Hardee’s corps collided with these Yankee patrols in the initial firefight of the battle beginning about 6 a.m. In spite of being surprised, Sherman held his line for several hours. Before the morning was out, several horses were shot out from under him and he was wounded in the hand. Still, as his division’s camps were overrun, he managed to regroup his men. When one hastily constructed line fell to the Southern juggernaut another was improvised by the Union divisional leader, usually a few hundred yards away. Instead of simply marching over the Yankees, Hardee’s men found themselves fighting for every inch of field and forest.
It was different on Prentiss’ front. His troops caught the brunt of Hardee’s and Bragg’s advance. By 9 a.m. his division was wrecked. A great number of soldiers threw down their arms and hurried to the Landing for refuge. At this time, Stephen A. Hurlbut’s Fourth division began to move toward the sound of the fighting. Prentiss managed to scrape together a small fraction of his division and formed in line with Hurlbut as Bragg’s brigades came on through yet another field. Here, the Rebels were repulsed and regrouped as the Northern troops sought better defensive positions near a peach orchard and a wooded, sunken road.
As Sherman, Prentiss and Hurlbut struggled to perpetuate their impromptu defense, the Confederates became increasingly disorganized. Some men skipped ranks to loot the newly captured Yankee camps. Others simply straggled away from the front lines because it was their first experience in combat, with “seeing the elephant” as soldiers of the period called it. More than this, however, the sheer momentum of the advance led to an mixing of the Army of the Mississippi’s corps. Brigades from Hardee’s and Bragg’s corps intermingled. It became increasingly difficult for either commander to ascertain which portion of the front line they were responsible for.
Grant arrived at Pittsburgh Landing from Savannah about 9 a.m. He disembarked into hundreds of Yankee stragglers who had chosen to abandon their positions in the face of the Rebel attack. “Panic-stricken” was the way Grant later described the scene. The stragglers “would have been shot” rather than return to face the Rebel assault. (Battles & Leaders, p.474)
The Northern General’s first order was an obvious one. Lew Wallace’s Third division was sent for at Crump’s Landing. This action became the source of a great deal of debate on the Northern side about the possibilities of the battle. Wallace did not march with any degree of urgency. Moreover, he lost his way in the thick Tennessee forests by choosing the wrong road to the battlefield. His men would not be a factor on the first day of Shiloh.
There was little Grant could do at this point to control the Union effort. By the time he got to the actual fighting, many of his army’s brigades were badly shot up. It took him several hours just to make an accurate assessment of the situation. Riding from one part of the field to another, he talked with most of the Union division commanders personally. But he had no general orders for his army. Each part had to save itself in its own way.
As Hurlbut supported the remnants of Prentiss’ command, John A. McClernand’s 1st division formed a line in the wake of Sherman’s ad-libbed withdrawal. The Yankee line ran along one of the few decent roads in the area. By now, Polk’s corps was fully engaged on this part of the field. As the morning ended, the Confederate’s broke through McClernand’s brigades, threatening to cut Sherman off from the rest of the army. Sherman retreated once again.
By noon, the first portion of the battle was over. Each side committed its only available reserves. For the South, it was Breckinridge’s corps of three fresh brigades. Beauregard had staff members scouting the field for information on the confused fighting. Based upon this intelligence, the Confederate reserve was ordered split, with one brigade going to Polk. The others were marched directly to Johnston who, by now, was on the Southern right flank looking for the river.
Grant did not wait to commit his reserve, W. H. L. Wallace’s 2nd division, to the fray. In scanning the length of the field, he discovered a huge gap in the Union center. He ordered the division to shore up the defensive line from Hurlbut along the sunken road to McClernand’s retreating men. At this point, Lew Wallace’s division was in the process of becoming lost on its way from Crump’s Landing. Bull Nelson’s troops from the Army of the Ohio were marching down the opposite side of the river, still several miles away.
In spite of all the factors working against the Confederate offensive at its inception, the success Johnston envisioned was solidly in the making. He had driven the Army of the Tennessee back one mile, overrunning most of its camps in the process. He still had several relatively fresh brigades, but they were becoming more mixed up as the attack progressed. Beauregard’s theory on the success of the assault by preponderance of numbers was being tested.
The elements of the Confederate corps began to compress like an accordion as they ran into Grant’s noon line. The results were combat-ready brigades chasing a nearly routed enemy while experiencing a gradual breakdown of corps command capability. Meanwhile, though the Northern right flank was still unsettled, the left and center were becoming solid.
Johnston had covered most of the front during the morning, directing troops as he saw fit. He made little effort to verify that his corps commanders were properly controlling what he had personally set in motion. Several brigades and certain regiments were placed exactly where he wanted them. He ordered attacks, even bayonet charges, at the Yankee defense. Johnston directed artillery fire and rallied shaken portions of his army’s ranks. All the while, he moved to his right with the idea of cutting the Yankee’s off from the river.
He wanted to seize Pittsburgh Landing.
As the attack progressed, the commingling of Southern brigades became so bad that Polk, Bragg, and Hardee began some improvisation of their own. Each agreed to command only the troops in their immediate third of the battleline, regardless of which brigades were in which corps. This was an inevitable result of Beauregard’s operational approach of stacking instead of linking the Confederate corps. The Southern assault began the afternoon as this spontaneous command arrangement went into effect.
Facing the Rebels was the best defensive line the Union army had put together all day. The remains of Prentiss’ wrecked division assimilated with Hurlbut’s and W. H. L. Wallace’s comparatively fresh troops. The right and center of the Northern position rested along a sunken road that ran eastward from an open field through thick forest to a peach orchard. There, the Union left was holding higher ground in advance of the sunken road locale.
Under Johnston’s personal leadership, the Union left was forced back through the peach orchard to the sunken road. Meanwhile, Braxton Bragg, commanding brigades from Polk’s and Hardee’s corps as well as his own, launched several vigorous assaults on the Union line dug in along the sunken road. Each time, the Northern defenders held their ground, forcing the Southerners to reform and charge again.
This stubborn resistance was the beginning of the end for the Confederate attack. The Union center held firm as Sherman and McClernand continued to be pushed back on the right flank and as the Rebels attempted to turn the Yankee left. The intensity of the fighting along the sunken road was such that this location soon became known as the “Hornet’s Nest.”
As Bragg regrouped for another attempt to carry the Hornet’s Nest, Johnston ordered a brigade under the command of Brigadier-General James R. Chalmers forward on the extreme end of the battlefield near the Tennessee River. Chalmers moved into and out of a ravine, disappearing in the thick woods headed north. At this moment there was no significant Union force between Chalmers and the Landing. “That checkmate’s them,” Johnston exclaimed. (Sword, p.261) It seemed to him that victory was at hand.
Johnston returned to observe Bragg’s assault on the Hornet’s Nest. He scattered his staff in every direction with various orders. Just then, he was struck in the leg by a stray minie ball, severing an artery. Within minutes he lost consciousness and died. With him died his personal perspective on how the battle was to progress. From this moment on, the vortex of the Confederate assault became the Hornet’s Nest rather than the Landing.
Beauregard assumed command of the Army of the Mississippi before 3 p.m. He had a fairly good idea as to what was happening on the field. His staff had kept him informed all day, providing him with important information so that decisions could be made on reinforcements and supplies. But, by now, the battle was beyond Beauregard’s control.
The Southern assault had a mind of its own. Bragg, Hardee, and Polk were reacting to the dynamics of battle with bits and pieces of each other’s troops. Each simply attempted to carry whatever Union position presented itself. Polk found this approach worked well against the Union right. For Hardee and Bragg, however, the Confederate offensive ethic collided headlong with the determined defenders of the Hornet’s Nest.
As many as a dozen assaults were made on this portion of the Union line (McDonough p. 139). Each time the Rebels advanced with great determination. Each time the Yankees yielded nothing. The fighting was so intense that the woods caught fire. Smoke from the blaze added to that of the muskets and canon. It became difficult to see or breathe. The screams of wounded men, desperate to avoid the flames in the woods, could be heard above the calls from officers to rally and the roar of gunfire.
About 3:30 Confederate Brigadier-General Daniel Ruggles decided that infantry alone would never take the Hornet’s Nest. Of his own volition, Ruggles ordered his staff to search the field for any and all available artillery. As Bragg attempted to ready his men for yet another attack, Ruggles collected the largest concentration of artillery ever assembled in North America.
One hour later 50 to 60 cannon opened up on the Hornet’s Nest (Daniel p.38, Sword p.292). At first, Union batteries that had supported the defensive line all afternoon offered effective counterbattery fire. But soon the superior volume of Southern firepower took effect. The Union batteries began to limber.
At this time, the Confederates turned the Union left flank back onto itself. In the absence of Johnston’s personal leadership, individual division commanders took it upon themselves to do what they thought Johnston would have done. As a result, four Southern brigades, including Chalmers, turned away from Pittsburgh Landing and jackknifed the Hornet’s Nest. They drove the Northern lines westward, away from the river, but the opportunity to capture the Landing was lost in the process.
The combined effect of Ruggles’ artillery barrage and the collapse of the left side of the Hornet’s Nest sent hundreds more Union soldiers scurrying to join the thousands of other stragglers at the Landing. The center, however, of the once impregnable Union line remained strong, but to no good end. Around 5:30, General Prentiss found his position hopeless. Too late, he ordered a withdrawal. His men were surprised to find their retreat cut off not only by Rebels coming at them from the river but by disorganized forces of Polk’s corps coming from the west as well.
Polk was completing the rout of the Northern right at the same time Prentiss decided to escape. Sherman and McClernand had been unable to hold a firm line since the fall of Shiloh Church that morning. Their constant retreats ultimately opened the door for Polk to advance toward the rear of the Hornet’s Nest just as it was caving-in from the final Confederate assaults.
Polk’s momentum carried him eastward, toward the river. Only a portion of his command followed Sherman’s remnants toward Pittsburgh Landing. Once again, the Hornet’s Nest drew all the Rebel forces onto itself and away from the Landing. A large section of the Union line was captured, but the original objective of Johnston’s assault was forgotten.
As a result, Ulysses S. Grant had the opportunity to put together what was truly a last-ditch defensive line. The tireless Sherman, with about one-fourth of his division still intact, anchored his right. He had fought hard and retreated almost 2 miles from his original morning encampment. Next to him stood the wrecked brigades of McClernand.
Beyond McClernand, scattered remnants of Hurlbut’s division collected themselves. These men formed the center of Grant’s desperate line. From here to the Tennessee River there was about 800 yards of high ground overlooking a ravine towards the Hornet’s Nest. Along this part of Grant’s line there was virtually no organized Union infantry.
Late in the afternoon, as the left and center of his army fought to hold the Hornet’s Nest, Grant gathered all the artillery he could find. He realized that he did not have enough organized troops left to protect the road upon which he hoped Lew Wallace’s lost division would soon arrive. His solution was to dedicate his entire left flank to 50 cannon (Keegan, p.227). For the most part, these pieces had been held back by Grant as the army’s tactical reserve.
Grant knew that Wallace and Nelson would arrive sometime during the night at the latest. He remained confident that he would be able to strengthen his line after nightfall. If only he could hold on to it. To assist in slowing down the Confederate advance, Grant took advantage of two Federal gunboats, the Tyler and the Lexington, positioned in the river.
The gunboats had harassed the Rebel right as it advanced toward the Landing since mid-afternoon. With Grant’s accumulated artillery, they were ready to concentrate a massive level of firepower on any Confederate unit that attempted to assail the immediate Landing area. Bolstering the Union left was a lone regiment of Northerners. To this force, Grant entrusted the protection of the Army of the Tennessee’s connection to the river.
About 5 p.m., as the early spring twilight began to approach, Grant was ready for the South’s final assault of the day. But, Beauregard did not order such an attack. He could tell from observation and staff information that both armies were all but fought out. The Army of the Mississippi was nearly a wreck. Of his original force of 44,000, probably half of it was still in some sort of controllable order. The rest were killed, wounded or straggled on the field.
The army was badly disorganized and unruly to command. Brigade commanders were leading little more than regiment-sized units. Division leaders had trouble locating all their brigades. Generals were leading geographic sections of the battlefield held by units from differing corps. Most Confederate units were reporting themselves low on ammunition.
Beauregard thought the Yankees would retreat the next day. His army had delivered the most powerful blow of firepower every displayed in North America. The better part of a Yankee division, numerous pieces of artillery, and no fewer than four Northern camps were captured almost fully intact. Grant had lost virtually all of his army’s materiel. Surely, Beauregard reasoned, the Union army would move back toward Savannah and await the arrival of Buell.
Shiloh slowed to a series of trivial skirmishes as daylight past to night.
Copyright © W. Keith Beason, 1999
Version 1.5
Version 2.0 is forthcoming with photos, original maps, updated information based upon new research. Stay tuned.
Understanding Shiloh
Conclusion
