Park.  According to Grant’s memoirs he ‘left his supply train behind during the campaign going around Vicksburg to the South. However, a more careful study of the dispatches and route that he took along the historic Natchez trace and old Jackson Vicksburg road  cut through the loess bluffs (now HWY80) shows this not to be the case. According to a amazon.com search The War College Institute at Fort Levanworth, KS has recently documented all of this information in a publication.

 

British principles of war

·         The UK uses 10 principles of war, as taught to all officers of the Royal Navy, British Army, and Royal Air Force:

·         The British Army’s principles of war were first published after the First World War and based on the work of the British general and military theorist, J. F. C. Fuller. The definition of each principle has been refined over the following decades and adopted throughout the British armed forces. The tenth principle, added later, was originally called Administration. The first principle has always been stated as pre-eminent and the second is usually considered more important than the remainder, which are not listed in any order of importance.

·         The 2011 edition of British Defence Doctrine (BDD)^[4] states and explains the principles with the following preface: “Principles of War guide commanders and their staffs in the planning and conduct of warfare. They are enduring, but not immutable, absolute or prescriptive, and provide an appropriate foundation for all military activity. The relative importance of each may vary according to context; their application requires judgement, common sense and intelligent interpretation. Commanders also need to take into account the legitimacy of their actions, based on the legal, moral, political, diplomatic and ethical propriety of the conduct of military forces, once committed.”

·         The ten principles as listed and defined in the 2011 edition, unchanged from the 2008 edition, of BDD (which also provides explanation) are:

·         Selection and Maintenance of the Aim

·         A single, unambiguous aim is the keystone of successful military operations. Selection and maintenance of the aim is regarded as the master principle of war.

·         Maintenance of Morale

·         Morale is a positive state of mind derived from inspired political and military leadership, a shared sense of purpose and values, well-being, perceptions of worth and group cohesion.

·         Offensive Action

·         Offensive action is the practical way in which a commander seeks to gain advantage, sustain momentum and seize the initiative.

·         Security

·         Security is the provision and maintenance of an operating environment that affords the necessary freedom of action, when and where required, to achieve objectives.

·         Surprise

·         Surprise is the consequence of shock and confusion induced by the deliberate or incidental introduction of the unexpected.

·         Concentration of Force

·         Concentration of force involves the decisive, synchronized application of superior fighting power (conceptual, physical, and moral) to realize intended effects, when and where required.

·         Economy of Effort

·         Economy of effort is the judicious exploitation of manpower, materiel and time in relation to the achievement of objectives.

·         Flexibility

·         Flexibility – the ability to change readily to meet new circumstances – comprises agility, responsiveness, resilience, acuity and adaptability.

·         Cooperation

·         Cooperation entails the incorporation of teamwork and a sharing of dangers, burdens, risks and opportunities in every aspect of warfare.

·         Sustainability

·         To sustain a force is to generate the means by which its fighting power and freedom of action are maintained.

·         These principles of war are commonly used by the armed forces of Commonwealth countries such as Australia.

Figure 3 The route of Grant from Grand Gulf to Raymond, after capturing Port Gibson.  Grant made a key decision here not to proceed north toward Vicksburg from Hankinson’s Ferry but toward Jackson and take control of Pemberton’s and Conf. Gen. Johnson’s forces there. Gen. Schwarzkopf who conducted the first Desert Storm war was said to have modelled his strategic planning which made a much larger turn around Saddam’s forces in Iraq than he expected after studying Grant’s campaign at Vicksburg.  Gen. Schwarzkopf was DCSOPS (Deputy Chief of Staff for the U.S. Army) when I worked for some people in the Pentagon in the 1980s. He told us then he was dissatisfied with the linear, push-pull weapons score war game modeling at the U.S. Army’s Concept Analysis Agency of the European theater. At that time, due to the large draw down of U.S. tanks in Europe after the Vietnam war the Soviets had the advantage in a short war scenario due to their stacked up T-72 tank re-enforcements lined up just over the inter-German border from the Fulda Gap.  Gen. Starry, who pretty much ran the U.S. Army’s post-Vietnam war theater level planning strategies then, had some Turbo-Pascal war games up in the 5-th floor of the I.G. Farben building in Frankfurt that added up and multiplied all the tank ammunition and firing rates in order to ‘service’ enough of the incoming attackers so the tactical-nuclear weapon trip-wire would not be passed.  Gen. Haag had argued for a more ‘manuever based’ strategy, but the digital map war-game were not able to model it effectively at that time. We here at the Geotechnical Lab, mobility division, at Waterways Experiment Station in Vicksburg (now known as ERDC Engineer Research and Development Center)  figured out how to do this about in 1989 (see my talk at the 1991 8^th Army Research Office conference on applied mathematics, computing, and statistics held at Cornell U which is available as a downloadable pdf at http://www.yhwhschofchrist.org/ 5073/NetCombLogic1.pdf which is in the About Us section of the http://www.yhwhschofchrist.org website.  Coincidently, the cold-war, ended shortly thereafter.

 

 

 

 

United States principles of war (Refer to US Army Field Manual FM 3–0)

The United States Armed Forces use the following nine principles of war:

• Objective – Direct every military operation toward a clearly defined, decisive and attainable objective. The ultimate military purpose of war is the destruction of the enemy's ability to fight and will to fight.

• Offensive – Seize, retain, and exploit the initiative. Offensive action is the most effective and decisive way to attain a clearly defined common objective. Offensive operations are the means by which a military force seizes and holds the initiative while maintaining freedom of action and achieving decisive results. This is fundamentally true across all levels of war.

• Mass – Mass the effects of overwhelming combat power at the decisive place and time. Synchronizing all the elements of combat power where they will have decisive effect on an enemy force in a short period of time is to achieve mass. Massing effects, rather than concentrating forces, can enable numerically inferior forces to achieve decisive results, while limiting exposure to enemy fire.

• Economy of Force – Employ all combat power available in the most effective way possible; allocate minimum essential combat power to secondary efforts. Economy of force is the judicious employment and distribution of forces. No part of the force should ever be left without purpose. The allocation of available combat power to such tasks as limited attacks, defense, delays, deception, or even retrograde operations is measured in order to achieve mass elsewhere at the decisive point and time on the battlefield. ...

• Maneuver – Place the enemy in a position of disadvantage through the flexible application of combat power. Maneuver is the movement of forces in relation to the enemy to gain positional advantage. Effective maneuver keeps the enemy off balance and protects the force. It is used to exploit successes, to preserve freedom of action, and to reduce vulnerability. It continually poses new problems for the enemy by rendering his actions ineffective, eventually leading to defeat. ...

• Unity of Command – For every objective, seek unity of command and unity of effort. At all levels of war, employment of military forces in a manner that masses combat power toward a common objective requires unity of command and unity of effort. Unity of command means that all the forces are under one responsible commander. It requires a single commander with the requisite authority to direct all forces in pursuit of a unified purpose.

• Security – Never permit the enemy to acquire unexpected advantage. Security enhances freedom of action by reducing vulnerability to hostile acts, influence, or surprise. Security results from the measures taken by a commander to protect his forces. Knowledge and understanding of enemy strategy, tactics, doctrine, and staff planning improve the detailed planning of adequate security measures.

• Surprise – Strike the enemy at a time or place or in a manner for which he is unprepared. Surprise can decisively shift the balance of combat power. By seeking surprise, forces can achieve success well out of proportion to the effort expended. Surprise can be in tempo, size of force, direction or location of main effort, and timing. Deception can aid the probability of achieving surprise.

• Simplicity – Prepare clear, uncomplicated plans and concise orders to ensure thorough understanding. Everything in war is very simple, but the simple thing is difficult. To the uninitiated, military operations are not difficult. Simplicity contributes to successful operations. Simple plans and clear, concise orders minimize misunderstanding and confusion. Other factors being equal, parsimony is to be preferred.

Officers in the U.S. Military sometimes use the acronyms "MOSS COMES", "MOSS MOUSE", "MOOSE MUSS", "MOUSE MOSS", "MOM USE SOS", or "SUMO MOSES" to remember the first letters of these nine principles.

There is a debate within the American military establishment to adopt flexibility as the tenth principle of war. Frost^[7] argues that the concept of flexibility should be integrated with America's warfighting doctrine. Americans soundly retort that flexibility is a given that pervades all aspects of each principle.

Many, however, hold that the principle of Simplicity implicitly includes flexibility. One of the oldest dicta states that the simple plan is the flexible plan.

 

 

 

 But, in the Vicksburg Campaign, conducted over basically a year and a half U.S. Grant out-thought, out-maneuvered, out-boasted, out-lasted, and possibly out-prayed, our nations proud southern confederate fighting rebel heroes. They were unfortunately trying to separate themselves and some of the rest of us from our northern friends and start out all over again in a brand new country.

1)       Grant’s adherence to the principle of Objective in the Vicksburg campaign. He and Lincoln both held up Vicksburg as a key objective of the overall war over several years time, in spite of being outmaneuvered at first in North Mississippi by confederate cavalry during his first attempts to move south from

Memphis on an overland route to take the city. Then again, when he sent Sherman down the river to launch an attack from the north of the city the Union troops were defeated in several locations, probably most significantly at the battle of Chickasaw bayou where the Confederate Stephen Lee used the high bluffs north of the city there in the terrain to help Fortress Vicksburg live up to its name up to that point and time. After this the only sensible options left to him were to try and move troops across Louisiania overland from north amphibiously with the help of heavly artillery counterfire from the union ironcalds south and below the city along the river. Even, after he had landed below Grand Gulf, Grant still had the option (and was advised to take this course by his superiors and fellow Generals) to be more cautious and move on Baton Rouge first.

 

2)      But, Grant decided to stay the course to defeated the eliminated the threat at Vicksburg which all agreed was key to the continuation of the Confederacy western supply lines through the railroad there.

By doing this he used the 2^nd main principle in the U.S. Army’s doctrine of fighting wars:

The Offensive  – Seize, retain, and exploit the initiative.

 

 

3)      And, by taking this course, and massing a huge army in order to do it he introduced  two other key principles to our U.S. doctrine, the principle of Mass and Manuever.

 

4)      Manuever. – Place the enemy in a position of disadvantage through the flexible application of combat power.

   

To be sure other Generals had already used the principle of Mass in earlier battles of the war, but not to such great effect, because they did not combine their massing of troops by applying the mass of troops

At a critical and decisive  turning point in the strategy of maneuver of forces as Clauswitz was already preaching from his experience in European wars. Application of force and mass this way was again to be re-discovered in our last U.S. century by General Schwarzkopf in the first Persian Gulf War against Saddam Husein.  General Schwarzkopf, referring to his own Army War College training and other Post-Vietnam U.S. Army training and doctrine studies as ‘the operational art’.  During the Vietnam war the U.S. Army unfortunately reverted to the civil war doctrine of applying overwhelming ‘firepower’ and other means of enemy attrition (such as bombing and and airpower) to be the decisive factor in the overall strategy of the war. This approach, which was still tried to be used as a deterrent of force arrangement for peacetime deterrence in the early 1970s by us in the US. It had failed us in Vietnam as a decisive factor along with a village pacification strategy to defeat the enemy. The Vietcong were able to resupply their forces in South Vietnam along the Ho-Chi Minh trail even though being attacked by behind the lines reconnaissance ranger land forces and bombed heavily from the air by B-52 based in Thailand and elsewhere. In the 1970s the Soviet’s used their advantage in numbers on the ground of several levels of T-72 tanks lined up against us across the inter-German border to neutralize the effect of General Starry’s and General Saint’s mobile battle-position deployment of attrition defensive forces.  The question, in conducting the war-games came down to whether the U.S. Engineer forces  deployment of obstacles would be able to slow the waves of attacking forces in the Fulda Gap before they reached Frankfurt in 90 days and presented NATO with a fait-de-accomplii leaving NATO with the only option of a tactical nuclear conflagration followed by a conventional allied counterattack re-inforced with more tanks from the US.   The word was (from intelligence sources) that Yuri Andropov was calculating that he could do this and NATO wouldn’t respond with ICBM’s because of our rightedly held fear of what another world war would do to human kind. After all, he had already done this in Czechsovakia. This was why the Reagan administration choose to up the anti-by introducing mobile missiles on the European continent. Looking back on it, it seems a wise move to me.

 

But, what does this all have to do with the principles of war and Grant’s campaign at Vicksburg. Well, Grant, when he decided to move strategically, with haste and speed in order to strike a decisive blow against the South was gambling the ‘operational art’ of maneuver as he understood it would be a more important factor that the balance of power of ‘attitrition’ in the scale of how the principles of war as he understood them were to be best applied at that time, in this place where I live (Vicksburg, MS) against Jefferson Davis and Pemberton.

 

 

 

 

 

 

On May 12 Pemberton moved his headquarters for battle to Bovina (a small town east of Vicksburg and west of the Big Black). He left 2 divisions at Vicksburg. On May 14 the confederate generals under Pemberton, Bowen and Loring moved to Edwards and and just south of there with 20,000 men. Pemberton’s engineer Lockett helped the troops set up positions at Bowers ridge.  During this time (contrary to what he wrote in his memoirs) Grant had several hundred supply wagons, which had come up the old Natchez Trace road, from Grand Gulf, moving around the Raymond area.

And, Grant had McPherson’s three divisions at Bolton ( a small town on the other side of the Big

Black on the Vicksburg Jackson road).

Figure 4  After overpowering the forces of the confederate General Pemberton (Col. Bragg's Brigade) and General Johnson's troops at Jackson, Grant was free to move to the west toward Vicksburg. After the battle of Jackson there comes a critical decision point for Grant when he has to determine whether to cover his movements to the west and Vicksburg with forces deployed to deal with the remnants of Confederate General Johnson’s troops attacking from the North. There is a very interesting account of Grant son Fred about how his father was awakened by someone at 3 AM before the movements the next day that advised him that Gen. Johnson had determined to pull back to the north and should not be much of a factor from this part of the battle area. After the war if was generally admitted that this was a Union spy who gave this information to Grant. But, who was it?  Was it the confederate officer on Pemberton’s staff delivering messages to Johnson from Vicksburg. Grant does not tell us the details of this in his memoirs. But, he does before talking about this part of the campaign hint at someone cashiered, in a court martial earlier in Memphis before the movement south. Gen. Johnson in his report of the events of the battle (May 23-July5, listed in Guide to the Vicksburg Campaign by Fullenkamp and all, pg. 343) mentions the name of a Lt. Saunders as being this confederate officer. Ed Bearrs lists his name as Lt. E.D. Saunders in the index to his volume III of the Vicksburg campaign where his name comes up as a Union  messenger from Sherman to Stephen Lee during the Battle of Chickasaw Bayou which occurred earlier in the Vicksburg campaign. If this Union officer went over to the Confederates after being cashiered from Grant’s army in Memphis he would have been serving under Grant’s chief of spies for the Vicksburg Campaign Grenville Dodge (who operated out of Decatur GA). Dodge located himself there because it was a railroad communication headquarters at the time and many of the Union spies were workers in railroad offices.  The information from these railroad spies helped Grant learn the details and times of Johnson’s troop movement to reinforce Jackson. Captain E. D. Saunders is listed from a google search on the internet as being killed June 2 1864 in a battle near Dallas GA.  Is it possible this Lt. E.D. Saunders was this union spy who played such an important role in providing Grant with crucial information about Johnson’s movements the night before this key battle in the U.S. Civil War?

 

Figure 5 The Champion Hill battle site area called the ‘Crossroads’ where the confederate forces attacked the Unions to the East. It is located west of Champions Hill at Latitude 32 degrees 19 minutes north, Longitude 90 degrees 32 minutes west.

 

All of these aerial photos were taken from the Crosswinds Flying Club Cessna 192 9881E based at the local Vicksburg/Raymond area John Bell Williams airport just to the east of the battle site.

 

Figure 6 Looking west flying over Hwy 80 and the Champion House location.

  

Figure 7 Present day farm structures on the Raymond Edwards road where the confederate forces were set up to attack the Unions to the east on Champion Hill. Latitude 32 degrees 20 minutes north, Longitude 90 degrees 31 minutes west.

On May 16 the main battle of Champion Hill begins. Loring, instead of helping Pemberton from the south, makes a wrong turn on a farm road and decides to go south to Crystal Springs and then turn north up to Jackson. This was a serious mistake with bad consequences for the Confederates. BG Tighman however, distinguished himself in the battle by standing his ground under fire at the Jackson creek bridge and making the ultimate sacrifice.

During the battle of Champion Hill (like that of Raymond), Pemberton did not have his cavalry deployed properly. The two armies, Union and Confederate, ran into each other. After the battle the confederate retreat has to depend on building two bridges that should have already been constructed.

 

Figure 8 3000' photo taking while flying back toward Raymond MS from Edwards over the Lower Baker's creek bridge battle site.

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 9 Photo of the old Jackson Vicksburg road (HWY 80) looking west toward the town of Edwards. This area is northwest of the Champion Hill battle area.

 

Figure 10 Flying parallel to current Interstate I-20 over the old Jackson Vicksburg road toward Edwards above what was the bridge over Baker's creek then. Latitude 32 degrees 20 minutes north, Longitude 90 degrees 3 minutes west.

 

 

Figure 11 Gen. Parker Hills map of the Champion Hill Battle

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 12 Present day site of Champion's Hill. Since 1910, it is just a rock quarry now in the upper left of the photograph. But, as seen from the air it is definitely the high ground that dominates the military topography of the area.

 

Figure 13 Location of Confederate General A. J. Smith's Division set up to attack to the west from the east of Champion Hill near Raymond on the Raymond Bolton road. Latitude 32 degrees 20 minutes north, 90 degrees 26 minutes west

 

Figure 14 Photo taken flying over the Raymond Bolton road, east of Champion Hill where the Union General McClernand's division was one of three Union divisions deployed to attack the hill. Latitude 32 degrees 180 minutes north, Longitude 90 degrees 28 minutes west.

 

Figure 15 Photo taken looking to the north on the Raymond Bolton road , just south of which Union General McPherson’s division was deployed to  attack Champion’s Hill to the west.  Latitude 32 degrees 200 minutes north, Longitude 90 degrees 28 minutes west.

 

Figure 16 Next three photographs show Gen. Hill's presentation of the details of Grant's movement during the sequence of the Raymond, Jackson, Champion Hill battles. His finger is pointed to Raymond MS on the map. The three X’s at the top are the outnumbered Confederate Gregg’s brigade moving to intercept Grant’s large force moving on Jackson. Besides having a much larger number of troops deployed than Gregg expected, Grant was helped by Pemberton’s confusing orders that he sent to Gregg.  Gregg did not know from the orders whether Pemberton wanted him to move to Bolton and Clinton first before Raymond on not.

 

Figure 17 Gen. Hill and I were both students over several years of Warren Grabeau. In the middle 1960s, a group about five us boys and girls went to his three evenings a week Science Seminar discussions at Waterways. This was when I was in H.V. Cooper high school at Vicksburg. Warren was not a practicing physicist with a degree but he had some very strongly held philosophical views about the necessity for high-school physics books to ‘define their terms”.  This philosophical approach, although Warren didn’t know it at the time, goes back to Blaise Pascal.  See some earlier http://www.ourprayergroup.blogspot.com  posting for more discussions on our amateur theological hero Pascal and why it is necessary, as he said, “to give definition to the defined”.  I don't remember meeting Mr. Bearrs although I took piano lessons from his wife Majorie for about a year in the late 1950s.

 

After the defeat at Champion Hill, the three Union Corps started their move on Vicksburg. Sherman built pontoon bridge at Bridgeport.  McPherson marched behind Sherman. McClernand led the other Corps and used trees to cross the Big Black.

                                                              

 

 

 

Figure 18  Tour Stop 1: Looking across recently cleared fields, toward the Louisiana monument from De'Goyer's battery

 

 

Figure 19  Looking from the high point of the Illinois monument southeast across open fields of fire toward, the union lines and their approach from the Union DeGoyer’s Battery toward the west.

 

Figure 20 Illinois Monument

 

Next Tour Stop #2 at the Shirley House

There were two main approaches to Vicksburg from Jackson:

The Old Jackson Road coming the Illinois mounument area and the Baldwin Ferry road coming into the Texas Redoubt positions.

1)      House goes back to first settlers in the area who moved here after Napoleanic wars, Wexford lodge 1812.

2)      Loess caves (She’Bangs’) dug by Union troops on the downslope of the other side of the Jackson road hills here

3)      Confederate union sympathisers were called Unionists, Federal southern sympathizers copperheads

4)      The Unions had sharpshooter’s as the coonskin tower east of here and the confederates at Ransom’s approach. There is a story of how Grant wandered into the sights of a confederate sharpshooter and only saved from being killed because the confederate shooter’s superior heard him cussing (at Grant who from what he saw was only a unidentified union officer) and ordered the enlisted man not to shoot because he was cussing at another officer (even if one on the other side).

“American history changed on this ground”

Abraham Lincoln’s words are on the Illinois monument (there are no guns on it), “With malice toward none, let us have peace”

In 1870, after the war, when there was a black sheriff of Vicksburg during reconstruction the whites in the city revolted and organized a rebellion on the house’s grounds. They ambushed and killed the black sheriff here.

There is the story my mother told while being a guide of the famous Helen Hayes visiting the park and when she discovered the excellent acoustics inside, decided to recite all the verses theatrically

In front of those happening by. There are 37,000 names on the plaques. The golden eagle symbolizes a victorious nation. The figurine on the portal is of the Greek God of History Cleo writing down the roles of the heroes here for immortality, with daughters of the North and South on each side of here.

 

 

Figure 21  Approach to the Louisiania Redoubt, looking west from the Illinois Monument

Tour Stop 6 On July 1 the Unions blew the redoubt here on June 24, the confederates counterattacked with mines of their own (34 US Army, 34 confederates killed). The Ransom gun path is named for John Wesley Powell who became famous after the war explored the Grand Canyon.

You can see the approach to the Louisiana redoubt dug at angles in order to avoid enfilade fire from the defenders. The union diggers were from the town of Galena (which means tin mining city). The first row of attackers shot while the 2^nd and 3^rd row reloaded. Springield and Enfiled rifles were used. They had a practical range of 400 yards.

 

 

Figure 22 Graveyard Rd., looking towards the Great Redoubt.

Graveyard Road

Sherman Corps leads the Union attacking troops into Vicksburg concurrently with the battle of the Big Black. On May 18 he fails miserably with the heaviest losses, and the most bloody battle of the Vicksburg siege attacks. On May 19 there is another attack on the stockade redan which fails. Attackers approached  in a solid body 6 deep, sharpshooter’s covered the advance to the extent they could. On May 22 there is a synchronized attack with a four to five hour artillery barrage on the railroad redoubt. At 10 AM the assault attack begins

1)      Ewings approach here is perpendicular to the defender’s redoubt. At 6 AM the first coordinated artillery attack in history begins with a four to five hour attack of the artillery here and at the railroad redoubt. There was a moat in front of the confederate defences, with 3 lines of trenches dug, as well as abatis, fascines. The confederate defenders had also but covered interior lines of communication between the trenches. During the attack the Union troops are well within the range of the Confederate Infield rifes Before the battle Sherman ordered some men to take the boards off the house that Grant had found shelter in, in order to construct scaling ladders to cross the moat. Grant allowed this after being surprised at what was happened. Union troops were ordered to run ahead of the other union attackers, charging up the steep hill, and through themselves down with the wood slats over the moats. It turned out the wooden ladders were not long enough and they dies in place. After the 2^nd  on the 20thbattle, due to Grant’s decision, the bodies were left on the field until the 24^th.

2)      There is the story of a 14 year old boy trooper who ran back under fire to Sherman, requesting more ammunition for his unit. He won the medal of honor for this heroic act.

 

 

Figure 23 View to the west and the Port of Vicksburg from Fort Hill.

Fort Hill stop (Actually the Louisiana Redan was called ‘Fort Hill’ by the troops at that time) . The Louisiana monument is the high point on the MS river between Memphis and New Orleans.

In 1866 the Vicksburg Natl Cemetary was created, volunteers were paid $5 a body to inter the dead in the cemetery. The figure of 20,000 casulties buried here refers to those 1)killed,2)missing in action,3)absent from duty. Of the 20,000,  17,000 are from the civil war, 13,000 unknown but died in the Western Theater of the War, of these 4700 were black troops fr om the area.This is the largest Civil war cemetery in the Western Theater

 

Figure 24 Cleared fields looking southeast of Texas Monument

 

Figure 25 Tour Stop 15 Texas Redoubt

 

The purpose of the redoubt is to protect the Southern railroad of MS. It guards the Baldwin’s Ferry road into Vicksburg. The big Union guns up on the opposite pounded the defenders fortifications.

SGT Higgens, the Union flag bearer won the medal of honor here during the assault. When he reached the confederate trenchs, he discovered the rest of his unit had already fallen behind him. There were 58 holes in the flag. The confederate soldiers, amazed at his daring, took him prisoner but did not take his flag away from him. 3 years later he was awarded the medal on the testimony from his confederate capturers in the trench about his heroism.

The assault of May 22: If the Union’s beak the Confederate lines here the game is over. If they can hold the area until Grant reinforces them they will be able to enter the city. But, the confederat4es are able to breach the Union lines here and postpone defeat. McClernand has no reserves to continue the attack (he uses all his troops in the front lines). Grant removes McClernand from command here after he fails to break through and for helping some newspapers to publish some of Grant’s orders. But, he does send reinforcemetns, but he (McClernand who Grant had always considered a political General and a threat to his success) is replaced by Gen. Ord. During the last attack Bowen is shot through the heart. (?) After these failed attacks Grant did not try and attack in the southern part of the battle area as much because he wanted to let the confederates attack first and then chase them down.

On the statue of the Texas monument the man is out of uniform with his shirt open. But, the socks tucked in to protect from chiggers is realistic

During the campaign there were about 20,000 casulties, during the battle around the city 2 days elapsed with the Union dead lying where they fell until a truce was finally called in order to negotiate surrender.

 

Figure 26 View to the Southeast, through the cleared areas of approach in the attack of McClernand May 22, from the Texas Redoubt.

 

Figure 27   View to the East and the IOWA Memorial, looking from standing on the Texas Redoubt. The frescos on the memorial portray scenes of Iowans from the battle of Grand Gulf, Port Gibson, Jackson, Big Black River, Champion Hill, and the assault on Vicksburg.