1862 Civil War newspaper w MAP of FORT HENRY Tennessee & GENERAL US GRANT expedi

Description

1862 Civil War newspaper with a MAP of FORT HENRY Tennessee & GENERAL US GRANT expedition against that Confederate stronghold  -
inv # 2W-201
SEE PHOTO----- COMPLETE, ORIGINAL Civil War NEWSPAPER, the
New York Herald
dated Feb 2, 1862.
This newspaper contains a prominent 9" x 5" front page map headlined: "THE REBEL PORTION OF THE TENNESSEE AND CUMBERLAND (Rivers) /  Map of the Tennessee River, Showing the Location of Ft Henry...and Ft Donaldson, Commanding the Cumberland River."
Long detailed report on Union General US Grant's expedition to Capture Ft Henry and Ft Donaldson, Tennessee
.
After the fall of
Fort Donelson
and Ft Henry to Grant's army on February 16, the Tennessee and
Cumberland
Rivers, two major water routes in the Confederate west, became Union waterways for movement of troops and material. As Grant suspected, the Union capture of the two forts and the rivers flanked the Confederate forces at Columbus, and soon caused them to withdraw from that city and from western Kentucky.
In early 1861 the critical border state of Kentucky had declared neutrality in the
American Civil War
. This neutrality was first violated on September 3, when
Confederate
Brig. Gen.
Gideon J. Pillow
, acting on orders from
Maj. Gen.
Leonidas Polk
, occupied
Columbus, Kentucky
. The riverside town was situated on 180 foot high bluffs that commanded the river at that point, where the Confederates installed 140 large guns, underwater mines and a heavy chain that stretched a mile across the Mississippi River to Belmont, while occupying the town with 17,000 Confederate troops, thus cutting off northern commerce to the south and beyond.
Two days later, Union Brig. Gen.
Ulysses S. Grant
, displaying the personal initiative that would characterize his later career, seized
Paducah, Kentucky
, a major transportation hub of rail and port facilities at the mouth of the Tennessee River. Henceforth, neither adversary respected Kentucky's proclaimed neutrality, and the Confederate advantage was lost. The buffer zone that Kentucky provided between the North and the South was no longer available to assist in the defense of Tennessee.
By early 1862, a single general,
Albert Sidney Johnston
, commanded all the Confederate forces from
Arkansas
to the
Cumberland Gap
, but his forces were spread too thinly over a wide defensive line. Johnston's left flank was Polk, in Columbus with 12,000 men; his right flank was Brig. Gen.
Simon Bolivar Buckner
, in
Bowling Green, Kentucky
, with 4,000 men; the center consisted of two forts, Forts Henry and
Donelson
, under the command of Brig. Gen.
Lloyd Tilghman
, also with 4,000 men. Forts Henry and Donelson were the sole positions defending the important
Tennessee
and
Cumberland
Rivers, respectively. If these rivers were opened to Union military traffic, two direct invasion paths would lead into Tennessee and beyond.
The Union military command in the West suffered from a lack of unified command, and were organized into three separate departments: the Department of Kansas, under Maj. Gen.
David Hunter
; the Department of Missouri, under Maj. Gen.
Henry W. Halleck
; and the
Department of the Ohio
, under Brig. Gen.
Don Carlos Buell
. By January 1862, the disunity was apparent because they could not agree on a strategy for operations in the Western Theater. Buell, under political pressure to invade and hold pro-Union eastern Tennessee, moved slowly in the direction of Nashville. In Halleck's department, Grant moved up the Tennessee River to divert attention from Buell's intended advance, which did not occur. Halleck and the other generals in the West were coming under political pressure from
President
Abraham Lincoln
to participate in a general offensive by
Washington's birthday
(February 22). Despite his tradition of caution, Halleck eventually reacted positively to Grant's proposal to move against Fort Henry. Halleck hoped that this would improve his standing in relation to his rival, Buell. Halleck and Grant were also concerned about rumors that Confederate
General
P.G.T. Beauregard
would soon arrive with 15 Confederate regiments. On January 30, 1862, Halleck authorized Grant to take Fort Henry.
Grant wasted no time, leaving
Cairo, Illinois
, at the
confluence
of the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers, on February 2. His invasion force, which arrived on the Tennessee River on February 4 and 5, consisted of 15–17,000 men in two divisions, commanded by Brig. Gens.
John A. McClernand
and
Charles F. Smith
, and the
Western Gunboat Flotilla
, commanded by
United States Navy
Flag Officer
Andrew Hull Foote
. The flotilla included four
ironclad
gunboats (flagship
USS
Cincinnati
,
USS
Carondelet
,
USS
St. Louis
, and
USS
Essex
) under Foote's direct command, and three timberclad (wooden) gunboats (
USS
Conestoga
,
USS
Tyler
, and
USS
Lexington
) under Lt.
Seth Ledyard Phelps
. Insufficient transport ships this early in the war to deliver all of the army troops in a single operation required two trips upriver to reach the fort.
After the fall of
Fort Donelson
and Ft Henry to Grant's army on February 16, the Tennessee and
Cumberland
Rivers, two major water routes in the Confederate west, became Union waterways for movement of troops and material. As Grant suspected, the Union capture of the two forts and the rivers flanked the Confederate forces at Columbus, and soon caused them to withdraw from that city and from western Kentucky.
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