Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 08.djvu/427

Rh a subordinate General of the Abolitionists at the expense of General Beauregard. I know your correspondent well enough to feel assured that he wrote with no such purpose, and yet that must be the effect with all who have given credit to the story of the "Lost Opportunity at Shiloh."

Having been on the staff of General Beauregard during the battle of Shiloh, I happen to know the exact truth of the matter misrepresented to P. W. A. by his pert and self-sufficient informant, and since the broad-cast dissemination of the untruth, I think it proper to ask space for a brief statement.

General Prentiss did not deceive the Commander-in-Chief of the Confederate forces at Shiloh by any shallow invention, either in regard to the movements of General Buell's army or the existence of extensive works at Pittsburg landing. General Beauregard had the concurrent evidence of prisoners and scouts that Buell's arrival was confidently expected. It was this knowledge that led him on the night of the 3d of April, at the hour of 11 o'clock, to send me to General Johnston to urge an immediate advance on Pittsburg landing, before the junction of Buell's and Grant's forces could be effected; and it was this belief that induced him, on the afternoon of the 5th of April, in a council of general officers, to give his opinion that the movement was then too late, in consequence of the untoward delay of our troops in their march from Corinth, and our consequent inability to strike the enemy on Saturday, as he had anticipated. It was, however, after General Beauregard had given his orders and made his arrangements, as far as practicable to meet any exigency, that I joined him, and communicated the substance of a dispatch addressed to General Johnston, that had been handed me on the battlefield, which encouraged the hope that the main part of Buell's forces had marched in the direction of Decatur.

But further in proof that Prentiss could not have attempted any such device as that represented, I can add he publicly said to me that Buell's forces would effect a junction during the night, and that as a consequence our victory would be wrenched from us the next day. Sharing my tent with Colonel Jacob Thompson and myself, on the morning of the 7th April, when the firing began at the outposts, he remarked with satisfaction: "Ah! what did I tell you, gentlemen? they are at it again."

As for the utter absence of defensive works at Pittsburg landing, our information was complete, and no words of General Prentiss