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The following is a true and life-like description
of the battle at the city of Memphis, which will be of interest
to every soldier, and especially to the Seventy-Eighth Ohio:
Events in this quarter have crowded upon each other
so rapidly during the past thirty-six hours, that sufficient time
has hardly elapsed to record one before another followed upon
its heels. Yesterday Fort Pillow was taken possession of by our
forces and the river opened to within five miles of Memphis; to-day
a great battle has been already fought and won, and the city occupied
by national troops.
Yes, Memphis, the commercial metropolis of Tennessee
and a hotbed of the rebellion in the South-west - Memphis, the
city of lying newspapers and fire-eating editors - Memphis, the
rival of Richmond and Charleston in all that is dishonorable,
treasonable and damnable, has fallen at last. With the dust of
its streets clinging to my feet, and surrounded by an atmosphere
tainted with disloyalty - with the magnificent spectacle still
before my eyes, of its entire population huddled together in one
dense mass upon bluffs, anxiously watching the progress of a desperate
naval combat, upon which the fall of the city hung - with the
crashing discharges of artillery, the rattle of small arms and
the explosion of shells still ringing in my ears, I seat myself
to write an account of the events of this morning, among the most
important that have occurred since the war began.
THE BATTLE OF MEMPHIS.
No one believed yesterday that any opposition would
be made to our entry into Memphis, and when Flag-Officer Davis
brought his vessels to anchor five miles above the city between
eight and nine o'clock in the evening, the wonder was expressed
that he did not advance and seize his prize at once. The gas-lights
certainly gleamed triumphantly in the distance, as if beckoning
him on, and two or three times during the night a rosy flash lit
up the back-ground of the sky, giving rise to the fear that the
town had been fired.
No move was made, however, till about five o'clock
this morning, when the Benton and Louisville weighed anchor and
leisurely drifted down with the current to within a mile of the
mouth of Wolf river, which it will be remembered empties into
the Mississippi just above Memphis. Here the rebel fleet, composed
of General Van Dorn, Jeff. Thompson, General Beauregard, General
Bragg, General Lovell, General Price, Sumter and Little Rebel
- eight vessels in all, under command of Captain Edward Montgomery
- was discovered lying close to the Arkansas shore, directly in
front of Memphis. Believing that men fight better on full than
on empty stomachs, Flag-Officer Davis did not desire to bring
on an engagement until the crews of his boats had taken their
usual morning meal, and he therefore retired. This retrograde
movement was construed by the enemy into an ignominious flight,
and immediately the whole rebel fleet formed in line of battle
and started in pursuit.
Finding that the enemy were determined to have a
fight immediately, the Flag-Officer, unwilling to check the enthusiasm
of his men, who were not half so hungry for breakfast as for battle,
signaled his three remaining boats, the St. Louis, Carondolet
and Cairo, to join him at once. They promptly weighed anchor,
and in a few minutes reached the vicinity of the Benton and Louisville.
By this time the enemy were nearly opposite the mouth of Wolf
river, and our boats were perhaps a mile and a half above, with
heads up stream, and drifting down on the strong current toward
the foe.
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