Confederates, unprovided with rations and the necessary supplies to enable them to hold their entrenched position, and fearing lest they should be cut off, retreated across the Cumberland River. The crossing was effected by the aid of a small steamer, which had made its way with supplies for the army from Nashville some days previous. The men only effected a passage; neither would time allow of the transport of the matériel of the army; neither were there a sufficient number of boats to convey the wagons, horses, and artillery, which, together with the camp equipment, fell into the hands of the Federals when their troops occupied, on the following morning, the deserted entrenchments. General Thomas reported the capture of 12 pieces of artillery, a battery wagon, and two forges, 150 wagons, and upwards of 1,000 horses and mules. His own loss he estimated at 14 officers and 232 men, killed and wounded. The Confederate loss must have been more severe, and during the retreat of the army to Monticello, and afterwards to Gainsboro' in Tennessee, the privations and suffering they underwent were very great. The thinly populated country could not supply means of support for so large a body of men, and the whole of the transport of the army having been abandoned, the soldiers carried nothing with them but what was on their backs. The battle of Mill Springs was the most serious disaster that had as yet befallen the Confederate armies. The troops do not appear to have behaved with their wonted firmness, as in the numbers actually engaged the Confederates were probably superior to the Federals. In the equipment and working of the artillery, the advantage lay with the Federals. On neither side did the cavalry play any considerable part. Indeed, the nature of the country,

and the absence of the requisite military training for either men or horses, have during the war prevented either the Confederate or Federal cavalry from performing the duties usually assigned to that arm in European armies. Eastern Kentucky was now completely in the hands of the Federals, but its possession was not of so great importance, either in a political or military point of view, as that of the Western part of the State, as it was through Western Kentucky that the rivers and railways passed which afforded an entrance into Tennessee, and so to the heart of the seceding States. During the month of January, strong reconnaissances of combined military and naval forces had been pushed forward from Cairo in the direction of Columbus; shots had been interchanged between the river steamers of the Confederates and the Federal gunboats, but no serious attack on the Confederate position had been attempted since the affair at Belmont. The Tennessee River, and not the Mississippi, was the real object of attack. The line of defence taken up by General Sydney Johnston, commanding the Confederate armies of the West, extended from Bowling Green on the right to Columbus on the left, which places were connected by a railroad passing through Russelville, Clarksville, and Paris, and crossing both the Cumberland and Tennessee Rivers, the former at Clarksville, the latter a short distance south of the Kentucky and Tennessee state lines. It was of great importance to preserve this line of rail, and also to defend the course of the two above-mentioned rivers, which debouch from Tennessee within a short distance of each other, and at about 70 miles from their points of entry into the Ohio River. With these objects two forts had been erected, viz. Fort Henry, on the right

SCENE OF THE CAMPAIGNS OF KENTUCKY AND TENNESSEE.

bank of the Tennessee River, a few miles north of the Kentucky state line, and Fort Donelson, on the left bank of the Cumberland River, about 15 miles to the southeast of Fort Henry, near Dover, in Tennessee. The defences of Fort Henry consisted of a bastioned earthwork, of which the river face mounted eleven heavy guns, one only being rifled. In addition to the fort itself, there were lines of entrenchments of considerable extent, consisting of a slight earthen parapet and abattis, connected with the river and the fort, and owing their strength partially to creeks and swamps in the vicinity of the river. About a mile and a quarter below the fort an island divided the stream into two parts, of which the main channel was on the western side; that on the east, when the waters were low, being too shallow for the passage of gunboats. The relief of the fort above the river was about twenty feet, and the higher ground on the opposite side of the stream commanded it. A considerable force under General Tilghman, of about 2,600 men, only a portion of whom were properly armed and disciplined, occupied the entrenchments, whilst a detachment of artillery, of 75 men, garrisoned the fort. Such was the position of affairs on February 4, when the fort was threatened by the Federal army and fleet, under General Grant and Commodore Foote. The expedition, consisting of ten regiments of infantry, with a proportion of artillery and cavalry, had embarked in transports at Cairo on February 1, and, convoyed by seven gunboats, had proceeded up the Tennessee River to a point about four and a half miles below Fort Henry. Here the troops were landed, and, on February 5, General Grant issued his orders for the attack. The object in view was to surround