SHILOH REVIEWED.

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advance of Major-General Buell’s column (a part of the division under General Nelson) arrived,the two generals named both being present. An advance was immediately made upon thepoint of attack and the enemy soon driven back. In this repulse, much is due to the presenceof the gun-boats Tyler and Lexington , and their able commanders, Captains Gwin and Shirk.”

My own official report is to the same effect. In a calm review of thebattle, not unfriendly to General Grant, and written some years after theoccurrence, General Hurlbut said:

“ About 6 p. M. this movement (for a final attack at the landing) was reported to GeneralHurlbut. He at once took measures to change the front of 2 regiments, or parts of regiments,of which the 55th Illinois was one, and to turn 6 pieces of artillery to bear upon the pointof danger. At that instant, he being near the head of the Landing road, General Grant cameup from the river, closely followed by Ammen’s brigade of Nelson’s division. Information ofthe expected attack was promptly given, and two of Ammen’s regiments deployed into line, movedrapidly forward, and after a few sharp exchanges of volleys from them, the enemy fell back, andthe bloody series of engagements of Sunday at Pittsburg Landing closed with that last repulse.”

The reports of all the officers who took part in the action at the landing, Nel-son, Ammen, and the regimental commanders, fully sustain the main point inthese accounts, and are totally at variance with General Grant’s statement inhis ‘‘Century” ai'ticle [see page 465], I have myself never described the attackat the landing as “ a desperate effort ” of the enemy; but I have said that thecondition of affairs at that point made the occasion critical. We know fromthe Confederate reports that the attack was undertaken by Jackson’s andChalmers’s brigades as above stated; that the reserve artillery could effectnothing against the attacking force under the shelter of Dill’s ravine; thatthe fire of the gun-boats was equally harmless on account of the elevationwhich it was necessary to give the guns in order to clear the top of the bluff;and that the final assault, owing to the show of resistance, was delayed.Jackson’s brigade made its advance without cartridges. When they came tothe crest of the hill and found the artillery supported by infantry, theyshrank from the assault with bayonets alone, and Jackson went in search ofcooperation and support. In the meantime the attack was superseded bythe order of the Confederate commander calling off his troops for the night.The attack was poorly organized, but it was not repelled until Ammen arrived,and it cannot be affirmed under the circumstances that the action of hisbrigade in delaying and repelling the enemy was not of the most vital im-portance. Had the attack been made before Nelson could arrive, with themeans which the enemy had abundantly at hand, it would have succeededbeyond all question.

As fast as Nelson’s division arrived it was formed in line of battle in frontof Grant’s troops, pickets were thrown across Dill’s ravine, and the dawn ofanother day was awaited to begin the second stage in the battle; or, speakingmore correctly, to fight the second battle of Shiloh. Let us in the meantimeexamine more in detail the condition in which the first day had left GeneralGrant’s command, and its prospects unaided for the morrow.

The evidence relied upon to refute the accepted belief in the critical con-dition of General Grant’s command on Sunday evening is of two sorts: first,