May 30, Saturday. I am surprised at the loose and improper management of General Dix in regard to the blockade and traffic in the Rebel region. Admiral Lee has sent me, yesterday and to-day, some strange permits for trade signed by Dix, wholly unauthorized and which cannot in sincerity and good faith be allowed.
Thursday, May 30, 2013
30th May (Saturday).—It rained hard all last night, but General Polk’s tent proved itself a good one. We have prayers both morning and evening, by Dr Quintard, together with singing, in which General Polk joins with much zeal. Colonel Gale, who is son-in-law and volunteer aide-de-camp to General Polk, has placed his negro Aaron and a mare at my disposal during my stay.
General Polk explained to me, from a plan, the battle of Murfreesborough. He claimed that the Confederates had only 30,000 troops, including Breckenridge’s division, which was not engaged on the first day. He put the Confederate loss at 10,000 men, and that of the Yankees at 19,000. With regard to the battle of Shiloh, [1] he said that Beauregard’s order to retire was most unfortunate, as the gunboats were doing no real harm, and if they (the Confederates) had held on, nothing could have saved the Federals from capture or destruction. The misfortune of Albert Johnston’s death, together with the fact of Beauregard’s illness and his not being present at that particular spot, were the causes of this battle not being a more complete victory. Ever since I landed in America, I had heard of the exploits of an Englishman called Colonel, who is now Inspector-General of Cavalry to Bragg’s army. This afternoon I made his acquaintance, and I consider him one of the most extraordinary characters I ever met. Although he is a member of a well-known English family, he seems to have devoted his whole life to the exciting career of a soldier of fortune. He told me that in early life he had served three years in a French lancer regiment, and had risen from a private to be a sous-lieutenant. He afterwards became a sort of consular agent at Tangier, under old Mr Drummond Hay. Having acquired a perfect knowledge of Arabic, he entered the service of Abd-el-Kader, and under that renowned chief he fought the French for four years and a half. At another time of his life he fitted out a yacht, and carried on a private war with the ERiff pirates. He was brigade-major in the Turkish contingent during the Crimean war, and had some employment in the Indian mutiny. He has also been engaged in war in Buenos Ayres and the South American republics. At an early period of the present troubles he ran the blockade and joined the Confederates. He was adjutant-general and right-hand man to the celebrated John Morgan for eight months. Even in this army, which abounds with foolhardy and desperate characters, he has acquired the admiration of all ranks by his reckless daring and gallantry in the field. Both Generals Polk and Bragg spoke to me of him as a most excellent and useful officer, besides being a man who never lost an opportunity of trying to throw his life away. He is just the sort of man to succeed in this army, and among the soldiers his fame for bravery has outweighed his unpopularity as a rigid disciplinarian. He is the terror of all absentees, stragglers, and deserters, and of all commanding officers who are unable to produce for his inspection the number of horses they have been drawing forage for. He looks about forty-five, but in reality he is fifty-six. He is rather tall, thin, very wiry and active, with a jovial English expression of countenance ; but his eyes have a wild, roving look, which is common amongst the Arabs. When he came to me he was dressed in an English staff blue coat, and he had a red cavalry forage-cap, which latter, General Polk told me, he always wore in action, so making himself more conspicuous. He talked to me much about John Morgan, whose marriage he had tried to avert, and of which he spoke with much sorrow. He declared that Morgan was enervated by matrimony, and would never be the same man as he was. He said that in one of the celebrated telegraph tappings in Kentucky, Morgan, the operator, and himself, were seated for twelve hours on a clay-bank during a violent storm, but the interest was so intense, that the time passed like three hours[2] General Polk’s son, a young artillery lieutenant, told me this evening that “Stonewall Jackson” was a professor at the military school at Lexington, in which he was a cadet. “Old Jack” was considered a persevering but rather dull master, and was often made a butt of by cheeky cadets, whose great ambition it was to irritate him, but, however insolent they were, he never took the slightest notice of their impertinence at the time, although he always had them punished for it afterwards. At the outbreak of the war, he was called upon by the cadets to make a speech, and these were his words: ‘Soldiers make short speeches: be slow to draw the sword in civil strife, but when you draw it, throw away the scabbard.” Young Polk says that the enthusiasm created by this speech of old Jack’s was beyond description.
[1] Called Pittsburg Landing and Corinth.
[2] This was the occasion, when they telegraphed such a quantity of nonsense to the Yankee general, receiving valuable information in return, and such necessary stores by train as Morgan was in need of.
30th. Rained last night. Eleven prisoners came in at 9 A. M. Pickets captured. Soon after 22 others. Kautz went to the forks before halting. Crossed at 2 A. M. and hastened towards Monticello, sending Detachments to the different fords to capture pickets. “E” and “C” covered the retreat. Skirmished a good deal. 20 to 40 rounds. I feel about the same, quite feverish and chilly at times.
Saturday, 30th—Came to Mr. Beasley’s and staid all night.
May 30—We see the Yankees in balloons every day, reconnoitering our lines.
Before Vicksburg, Saturday, May 30. Warm and dull. Nothing to do and nothing to read so lay down and slept most of the day. Awake at 10 o’clock at night with orders to hitch up, and at quarter to eleven o’clock the pieces and limbers started to the left and front, down through the valley, past sutler shops and baggage wagons, then up a steep bluff, where it required five teams to haul the pieces up; then passed through the advance line of artillery and through a passage dug in the hill, hiding us from view for about six rods, then down into an abrupt ravine. The cannoneers obliged to hold back with prolongs to keep it [the piece] from running down unmanageable.
We were soon at the bottom of the ravine. On the top of the hill the pieces were to be planted. It was 3 A. M. when the artillery on each side and behind us opened a hot cannonading over our heads, grazing the top of the hill so close that we dared not go in position, and we lay at the bottom while they whistled and screeched over our heads. The fiery track of the fuze-shell could easily be tracked through the dark, and the roar of pieces as they echoed was deafening for half an hour, when we put our pieces in position, took the limber under the hill and unhitched.
May 30th. Commences with pleasant weather. This morning, early, sent the body of Michael Walsh, marine, on shore for burial; he died at ten o’clock in the evening of yesterday, after a brief illness. During the afternoon of this day the steamer General Price, of upper fleet, came down from Vicksburg, bringing a mail for us, and the information that Major-General Grant is fighting hard at Vicksburg, and gaining ground; at four forty-five P. M., the General Price started back up the river, taking our mail; at eleven fifteen the mortar fleet below opened fire upon Port Hudson.
May 30 — Day dawned and the sun rose in its undimmed splendor this morning and all is quiet and still around old Vicksburg — not even the firing of a gun can be heard around our line. Those boats spoken of yesterday are still in sight above town — anchored out. 7 o’clock p.m. Mortars shelling us from the other side of the river and the gunboat dropping a shell occasionally from below.
May 30.—This morning, at about half-past ten, the rebels attacked a train of sixteen cars from Alexandria, loaded with forage, about a mile and a half from Kettle Run, toward Warrenton Junction, Va. The Third brigade, under Colonel De Forrest, was stationed at Kettle Run, and the pickets were first notified of the enemy’s presence by hearing heavy firing. A force was immediately sent in the direction of the firing, but too late to save the train, which was utterly demolished, the locomotive being pierced by two six-pound cannon-balls.—(Doc. 203.)
—Great excitement existed at Harper’s Ferry, Md., and its vicinity, on account of the reported approach of the rebel General Lee, with a view of entering Maryland.—The Thirtieth regiment of New York volunteers, under the command of Colonel William M. Searing, returned to Albany from the seat of war.—A rebel camp near Carthage, Tenn., was surprised by a party of the Twenty-sixth Ohio regiment, who captured twenty-two prisoners, and thirty-five horses, besides destroying all the camp equipage.— Cincinnati Commercial.
—A large meeting was held at Newark, N. J., “by the Democracy of that city, to express their opposition to the recent arrest and banishment of Mr. Vallandigham. There were six thousand persons present, and the sentiments uttered by the various speakers were heartily applauded.” Speeches were made by A. J. Rogers, Eli P. Norton, Judge A. R. Speer, and General Theodore Runyon.—New-York Daily News.
—The town of Tappahannock, on the right bank of the Rappahannock River, Va., was this day captured by four Union gunboats. A party of troops landed and carried off and destroyed a large amount of rebel stores, etc. They also captured a large quantity of personal property, and a number of negroes.
by John Beauchamp Jones
MAY 30TH—The newspapers have a dispatch, to-day, from Jackson, Miss., which says the enemy have fallen back from the position lately occupied by them in front of Vicksburg, It adds, that they will be forced to retire to the Big Black River, for want of water. Gen. G. A. Smith, who is here, and who resigned because he was not made lieutenant-general instead of Pemberton, says he “don’t know how to read this dispatch.” Nevertheless, it is generally believed, and affords much relief to those who appreciate the importance of Vicksburg.
Mr. Botts was offered $500 in Confederate States notes, the other day, for a horse. He said he would sell him for $250 in gold, but would not receive Confederate notes, as the South would certainly be conquered, and it was merely a question of time. This information was communicated to the Secretary of War to-day, but he will attach no importance to it.
Among the papers sent in by the President, to-day, was a communication from Gov. Vance, of North Carolina, inclosing a letter from Augustus S. Montgomery, of Washington City, to Major-Gen. Foster, Newbern, N. C., found in a steamer, captured the other day by our forces, in Albemarle and Chesapeake Canal. It informed Gen. F. that a plan of servile insurrection had been adopted, and urged his co-operation. All the Yankee generals in the South would co-operate: they were to send smart negroes from the camps among the slaves, with instructions to rise simultaneously at night on the 1st August. They were to seize and destroy all railroad bridges, cut the telegraph wires, etc., and then retire into the swamps, concealing themselves until relieved by Federal troops. It is said they were to be ordered to shed no blood, except in self-defense, and they were not to destroy more private property than should be unavoidable. The writer said the corn would be in the roasting-ear, and the hogs would be running at large, so that the slaves could easily find subsistence.
The President thanked Gov. Vance for this information, and said our generals would be made acquainted with this scheme ; and he commended the matter to the special attention of the Secretary of War, who sent it to Gen. Lee.
