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Crittenden’s army, and the fugitives from Donelson. These he reorganizedat Murfreesboro ’ within a week. He saved the most of his valuable storesand munitions, which fully absorbed his railroad transportation to Stevenson,Alabama, and moved his men over the mud roads to Corinth, Mississippi ,by way of Decatur , in a wet and stormy season. Nevertheless, he assembledhis army of 23,000—about 16,000 effectives — at Corinth, on the 25th day ofMarch, full of enthusiasm and the spirit of combat. In the meantime theConfederate Government lent him all the aid in its power, reenforcing himwith an army ten thousand strong, from the Southern coast, under GleneralBraxton Bragg, who had been in command at Pensacola [see note, page 32],and with such arms as could be procured.
General Beauregard has claimed that he raised, concentrated, and organ-ized the army which fought at Shiloh; that he persuaded General Johnston to turn aside from a retreat toward Stevenson and join him at Corinth, andsubstituted an offensive campaign for a defensive one projected by GeneralJohnston; and that he likewise planned the battle of Shiloh, induced Gen-eral Johnston to fight it, and executed all the general movements on the field,and that General Johnston was merely the ostensible commander . I haveelsewhere fully confuted each of these absurd pretenses; and as this rapidsurvey is historical, not controversial, the space at my disposal does not per-mit me to argue here the points involved; I shall, therefore, merely state thefacts, which rest upon unimpeachable contemporary evidence. The finalverdict I am satisfied to leave to the soldiers of both armies who fought there,to the careful analysis of impartial military criticism, or to the ultimate arbit-rament of history.
When the capture of Port Henry separated Tennessee into two distincttheaters of war, General Johnston assigned the district west of the Ten-nessee River to General Beauregard, who had been sent to him for duty.This officer had suddenly acquired a high reputation at the battle of BullRun, and General Johnston naturally intrusted him with a large discre-tion. He sent him with instructions to concentrate all available forcesnear Corinth, a movement previously begun. His own plan was to defendColumbus to the last extremity with a reduced garrison, and withdrawPolk and his army for active movements. Beauregard made the mistake,however, of evacuating Columbus, and making his defense of the Missis-sippi River at Island Number Ten, which proved untenable and soon sur-rendered with a garrison of 6000 or 7000 men. He was ill most of the timeand intrusted the actual command to Bragg , but did what he could fromhis sick-bed.
Besides the reenforcements brought by Bragg , General Beauregard foundin the western district 17,500 effectives under Polk, and at or near Corinth3000 men under Pope Walker and Chalmers, and 5000 under Ruggles sentfrom Louisiana by Lovell. He made eloquent appeals, which brought himseveral regiments more. Thus he had nearly 40,000 men collected for him,10,000 of whom he disposed in river defenses, and the remainder to pro-tect the railroads from Grant’s force which was concentrating at Pittsburg