Never Call Retreat (71 page)

Notes

NOTES

Chapter One:
IN THE RAPIDS
1. Castles in the Air

1.
Richmond
Dispatch
for Dec. 31, 1862. The correspondent failed to note that Mr. Davis was accompanied by a military aide, Gen. G. W. C. Lee, son of Robert E. Lee.

2.
Edward Younger, ed.,
Inside the Confederate Government: the Diary of Robert Garlick Hill Kean,
28; William E. Dodd, Jr.,
Jefferson Davis,
294-95;
The War of the Rebellion: a Compilation of Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies,
Vol. XX, Part Two, 421-22. (This is cited hereafter as O.R. Unless otherwise indicated, the volume referred to is from Series One.)

3.
William E. Polk,
Leonidas Polk, Bishop and General,
Vol. II, 177; Stanley Horn,
The Army of Tennessee,
195; Isabella D. Martin and Myrta Lockett Avary, eds.,
A Diary from Dixie,
by Mary Boykin Chesnut, 242-43. Incidentally, Mattie Ready's last name was pronounced "Reedy."

4.
Troop strengths are Pemberton's estimates; draft of an unfinished letter, apparently to Maj. W. T. Walthall, in the J. C. Pemberton Papers, Manuscript Department, New York Public Library.

5.
Dunbar Rowland,
Jefferson Davis, Constitutionalist
(cited hereafter as Rowland), Vol. V, 384, 386; Diary of Robert Kean, 33.

6.
Senator Phelan's long, despairing letter to Davis is in O.R., Vol. XVII, Part Two, 788-92.

7.
Robert Hartje,
Van Dorn Conducts a Raid on Holly Springs and Enters Tennessee,
Tennessee Historical Quarterly, Vol. XVIII, No. Two, 120-22; O.R., Vol. LU, Part Two, 371.

8.         John C. Pemberton,
Pemberton, Defender of Vicksburg,
22,

43-48; Major R. W. Memminger,
The Surrender of Vicksburg
—
a Defense of Gen. Pemberton,
Southern Historical Society Papers (a compilation cited hereafter as SHSP), Vol. XII, 352-53; O.R., Vol. XXIV, Part One, 287-88.

9.      Phelan to Davis, as cited in footnote 6, above; O.R., Vol.
XIIT. 888.

10.Col. Thomas L. Snead,
The Conquest of Arkansas,
Battles and Leaders of the Civil War (cited hereafter as B. & L.), Vol. Ill, 441-50; O.R., Vol. XOT, 918.

11.O.R., Vol. XIII, 906-7, 914; Vol. XVII, Part Two, 728; Vol. XX, Part Two, 423-24; Rowland, Vol. V, 356, 371-72; Earl S. Miers, ed., J. B. Jones,
A Rebel War Clerk's Diary,
118, 120; Diary of Robert Kean, 28-31.

12.O.R., Vol. XX, Part Two, 424, 435, 436; Vol. XVTI, Part Two, 766; Joseph E. Johnston,
Jefferson Davis and the Mississippi Campaign,
B. & L., Vol. Ill, 472-75. Davis' letter of Dec. 21 to Holmes (Rowland, Vol. V, 386-88) is a very clear analysis of the Mississippi valley situation at that time. Attention should be called here to Frank Vandiver's persuasive argument that Davis fully recognized the need for on-the-spot direction and coordination of army movements in the west and meant Johnston to have real authority in that theater. Johnston, Vandiver suggests, did not quite understand how much power was being given to him, doubted that the President meant him to act with firmness, and failed to grasp an opportunity that was actually extremely broad. (Vandiver,
Rebel Brass,
33-35, 57-59.)

13. O.R., Vol. XVTl, Part Two, 783-84.

14.    Rowland, Vol. V, 31-32; letter of Johnston to Senator Wig-
fall dated Dec. 15, 1862, in the Wigfall Family Papers, Library of
Congress.

2. Battle without Logic

1.
Jefferson Davis to Varina Davis dated Dec. 15, 1862, in the Davis Letters, Confederate Memorial Literary Society, Richmond; letter of Gen. Johnston to Senator Wigfall, same date, in the Wigfall Family Papers, Library of Congress.

2.
Shortly after he took command Burnside wrote to his friend, the Rev. Augustus Woodbury: "The responsibility is so great that at times I tremble at the thought of assuming that I am able to exercise so large a command. Yet when I think that I have made no such assumption, that I have shunned the responsibility, and only accepted it when I was ordered to do it, and when it would have been disloyal and unfriendly to our government not to do it, then I take courage, and I approach our Heavenly Father with freedom and trustfulness, confident that if I can act honestly and industriously, constantly asking His protection and assistance, all will be well." (Ben: Perley Poore,
The Life and Public Services of Ambrose E. Burnside, Soldier—Citizen—Statesman,
182-83.)