THE LAST STAND MADE BY THE CONFEDERATE LINE.
General Beauregard at Shiloh Chapel sending his aides to the corps commanders with orders to begin the retreat. This was at two o’clock on Monday. The tents are part of Sherman’s camp, which was reoccupied by him Monday evening.
GeneralBreekinridge, with the rear-guard, bivouacked that night not more than two miles from Shiloh. He withdrew three miles farther on the 8th, and there remained for several days without being menaced.
Our loss in the two days was heavy, reaching 10,699.*
The field was left in the hands of our adversary, as also some captured guns, which were not taken away for want of horses, but in exchange we carried off at least 80 pieces of his artillery, with 26 stands of colors, and nearly 3000 prisoners of war; also a material acquisition of small arms and accouterments which our men had obtained on Sunday instead of their inferior weapons.
* See General Grant’s remarks on page 57.
corps commanders to prepare to retreat from the field, first making a show, however, at different points of resuming the offensive. These orders were executed, I maysay, withno small skill, andthe Confederate army began to retire at 2.30 p. M. without apparently the least perception on the part of the enemy that such a movement was going on. There was no flurry, no haste shown by officers or men; the spirit of all was admirable. Stragglers dropped into line; the caissons of the batteries were loaded up with rifles; and when the last of our troops had passed to the rear of the covering force, from the elevated ground it occupied, and which commanded a wide view, not a Federal regiment or even a detachment of cavalry was anywhere to be seen as early as 4 p. m.
his brigades. Rousseau reached the field by water, at daylight, while two other brigades of the same division (McCook’s) were close at hand. Thus, at the instant when the battle was opened we had to face at least 23,000 fresh troops, including 3 battalions of regulars, with at least 48 pieces of artillery. On the Confederate side there was not a man who had not taken part in the battle of the day before. The casualties of that day had not been under 6500 officers and men, independent of stragglers; consequently not more than 20,000 infantry could be mustered that morning. The Army of the Ohio in General Buell’s hands had been made exceptionally well-trained soldiers for that early period of the war.
The extreme Federal right was occupied by General Lew Wallace’s division, while the space intervening between it and Rousseau’s brigade was filled with from 5000 to 7000 men gathered during the night and in the early morning from General Grant’s broken organizations.
After exchanging some shots with Forrest’s cavalry, Nelson’s division was confronted with a composite force embracing Chalmers’s brigade, Moore’s Texas Regiment, with other parts of Withers’s division; also the Crescent Regiment of New Orleans and the 26th Alabama, supported by well-posted batteries, and so stoutly was Nelson received that his division had to recede somewhat. Advancing again, however, about 8 o’clock, now reinforced by Hazen’s brigade, it was our turn to retire with the loss of a battery. But rallying and taking the offensive, somewhat reinforced, the Confederates were able to recover their lost ground and guns, inflicting a sharp loss on Hazen’s brigade, that narrowly escaped capture. Ammen’s brigade was also seriously pressed and must have been turned but for the opportune arrival and effective use of Terrill’s regular battery of McCook’s division.
In the mean time Crittenden’s division became involved in the battle, but was successfully kept at bay for several hours by the forces under Hardee and Breckinridge, until it was reinforced by two brigades of McCook’s division, which had been added to the attacking force on the field after the battle had been joined, the force of fresh troops being thus increased by at least five thousand men. Our troops were being forced to recede, but slowly; it was not, however, until we were satisfied that we had now to deal with at least three of Buell’s divisions as well as with General Lew Wallace’s, that I determined to yield the field in the face of so manifestly profitless a combat.
By 1 o’clock General Bragg’s forces on our left, necessarily weakened by the withdrawal of a part of his troops to reinforce our right and center, had become so seriously pressed that he called for aid. Some remnants of Louisiana, Alabama, and Tennessee regiments were gathered up and sent forward to support him as best they might, and I went with them personally. General Bragg, now taking the offensive, pressed his adversary back. This was about 2 p. M. My headquarters were still at Shiloh Church.
The odds of fresh troops alone were now too great to justify the prolongation of the conflict. So, directing Adjutant-General Jordan to select at once a proper position in our near rear, and there establish a covering force including artillery, I despatched my staff with directions to the several
64
CONFEDERATE SHARPSHOOTERS.
THE SECOND DAY’S FIGHTING AT SHILOH.
BY G. T. BEAUREGARD, GENERAL, C. S. A.
After the death oi General Albert Sidney Johnston, General Beauregard took command.
... Of the second day’s battle my sketch shall be very brief. It began with daylight, and this time Buell’s army was the attacking force.
Our widely scattered forces, which it had been impossible to organize in the night after the late hour at which they were drawn out of action, were gathered in hand for the exigency as quickly as possible. Generals Bragg, Hardee, and Breckinridge hurried to their assigned positions—Hardee, now to the extreme right, where were Chalmers’s and Jackson’s brigades of Bragg’s corps; General Bragg to the left, where were assembled brigades and fragments of his own troops, as also of Clark’s division, Polk’s corps, with Trabue’s brigade of Kentuckians; Breckinridge was on the left of Hardee. This left a vacant space to be occupied by General Polk, who during the night had gone with Cheatham’s division back nearly to Hardee’s position on the night of the 5th of April. But just at the critical time, to my great pleasure, General Polk came upon the field with that essential division.
By 7 p. M. the night before, all of Nelson’s division had been thrown across the Tennessee, and during the night had been put in position between General Grant’s disarrayed forces and our own; Crittenden’s division, carried from Savannah by water and disembarked at midnight, was forced through the mob of demoralized soldiers that thronged the riverside and established half a mile in advance, to the left of Nelson. Lew Wallace’s division of General Grant’s army also had found its way after dark on the 6th across Snake Creek from Crump’s Landing to the point near the bridge where General Sherman had rallied the remains of two of