Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 9.djvu/93

CHAPTER VIII.

OPENING OF THE SUMMER CAMPAIGN IN 1862—RELATIVE STRENGTH AND POSITION OF FEDERAL AND CONFEDERATE FORCES— GENERAL BUELL'S MOVEMENT FROM CORINTH FOR THE REDUCTION OF EAST TENNESSEE— GENERAL G. W. MORGAN'S ADVANCE ON CUMBERLAND GAP—ITS FINAL OCCUPATION BY HIM-GENERAL BRAGG SUCCEEDS GENERAL BEAUREGARD AT TUPELO— GENERAL E. KIRBY SMITH IN EAST TENNESSEE—HIS CRITICAL POSITION-GENERAL BUELL THREATENS CHATTANOOGA—HIS SUCCESS SEEMS ASSURED—GENERAL POPE SLURS THE CONFEDERATE ARMY AT TUPELO—GENERAL BRAGG CONTEMPLATES MOVING NORTHWARD TO STRIKE BUELL IN FLANK— PLAN ABANDONED AS IMPRACTICABLE— ANOTHER BRILLIANT STRATEGIC MOVE DECIDED ON.

THE current of the narrative has been somewhat broken and the sequence of events anticipated, in order to group the foregoing facts in what seems the best form for a good understanding of a subject which has never been made clear to Kcntuckians, and in reference to which there has been no little incorrect representation. Pending the events which have been detailed as participated in by the Kentucky troops under General Breckinridge, important movements were in progress in other parts of the department of the Mississippi which were soon to change the whole aspect of affairs. The two opposing armies, which confronted each other at Corinth after Shiloh, passed through a season of inaction in which no definite policy could be discerned, and no considerable achievement was performed by either. Each seemed to wait on the other. Memphis had fallen, and the Federal forces were in undisputed possession of all Tennessee west of the Cumberland mountains.

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