ar the northern boundary
line. One was Fort Henry on the Tennessee River, and the other Fort
Donelson, twelve miles away, on the Cumberland.

Opposed to this strong position were two Union armies, the larger,
numbering 100,000, under General Don Carlos Buell, in central Kentucky,
and the lesser, numbering 15,000, commanded by General U.S. Grant, at
Cairo. Under Buell was General George H. Thomas, one of the finest
leaders in the Union army. In January, with a division of Buell's army,
he attacked the Confederates, routed and drove them into Tennessee. In
the battle, General Zollicoffer, the Confederate commander, was killed.

Embarking at Cairo, General Grant steamed up the Tennessee River,
intending to capture Fort Henry. Before he could do so, Commodore Andrew
H. Foote, with his fleet of gunboats, compelled it to surrender, though
most of the garrison escaped across the neck of land to Fort Donelson.

CAPTURE OF FORT DONELSON.

Upon learning that Fort Henry had fallen, Grant steamed up the
Cumberland to attack Fort Donelson, which was reinforced until the
garrison numbered some 20,000 men. It was a powerful fortification,
with many rifle-pits and intrenchments on the land side, and powerful
batteries commanding the river. The political General Floyd was in chief
command, the right wing being under General Simon B. Buckner and the
left in charge of General Gideon J. Pillow.

On the afternoon of February 14th, Commodore Foote opened the attack
with two wooden vessels and four ironclad gunboats. The garrison made no
reply until the boats had worked their way to within a fourth of a mile
of the fort, the elevation of which enabled it to send a plunging fire,
which proved so destructive that two of the boats were disabled and
drifted down current, the other following. Some fifty men were killed,
and among the wounded was Commodore Foote. He withdrew to Cairo,
intending to wait until a sufficient force could be brought up from that
point.

[Illustration: UNITED STATES 12-INCH BREECH-LOADING MORTAR, OR
HOWITZER.]

But General Grant, like the bull-dog to which he was often compared,
having inserted his teeth in his adversary, did not mean to let go.
Placing his troops in front of the works, it did not take him long to
invest the whole Confederate left, with the exception of a swampy strip
near the river. The weather, which had been unusually mild for the
season, now became extremely cold, and some of the Union men w