Loring stood now, and Pemberton dreaded this, knew that Loring would choose the opposite position from anything Pemberton believed.
William Loring had much the same background as Pemberton, experience in the Seminole Wars, had lost an arm in Mexico, and had begun his service to the Confederacy in the East. But Loring had an indiscreet temper and seemed to relish controversy, so much so that the year before, a sharp disagreement between Loring and Stonewall Jackson had cost Loring his command in Virginia. To placate Stonewall, Loring had been sent to Mississippi. If Loring was disagreeable by nature, he was Pemberton’s problem now.
“All I know is that the commanding general of this department has ordered this army to attack the enemy’s rear. I believe we should do precisely that. Or does our commanding general wish to record his views that disobedience is the better course?”
Loring kept his feet, stared hard at Pemberton, the tiresome defiance that Pemberton did not need. Pemberton looked at the others, saw faces turning to Loring, a mix of reactions in their expressions. Pemberton struggled with the energy to combat Loring’s typical hostility.
“Is General Loring aware that if we continue eastward toward Clinton, we are increasing the distance between ourselves and Vicksburg? And if there is a full Federal division to the south at Dillon’s Plantation, any farther advance to the east would put those troops on our flank, or even to our rear. By our offensive actions, we could be providing an opportunity for the enemy to cause us some embarrassment.”
Loring seemed to sneer, and gazed at the others, as though measuring his support.
“I can read a map, General. I have no doubt that Colonel Adams’s scouts have performed their duty, and so we know that the main body of the enemy is to the east, moving on the capital. I, for one, choose to obey a direct order from General Johnston. Assaulting the enemy from behind could aid our cause immeasurably. What else must we discuss?”
Pemberton felt his heat rising.
“I have every confidence in Colonel Adams. As you just heard, the enemy, General Sherman in particular, does not seem to be resting carelessly in Clinton with four divisions, contrary to what General Johnston asks us to believe. We know there is an engagement at Jackson, and yet our orders remain as they have been: Attack the enemy’s rear at Clinton. We do not know if anyone is in Clinton. What we do know is that the longer we remain distant from Vicksburg, the greater the risk that we lose the one strategic location I have been ordered to defend.”
Loring seemed to ignore the force of Pemberton’s concerns, still looked at the others. Adams stood now and said, “I assure everyone here that the reports from my cavalry are accurate. I only suffer the disadvantage of numbers, as you all know. But we have made our best effort to keep a watchful eye on the enemy’s movements. It is possible that we have an opportunity at Dillon’s Plantation. If a single Federal division is isolated there, they cannot believe they are under any threat. That could provide the opportunity to carry out General Johnston’s order in the most practicable way. Destroying a Federal division would certainly have a negative effect on General Grant’s zeal for campaigning. We do know he is being closely watched by his superiors in Washington.”
Loring seemed to have far more respect for Adams than he did Pemberton, and Pemberton saw a slight nod. Pemberton said, “My preference is to withdraw back to the safety of the Big Black and await developments to our front. I understand that would place me in direct disobedience to General Johnston. Do any of you not see the wisdom of adhering to our primary mission of protecting Vicksburg?”
Loring pointed toward him with his single arm.
“Your mission? Mine is to defeat the enemy, wherever he may be.”
“Yours is to obey your commander.”
“My commander is General Johnston. Who is yours?”
Pemberton clenched his fists, knew this was a battle he could not win. The eyes of the men around him gave the message clearly, that a majority favored advancing eastward. General Stevenson rose now, seemed to be a calming influence on Loring, aimed a hard stare that silenced him, then Stevenson said, “Sir, it is quite likely that, through no fault of his own, General Johnston’s orders are too far removed from current conditions. The enemy is most likely not in Clinton, as you say. All reports indicate a sharp engagement is taking place at Jackson. Thus, with our forces already out here, east of the Big Black, and with the enemy now making their assault on the capital, perhaps we should use the opportunity presented us to march southward, and drive a strong wedge through the Federal supply lines. If General Grant cannot supply his army, he will have no choice but to reconsider his entire campaign. General Johnston can find no fault with that, surely. Inflicting damage upon the enemy is our primary goal, sir. As deeply as you hold to the notion of defending Vicksburg, I would offer that defeating Grant accomplishes that goal in the best way possible.”
Pemberton glanced back at Waddy, who stood near the closed doorway.
“The map, please, Colonel.”
Waddy stepped forward and unrolled a thick piece of paper. Pemberton studied for a long moment, the others in the room continuing their own discussion, a low-pitched debate. His eye traced the flow of the Big Black, the network of roads that led up from Grand Gulf, any one of them a potential avenue for Grant’s wagon trains. And all of them taking his army that much farther from Vicksburg.
“Am I correct that the majority of you desire to march this army eastward?”
There were murmurs, most of the men agreeing to follow Johnston’s orders, whether they had been made obsolete or not. He felt a sharp wave of uncertainty, a raging argument digging into him from the variety of opinions in the room. I cannot abandon Vicksburg, he thought. And yet, we must seek opportunity to destroy the enemy.
“This is still my command. I will not submit blindly to instructions from General Johnston that do not take into account our uncertainties. The risks are far too great. General Stevenson, though I appreciate your counsel, marching more to the south adds risk as well. We do not know the exact disposition of General McClernand’s forces. We could open ourselves to a flank assault from that quarter that could devastate us piecemeal.”
Loring assumed the defiance again.
“Then you would have us turn tail and scamper back to Vicksburg? At the very least, I would submit to General Stevenson’s suggestion. Maneuver with an eye toward damaging the enemy must be our goal. Should we do as you propose, and abandon this position, we would be leaving General Johnston to his fate.”
Loring stopped abruptly, and Pemberton heard a mumble from some of the others, knew what they were thinking. Leaving Johnston to his fate. Yes, the act of a man who would prefer to see his army defeated. The act of a traitor.
After lengthy discussion, debate and argument, the council of war concluded just before dark. The disagreements continued, a variety of opinions, some favoring Stevenson’s plan to jab southward, possibly severing Grant’s supply line to the Mississippi River. Others continued to insist that an attack as Johnston had ordered might be essential to the protection of the capital city, and that Johnston’s very survival could depend on that kind of assistance. In the end, Pemberton had to choose, to issue the order that would decide just what these men did. The only decision he could muster was something of a compromise that satisfied no one. Thus far, in every engagement since Grant’s crossing of the Mississippi, the Confederates had been outnumbered. Now a vigorous assault on the single Federal division at Dillon’s Plantation could push the pendulum the other way. Whether Johnston would approve such a move was anyone’s guess.
Just prior to dark, Pemberton sent his wire, giving Johnston details of just what the army was intending to do. Whether that wire could get through to the capital, no one really knew. When Johnston did learn of Pemberton’s decision, it mattered little. The fight for Jackson had ended hours before Pemberton’s council of war, Johnston’s troops abandoning the city completely. Though Johnston issued Pemberton another order, that the
two men join their forces at the town of Clinton, west of Jackson, it was hardly a practical plan, since neither man knew the exact location of the Federal army. With the Federal occupation of Jackson completed, an entire corps, McPherson’s men, had begun their move back out on the very road that connected Jackson and Clinton. But Johnston’s orders were specific once more, that Pemberton continue his march eastward, giving Pemberton every expectation that Johnston somehow had a route open to complete a rendezvous, adding several thousand men to Pemberton’s forces. Despite those assurances, a mild tonic to Pemberton’s uncertainty, Johnston was instead marching his men out of Jackson to the northeast—in the opposite direction.
For a larger version of this map, click here.
The arguments continued the following day, May 15, and despite a variety of opinions, no one was certain just what the best strategy should be. Pemberton continued to wage that war in his own mind, mindful that every mile marched out beyond the Big Black was one more mile they would have to retrace should Vicksburg be attacked. While Pemberton struggled to make a firm decision, the army struggled as well. What was supposed to be an early morning march had instead become a half day’s idleness. The columns were forced to wait, until at long last, the wagon trains carrying precious rations and ammunition reached them after a long march of their own, all the way from Vicksburg.
When they did move, the march was slow and pointless. What some had insisted should be a hard drive to crush the lone Federal division at Dillon’s had instead become a confused stumble by Pemberton’s three divisions across flooded roadways and swollen creeks. The divisions under Loring, Stevenson, and Bowen had taken the same roadway, Loring in the lead, the single narrow route guaranteeing another plodding march. Worse, Pemberton had not ordered Wirt Adams to deploy cavalry scouts to survey the routes immediately to their front, so that when the lead elements of any column arrived at the various crossings, many of those waterways were far too dangerous for troops to ford. In some cases, the head of the main column was forced to halt the march altogether, while behind them, decisions had to be made whether to wait for the flow of water to slacken or to march off in another direction, the attempt to find yet another route that might take them closer to the enemy.
With his troops positioned well south of the rail line that connected Vicksburg to Jackson, Pemberton understood that the most direct route to reach the capital now lay on the road that passed through Raymond. But that route was blocked by the flooded Baker’s Creek. After long hours of shifting their routes, the army finally zigzagged and shoved northeasterly, still intending to reach the goal laid out for them by Joe Johnston, the rail crossing at Clinton. As night fell on the fifteenth, some of Pemberton’s exhausted troops made camp in muddy fields, suffering through the meager rations brought them from Vicksburg. Others, Stevenson’s troops in particular, were forced to march well into the night. With Loring’s division still in the lead, the men were spread out in a confused line, still uncertain where the enemy might be. As Loring’s men built their small fires, skirmishers had been sent to the east, protecting the men from whatever enemy might be probing toward them, patrols or cavalry scouts. As happened so often, those skirmishers found a line of skirmishers from the other side, pushing forward as well. The musket fire was light, scattered, but enough to let everyone on the field know that the two armies might be close to a major confrontation. What Pemberton did not know was that on the roads leading eastward, McClernand’s entire Federal corps had been ordered by Ulysses Grant to push hard toward the rail crossing at Edward’s Station. With nothing to hold them back, McClernand had made the short march in relatively easy fashion, his men well rested, going into camp, brewing coffee, eating their rations. To the north, along the railroad, the road to Clinton was thick with blue as well, the corps of James McPherson passing unmolested through the town. The sight of a vast Federal column caused outrage and dismay from the citizens there, who had cheered the thunderous echoes from the fight at Jackson and had convinced themselves that Grant’s invading horde would be crushed by Joe Johnston’s guns. Instead, that “horde,” more than thirty thousand troops, had received the order most of them knew was coming. Along three parallel routes that drove westward, Grant’s army was on the march toward Vicksburg.
On the night of May 15, the skirmishers continued to probe and take their potshots, while patrols of cavalry engaged in brief clumsy duels with their counterparts, neither side truly knowing how close they were to the bulk of the enemy’s forces. The encampments were barely four miles apart.
Between them lay a farm, to the east of Baker’s Creek. It was one of so many farms that spread across the rolling countryside, and its boundaries included an imposing piece of high ground, a mostly bald hill, crowning a series of ridgelines that offered a panoramic view of the surrounding woodlands and cultivated fields. In the farmhouse close to the hill, a woman hurried about, securing valuables, storing heirlooms in hidden places. She knew something of armies, felt comforted that her husband was close by, a cavalry officer who served Colonel Adams with a cautious eye toward the protection of his own family. Their name was Champion.
NEAR BAKER’S CREEK, SOUTH OF CHAMPION HILL
MAY 16, 1863
He stood outside, staring east, the sun already throwing a bright glow that swept the darkness out of a cloudless sky. His staff had gathered, Waddy close beside him, all of them staring, as he was, toward the first sound they heard. It was artillery.
“Do we know who that is?”
No one responded, and Pemberton searched for his horse, the groom not yet there. He felt his heart racing, stared again where the sounds were coming close, just down the road from his camp, the same camp where Loring had made his temporary headquarters. The cannon fire increased now, a series of hard thumps beyond the woods to his front, and Pemberton couldn’t wait for the horse. He said to Waddy, “Order General Loring to deploy his division in a line of battle!”
“Sir, he has done so. They made their camps in a line along the road. General Loring anticipated—”
“I don’t care what he anticipated. I am more concerned with what is happening right now.”
“Yes, sir. General Tilghman’s brigade has been placed in line near the farmhouse, past that bend in the road.”
Pemberton moved anxiously, shifting his weight, saw the groom, finally bringing the horse close. He jumped up quickly, the animal reacting to the shelling with nervous jumps, the same nervousness rolling through Pemberton.
“Sir! Colonel Adams!”
He saw the cavalryman riding hard, coming up the road from where Loring’s men seemed to know what was happening. Adams will know, too, he thought. He must know.
Adams reined up, a small staff just behind, and jumped down from a horse whose flanks were thickly lathered. Adams saluted and said, “General! The enemy is advancing in force against our picket line! Their artillery is having good effect. General Loring is making preparations to receive them, and requests instructions.”
Pemberton stared down the road, could see smoke rising, a low-hanging fog through the treetops. Loring isn’t requesting anything, he thought. But thank you, Colonel, for at least offering me a show of respect.
The artillery fire seemed to intensify yet again, rippling thunder, more smoke. Pemberton thought of the map, the confusing array of roadways, plantation trails, too many to recall. But the ridgelines were plain, each one a strongpoint, where men could hold to high ground and force the enemy to come at them from rugged terrain below. He looked toward Waddy, saw the aides gathered, expectant, fear in their eyes. The thought flickered through him, that some of these men had never seen the enemy.
“Colonel Waddy! We must learn more of what we are facing! It would be good to speak with General Loring. Colonel Adams, with all respects to you, your service is most valuable when you are out in the field. Please return to your patrols and provide me with reports of the enemy’s movements.”
Adams acknowledged with a silent salute a
nd was quickly gone, his small staff following. Good man, Pemberton thought. Valuable in times like these. I should be more forceful in my requests to General Johnston that we be given more horsemen. They were, after all, taken from me. One more outrage. And Colonel Adams deserves a larger command.
Pemberton brought himself back to the moment, stared down the road, more smoke billowing up, closer, more artillery. Yes, the scouts must move in haste, determine what troops those are, whose skirmishers … I suppose there is more than skirmishing … artillery, of course. But we should know who those people are.
He was surprised to see Loring now, trailed by a color bearer and his usual staff. Loring halted the horse, stared at Pemberton with no emotion, said in a calm voice, “It appears, sir, that the enemy is not intending to await our arrival at a place of our own choosing. My men were unprepared to receive an attack. I have ordered them to form a battle line with all haste, and to deploy the artillery batteries in the most advantageous position. With your permission, of course.”
There was an eerie calm to Loring’s words, and Pemberton saw an odd smile on one of Loring’s officers.
“Yes, of course. Prepare your men to receive an attack. Do we know who that is?”
“It is … the enemy, sir. I have already put General Tilghman’s brigade into motion. They have a commanding position along that ridgeline past those trees.”
“No … they are too close … you must order General Tilghman’s men to pull back, the next ridge to the west. The enemy’s artillery could inflict grave damage.” Loring glanced back, seemed to study the ground in the distance, drifting smoke opening up to reveal the ridge where Pemberton pointed. “There … back there,” Pemberton said. “They will be in a better arrangement.”
“That ridgeline is too exposed, General.”
“But … your men are too close to the enemy’s guns.”