to disband the
regular army, with the exception of the staff corps, and notify the
disbanded officers that they would receive no compensation while the war
lasted except as volunteers. The register should be kept up, but the
names of all officers who were not in the volunteer service at the
close, should be stricken from it.

On the 9th of November, two days after the battle of Belmont,
Major-General H. W. Halleck superseded General Fremont in command of the
Department of the Missouri. The limits of his command took in Arkansas
and west Kentucky east to the Cumberland River. From the battle of
Belmont until early in February, 1862, the troops under my command did
little except prepare for the long struggle which proved to be before
them.

The enemy at this time occupied a line running from the Mississippi
River at Columbus to Bowling Green and Mill Springs, Kentucky. Each of
these positions was strongly fortified, as were also points on the
Tennessee and Cumberland rivers near the Tennessee state line. The
works on the Tennessee were called Fort Heiman and Fort Henry, and that
on the Cumberland was Fort Donelson. At these points the two rivers
approached within eleven miles of each other. The lines of rifle pits
at each place extended back from the water at least two miles, so that
the garrisons were in reality only seven miles apart. These positions
were of immense importance to the enemy; and of course correspondingly
important for us to possess ourselves of. With Fort Henry in our hands
we had a navigable stream open to us up to Muscle Shoals, in Alabama.
The Memphis and Charleston Railroad strikes the Tennessee at Eastport,
Mississippi, and follows close to the banks of the river up to the
shoals. This road, of vast importance to the enemy, would cease to be
of use to them for through traffic the moment Fort Henry became ours.
Fort Donelson was the gate to Nashville--a place of great military and
political importance--and to a rich country extending far east in
Kentucky. These two points in our possession the enemy would
necessarily be thrown back to the Memphis and Charleston road, or to the
boundary of the cotton states, and, as before stated, that road would be
lost to them for through communication.

The designation of my command had been changed after Halleck's arrival,
from the District of South-east Missouri to the District of Cairo, and
the small district commanded by General C. F. Smith, embra