Thread by @pptsapper

Judging from the sounds outside, the neighborhood kids are playing "how many roman candles before we lose a finger" and so I therefore deduce it's July 4

And since it's July 4, I've had some gin, and do you have a moment to talk about the Gibraltar of the West?

Of course you do

Look, basic rule of thumb. Unless you're actual no shit Gibraltar, don't call yourself the "Gibraltar of X" it's never a good portent. Ticonderoga, Gibraltar of the north, falls in 1777. Crown Point, Gibraltar of the Hudson, falls in 1779. The trends don't lie

But I'm getting ahead of myself, which is to be expected because alcohol and history. Mixing the two has been known to cause problems, but we're just gonna surge right thru that

We begin with the Mississippi river. It's a bigass river. Like. Big. Ass.

Did you guys know it's all the way up in Minnesota? Like who the fuck put that there. Sheesh. I digress, however

In 1861, some shit goes down. Some people in the south decide their right to own other people is more important than, well, anything else, and so there's a war

Now the general of the doggone US Army, himself a southerner, Winfield "I like big dinners and I can't lie" Scott is like "look, these people don't have ships, so cut em off at sea and then take the Mississippi and it's OVER" but he's old and everyone thinks Mcclellan is sexy so

FINALLY by 1862 people are like "shit, maybe that ol Scott guy was right" and US Grant and the Army of the Tennessee are sent to do something about the Mississippi. Not that stuff hadn't been done already, basically just one giant fortress remained on that bigass river: Vicksburg

Not gonna lie, it's defensible af. Would defend 10/10. High bluffs over the river, swamps around the land approaches. This thing gets a 6 star Michelin rating for cities this engineer would not mind defending I tell you what

And that's what the rebs think too

They give command of this shit to John C Pemberton, from PENNSYLVANIA of all goddam places, one of the few northerners to be like "yeah, secession seems chill, I'm down." He's got about 3 divisions of troops that he's supposed to share w Joe Johnston & they DON'T like each other

But whatevs, it's the Gibraltar of the west, right? It's fine that the department commander and the garrison commander don't get along. It's not like the US Navy is ever getting past the massed batteries on the bluffs overlooking the river, right?

*Laughs in David Dixon Porter*

But I'm once again getting ahead of myself. It's Jan 1863 and US Grant wants to get to Vicksburg but he wants to do it without everyone dying etc. So tires ALL THE STRATAGEMS. like ya know, digging canals thru swamps and shit and flooding levees and all stuff that fails

But grant, he's like Thomas Edison, in failure he just sees more things that didn't work but that maybe will next Time with the application of more fire and maneuver

By April, tho, nothing is working. So Grant goes to his navy buddy DD Porter & is like can ya just run the guns?

Porter thinks about it and is like, "fuckit, let's do it" and takes his gunboats and transports and no shit slips through the darkness on the. Ight of April 16 1863 all gliding down the river and then the rebs open fire and this is the part where it goes to shit, right?

Wrong

Porter sneaks his vessels just under the mouths of the rebel guns so that they can't get clear shots and bam, suddenly, there's ships south of the city and north of rebel fortifications, all set for Grant's army which has marched down on the west bank of the river

Grant has a corps of 17k troops across the river before Pemberton can say "I've made a huge mistake"

Of course, it's the corps under Alexander "have you voted for me yet?" McClernand, a politician from Illinois whose idea of tactics is to just throw more troops at the problem

True to form, as McC attacks Port Gibson, the rebel strong point south of Vicksburg, he just throws more troops at it. Luckily, it works & US forces outflank the rebs at Grand Gulf who decide discretion really is the better part of valor & hoof it. Grant now has a resupply line

It's around this time, early May, that Pemberton is like, "hmmm this could actually be a problem" and orders troops to assemble to stop Grant. The first is at Raymond where Rebs try to ambush @BlackJakLogan who's like "fuck right off" & forces them back to Jackson, MS

Now, Grant has a few options at this point. He can head west, and make Pemberton have all the ragrets. But if he does that, Johnston might appear in his rear (heyo). So, ol Hiram goes east to deal with Johnston, because no one likes surprises in their rear

Johnston is there at the MS capitol but gives it up after a delaying action, while ordering Pemberbitches to attack Grants rear. Pemberton and his assembled cast of some of the worst division commanders of the war, decide the order is sort of, well, optional, and don't

With Johnston taken care of in Jackson, Hiram is all "hi ho, hi ho, it's off to Vicksburg I go, with Cump and McPherson and McClernand's dumb ass, hi ho, hi ho" and heads west just as Pemberton - who had left V-burg to maybe see about attacking Grant - decides to turn around

Which is how Pemberton gets caught in a pincer at Champions Hill on May 16, where he gets both ass cheeks soundly kicked but manages to escape with most of his force because goddammit, McClernand just fucking ATTACK ALREADY.

This campaign needed George Thomas. There, I said it.

As Johnny Pemberbottom runs towards Vicksburg with his whole force, Grant keeps up in hot pursuit, hitting the rebel rear guard at Black River Bend

Would like to just note for posterity that the neighborhood kids have graduated from mortars to medium artillery

Anyways. Battle.

On May 17, McClenand and this XIII Corps hit Pemberton at Big Black River, because that's apparently a place. I guess once we got west of the Ohio River we gave up on naming things. Anyways. US troops find a gap In the lines & the rebs have to leg it once again to escape capture

If I'm John C Pemberbunkle, I'd be calling it quits now as I fall back to my fortifications in Vicksburg as I've got Grant, Sherman, McPherson, and...and some guy from Illinois coming at me and I can't get out. But, Pemberton's five divisions settle in for a siege

Pembertittle isn't wrong tho, he's got Joe Johnston out there with a decent sized army, surely Joe isn't gonna let the lynchpin of the rebellion go without a fight

The neighborhood is graduating to the Somme, as regards to frequency of explosions goes

Anyways. Actually, he will

Also, is Pemberton dug the fuck in. As Grant discovers on May 19 when he tries a direct assault. It goes...poorly. very poorly.

...Are they firing 155s out there?

No one can break thru. The assaults fail more than US infrastructure does these days

On May 22, Grant is determined to try again. He shells the rebel lines forever, then has all 3 corps attack. It goes about as well as any engineer could've told his West Point-educated ass. It doesn't. Sherman calls off one attack, calling it murder. That's how you know it's bad

After May 22d's failures, Hiram is like "if you wanna fuckin siege I'll give you a fuckin siege. Hope you've got a lotta rats to eat." And the armies settle down for a good ol fashioned grudge match. Grant calls in some favors and gets reinforcements pouring in around V-burg

Pemberton, meanwhile, is like "Yo Joe! Wanna attack and get me outta this?" But Joe Johnston doesn't, in fact, because by now, Grant has a task force commanded by the unmedicated Sherman dedicated to keeping Johnston from attacking, so Johnston wisely doesn't attack

Meanwhile, the surrounding rebel states and governments are suddenly realized that, shit, of Vicksburg falls, they're sorely fucked, and so they send troops, oh, wait, nope, those have pretty much all been taken by Bobby Lee to invade Pennsylvania. Woopsy daisy

Rebs in Louisiana go for Grant's supply line at Milliken's Bend, assuming that the United States Colored Troops posted there won't fight very well

They are proven very, very wrong as the ill-supplied USCT kick their asses back to Louisiana.

Have now heard the unmistakeable sounds of a mom intervening in the bombardment of my neighborhood ("whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa!!)

Which reminds me that the Navy is also severely shelling Vicksburg at this time. Pemberbottle has lots of munitions, not a lot of food...

By June, the populace of Vicksburg has burrowed into the hills like a population of gophers. Which is also a good description of everyone's diet. Shoe leather becomes something of a premium as mule meat is too expensive for most ppl

Shops jack up the prices of food in the city

In late June, Grant's like, can we be done now? So he authorizes tunneling under the reb lines, placing a giant charge, and blowing it all the fuck up. The 45th Illinois is the 1st to experience what troops at Petersburg will later experience: attacking into this doesn't work

But by July-as the US engineers are like "but what if we have a BIGGER BOOM" - Pemberton is realizing that Johnston isn't coming & that Vicksburg is starving. On July 3 he's like "so Hiram, if I was to hypothetically surrender" and Grant is all "UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER IS MY NAME

The grant thinks for a sec and realizes that processing 30,000 surrenders will take too long. So he's like, "sure, surrender, we'll parole you, it'll be cool"

Pemberton accepts & on this day in 1863, surrenders the Gibraltar of the west to the hard fightin Army of the Tennessee

All those proud and chivalrous rebels totally honor their paroles, right? They go home and become gentleman farmers, right?

Fuck no, half of them are gonna get routed at Missionary Ridge for fucks sake. Spare me the honor of an honorless people

But hey, Vicksburg is finally in US hands. Lincoln announces to the nation "the father of water again fucks off to wherever, the traitorous assbags surrendered" or something to that extent, I'm a bit fuzzy on the details

AR, LA, & TX are cut off from the rest of rebeldom

Vicksburg is a huge fuckin deal. The Army and the Navy have complete control of the Mississippi when on July 9, Port Hudson, the other rebel stronghold on the Mississippi - also commanded by a northern West Pointer - surrenders. The Confederacy is completely cut in half

NATURALLY the lost causers blamed the whole thing on the two northern officers who their government had put in command. Nevermind that the entire department's organization collapsed because Grant outmaneuvered them all & they were too busy trying to support Lee

REGARDLESS

July 4 1863 is a pretty awesome day if you hate slavery and treason, with twin victories at Gettysburg and Vicksburg

So here's a toast to Grant, Meade, & the armies of the Tennessee & the Potomac: the rebs fucked around, you made them find out

#drunjhistory

This hereby endeth the Gettysburg/Vicksburg weekend programming

We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming of...well, pretty much the same stuff, just not all at once and with more cats