Introduction
Engineers in Union blue and Confederate gray played a prominent role in the Vicksburg campaigns of 1862-1863. Although their contributions have largely gone unnoticed in published works on the campaign, the stories of these men and the fatigue parties that toiled under their supervision are worthy of note and will be detailed in this series of articles.
Part Nine: The Union’s Dark Winter
Due to Sherman’s defeat at Chickasaw Bayou, as well as his own misfortune in north Mississippi, Grant boldly abandoned conventional lines of supply that relied on roads and railroads. Instead, he decided to take advantage of Union superiority on the inland waters and moved his force by boat to Milliken’s Bend and Young’s Point, Louisiana, opposite and upstream from Vicksburg.
Here he established his base camps as well as his forward supply base and stockpiled tremendous quantities of food, clothing, medicine, ammunition, and the myriad other supplies necessary to sustain his army in the field in preparation for the spring campaign against Vicksburg.
The winter of 1862-1863 witnessed the darkest days of the war for the administration in Washington. In addition to Sherman’s defeat at Chickasaw Bayou and Grant’s failure in north Mississippi, the Union Army of the Potomac had met with disaster at Fredericksburg, Virginia, on Dec. 13, and the Union Army of the Cumberland suffered heavy casualties in the Battle of Stones River, near Murfreesboro, Tennessee, at the end of the year. Compounding the bleak military situation, the off-year elections in November had gone against the administration and its war policy. A sharp decline in volunteers was evidence of widespread discontent and the draft was initiated to help fill the vacant ranks.
In order to keep the spirit of the offensive alive and bolster the nation’s sagging morale, as well as keep his soldiers in good physical condition for the spring campaign, Grant turned to his engineers and orchestrated a series of bayou campaigns. The objective of these “experiments,” as Grant termed them, was to get his army on high, dry ground east of the Mississippi River where he could put his troops in motion and his artillery to use. Union engineers were called upon to excavate canals and blast openings in the Mississippi River levees in order to gain access to interior chains of waterways that led to Vicksburg.
The most famous of these efforts was resumption of work on the canal across the base of De Soto Point that was started the previous summer under Gen. Thomas Williams. Fatigue parties and hundreds of slaves pressed into service labored under the direction of the army’s chief engineer, Capt. Frederick E. Prime. Born in Italy on Sept. 24, 1829, Prime graduated at the top of the West Point Class of 1850. He spent his pre-war career building fortifications along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts. Elevated to captain at the outbreak of hostilities, Prime was wounded and captured in the Battle of Mill Springs, Kentucky, on Dec. 5, 1861. Following his exchange in the spring of 1862, he was assigned as chief engineer on Grant’s staff.
In mid-January 1863, work on the canal resumed and was vigorously pushed by Prime, but the mighty river failed to cooperate. Just as the soldiers and slaves reached the desired depth of six feet, there was a sudden and dramatic drop in the river which fell below the level of the canal. As they dug deeper, the river suddenly rose and inundated the countryside. The canal filled with backwater and sediment that threatened to undo their work. Two huge dipper dredges were brought in to continue the effort, but were forced to retire as they worked within range of Confederate artillery.
Although Grant sent optimistic reports to Washington, Sherman was far more candid in his appraisal:
“The canal don’t amount to much.”
In late March the effort was abandoned.