a mere child, whom an officer had taken up behind him on his horse, was seen by Chalmers, who at once ordered the officer to put him down and shoot him, which was done. The huts and tents in which many of the wounded had sought shelter, were set on fire, both that night, and the next morning, while the wounded were still in them-those only escaping who were able to get themselves out, or who could prevail on others less injured than themselves, to help them out; and even some of those thus seeking to escape the flames, were met by those ruffians and brutally shot down, or had their brains beaten out. One man was deliberately fastened down to the floor of a tent, face upward, by means of nails driven through his clothes and into the boards under him, so that he could not possibly escape, and then the tent set on fire; another was nailed to the side of a building outside the fort, and then the building set on fire and burned. The charred remains of five or six bodies were afterward found, all but one so much disfigured and consumed by the flames that they could not be identified.

"These deeds of murder and cruelty ceased when night came on, only to be renewed the next morning, when the demons carefully sought among the dead, lying about in all directions, for any of the wounded yet alive, and those they found were deliberately shot. Scores of the dead and wounded were found there the day after the massacre, by the men from some of the Union gunboats, who were permitted to go on shore and collect the wounded, and bury the dead. The Rebels themselves had made a pretence of burying a great many of their victims, but they had merely thrown them, without the least regard to care or decency, into the trenches and ditches about the fort, or the little hollows and ravines on the hill-side, covering them but partially with earth. Portions of heads and face, hands and feet, were found protruding through the earth in every direction. The testimony collected by the 'Committee on the Conduct of the War,' also establishes the fact that the Rebels buried some of the living with the dead, a few of whom succeeded afterward in digging themselves out, or were dug out by others."

The whole number thus brutally murdered at Fort Pillow, was about four hundred, and a very considerable number subsequently died of their wounds at Mound City hospital, and elsewhere. Major Bradford, it appeared, from the evidence obtained by the Committee on the Conduct of the War, was murdered the day after the capture of the fort, between Brownsville and Jackson, Tenneseee, and of the nearly two hundred who escaped death on that day, it is supposed that the greater part were subsequently murdered.

Both Forrest and Chalmers undoubtedly ordered and sanctioned this massacre, and both subsequently justified it, and declared that they were under orders to kill every colored soldier, or "home-made Yankee" (the name they gave to the white Tennessee and Alabama unionists), they

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might capture. The Rebel press also justified and gloried in these butcheries, and the Rebel Government made them the occasion for promoting both Forrest and Chalmers to a higher rank in the army.

Having thus escaped with impunity, after committing these atrocities, Forrest was emboldened to attempt further outrages. He accordingly sent the Rebel General Buford, the next day, April 13th, to Columbus, Kentucky, to demand the unconditional surrender of that post. This demand was coupled with a threat, that if the post was not immediately surrendered, and he were compelled to storm it, he would show no quarter to the negro troops. Colonel Lawrence, the commander of the fortress, replied, that "surrender was out of the question, as he had been placed there by his Government to hold and defend the place, and he should do so." Buford, like his superior officer, took advantage of the flag of truce to steal a number of horses, but on receiving the patriotic reply of Colonel Lawrence, he made no attempt to attack the Union garrison, but retired to Forrest's camp. A considerable force of Union cavalry were now in pursuit of Forrest, and as his vocation was rather to steal and murder. than to fight, he made all speed southward, and escaped into Mississippi.

CHAPTER LVII.

PREPARATIONS FOR THE ADVANCE-GENERAL GRANT'S STRATEGY-SIMULTANEOUS MOVEMENT -THE NUMBERS IN THE OPPOSING ARMIES-SITUATION OF THE SUBORDINATE ARMIES OF THE UNION AND THEIR NUMBERS-GENERAL BUTLER'S ADVANCE-THE FEINT ON YORK RIVER-ASCENT OF THE JAMES TO CITY POINT AND BERMUDA HUNDRED-THE ADVANCE ON FORT DARLING-THE TROOPS DRIVEN BACK-ATTACK OF THE REBELS ON BERMUDA HUN. DRED THEY ARE REPULSED-DEPARTURE OF THE EIGHTEENTH CORPS-THE ATTACK ON PETERSBURG-ITS PARTIAL FAILURE-ARMY OF THE POTOMAC CROSSING THE RAPIDANTHE BATTLES OF MAY 5TH AND 6TH-LEE'S CHANGE OF POSITION-DEATH OF WADSWORTHSKETCH OF WADSWORTH-FIGHTING OF MAY 7TH AND 8TH-PARTIAL LULL ON THE 9THDEATH OF GENERAL SEDGWICK-DESPERATE FIGHTING ON THE 10TH-THE RESULTS STILL INDECISIVE QUIET ON THE NEXT DAY-GENERAL GRANT'S DESPATCH-“FIGHTING IT OUT ON THAT LINE"-THE TERRIBLE BATTLE OF THE 12TH-THE CHARGE OF THE SECOND CORPS -DESPERATE FIGHTING-WILCOX'S DIVISION FORCED BACK-SUCCESS TURNING TO THE UNION SIDE-LOSSES OF THE EIGHT DAYS ON THE UNION SIDE-LOSSES ON THE REBEL SIDE -IMPOSSIBILITY OF MOVEMENTS DURING THE STORM-SKETCH OF GENERAL SEDGWICK.

THE notes of preparation had sounded loud and long, and all was ready for such a campaign between the opposing armies as had not been surpassed in any war of modern times. Under the control and at the bidding of the Lieutenant-General, Sherman's army in Georgia, Meade's army on the Rapidan, Butler's on the James, Sigel's in the Shenandoah valley, were each to seek their foe, and plunge simultaneously into the conflict. Hitherto it had been towns or cities which our armies sought to win; now it was the opposing army itself, wherever it might retreat, which was the real objective. Not Atlanta, so much as Johnston's army, was the prize Sherman sought to win; not Richmond, so much as Lee's army, was the guerdon of the armies of the Potomac and the James. The old strategy consisted in driving the covering force of the foe from a city which it was deemed necessary to capture, and then reducing it, when it had but a slender garrison. Grant's strategy aimed at something entirely different; he drove the army of his enemy into his capital, surrounded and held him there, striking first at one flank and then at the other, and wearied him by his pertinacity and his heavy blows, until the citadel and the army of the foe were surrendered together, and the war brought to an end, almost simultaneously with the reduction of the enemy's capital. The siege of the beleaguered city might be longer by this process, but when the surrender came, the results amply repaid the delay. The campaigns of the spring and summer of 1864, both in Virginia and Georgia, were on a far larger scale than those of any previous year of the war. The Union armies outnumbered their opponents in both States, but more largely in the latter than in the former, but they were to a greater extent new troops, and were to act on the offensive against an enemy on his own

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territory, and with abundant intrenched positions, and these advantages fully counterbalanced any excess of numbers.

In Virginia, by the most strenuous efforts, General Lee had assembled a Rebel army far superior in numbers, discipline, and equipment, to any he had hitherto commanded. His army, when much inferior in numbers, training, and equipment, to the present one, had indeed been defeated at Antietam and Gettysburg, but had always been successful on its own territory, and its able commander might well be hopeful of victory in the coming contest. But he had not reckoned upon the iron will, the stern persistence, the unyielding grip, of his antagonist. He had hitherto been matched against generals less skilled in strategy, less fertile in resources, less capable of wielding a great army effectively than himself. But he was now to contend against a general who could parry all his attacks, who was a greater master of strategy than himself, and who could work steadily on for months, or even years, if necessary, to accomplish his purposes.

The army of the Potomac, under the command of Major-General Meade, numbering, including Burnside's reserves, which were at this time at Annapolis, about one hundred and sixty thousand men, occupied a position along the Rapidan, south and southeast of Culpepper Court

House.

Major-General Butler's command, afterward named the army of the James, consisted of the army of southeast Virginia and North Carolina, nearly or quite an ordinary army corps in numbers, the tenth (Gillmore's) corps, from the Department of the South, and the eighteenth corps from Louisiana; it numbered about forty thousand, and was concentrated at Fortress Monroe and its vicinity. In the Shenandoah valley, MajorGeneral Sigel was in command of a single corps of not far from ten thousand men, with orders to participate in the simultaneous movement, by attacking the forces of the enemy in the valley, and to strike at Lynchburg. Generals Crook and Averell were in West Virginia, and had assembled there a force of more than twenty thousand men, a part of whom were to be pushed forward to join Sigel.

The forward movement commenced on the 4th of May. The tenth and eighteenth corps, of General Butler's command, having marched previously from Fortress Monroe to Yorktown and Gloucester Point, embarked, on the 4th of May, on transports, and made a feint of ascending York river, a small force being landed at West Point to build wharves, &c. Having deceived the enemy by this movement, General Butler secretly re-embarked his troops, and descended the York river by night, ascended the James, accompanied by a large squadron of gunboats, four monitors, and the iron-clad Atlanta. Landing a part of his troops at City Point, he went on with the remainder as far as Bermuda Hundred, four miles above Appomattox river, where, landing under the protection of the gun

boats, they proceeded at once to intrench themselves. On the 6th, he ascertained the enemy's position by means of reconnoitering parties, and on the 7th made a demonstration, with a force of five brigades, toward Petersburg. After a sharp and severe fight, the Union troops succeeded in reaching and cutting the railroad, General Kautz meanwhile being sent with a cavalry force to burn the railroad bridge below Petersburg, thus temporarily dividing Beauregard's force, a part of which had not yet reached that city. Meanwhile, Colonel West, with two regiments of colored troops, moved from Williamsburg, and made a successful demonstration on Lee's lines north of the James.

General Butler next sent reconnoissances in force toward Richmond, on the south side of the James, which destroyed the railroad between that city and Petersburg for a considerable distance, busying the rest of his troops meantime, in fortifying the two positions at Bermuda Hundred and City Point. This accomplished, he proceeded at once to lay siege to Fort Darling, a work of considerable strength, situated on Drewry's bluff, an eminence overlooking the James, and which had previously repulsed an attack of the Union iron-clads on its river front.

On the 13th of May, the outer line of earthworks around the fort was carried, after a brief but sharp battle, and the Union troops moved forward toward the second line, and began to bring up their artillery to bear upon it, but committed the fatal mistake of neglecting to intrench their new position.

On the 16th of May, the enemy, taking advantage of this blunder, made a sortie upon their lines, in a dense fog, (having been reinforced for the purpose by the greater part of Beauregard's army,) and attacking the Union right wing with great violence, forced it back with very heavy loss, flanking it so completely that the whole army was compelled to fall back to their intrenchments at Bermuda Hundred, which, however, they succeeded in reaching in good order. The Rebel force, satisfied with having compelled them to raise the siege of the fort, did not pursue them to Bermuda Hundred. It is said that Beauregard sought, from the Rebel President, the loan of ten thousand of Lee's troops, in addition to his own, for thirty-six hours, promising, if he could have them, to annihilate Butler's force. Mr. Davis refused, because that reduction of Lee's troops, even for so short a time, would compel him to fall back to Richmond, and would add to Grant's prestige to such an extent, that the annihilation of Butler's force would not compensate for it. He insisted, however, that Beauregard could accomplish his object without reinforcement. The attempt was made, and Butler suffered heavy loss, nearly five thousand of his troops being killed, wounded, or taken prisoners, but he was very far from being annihilated. On the early morning of the 20th of May, after three days' skirmishing, the Rebel army advanced, and attacked Bermuda Hundred, but were repulsed with severe slaughter, and retreated in con