The Vicksburg Campaign spans from the Union capture of New Orleans in April 1862 through grueling swamp, bayou, and river operations to the decisive 47-day siege and surrender of Vicksburg on July 4, 1863, a major turning point that split the Confederacy in two. A solid introductory account details the Vicksburg campaign's land and water cooperation between Union army and navy. A significant strength in “Confederate Gibraltar: The Vicksburg Campaign from the Fall of New Orleans through the Battles in the Bayou” (Emerging Civil War Series) is Matt Atkinson’s providing readers with Ulysses S. Grant’s strategic aims, river warfare, and grueling siege, highlighting political stakes, terrain challenges, and key commanders in a pivotal Civil War struggle.
" Confederate Gibraltar: The Vicksburg Campaign from the Fall of New Orleans through the Battles in the Bayou Battles” refers to the Bayou Expeditions of early 1863, a series of grueling amphibious operations where Major General Ulysses S. Grant attempted to bypass the formidable Confederate bluffs at Vicksburg by navigating the treacherous, flooded swamplands of the Mississippi Delta. Union forces captured New Orleans from the south in April 1862 and Memphis from the north shortly after, leaving Vicksburg as the primary obstacle to total control of the Mississippi River. Atkinson spent many pages examining the six Bayou Expeditions: 1. Grant’s Canal (January–March 1863); 2. Grant's Canal (January–March 1863); 3. Lake Providence Expedition (February–March 1863); 4. Yazoo Pass Expedition (February–April 1863); 5. Steele's Bayou Expedition (March 1863), and the Duckport Canal (April 1863).
To the south of Vicksburg, Federal naval vessels closed in on the city of New Orleans. New Orleans was defended by several small Confederate forts and two significant structures—Fort Jackson and Fort St. Phillip—which lay about ninety miles downriver from the Crescent City. The Confederates had very few naval vessels of any worth with which to combat superior Federal River forces under the command of Flag Officer David Glasgow Farragut and Commodore David Dixon Porter. Between April 25 and 28 Confederate defenses collapsed, Forts Jackson and St. Phillip surrendered, and a small contingent of Rebel troops led by Mansfield Lovell evacuated New Orleans.
In planning his campaign, Grant had to take into account myriad geographical factors. North of Vicksburg on the east side of the Mississippi lay the Delta region, a flat, periodically flooded area coursed by many streams of various navigability, including Steele's Bayou and the Coldwater, Tallahatchie, Yalobusha, and Yazoo rivers. Then, too, there were a multitude of creeks, many with steep banks, as well as uncleared swampland infested with tangled undergrowth, mosquitoes, and various reptiles. On the western side of the Mississippi in Louisiana, the land was if anything more flat, and swampy and would require much corduroying, that is, building roads of logs.
The early phases of the Vicksburg campaign proved disappointing for Grant, but he displayed the tenacity and firmness of purpose that characterized the remainder of his military career. Undaunted by the problems inherent in taking the Confederate fortress on the Mississippi, Grant plunged ahead. Fortunately for the Union, this able commander had many able lieutenants serving under him, and he established and maintained a good working relationship with most of them.
A significant point that Atkinson makes in numerous pages is the initial campaign to capture Vicksburg began with the ascent of Union ships up the river from the Gulf. Commanded by David Farragut, the fleet captured New Orleans and further upriver took Baton Rouge and Natchez without firing a shot. On May 18, 1862, Farragut’s advance ships arrived at Vicksburg, and on May 26, 1862, his vessels began shelling the city. This part of the narrative is one of Atkinson’s strengths
Confederate Gibraltar argues that from January-April, 1863, Grant tried several routes to get at Vicksburg and all failed. One of his plans included sending troops via Louisiana bayous south to the Red River which emptied into the Mississippi well below Vicksburg. The Lake Providence gambit was an attempt to carry out the plan but inadequate water levels and passages doomed it to failure. His most notable operation was the Yazoo Pass expedition. He intended sending gunboats and transports into the Tallahatchie River northwest of Greenwood, Mississippi, where the Tallahatchie merged with the Yalobusha River to form the Yazoo, which flowed south to the Mississippi. This was the same river from which Sherman had launched his assaults along Chickasaw Bayou. Sherman had gone up the Yazoo directly from the Mississippi; this time the Union forces would come from the opposite direction.
Atkinson, asserts that Grant now decided to implement a plan that had been discussed for some time. He would send his army moving down the west side of the Mississippi south through Louisiana lowlands and cross the river well below Vicksburg. Once they began to make progress, he would have David Porter send gunboats and transports downriver past the Vicksburg batteries. Porter agreed to the plan, and he sent a fleet at night, equipping the transports with cotton bales strapped to the sides of the boats to protect them from Rebel shells. Major General Ulysses S. Grant and Rear Admiral David Dixon Porter spent months testing alternative routes through the treacherous alluvial lowlands, canals, and bayous surrounding the river. His flotilla successfully ran the gauntlet, losing only one vessel. The guns on the Vicksburg bluffs did less damage than expected, because Confederate gunners could not depress their gun barrels sufficiently to hit Porter’s vessels traveling close to the east bank of the river. A second run past the batteries was also successful.
A random sample of the titles of some of the ten chapters will give the reader a pretty good idea of that can be found in these pages.
Chapter 5: “Steele’s Bayou Expedition”.
Chapter 7: “Farragut Sails North”.
Chapter 9: “Grant Goes for Broke”.
Using a variety of scholarly approaches, the chapters cover a broad range of topics, as can be seen from this sample of the contents.
Readers will surely appreciate Atkinson’s thorough understanding of the battlefields, ricers, cities, towns, and geography of the story as he pieces together of this important portion of the early Vicksburg Campaign. As with most titles in Savas Beatie’s Emerging Civil War Series, the work is exceedingly accessible. Atkinson has a delightful writing style that is colloquial without being overly familiar in tone. He poses thoughtful questions throughout, enticing the reader to think critically about what we think we know about the Civil War and its participants. Readers will certainly be illuminated about this important campaign.
Confederate Gibraltar does what good history should do – separate fact from fable and present people or events from the Union and Confederate armies as it should be. This 192-page title includes an Epilogue, an Appendix on The Sinking of the USS Cairo, numerous images throughout for the convenience of the reader, four excellent maps drawn by famed cartographer Hal Jespersen, an Order of Battle, Suggested Reading, and About the Author but a weakness is that there is no footnotes, bibliography nor index contained in this volume. Buffs will consider it a valuable resource that provides an accurate account of the early Vicksburg Campaign.
This author tackles this investigation in fine style, and so I highly recommend the book.
Matt Atkinson is a native of Houston, Mississippi. He has a BBA in general business, a BA in history from the University of Mississippi, and an MA in history from the University of Louisiana-Monroe. Matt has worked as a historian at battlefields in Vicksburg and Gettysburg.
