Under Siege! (6 page)

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

T
hat 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.

E
LSEWHERE IN
V
ICKSBURG
, 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?”