Lew Wallace’s March to Shiloh Revisited Harold Lew Wallace* For two days in the springtime of 1862, near a church named Shiloh, there occurred one of the most controversial campaigns of the Civil War. Fresh from the capture of Fort Donelson-the most successful Union victory so far in the West-the Union leaders were optimistically preparing an- other offensive against the Confederates from a base at Pittsburg Landing on the Tennessee River. Major General Ulysses S. Grant, in charge of the operation, planned to con- solidate the Fort Donelson victory with a decisive campaign to end the Confederate threat in the West. What he did not foresee was that the Confederates, far from collapse, would seek to regain their 1osses.l The Confederates, too, were thinking in terms of offense. The result was Shiloh, a surprise attack by Confederate troops and a near rout of the Union forces the first day. This was an encounter which, after two days of fighting, saw the armies in nearly the same position they had held before with each claiming victory.2 Leaders on both sides were bitterly assailed for blunders made in the confusion of the first day’s fighting. The people of the North condemned Grant, Brigadier General William T. Sherman, and Major General Lew Wallace for their actions at Shiloh.a Grant and Sherman were later to recoup their reputations. Wallace, whose troops had been instrumental in the capture of Fort Donelson, was never to escape the military discredit he had incurred at Shiloh. In the confused movements before the battle, the Union plan had been to strike the Confederates at the railroad junc- *Harold Lew Wallace is a Lilly Fellow in American History at Indiana University and a history teacher at Mooresville High School, Mooresville, Indiana. He is not related to General Lew Wallace. This article is a revision of a paper prepared for a course given by Professor Oscar Osburn Winther at Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana. 1 J. G. Randall and David Donald, The Civil War and Reconstruc- tion (2d ed., Boston, 1961), 204-205. As much as possible, the military ranks given are those of the individuals at the time they are discussed in this article. This information has been obtained from the official reports and from Mark Mayo Boatner 111, The Civil War Dictionary (New York, 1959). 2 Randall and Donald, Civil War and Reconstruction, 205-206. 3 Stanley F. Horn, The Army of Tennessee: A Military Histow (New York, 1941), 122. 20 Indium Magazine of History tion of Corinth, Mississippi, twenty-five miles from Pittsburg Landing.( The armies of Grant and Major General Don Carlos Buell were to merge at the region around Pittsburg Landing and from this point move against the enemy. Grant and Major General Henry W. Halleck, the commander of the De- partment of the West, had worked out the battle plan. As district commander, Grant would move his army to Pittsburg Landing. At the same time he would arrange to bring Buell’s forces from Savannah, Tennessee, where Buell soon would arrive with the Army of the Ohio. After the armies merged, Halleck would lead the attack upon the Confederates com- manded by General Albert Sidney John~ton.~ Everything at first looked all right. In March, 1862, the divisions of Grant’s army took up positions in the vicinity of Pittsburg Landing.+I Grant remained at Savannah while awaiting the arrival of Buell. Buell had met delays, and on April 5 it seemed that the attack might have to be made without him. Then, on that day, Brigadier General William Nelson arrived at Savannah with an advance division of Buell’s army. Grant learned that Buell would arrive the next day.’ Nelson requested the transportation of his troops to Pittsburg Landing. But Grant saw no need for haste; al- though intermittent skirmishing had taken place recently around Pittsburg Landing, Grant told Nelson that “there will be no fight at Pittsburg Landing; we will have to go to Corinth, where the rebels are fortified.”* Unfortunately Grant saw unclearly. On the morning of April 6, Johnston with about forty thousand troops struck at Pittsburg Landing, where the main concentration of Union forces was near the Shiloh church three miles from the landing. Shouted Sherman, whose division received the first blow: “My God, we are attacked.”O The Union plan, it developed, had a major flaw-the Confederates had refused to remain at Corinth. 4 Kenneth P. Williams, Lincoln Finds a General (5 vols., New York, 1949-1959), 111, 310. 5Bruce Catton, U. S. Grant and the American Military Tradition (Boston.. 1954). 82. 6 Ulysses k. Grant, Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant, ed. by E. B. Long (Cleveland, Ohio, 1952), 169-170. 7 Ibid., 172. 8J. F. C. Fuller, The Generalship of Ulysses S. Grant (2d ed., Bloomington, Ind., 1958), 105. 9 Ibid. Lew WaUace's March to Shiloh Revisited 21 Some six miles away at Crump's Landing, Wallace, who was in command of the Third Division, heard the heavy firing. He interpreted it as a general Confederate attack. He ordered the three brigades of his division alerted and under arms. Then, anticipating that Grant would soon pass upstream from Savannah, he went to the river bank to await orders.'O Wallace had anticipated correctly. Grant also had heard the firing at Pittsburg Landing and, on the boat Tigress, was moving toward the battle. At Crump's Landing, Grant ordered the boat close enough to shore to speak with Wallace. Un- certain whether the attack was a general one, he directed Wallace to remain in readiness." Grant moved on to Pittsburg Landing. He later placed the hour of his arrival there at about 8:OO A.M.'2 While Grant was moving upstream, Wallace prepared to concentrate his three brigades, which were scattered along the road leading from Crump's Landing toward Adamsville. He ordered the First Brigade, at the landing, and the Third, at Adamsville, to close in on the Second at Stoney Lonesome.Ia Anticipating instructions from Grant, he ordered a horse saddled at Crump's Landing for the expected messenger and then followed the First Brigade to Stoney Lonesome. Here Grant's order reached him. The messenger was Captain A. S. Baxter, a quartermaster on Grant's staff." It was upon reaching Pittsburg Landing that Grant learned the attack was a general Confederate offensive. The battle of Pittsburg Landing, or Shiloh, was underway ; con- sequently, the disposition of forces had to be changed. There was no need for the Third Division to remain at Crump's 10 Horn, Amy of Tennessee, 131. 11 Ibid. 12 Grant, Personal Memoirs, 173. 1S''Some mystery attaches to the inaction of the Third Brigade during the morning. General Wallace states in his report that it was concentrated on the Second, meaning, as he explains to the editors, that the order for the concentration had been sent, and, he presumed, obeyed. Colonel Ross delivered the order to Colonel Charles R. Woods, then in command at Adamsville, and Captain Ware, Wallace's second aid carried a repetition of it-both during the morning. Yet Colonei Whittlesey, who during the day, by seniority of commission, succeeded to the command of the brigade, says in his report that three of the four regiments 'received orders to march with their trains about 2 P.M., and to advance toward Pittsburg Landing in advance of the trains at 4 P.M.' " Battles and Leaders of the Civil War, ed. by Robert Under- wood Johnson and Clarence Clough Buel (4 vols., New York, 1884-1888), I, 608. 14 Ibid., 607. BATTLE OF SHILOH. APRIL 6, 1862: THE ROUTES OF NELSON AND WALLACE Reproduced from Kenneth P. Williams, Lincoln Fin& a General (6 vols.. New York. 1949-1959). 111, 880 with the permission of The Macmillan Company. There has always been some controversy about the position from which Wallace began his countermarch. The map which he included in his memorandum of March 14, 1863, to Major General Henry W. Halleck and which is printed in U.S., War Department, The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies (128 vols., Washington, 1880-1901), Ser. I, Vol. X, pt. 1, p. 177 and the one given in Battles and Leaders of the Civil War, ed. by Robert Underwood Johnson and Clarence Clough Buel (4 vols., New York, 1884-1888), I, 608 differ significantly in topography from Williams’ map and from each other. But they agree in placing the point of countermarch farther to the south than does the above map. According to the editors of Battles and Leaders, Wallace had informed them that his “map is incorrect, and that its inaccuracy arose from a prevalent confusion of the names of Snake and Owl creeks. That map, however, faithfully represents General Wallace’s claim that the head of his column advanced to within a mile of what had been the right of the army” (I, 608). On the other hand, Williams insists in Lincoln Finds a General that Wallace “when he went over his route of march with the battlefield historian in November, 1901, . had to concede that the point at which he had turned around was four miles short of where, for forty years, he had believed it was” (111, 392). Lew Wallace’s March to Shiloh Revisited 23 Landing. Indeed it was imperative that it join the main army immediately, and Grant directed Captain Baxter to order Wallace to advance.1s Grant gave the order orally, but Baxter, a paper-minded quartermaster, made a copy of it while he was going down the river to Crump’s Landing.lo At Stoney Lonesome, Baxter handed Wallace the unsigned order which, as Wallace later wrote, “directed me to leave a detach- ment to guard the public property at Crump’s Landing, then march my division and form junction with the right of the army; after junction I was to form line of battle at a right angle with the river.”’? Wallace sent two regiments back to the landing and at noon marched from Stoney Lonesome to join the right of the lines as they had existed at the start of the attack.’s He was familiar with the road he was following.