Under Siege!

by Andrea Warren

Grant had other problems as well. Everywhere he went, Southern blacks left the homes and plantations where they had been slaves and followed the army, afraid for their safety if they struck out on their own, for in the eyes of most Southerners, they were not free. Grant was unsure what to do with them. As their numbers grew, feeding them became a burden. He employed some of them as laborers and cooks, but their numbers kept swelling.

  Many black families escaped their masters and fled to the safety of Union lines. Grant had an estimated 10,000 liberated slaves with his army at Vicksburg.

  Northern newspaper editors questioned everything. There was a war to fight, the troops were critically needed in other places, and here was the Army of the Tennessee still trying to silence the guns at Vicksburg. President Lincoln had selected Grant as the man to take Vicksburg because he knew Grant wouldn’t give up. The president’s confidence surprised some, for Grant had not yet proved himself to be an outstanding leader and had only a few victories to his credit. But Lincoln said of him, “I cannot spare this man. He fights.”

  Fred knew that his father’s soldiers loved him. They not only followed him, they worked for him. Grant stood five feet, eight inches tall and weighed 140 pounds. He was a plain man, rumpled, not given to talking very much. He almost always had a cigar in his mouth, whether lit or unlit. Though he was only forty-one, the soldiers affectionately referred to him as “The Old Man.” One said of him, “Somehow he was more partner than boss; we were in this thing together.”

  Sherman ably assisted Grant’s efforts in the Vicksburg campaign.

  Grant’s close friend General William Tecumseh Sherman was also “in this thing” with him. Sherman was forty-three, tall, craggy, with red hair and a scruffy red beard. Like Grant, he chain-smoked cigars, and he was restless, his hands always moving. When he was born, his father named him “Tecumseh” for the Shawnee Indian chief he considered a great warrior. Sherman was still a boy when his father died, and other family members added the first name “William,” feeling the child needed something more suitable. Sherman had been at West Point with Grant, and they had served in the Mexican War together. Their friendship was strong. They knew they could trust and rely on each other.

  About the time Fred joined his father on the Mississippi, Grant was explaining to Sherman and his other officers his newest plan to take Vicksburg. Though it involved a long route to reach the town, after Grant’s previous disasters it seemed the best way to actually get there.

  But it was complicated. The army was currently in Louisiana, across the river and north of Vicksburg, so the first step would be to march the men south along the Louisiana shore—a slow, arduous task through difficult, often flooded terrain—to a point below Vicksburg.

  Admiral David Porter, commander of the navy’s Mississippi River squadron, had a reputation/or acting alone, but he worked well in partnership with Grant.

  Then navy ships, currently on the river north of the city with Grant, would make a run southward to try to get past Vicksburg’s guns. If the run past the batteries was successful, the ships would then transport the Union army, which would be waiting on the Louisiana shore, across the river and into Mississippi. Rather than try to fight through the swamps that protected Vicksburg to the south, Grant would march the men east to the state capital of Jackson, and then follow the Jackson road west back to Vicksburg. As the army surrounded and attacked the city, the Union navy would bombard it from the river. Once that happened, Grant was confident he could force Vicksburg’s surrender within a day.

  Grant’s officers were skeptical. Though Sherman privately feared failure, he agreed to go along with the plan. Navy admiral David Dixon Porter, whose ironclads would take the brunt of fire if the fleet was discovered while trying to pass Vicksburg, viewed the plan with reluctance, but like Sherman, he trusted Grant. His ships would be ready.

  As for Fred, he had no doubts. This plan was going to work!

  IN THE WEEKS THAT FOLLOWED, the army marched southward along the Louisiana shore, sometimes struggling through muck and bogs, until the men were finally south of Vicksburg. The next step was for the navy to transport them across the river and into the state of Mississippi. It was time to try to get the entire fleet, including the ship that served as Grant’s headquarters, downriver beyond Vicksburg.

  Grant was confident they could do it. He selected April 16 as the night for this venture. With luck, clouds would cover the moon, and, as the ships floated downriver in the darkness, the Confederates would never be the wiser. Fred planned to be standing right on deck with his father when they silently glided past Vicksburg.

  During the day of April 16, as sailors busily prepared each boat for that night’s run, Julia Grant arrived with her younger three children for a visit. She had managed to get a ride down the river from Memphis, where the family was staying, and had brought Ulysses Jr., who was ten, Nellie, seven, and little Jesse, just five, to visit their older brother and their father. Grant was pleased to see them. No sooner had they arrived than Fred heard his mother offering his father suggestions on how to take Vicksburg. Julia Grant recalled that, in response to her unsolicited advice, “the General was greatly amused and inquired if I, too, had a plan of action to propose. Of course I had.”

  While she was explaining it, Grant’s eyes twinkled. Then he said, “Mrs. Grant, I will move upon Vicksburg and will take it, too. You need give yourself no further trouble … I am glad you arrived in time to witness the running of the blockade.” He explained how that night the Union ships would “drop silently down the river as far as possible and then put on all steam and go flying past Vicksburg and its batteries to where I want to use them.”

  Julia Grant was delighted. She had been at Holly Springs with Grant the previous December when the Union supply base was raided and destroyed by Confederate troops. Her carriage had been burned and her horses stolen, but she took danger in stride and looked forward to the evening’s events.

  In Vicksburg that April day, the air was filled with the scent of blooming flowers. Though daily life had not changed much for most people, the town had been transformed into a fortress. General Pemberton now had 172 cannon and 30,000 troops in place along a semicircle of military fortifications surrounding Vicksburg. Sentries along the riverfront kept a close eye on the water, and the cannon were loaded and ready. The Yankees had been in the area for months, and as far as the people of Vicksburg were concerned, all they’d managed to do was dig an ill-fated canal and try various silly schemes in the bayous where their boats got stuck. Surely they were about to leave for good and go back north. But until that actually happened, no one was going to take chances.

  By sundown, Grant was ready. The waters of the mighty Mississippi were calm and black as ink, and soon the sky would be as well. The Union fleet included seven gunboats, one steam ram, three transports full of supplies, and an assortment of smaller boats. The bigger boats had bales of hay and cotton and sacks of grain stacked up on deck to protect the boilers, which could blow up if hit by enemy fire. The ironclads had coal barges strapped to their sides to give them extra protection. The boats would travel with no lights and move at low speed. Those with few or no guns, which included Grant’s, would hug the Louisiana shore, protected by Porter’s ironclads. If they were spotted, the ironclads were prepared for a fight.

  The sky lit up like daylight the night when Grant’s fleet made its successful run past the batteries at Vicksburg.

  Several of Grant’s officers had their wives and children with them, and the families dined together aboard Grant’s headquarters ship. By ten p.m. everyone was on deck and ready. It was almost as if they were waiting for the curtain to open on a play. The adults were drinking champagne. Grant smoked a cigar, and he and Julia sat in chairs, holding hands, their children around them. Fred could clearly see his father’s face, calm and relaxed as he watched first one navy vessel and then another begin the silent glide toward the Vicksburg waterfront.

  Suddenly the Vicksburg cannon opened fire,
exploding in the night sky like the Fourth of July. Lookouts had spotted the fleet. They hurriedly set fire to several abandoned houses along the Louisiana shore, illuminating the river and giving the cannon better aim at the advancing ships. The ironclads returned fire, aiming at the Vicksburg guns but also hurtling shells into the town, where they exploded with fiery howls. Several buildings went up in flames, and people sixty miles away could hear the explosions.

  Onboard his father’s ship, Fred gripped the railing with anticipation as he watched the bombardment, exhilarated by the sounds and sights and the thunderous roar of the multitude of explosions. One of the ships was hit, caught fire, and slowly began to sink. Fred breathed a sigh of relief when he saw the sailors who had jumped into the river being rescued by another boat.

  With all the gunfire and the burning ship, “the river was lighted up as if by sunlight,” Fred observed. When he focused his spyglass on Vicksburg, he saw residents running through the streets. He watched as some headed to higher ground where they could get a clear view of the river, and noted that “the people of Vicksburg lined the hills, and manifested great excitement.”

  “Indeed, it was a grand sight,” Julia Grant wrote in her memoir. “How vividly that picture is photographed on my mind; the grand roar of the cannon rests in my memory. The batteries of Vicksburg poured shot and shell upon the heads of the devoted little fleet, but Porter was there—thank Heaven!—to return broadside for broadside. The air was full of sulphurous smoke.”

  For nearly two hours Fred watched the battle with his family as their boat slowly made its way downriver. During the entire time, he would remember that his father “was quietly smoking, but an intense light shone in his eyes.” Years later Grant himself wrote in his memoir that the sights that night were “magnificent, but terrible,” while an officer with him said, “It was as if hell itself were loose that night on the Mississippi River.”

  And then it was over. When the last boat made it past the Vicksburg waterfront, cannon on both sides ceased fire and the battle stopped as quickly as it had begun. Grant had lost only one ship: the rest had safely run the gauntlet and were now south of the city. In the wee hours of the morning onboard Grant’s ship, Julia Grant noted, “The batteries were passed, and we rested here awaiting the report of casualties and were happy to learn that there had been no loss of life, although some few were wounded—poor fellows! The smoke cleared away, the stars looked down tenderly upon Union and Rebel alike, and the katydids and the frogs began again their summer songs.”

  Now if all went as planned, General Ulysses Grant would soon storm Vicksburg, his young son at his side, and once and for all destroy the guns guarding the Mississippi.

  BURYING THE FAMILY SILVER

  Late Spring 1863

  That terrible night of April 16, when the Union fleet was passing the waterfront and the first explosions rocked Vicksburg, the Reverend W. W. Lord and his wife, Margaret, had leaped from their bed. Their five children were already wide awake, terrified by the noise. The Lords hurriedly gathered the children and, with the help of their two frightened house slaves, urged everyone out of the house, across the lawn, and into the church next door. Guided only by candles, they felt their way into the small, windowless basement coal bin, where Dr. Lord hastily spread rugs and blankets over the lumpy coal. There they stayed for the next two hours, trying to shut out the awful sounds of exploding shells.

  The Reverend W. W. Lord was rector of Christ Church in Vicksburg from 1854 to 1863.

  Eleven-year-old Willie—whose given name was William Wilberforce Lord, Jr.—quickly realized that they were in real danger. These Yankee guns were more powerful than the last ones, and shells were landing higher in the city. Willie had been excited by all the war preparations in Vicksburg and, along with his friends, had eagerly followed the activity of the Union fleet on the river. The possibility of war had seemed like a fairy tale to him. But tonight was different. “With the deep but muffled boom of the guns reaching us at intervals in our underground retreat, my mother and sisters huddled around me upon the coal-heap,” he later recalled. “Lighted by the fitful glow of two or three tallow candles, the war became to me for the first time a reality.”

  The Lords were from New York but had lived in Vicksburg for ten years. Dr. Lord was the minister of Christ Episcopal Church, high in the hills of the city, and his large congregation included many of Vicksburg’s most prominent citizens. Margaret Lord was a high-strung woman who worried constantly, but Dr. Lord had determined that, in spite of the danger, they would not leave Vicksburg. Not only was it their home, but he supported the South in this war. In addition to his church duties, he served as chaplain for the First Mississippi Brigade of the Confederate Army. He was well educated—a graduate of Princeton Theological Seminary—and a published poet. He was reputed to have one of the largest private libraries in the South, and his books occupied every wall in his study. Willie shared his father’s love of learning and sometimes read aloud to his sisters from Robinson Crusoe and his other favorite adventure tales.

  But this night of the bombardment, books and learning seemed far away. There was nothing to do but wait, and pray, and hope for the best.

  ELSEWHERE IN VICKSBURG, the first thunderous boom of the cannon along the waterfront had jolted people out of sleep. The Union fleet trying to sneak down the river was returning fire, hurling shell after shell into the town. China cabinets rattled, dogs howled, and horses spooked as the black sky filled with smoke and flashes of light. The odor of gunpowder filled the air, and candles and lanterns lit up every house. People ran out of their homes in confusion, then rushed back inside. Should they stay? Seek shelter in one of the new caves scattered about? Was there time to harness horses and flee? Some went to Sky Parlor Hill, where they gasped in horror at the sight of the battle raging on the river.

  Not far from the hill and close to Christ Episcopal Church, twenty-seven-year-old Mary Loughborough (pronounced “Lof-burrow”) was experiencing the horrors of that night. Her husband, James, was an officer in the Confederate army and was stationed at Vicksburg. Mary lived in Jackson, forty miles away, and had left their two-year-old daughter with friends there so she could come by train earlier that day to visit her husband. When she arrived in Vicksburg, she was surprised to see the damage in the city from the previous shelling and had commented to her friend, “How is it possible you live here?” Her friend responded, “After one is accustomed to the change, we do not mind. But becoming accustomed, that is the trial.”

  As Mary had settled into her hosts’ home with its view of the river, she wrote in her diary, “I looked over this beautiful landscape, and in the distance plainly saw the Federal transports lying quietly at their anchorage. Was it a dream? Could I believe that over this smiling scene in the bright April morning the blight of civil warfare lay like a pall?”

  That evening Mary and her husband took a carriage ride through the streets of Vicksburg. Later they sat on their friends’ veranda to enjoy the balmy night air. Mary found herself studying the river through her spyglass, watching the Union ships anchored north of the city. Finally she put the glass away and prepared for bed. But she could not stop thinking about the enemy fleet. “Resting in Vicksburg,” she noted, “seemed like resting near a volcano.”

  When the shelling started, Mary awoke instantly. “I sprang from my bed, drew on my slippers and robe, and went out on the veranda … The river was illuminated by large fires on the bank, and we could discern plainly the huge, black masses floating down with the current, now and then belching forth fire from their sides … and we could hear the shells exploding in the upper part of town … We could hear the gallop, in the darkness, of couriers upon the paved streets; we could hear the voices of the soldiers on the riverside. The rapid firing from the boats, the roar of the Confederate batteries, and, above all, the screaming, booming sound of the shells, as they exploded in the air and around the city, made at once a new and fearful scene to me.”

  Mary’
s husband had to report immediately to his regiment. As he was leaving, he urged her to seek shelter in their hosts’ backyard cave. “While I hesitated,” Mary recalled, “… a shell exploded near the side of the house. Fear instantly decided me and I ran, guided by one of the ladies, who pointed down the steep slope of the hill … While I was considering the best way of descending the hill, another shell exploded … I flew down, half sliding and running. Before I had reached the mouth of the cave, two more exploded on the side of the hill near me. Breathless and terrified, I found the entrance and ran in, having left one of my slippers on the hill-side.

  “Shell after shell fell in the valley below us, exploding with a loud, rumbling noise, perfectly deafening. The cave was an excavation in the earth the size of a large room, high enough for the tallest person to stand perfectly erect, provided with comfortable seats, and altogether quite a large and habitable abode … were it not for the dampness and the constant contact with the soft earthy walls.”

  When the shelling stopped after two impossibly long hours, Mary and the others cautiously emerged, shaken but safe. They watched the river as the one Union boat that had been hit by Confederate fire slowly burned and sank. “We remained on the veranda an hour or more, the gentlemen speculating on the result of the successful run by the batteries,” Mary reported. “All were astonished and chagrined.”

  The next day townspeople watched in disbelief as Union troops set up two large cannon on the Louisiana shore, directly across from the Vicksburg waterfront, and opened fire. A few shells reached land, and once again the earth rumbled and exploded.

  Mary’s only thought was to get back to her little daughter in Jackson. At the station, where several shells had already fallen, she waited anxiously for the train to arrive. Finally “the glad sound of the whistle was heard, and, after our long suspense, we felt the motion of the cars again, and were glad to leave Vicksburg, with the sound of the cannon and noise of the shell still ringing in our ears.”