Battle of vicksburg :: essays research papers

By 1863, the Confederate hold on the Mississippi River was limited to siege of Vicksburg and Port Hudson both square bastions difficult to overcome. In a daring move, U.S. Grant, commanding the Union forces, sent his troops past Vicksburg and landed to the south of the city. Grants troops then get the better of Confederate forces in five separate engagements. After a 6 week seige, Confederate forces surrendered.To the Confederates Vicksburg was there "Gibraltar of the West", it together with Port Hudson were the sole(prenominal) two points that the South held on the Mississippi. Grant had tried a number of round-about approaches to Vicksburg including the building of a by pass canal, as well diverse routes through the bayous. Finally, Grant decided on the direct approach. He sent his army south of Vicksburg on the opposite side of the river. Then he sent his gunboats and a number of transports south passed the guns of Vickburg to ferry the troops across the mile wide Mis sissippi. On April 16th three transports and eight gunboats traversed the guns of Vicksburg. Despite the accompaniment that defenders of Vicksburg fired 525 rounds at them, they succeeded in making it past the guns with the lose of only one transport. A few days later additional boats followed. To shame the confederate defenders commanded by General Pemberston, Grant sent Union cavalry men under the command of Benjamin Grierson to raid the Confederate interior. His raid was passing successful. He successfully crossed the state of Mississippi, destroying railroads and other materials, while avoiding his pursuers. The great success of the raid was however, in forcing Pemberston to detach troops to follow him. Grant in addition detached a division of Sherman troops to feint an attack North of the city. This causes Pemberston to send troops guarding the Southern approaches to the North. Thus when Grant crossed with all of his forces he was not opposed. Once across instead of attacki ng Vicksburg, Grant moved eastward towards Jackson the state capital. There, Confederate General Johnson was putting together a forces to oppose Grant. Grants forces quickly overwhelmed the confederates in Jackson. In four additional battles Grants forces totally decimated Confederate forces. After defeating all of the field armies that he faced, Grant then attacked Vicksburg itself on May 19th.