Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 19.djvu/202

 196 Southern Historical Society Papers.

walla than he gave orders to move in the morning to attack the enemy at Rienzi. But the condition of two of his three divisions was such that the generals advised against attempting any new ag- gressive movement until we could reform and refit our commands. My division had marched from Chewalla to attack Corinth with four thousand eight hundred muskets the day but one before. We left in the approaches and the very central defences of Corinth two thou- sand officers and men killed or wounded, among them were many of my ablest field and company officers. The Missourians had lost almost as heavily ; Lovell's division alone, not having attacked the works at all, came off with but a trifling loss. It was, there- fore, decided to move down to Riplev by the route we had so lately come over in such brave array and with such high hopes. But before dawn next morning Van Dorn had moved the cav- alry and pioneers on the road to Rienzi, still resolved to capture that place, and march around immediately and attack Corinth from the opposite direction.

A BRILLIANT RETREAT.

The plan was worthy of Charles XII, and might have been suc- cessful ; and Van Dorn only abandoned it when convinced that he would inevitably lose his wagon train, and that the army would feel he was rash. A friend said to him finally: "Van Dorn, you are the only man I ever saw who loves danger for its own sake. When any daring enterprise is before you, you cannot adequately estimate the obstacles in your way." He replied: "While I do not admit the correctness of your criticism, I feel how wrong I shall be to im- peril this army through my personal peculiarities, after what such a friend as you have told me they are, and I will countermand the orders and move at once on the road to Ripley."

Few commanders have ever been so beset as Van Dorn was in the forks of the Hatchie, and very few could have extricated a beaten army as he did then. Ord, with a force stated at ten thousand men, headed him at the Hatchie bridge, while Rosecrans, with twenty thousand men, was attacking his rear at the Tuscumbia bridge, only five miles off. The whole road between was occupied by a train of near four hundred wagons and a defeated army of about eleven thou- sand muskets. But Van Dorn was never for a moment dismayed. He repulsed Ord and punished him severely, while he checked Ro- secrans at the Tuscumbia until he could turn his train and army