Our Civil War Tour begins at Vicksburg, Mississippi

It's the beginning of a turn in the war, into the Union's advantage.

All other major Confederate ports north of here had been recently conquered.
President Lincoln had said this was the most important campaign of the war.
Once Vicksburg was captured, it would deny the South access to all the supplies and food sent to it form Arkansas, Kansas, and Texas.

It was a long siege, though.
It took Ulysses Grant from March 29 to July 4, 1863 to capture the city.

This picture gives you a hint of why.

Vicksburg is up on a hill and the Mississippi is quite wide at this point.

Attacks from the north over land had failed.

Grant took his troops across the river and tried using mortar cannons (mounted on schooners) to quiet the artillery being used against him from the city on the hill.

These guys weighed 17,000 pounds each and fired 12 inch explosive bombs.

He also used 6 armor-clad ironsides to sail down the river and fire up at the city.
These ships burned 2,000 pounds of coal per hour to travel at their peak of 8 mph.
Can you imagine the heat those 175 sailors experienced in a vessel sheathed with steel, without windows, in Mississippi's May heat?

Here is one that has been recovered from the river bottom.

But, no luck. They didn't quiet the Confederate's hill top cannons bombarding him on the river.

So, Grant moves downriver and tries to cross and attack form the south. 
He fails in capturing and crossing at Grand Gulf.
But, a slave tells him that 10 miles further downriver a crossing by the army might be possible.

He is correct. Grant crosses the river without opposition and marches east all the way to the capital at Jackson. 
He conquers that and several other Confederate sites. 
He then attacks Vicksburg by land from the east and lays siege on May 18.

With no supplies coming in, and nearly starving troops, the Confederates concede Vicksburg on July 4, 1863.

Almost 5,000 men have died and another 15,000 wounded (in similar numbers for each side) since the beginning of this campaign in March 29th.

The choice of Independence Day as the surrender day of 29,000 men was a tactical move by the Confederate's General Pemberton. 
He is hopeful Grant will be lenient and not punish his soldiers severely.

And indeed Grant lets them go free. 
He does to want prisoners to feed.
He figures the return home of the worn-out, nearly starved  soldiers will be a psychological knife that will take the will-to-fight out of Confederates in the small towns.

But, just like in our recent Guantanamo experience, many of those soldiers are back on the line, fighting the Union at the battle we might discuss on our next blog: 

The battle of Chickamauga,  just 2 1/2 months after Vicksburg.