The loss of Vicksburg and the simultaneous
defeat at Gettysburg made the South’s
demise almost inevitable, but the rest of
1863 did not see constant Union success.CLEAR PASSAGE
Port Hudson, the last Confederate outpost on
the Mississippi, fell on July 9. Unarmed Union
ships could now sail from St. Louis to the sea.JOHNSTON SLIPS AWAY
Johnston hoped to lure Union forces into a
frontal assault against his prepared positions
at Jackson. Instead, Sherman began encircling
Johnston’s army. On July 16, Johnston made a
masterly withdrawal and escaped.CHICKAMAUGA AND CHATTANOOGA
Union forces next went on the offensive in
eastern Tennessee. Though they captured
Chattanooga, they were defeated at
Chickamauga in September 1863 and then
besieged 210–13 ❯❯. They were relieved only
after Grant was appointed to command.ENDURING CONFEDERATE SYMPATHIES
So humiliating was the capture of Vicksburg that
it was not until the 1930s that its citizens again
formally celebrated the 4th of July.AFTER
THE VICKSBURG CAMPAIGNthe east of the city but blocked by seven
Federal divisions under Sherman, had
grown to 30,000 men in a matter of
weeks, but many were inexperienced
troops or untested conscripts. Worse,
their commander was hesitant to attack
the numerically superior Yankees.
The Confederates try to fight back
At the end of June, under immense
pressure from a frantic Jefferson Davis,
Johnston feebly probed with his five
divisions against Sherman, but with
no result. A more serious attempt had
been made in early June by General
Richard Taylor, in command of
Louisiana’s Confederate forces.
However, Taylor had even fewer troops
than Johnston and was stopped cold at
Milliken’s Bend, a fortified Federal
supply depot north of Vicksburg.
Among the defenders at Milliken’s
Bend were several regiments of freshly
trained black troops, who fought
desperately against their attackers.
Taylor’s infuriated men shouted, “No
quarter!” as they stormed forward.
They succeeded in capturing several
dozen of their enemy (some of whom
were later sold into slavery), before
being driven off.
Tightening the noose
Within Vicksburg, as the realization
set in that Johnston and Taylor were
not coming to their relief, the city’s
defenders lost the high morale they
had in May, along with their physical
strength. Grant wired Washington:
“The fall of Vicksburg and the capture
of most of the garrison can only be a
question of time.” Every day
Union dugouts
The Union forces used siege tactics at Vicksburg,
building trenches and dugouts and tunneling under the
Southern lines. Here troops of Logan’s Union division
are seen near the “White House,” northeast of the town.
Pemberton’s soldiers grew weaker; by
the end of June, almost half were on
regimental sick lists.
Consulting with his generals, the
Confederate commander confirmed
his suspicions that a breakout
attack would certainly fail. He was
determined to hold out, however,
despite the long odds, confident
that some event outside his
entrenchments would either draw
Grant away or force him to lift the
siege. On June 28, Pemberton received
a letter signed by a group of enlisted
men declaring that, “If you can’t feed
us, you had better surrender us,horrible as the idea is ...” He knew the
game was up. The letter threatened
mutiny and mass desertion if he failed
to see General Grant to discuss terms.
On July 3, the same day that
Pickett’s Charge was repulsed at
Gettysburg, John C. Pemberton, the
Pennsylvania-born Southern general,
met with Ulysses S. Grant, the former
Illinois leather tanner, and agreed to
surrender his army. Grant wanted
to make the terms “unconditional
surrender” as before, but soon realized
that 30,000 Rebel prisoners headed
north would swamp Union logistical
capacity in the area. He therefore
paroled every one of Pemberton’s men,
fully expecting to fight some of them
again. Indeed, well over half of
Vicksburg’s captured defenders broke
their parole. In fact, some were in
action again with the Confederate
army later in 1863.Federal jubilation
On July 4, 1863, Union troops marched
into the city. One soldier wrote, “This
was the most glorious Fourth I ever
spent.” Despite the feelings of pride in
their hearts, Grant’s victors displayed
compassion and restraint to their
erstwhile foes, sharing provisions withRefuge from the siege
Many of the civilian population of Vicksburg abandoned
their homes because of the incessant bombardments
from Union river gunboats, and took refuge in caves dug
into the hillsides. Only a handful of Vicksburg civilians
died from enemy action.“Grant is my man and I am his
for the rest of the war.”
ABRAHAM LINCOLN, AFTER THE FALL OF VICKSBURGThe number of
Confederate
troops who surrendered at Vicksburg.
The two sides each lost about 10,000
killed and wounded in the campaign.29,495
starving soldiers and civilians alike. One
woman, watching the victorious Union
troops, observed these “stalwart,
well-fed men” and contrasted them
with the city’s emaciated former
defenders, who had been “blindly
dashed” against them.Confederate loss, Union gain
In Richmond, Jefferson Davis blamed
the loss on Pemberton, and to a slightly
lesser extent, Johnston. In Washington,
a grateful Abraham Lincoln waxed,
“The Father of Waters [the Mississippi]
again goes unvexed to the sea.”
The fall of Vicksburg split the
Confederacy irrevocably into two
and ensured that cattle, metals, and
grains from the Trans-Mississippi
region would rarely again find their
way to the Rebel states east of the
river. Grant captured precious heavy
cannon that the Confederacy could no
longer replace, and the surrender of
almost 30,000 men was a heavy blow
to a South running out of manpower.
Most significantly, the Union forces
could now concentrate their efforts,
and their growing numerical strength,
against the remaining Confederate
strongholds farther east.