ase. At
Vicksburg itself, and for some distance south of it, a line of bluffs or
steep-sided hills lying east of the Mississippi comes right up to the
edge of the river. The river as it approaches these bluffs makes a
sudden bend to the north-east and then again to the south-west, so that
two successive reaches of the stream, each from three to four miles long,
were commanded by the Vicksburg guns, 200 feet above the valley; the
eastward or landward side of the fortress was also well situated for
defence. To the north of Vicksburg the country on the east side of the
Mississippi is cut up by innumerable streams and "bayous" or marshy
creeks, winding and intersecting amid a dense growth of cedars. The
North, with a flotilla under Admiral Porter, commanded the Mississippi
itself, and the Northern forces could freely move along its western shore
to the impregnable river face of Vicksburg beyond. But the question of
how to get safely to the assailable side of Vicksburg presented
formidable difficulty to Grant and to the Government.

Grant's operations began in November, 1862. Advancing directly southward
along the railway from Memphis with the bulk of his forces, he after a
while detached Sherman with a force which proceeded down the Mississippi
to the mouth of the Yazoo, a little north-west of Vicksburg. Here
Sherman was to land, and, it was hoped, surprise the enemy at Vicksburg
itself while the bulk of the enemy's forces were fully occupied by
Grant's advance from the north. But Grant's lengthening communications
were cut up by a cavalry raid, and he had to retreat, while Sherman came
upon an enemy fully prepared and sustained a defeat a fortnight after
Burnside's defeat at Fredericksburg. This was the first of a long series
of failures during which Grant, who for his part was conspicuously frank
and loyal in his relations with the Government, received upon the whole
the fullest confidence and support from them. There occurred, however,
about this time an incident which was trying to Grant, and of which the
very simple facts must be stated, since it was the last of the occasions
upon which severe criticism of Lincoln's military administration has been
founded. General McClernand was an ambitious Illinois lawyer-politician
of energy and courage; he was an old acquaintance of Lincoln's, and an
old opponent; since the death of Douglas he and another
lawyer-politician, Logan, had been the most powerful of the Democr