River of Blood (Shiloh Series Book 4)

by Phillip Bryant

  An hour later, Breckenridge arrived, looking impatient and annoyed at the summons. A former Democratic vice presidential candidate and influential Kentucky state senator, he had proven an able commander of men despite the obvious political reasons for his quick elevation to command. Raising a brigade of Kentucky volunteers for the Confederacy, he saw action at Shiloh. John Breckenridge was personally a petulant man: Bragg and he together did not make for a congenial reception.

  Breckenridge gave a lazy salute and inquired as to his orders. Bragg had collapsed into a chair and failed to bestir himself to receive his subordinate with any convention. Instead he chose to launch not into Breckenridge’s orders but into a demand for an explanation as to the 31st instance.

  “General, my report—” Breckenridge started but was waved off.

  “I read your summary of the day, General. There was little excuse for the delay in sending reinforcements to bolster General Polk’s assaults on the Union center. Several hours’ delay, General. Several hours allowed the enemy to strengthen his line and repulse your piecemeal attacks. That was the cause of our failure on the 31st to dislodge the enemy!” Bragg ended with a fierce glare at Breckenridge.

  “I was ordered to advance upon the enemy on the right of the river ford not once, but twice! Each time—”

  “You were overcautious, General. There was not the threat to your line that you presented to me in your dispatches.”

  “General Pegram reported the enemy was in force and advancing. I was ordered to advance myself and sweep the enemy off the hill twice, each time with a smaller and smaller force as you requested reinforcements be diverted,” Breckenridge stated flatly, his countenance remaining cool. “I sent my brigades as requested without delay.”

  “And yet, General, there was delay—inexcusable delay. And Pegram’s assessment of the enemy strength and threat to your wing was incorrect. You should have verified that it was so before delaying for nothing.”

  Breckenridge bit his lip and exhaled sharply. He was the scapegoat of the moment, and Bragg would have little truck in hearing any excuse, regardless of how valid. The communications had been hurried and confusing that day, and it seemed that just as he was about to execute one order, another would arrive countermanding it and peeling off more of his division, forcing more of his men to march in a big U from one wing to the nearest ford in the river to get to the other. It mattered little to Bragg that he had aided in the problem. As far as the general was concerned, it was not his responsibility to take any responsibility.

  “Sir, what are your orders?” Breckenridge asked.

  “You are going to redeem yourself and attack these Yankees here on the right of the river. Force them back across and seize this hill opposite.”

  Bragg motioned to ground Breckenridge knew well, having trooped back and forth over it several times alone on the 31st.

  Breckenridge kept his protest as calm as possible. “Sir, my brigades were mauled on the 31st and are scattered about the line we now hold. I could not possibly attack with what is currently opposite the town.”

  “You will reconstitute your division, General, forthwith, and then assault the single Yankee division holding the hill above the ford. We must clear the Yankees from this hill on their side of the river. Their cannon threaten Polk’s line where they are now and prevent Polk from advancing. Clear the Yankees off the hill, and we complete what we started on the 31st and sweep them back down the Nashville pike and back to Triune.”

  Breckenridge studied the map with its simplistic scribbles for where the enemy was, the distance between the two halves of a hill cut through by the river, and the laughable certitude about the presence and state of the enemy in their front.

  “Scouts say the enemy has heavily fortified this hill here with artillery, lots of it. They also have batteries on the right side of the ford with this division of Yankees,” Breckenridge pointed out.

  “You will be given more artillery. We took many guns in our attack; you can have any number. I want your artillery to advance with your infantry; get them in close to support your attack. No hanging back. We need as many guns as we can get across the ford and up on that hill quickly to hold it.”

  “And what of my reduced numbers?”

  “You will move Preston and Adams back to your wing, and you will have sufficient force to knock the enemy off of the hill by coup de main.”

  “Sir, my estimates of the Yankees in my front are more than a single division,” Breckenridge stated hotly, feeling now that he was being tasked with something impossible.

  “Estimates based on Pegram’s cavalry? The same estimates that had the enemy advancing on your line on the 31st when he was never found to be doing so? General, your force is the only remaining force largely uncommitted as yet. You are in possession of the line where I am ordering an assault. If you want to be relieved of command . . .”

  “No, sir,” Breckenridge replied. He had led both Preston’s and Adam’s brigades into the fight on the 31st and witnessed firsthand the Yankee strength in artillery and infantry. Palmer’s brigade, sent earlier in the morning, had also been roughly handled. It was true, half of his division had remained uncommitted, but the other half had been reduced significantly.

  “Sir,” Breckenridge said after a moment’s hesitation, “Preston and Adams are still in the line in the center. It will take several hours to move both brigades back across the river. Palmer’s brigade was withdrawn last night. I will not be ready to attack until at least two p.m. o’clock. I would also request an engagement by the whole line to support my advance and keep the enemy from reinforcing the uh . . . lone division in my front.”

  Even as he agreed, Breckenridge’s disbelief that Bragg would order this grew. He had information from his own pickets that Rosecrans had moved several more brigades across the river just this morning to reinforce Van Cleve; that, coupled with the cannon and infantry on and at the base of the opposite hill to the ford he was being ordered to push across, meant Bragg’s orders were ludicrous.

  “Polk will be ordered to fire his artillery upon the enemy line as the signal for your advance to support it,” Bragg replied quickly.

  John C. Breckenridge was already feeling the knife in his back as arguments for delaying or canceling the advance flitted through his mind one after another. He was already being blamed for the 31st; he could easily see Bragg blaming him for any foul-up today. But what choice did he have? He nodded in reply and stood stiffly for a moment more before saluting. Saying anything more was just to invite further abuse.

  Once outside, Breckenridge set his staff into motion recalling the remaining brigades on the south side of the river and made his way slowly down the Franklin pike toward Murfreesboro. He had the sneaking suspicion that when all was said and done, he was going to be made the scapegoat for a disastrous attack.

  * * *

  The James house HQ was kept warm by fires tended hourly, round the clock, and others of the staff rested wherever there was a flat surface to stretch out on. Bragg remained upright, surly. There had been a flurry of activity as Johnston sent off the orders to Hardee and Breckenridge for the movement on the right and their little room became crowded with a constant stream of messengers coming and going. Once all had been set in motion, Bragg had settled into a funk once more, a lapse of communication occurring as he sat in a chair in the study and nodded off.

  Loud cannon reports shook Bragg awake.

  “What’s this!” Bragg demanded as he sat up to look over his shoulder through the window.

  “Sir, don’t know,” Johnston replied with a look of consternation.

  “Is Rosecrans attacking? Send to Polk and Hardee, I want to know what is happening!” Bragg stood up and paced the room. “Send to Breckenridge, hold off on advancing until we know if the enemy is attacking and where!”

  “Sir,” a harried Johnston mumbled as he scribbled upon several small squares of paper and then quickly strode from the room.

  Mumbling to
himself, Bragg continued to pace the small room, his footfalls treading a worn oval rug that sat in the middle of the room and the hard wood flooring below it: clack, clack, pause, clack, clack, pause.

  “Lost the confidence of the army, have I? Lost the confidence of the country, have I?”

  Bragg stopped pacing at the window at intervals to listen to the cannonade before continuing.

  “Who was it that pushed the enemy three miles and captured thousands of prisoners? Who gave that order? Whose order took thirty cannon?”

  “Sir?” Johnston said as he stood in the doorway to the room.

  “Who pushed the enemy back? And who failed to do more? Polk failed the army. Breckenridge failed the army! I did not fail the army!” Bragg resumed his pacing, ignoring Johnston’s presence.

  “Sir, I’ve dispatched messengers to the corps. The cannonade seems to be going on in the enemy center. Do you wish to have your horse saddled and go see for yourself?” Johnston asked nervously.

  “What?” Bragg asked. “I’ll tell you who the army is ashamed of: it is that meddler Polk and his failure to follow orders. Damn that man! I shouldn’t have sent that telegram announcing our victory to President Davis so soon. We’ll make good on that boast today! Breckenridge had better advance and advance strong. We can still salvage what I started.” Bragg stopped by his chair and contemplated taking another sit.

  As suddenly as the cannonade had started, it stopped. Bragg listened intently for a few moments, not deigning to move a muscle lest his ears fail to detect what was happening in the distance.

  “Hardee’s a fighter; he wants to keep fighting. Damn that question; a moment of weakness is what it was. Should never have asked that ass of a man if we should retreat. A moment of weakness, Johnston, that I’ll not soon repeat. Polk has used this to remove me from command, even turning Cleburne against me!”

  Bragg took another look at the chair and then settled down into it heavily.

  “Sir,” Johnston said evenly and went back to work at his desk.

  “Breckenridge’s attack will fix this, it’ll fix this. It has to,” Bragg mumbled and fell into a long silence.

  * * *

  In a funk of his own, William Stark Rosecrans ignored the bustle about his command tent as he stared listlessly at the fire burning near the tent opening. It was late afternoon and Rosecrans had done little but mope around his command tent all day. He had bestirred himself only to work on his map.

  The loss of his trusted aide and friend Julius Garesche was still fresh on his mind, weighing everything down. If not for the stress of the hour, he might have withdrawn entirely into himself and spent his time in solitude and prayer. Rosecrans fancied himself a God’s general—able to kill without mercy hundreds and thousands of the enemy without a single worry about his soul but also able to quote Scripture and show himself to be a man of stalwart heart. His army had not been idle, but with his plans for taking the offensive wrecked, he had no further plans to try again. Other than throwing Van Cleve’s division back across the ford where it had been the morning of the 31st December, Rosecrans was simply waiting.

  The enemy had tried once to turn his left flank again, and the Round Forest had been traded back and forth. Aside from that, all had been quiet. Too quiet. An uneasy peace had settled in, and Rosecrans was confused by it.

  Finally stirring himself from his seat, Rosecrans stood over his camp table, leaning heavily upon it with both hands, and stared at the penciled markings.

  “Why does he not advance?” Rosecrans blurted out after some minutes of silently poring over his topographic engineer’s masterpiece of a map. He had spent all day on it, penciling in the cedar growths, fussing over the roads, and getting the placement down to the nearest one thousand feet. He’d lost himself in that map. It was his cathartic exercise, working out the demons of Garesche’s death and the near disaster of the day before. If he could, he would have charted the piles of dead left behind in the retreat. Bragg’s army had executed a great slaughter in their last bid to force the Union army from the Nashville pike. The dead and wounded left out overnight were witness to this. Despite that, the enemy was still far superior in force—much too superior to have lingered without organizing the final blow. And yet that was what they had done.

  “Waiting for reinforcements?” postulated his new aide-de-camp, Captain Frank Bond of Connecticut.

  “Bragg could be getting reinforcements by rail from Chattanooga and Atlanta, but we’ve not heard any sign of rail traffic rolling along the line we do hold. No engine smoke or whistles.” Rosecrans shook his head. “No, if he is being reinforced, they are coming by the Franklin pike from Chattanooga.”

  “Sir, General Negley reports he has sent Miller’s and Hazen’s brigades to the hill on the left overlooking the ford in the river, and Captain Mendenhall is asking permission to concentrate division artillery on the hill as well. The 3rd Battalion Pioneers have also been moved back to the hill as ordered.”

  Bond read off a checklist of the aggregate communications that had come to his attention. Normally Rosecrans would have intercepted each communication and insisted that he respond to each, but this morning he had been content to let his new aide reply.

  “Does Crittenden think the enemy is building up on our left?” Rosecrans asked listlessly.

  “Crittenden does not say, sir. Just requests permission to concentrate his available guns above the good ford. We have brought up more batteries from Nashville and transferred two from Triune overnight. They are on the field now in the center.”

  “With Wheeler still out there in our rear, I dare not weaken Triune or La Vergne too much. He has caused us much trouble along our supply line. And Pegram’s cavalry? Is he still on our far left flank?”

  “No indication Pegram has moved from the enemy’s right flank along the Lebanon pike. We think he is still in place, and Wharton’s cavalry on our right flank. Wheeler seems to have been given free rein to move about our rear.”

  Rosecrans had taken a seat upon a stool and was slumped down into it, his chin on his chest as he stared out through the tent flap. “The moves on our right flank yesterday; what was the estimated strength?”

  “Three brigades, sir, Cleburne’s division. They didn’t get much past the road. They moved back into the cedar brake.”

  “But they didn’t push forward with more?” Rosecrans asked rhetorically. “And we know nothing about what Bragg is bringing up from Chattanooga?”

  This time he gave Bond a quizzical look that invited response.

  “No, sir. Minty’s cavalry has been unable to penetrate the rear of Bragg’s army to see what his intentions have been or if he is preparing to abandon the town. Wharton and Pegram have kept the screen pretty tight.”

  Rosecrans shook his head. “General Stanley has his troopers escorting supplies along the Nashville pike, not pushing into the enemy rear. We’ve identified three brigades of cavalry, and we know Forrest is off in Kentucky. Stanley needs to be more aggressive with his horse!” He said this last with some vehemence, the first indication today that he had anything of life left in him.

  “Sir, do you want to order General Kennett to move a brigade to press the Franklin pike?” Bond asked tentatively. General David Stanley was in command of Rosecrans’s cavalry, but General John Kennett was in command of the two brigades of Union horse under both Colonel Lewis Zham and Colonel Robert Minty. So far Stanley had been more an interference than a strategist, and Kennett had been perfunctory.

  “No, Zham has his hands full, and some of these regiments of Tennessee volunteers are worthless for anything but looking the part. No, I will not alter the course of Stanley’s plans today.” Rosecrans slumped back into his chair.

  Suddenly sitting straight up, bolt upright, Rosecrans waited a moment and then said, “Have Van Cleve prepare to advance tomorrow if the enemy does nothing today. Move the 1st Battalion Pioneers to the upper bridge over Stone’s River to repair it, and have Negley’s division prepare to cr
oss the ford behind Van Cleve. We’ll move Wood’s division to the left and push across the repaired bridge. Send both Pioneer battalions to the area of the destroyed bridge and the 3rd Battalion to finish leveling the good ford to support wheeled traffic.”

  “And if Bragg does do something today?” Bond asked.

  “It is already two p.m. o’clock. Bragg would have done something by now if he was going to. We have opportunity to do something tomorrow. He is weakest on his right flank, unless he has strengthened it overnight, so we will maintain our ground here and push on his right again.”

  Rosecrans finished dictating and lapsed back into thought, though he maintained his upright posture in the chair. As Bond busied himself writing out the orders, Rosecrans looked as if he might any moment leap up and resume his usual activity. Chewing absently at the whiskers that drooped over his upper lip, the general held his posture for some minutes before easing back.

  “Yes, I believe we have avoided another bloody day. It is time to get this army moving again,” Rosecrans said with an air of satisfaction. “If we can take and hold that destroyed bridge and repair it, we can force Bragg to deal with Thomas’s corps moving on his right wing. Bragg may have given us the keys to Murfreesboro after all.”

  He finished with a satisfied smile. “Bond?”

  “Sir?” The captain dropped his pencil.

  “I think I’ll have supper now.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What did Thomas report of this morning’s cannonade?” Rosecrans asked.

  “No movement of the enemy, though they did concentrate on the heights above the good ford,” Bond replied sardonically. Rosecrans had read the communications earlier in the noontime and was well aware of what his commanders thought was going on. Was the general just asking rhetorical questions, or did he really not remember?