738

THE BATTLE OF CORINTH.

was called to Washington to discharge the duties of General-in-chief. He leftthe District of West Tennessee and the territory held in northern Mississippi under the command of General Grant. In August, by Halleck’s orders, Gen-eral Grant sent E. A. Paine’s and Jeff. C. Davis’s divisions across the Ten-nessee to strengthen Buell, who was moving northward through middleTennessee, to meet Bragg. One of these divisions garrisoned Nashville while the other marched with Buell after Bragg into Kentucky .

In the early days of September, after the disaster of the “ Second BullRun, ” the friends of the Union watched with almost breathless anxiety theadvance of Lee into Maryland, of Bragg into Kentucky , and the hurryingof the Army of the Potomac northward from Washington, to get betweenLee and the cities of Washington, Baltimore, and Philadelphia . The suspenselest McClellan should not be in time to head off Lee—lest Buell should notarrive in time to prevent Bragg from taking Louisville or assaulting Cin-cinnati , was fearful.

At this time I was stationed at Corinth with the “ Army of the Mississippi,”having succeeded General Pope in that command on the lltli of June. Wewere in the District of West Tennessee, commanded by General Grant. Underthe idea that I would reenforce Buell, General Sterling Price , who, during Julyand August, had been on the Mobile and Ohio railway near Guntown andBaldwyn, Miss., with 15,000 to 20,000 men, moved up to Iuka about the 12thof September, intending to follow me; and, as he reported, “ finding thatGeneral Rosecrans had not crossed the Tennessee River,” he “ concluded towithdraw from Iuka toward my [his] old encampment.” His “withdrawal”was after the hot battle of Iuka on September 19tli, two days after the battleof Antietam which had caused Lee’s “ withdrawal” from Maryland .

During the month of August General Price had been conferring with Gen-eral Van Dorn, commanding all the Confederate troops in Mississippi exceptPrice ’s, to form a combined movement to expel the Union forces from north-ern Mississippi and western Tennessee , and to plant their flags on the banksof the Lower Ohio, while Bragg was to do the like on that river in Kentucky .General Earl Van Dorn, an able and enterprising commander , after disposinghis forces to hold the Mississippi from Grand Gulf up toward Memphis , latein September, with Lovell’s division, a little over 8000 men, came up to Rip-ley, Mississippi , where, on the 28th of September, he was joined by GeneralPrice, with Hebert’s and Maury’s divisions, numbering 13,803 effectiveinfantry, artillery, and cavalry.

This concentration, following the precipitate “ withdrawal ” of Price fromIuka, portended mischief to the Union forces in west Tennessee , numberingsome forty to fifty thousand effectives, scattered over the district occupyingthe vicinity of the Memphis and Charleston railway from Iuka to Memphis , astretch of about a hundred and fifteen miles, and located at interior positions onthe Ohio and Mississippi from Paducah to Columbus, and at Jackson , Bethel,and other places on the Mississippi Central and Mobile and Ohio railways.

The military features of west Tennessee and northern Mississippi will bereadily comprehended by the reader who will examine a map of that region