Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 16.djvu/87

 The Battle of Belmont. 81

a liberal exchange of prisoners, over 100 remained. He also reports the capture of one stand of colors, over 1,000 stand of arms, with knapsacks, ammunition and other military stores.

General Pillow says in his official report : " We buried 295 of the enemy's dead, and the enemy, under a flag of truce, was engaged in the same labor during a large portion of the day." General Pillow estimates the loss of the enemy at between 1,800 and 2,000. He bases this estimate upon " the most unquestionable information from persons who were in Cairo when the Federal fleet returned, who state that the enemy was a day and a half in burying the dead and removing the wounded from their boats."

General Grant gives as his reasons for fighting the battle of Bel- mont, that on the ist of November he was ordered to make a demon- stration on both sides of the Mississippi river, with the view of detaining the Confederates at Columbus, Kentucky, within their lines.* He had been notified that there was a force of about three thousand Confederates on the St. Francis river, Arkansas, about fifty miles from Cairo, and had sent Colonel Oglesby there, with a force equal to that of the Confederates, to oppose them and hold them in check. Learning that General Polk was about to detach a large force from Columbus to be moved down the river and to reinforce General Price, he had orders to prevent this movement. He then ordered a regi- ment under Colonel W. H. L. Wallace to reinforce Oglesby, and ordered General C. F. Smith to move all the troops he could spare from Paducah directly against Columbus. Added to these, he took all the troops which could be spared from Cairo and Fort Holt and moved them down the river for the attack on Belmont.

General Grant says in his narrative: " ' Belmont ' was severely criti- cised in the North as a wholly unnecessary battle, barren of results; or the possibility of them from the beginning. If it had not been fought, Colonel Oglesby would probably have been captured or destroyed with his three thousand men. Then I would have been culpable indeed."

After the retreat of the Union forces from the field, as before stated,

defeat for General Grant, "Curtis" telegraphs General E. D. Townsend, Adjutant- General United States army, from St. Louis, under date of gth November, 1861, two days after the battle, as follows: * * "Captain McKeener telegraphs from Cincinnati to General Fremont, that General Grant had no orders from Fremont to attack Belmont or Columbus." (See Rebellion Records, Vol. Ill, p. 567.) 6
 * As evidence that the battle of Belmont was regarded in the North as a