Gid. J. Pillow to Braxton Bragg, August 22, 1862

SPECIAL ORDERS, ADJT. AND INSP. GENERAT/S OFFICE,

August 22, 1862.

No. 196. i Richmond, Va., August 22, 1862. * * * * * * *

XL. The reports of the Fort Donelson disaster having now been received and considered, it is impossible to acquit Brig. Gen. G. J. Pillow of grave errors of judgment in the military operations which resulted in the surrender of the army, but there being no reason to question his courage and loyalty, his suspension from duty i is removed,

‘and he will report to General B. Br agg for orders. fe

JNO. WITHERS, Assistant Adjutant- General.

By kia of the Kb of War:

OXFORD, Miss., August 27, 1862. General S. COOPER, ‘ Adjutant- General, Richmond :

Is the order of suspension simply removed, without anything being said relieving me from censure? Am I required to report to General ‘ Van Dorn, or will the President allow me to report to General Bragg and assist in relieving my own State?

GID. J. PILLOW, DBrigadier- General, C. S. Army.

RICHMOND, VA., September 12, 1862. Hon. GEORGE W. RANDOLPH, Secretary of War:

The order of the Government restoring me to duty ascribes to me errors of judgment in the military operations at Donelson. The explanations as to what constitutes those errors, in our personal interview, indicated to my order to call off the pursuit of the army after the battle of the 15th February and back into the works as erroneous. In my communication of the 11th instant I gave my understanding of the objects and purposes of that combat, and solemnly asseverated that I never understood that the army was to retreat from the battle-field towards Charlotte, and I assigned reasons to show that that step was then impossible. I beg now to refer the Department to the original and supplemental reports of Colonel Gilmer, of the Engineer Corps, who was on duty with me at that post.

*See Special Orders, No. 289, December 10, 1862.

The supplemental report wil be filed in a few days. From these reports [you] will, I am persuaded, be satisfied that my order was not only a proper one, but that it was the means of saving the army from a conflict with a large fresh force of the enemy, Which would greatly have endangered’ its existence, and that General Buckner was himself in error in supposing that my order had defeated or had any reference to the army retreating from the battle-field. That step was never contemplated or spoken of or even suggested as proper. It is difficult to understand how he could have taken up such impression, and it is singular that if my order had interfered with the previously-understood programme of action, why General Floyd should have so promptly approved my order, as General Buckner himself states in his report, and why neither he nor General Floyd should have said something about it.

I hope to make the point elear by other testimony, when, I trust, the Department will perceive the justice of rescinding the order.

Respectfully, * GID. J. PILLOW, Brigadier-General, €. S. A.

RICHMOND, VA., September 18, 1802. Hon. GEoRGE W. RANDOLPH, Secretary of War: :

In the personal interview with the President and yourself explanatory of the errors of judgment which I am considered by the Government to have committed (as stated in the order of August 22 past), I understood that the Government was satisfied that I was opposed to the surrender of the army of Donelson, and that in regard to the surrender my error consisted in not accepting the command when turned over by General Floyd to General Buckner for the purpose of capitulation and myself fighting it out (if I believed that was practicable), or of surrendering the command and myself with it. I have stated in my correspondence with the Department that I consider the action of Generals Floyd and Buckner in determining that the command could not be saved but must be surrendered was binding upon me, and that I refused to accept the command to carry this determination (by a surrender) into effect. ‘The decision of the President upon the point settles the question, and I accept that decision as the law of the case, and acknowledge myself relieved of a question upon which (suddenly sprung upon me) my mind was never free from doubt.

The other error, as I understand your explanation of the order, consisted in the order I gave after our army had driven the enemy from all his positions in front of our lines, where he was slowly falling back upon his large fresh force of 20,000 men at the gunboat landing.

My order was to draw off from further pursuit, and’ for our forces to return to our line of defenses. This order was given to ayoid a conflict, after a long and bloody battle, with the enemy’s large body of fresh troops, which I was satisfied would be brought to the field, and which I knew we could not withstand in the exhausted condition of our small force. I had kept up the fight with the forces under my immediate command for the last two hours by carrying ammunition in boxes upon the heads of details from the command for that purpose, my supply of 60 rounds having been exhausted in the long struggle, and no wagon could go to the battle-field on account of the thick undergrowth and want of road. The order that I gave had no other object, and when its object

was explained to General Floyd he unhesitatingly approved it. I did not prevail upon him or use any arguments or persuasive.measures to induce him to approve of it. He at once saw its necessity, and countermanded the order which he had given upon the field for General Buckners command to occupy the open field in front of our line and from which we had driven the enemy on the Wynn’s Ferry road.

This order of mine did not prevent the command from retiring from

the position on the retreat towards Charlotte and Nashville, for the reason that it was not ready nor in condition to assume the march. I solemnly aver before God that I never understood it to be the purpose, object, or determination of the general officers, or of any of them, to ` march in retreat from the battle-field if we won it. So far from it, and as an evidence that we ali so understood it, the command went into the aetion without the necessary subsistence and covering for along march over a country scarcely practicable for infantry and deemed impracticable for anything else, covered as it was with a deep snow and sheeted over with sleet. The army could not have taken the field for battle, encumbered with the necessary rations, blankets, knapsacks, &c., for the march. . Neither in the council of the night of the 14th nor at any other time was it understood or even suggested that we should march from the field of battle on retiring from Donelson. General Buckner seems to have understood it differently, but he never explained to me this view of his, and I did not know that he so understood it until I read his official report. I was in the midst of his troops several times during the after part of the battle and after they returned into the work, and I am satisfied they had not the rations and other necessary preparations for the march. /

It will be recollected that the first purpose was to have fought the enemy on February 14; but it was deferred, at my suggestion, as being too late in the day. General Buckner never reported himself ready for the march nor intimated to me after the battle that my order had inter- – fered with his views or intended action. No orders had been issued to the eommand, either written or verbal, to march from the field; no preparations had been made for that purpose.

The battle of the 15th was fought to cut up the investing force before the fresh forces could get in position to open the way to Charlotte, but it never entered into my head that we were to.mareh from the field of battle without any subsistence, blankets, or knapsacks, leaving all of our wounded upon the field of snow, with the different regiments and brigades broken, mixed, and scattered, leaving behind the artillerists in the river bottoms, the two regiments at that place as a protecting force, the four regiments of Heiman’s brigade left in its position in the line of works to proteet General Buckner’s right flank, and all the pickets along our whole line then drawn back into the works to hold them, while the main army contested the field outside of the works. To none of these forces had orders been given. Neither had any of our field artillery been taken outside of our works before the battle was won. Its participation in the conflict was from the inside of the works. General Buckner’s artillery was left in his part of the works, aud the piece ordered by him into the field after the battle was fought was taken from my portion of the works.

I ieel confident General Floyd will sustain me in this view of the sub- . ject. This point (deemed to involve error on my part) is raised by General Buckner’s report; was unknown to me until I read his report, and Iam persuaded that upon a full view of all the circumstances the Gov316 OPERATIONS IN KY., TENN., N. ALA., AND 8. W. VA. [Cnar. XVII

ernment wil see the injustice done me in ascribing to me an error of judgment. My order for the army to be called off from the pursuit and brought back into the works alone saved it from being crushed by the large, fresh force of the enemy which did in a short time afterwards attack and carry a portion of- General Buckner’s rifle pits.

For these reasons the order of the Government ascribing to me error of judgment I feel is unjust, and I respectfully request that part of the case may be held by the Government for further information, which I hope to present to the Department in the future.

I also ask that the Department will, in writing, specify the points of error ascribed to me as stated in our verbal conversation, believing that, when the errors are stated in order, they will be less injurious to me than the general ascription of errors without specifying them. I cannot believe the President or yourself will do me intentional injustiee, and yet, as the order now stands, I feel that it is more hurtful to my reputation than if the errors were pointed out.

Respectfully, ; GID. J. PILLOW.

OXFORD, Mıss., October 10, 1862. Hon. GEORGE W. RANDOLPH, Secretary of War:

Having made up my mind to retire from the service unless a reconsideration of its aetion by the Government shall eause a corrcetion of those acts considered unjust towards me, I consider it respectful to the Government as well as due to my own reputation as a patriot to explain the reasons of my determination. In doing so, I may refer to past occurrences, in which the President has felt but little interest, yet, as they are truths, they should be known as parts of the history of this war.

When Tennessee, by her declaration of independence, had separated herself from the Lincoln Government, she provided by law for raising and arming a force of 55,000 men, and placed me, as the senior majorgeneral, in command of this force. When I had organized about 35,000

of this force, had established shops for the manufacture of cannon and small-arms of every description, and had gathered a large amount of powder and other material of war, and before a man had been transferred to the Confederate service, the President appointed Bishop Polk, of Louisiana, a major-general, and assigned him to the command of the department which embraced my then field of operations, and instructed him to have the Tennessee forces transferred to the Confederate service. Subsequently he tendered me the appointment of major-general. That I should have felt deeply humiliated at being thus deprived of my eommand, reduced in rank, and placed under the orders of a priest, who had devoted his life to religious pursuits and had no experience in the field as a military man, ought not to excite surprise. That this injustice should have been done by a fellow-soldier of the Mexican war, for whom I had always cherished a warm friendship and for whom I had a high admiration, neither diminished my surprise nor mortification. From à sense of duty to the country (under certain pledges of the major-general), I accepted the position.

Subsequently I fought the battles of Belmont and Donelson. In both of these battles the greatinequality of the forces engaged made the conflicts most unequal and bloody. In both our arms were victorious. In the battle of Donelson the forces commanded.by myself fought with brilliant success and with a gallantry never surpassed. Had General

L4 4 Cmar. XVIL] CAPTURE OF FORT DONELSON, TENN.

Buckner’s command been equally successful we would have destroyed the enemy’s army of 30,000 men. But unfortunately, by his failure in the assault on the Wynn’s Ferry road battery, and permitting the enemy after the main battle had been won to take possession of a portion ot his rifle pits, the position we occupied became untenable, and having reinvested us with 40,000 troops, half of which were fresh, Generals Floyd and Buckner were of opinion that the army could not be saved, and that capitulation was all that wasleftus. In this opinion I differed with them. I believed we could cut our way through the enemy’s new line and insisted that it was our duty to do so. But not being sustained in these views, and regarding their decision, approved as it was by General Floyd (the senior general present), as equivalent to a military order of that commander, I felt constrained to acquiesce in what I could not prevent.

In pursuance of this decision General Floyd devolved the command upon General Buckner, who surrendered it accordingly. It is proper here to state that I refused to receive the command. for the purpose of capitulation. It appeared afterwards, from the President’s special message to Congress, that he was surprised aud offended at the surrender, and by his orders General Floyd and myself were suspended from command. Believing the President had acted under a misapprehension of my position, I took the sworn testimonials of five officers present, all of whom proved that I opposed the surrender, and early in April I laid it before the Government, and asked to be relieved from the order of suspension. This was not done. On the contrary, I was held suspended for nearly six months and until General Buckner’s release. When his report [was] received by the Government the order of suspension was removed, but in the order relieving me from suspension it is recited:

It is impossible to aequit Maj. Gen. G. J. Pillow of grave errors of judgment in the military operations which resulted in the surrender of the army at Donelson, but there being no reason to question his courage or loyalty, the order of suspension is removed, and he will report to General Bragg for orders.

From this order it appears that the President was of opinion that the surrender of the army was caused by my grave errors of judgment. I was conscious of the commission of no errors. None were specified in the order. To enable me to guard against like errors in the future it was essential that I should understand what were the errors of judgment ascribed to me. For the purpose of having this explanation of

‘ the order I visited Richmond, and in a personal interview with the

President and yourself I asked for this explanation. Inreply, the first error specified was that it was my duty—notwithstanding the decision of Generals Floyd and Buckner that the command must be surrendered—to have taken command and fought it out, if that was practicable, or have surrendered the command and myself with it. I accepted this decisiow of the President as the law of the case, though I had

‘thought I would have subjected myself to arrest for insubordination

had I taken that course. I then asked what other error I had committed. The answer was that it appeared from General Buckner’s reports that, after we had driven the enemy from our front to the right of our position, he was in position to protect the retreat of the army towards Charlotte, and that my order calling off the pursuit and ordering it back into our works defeated this retreat. In reply to this I stated that this was a new point; that I had never heard of it before as offensive to the Government; thatit was founded on a total misapprehension of the order. I had given and of the condition of the army. I stated that we fought the battle of February 15 to cut up the investing force

before the fresh force of 20,000, which arrived at the gunboat landing on the evening of the 14th, could be got into position, with the view of opening our communications with Charlotte and Nashville, and intending ultimately to avail ourselves of a successful issue of the battle to retire from the post. All parties regarded the issue as more or less doubtful. We knew we should have a desperate fight; but we made no preparation before going into the battle for retre ating from the battlefield. No suggestion or proposition was ever made that we should do so, and all that was determined upon in the conference on the night of February 14 was that we would give the investing force battle next morning. We could not have gone into such a fight with the men loaded down with blankets, knapsacks, and six days’ rations, and without these the march over 60 miles of extremely broken and poor country, covered with snow and sleet 4 inches deep, could not have been made. We had left all of our field artillery within our works, because we could not use it on a battle-field covered over with a thick undergrowth of black-jack bushes. We could not have commenced a retreat before the enemy’s large force of cavalry and artillery without artillery to protect our rear.

We had fought the battle, leaving the three companies of artillery in the river batteries, with tworegiments of infantry as a supporting force. We had left Heiman’s brigade of four regiments in its position in the line of works to protect the right flank of General Buckner’s force when he should attack the enemy’s position on the Wynn’s Ferry road. All these forces were left within our works, without orders or a knowledge that we contemplated a retreat from the battle-field.

Again, when the army had been engaged in a close and bloody fight for seven and a half hours, every officer of experience in the field knows that regiments and brigades are broken and mixed and more or less scattered over the field. To have attempted a retreat from the battlefield under such circumstances, and without reformation and in compact order, would have resulted, if pursued, in a massacre of the command. All these circumstances I stated as showing that the statement in Genexal Buckners reports was founded in error on his part as to our intention to retreat from the battle-field. If such was then his understanding he would certainly have reported himself to me as ready to commence the retreat, which he never did; and when we were engaged on the night of the 15th (after the battle) in making a: rangements for the retreat, then we called together all the commanders of companies, regi- * ments, ‘and brigades, of every arm of the service; gave orders for the retreat; assigned to the different corps their respective positions ; gave orders for the whole command to have their blankets, knapsacks, new supply of ammunition, and five days’ rations, and directed General Buckner (then nearest the position of the enemy) to protect the rear of the army in the retreat. General Buckner, after so great a lapse of time, evidently has his memory confused as to what was determined upon on the night of the 15th, confounding them with events and purposes ws ; tained on the night of February 14.

I further said that as this point was a new one, suggested for the ie time in General Buckners report, it would have been but fair to give me notice of the point and an opportunity of explanation before my conduct was condemned; that my object in giving the order was to avoid a conflict with the enemy’s fresh force of 20,000 men, which, in our then . exhausted condition, I knew we could not withstand; that the moment

the reasons of the order were explained to General Floyd he revoked his own order, approved of mine, and directed General Buckner to return as promptly as possible to his position in the rifle pits. The necessity of this order is proved beyond all question by the result which quickly followed, for before General Buckner got back to his position he found the enemy advancing rapidly upon and into some of them, and he actually made so firm alodgment into those on his rightthat he could not be dislodged. 1 further said that I was satisfied that Major Gilmer and General Floyd would sustain me in this view of the order imputed to me as error of judgment.

Before leaving Richmond I saw Major Gilmer, had a full conversation with him, and ascertained that his recollection and opinions fully sustained mine on this whole subject. I then addressed an official communication to you, referring you to the original and supplemental reports of Major Gilmer as sustaining me on the point, and requested that the specifications of error might remain open for further information. To this I have received no reply. General Floyd being in Western Virginia, I could not see him.

Such, sir, was the substance of my explanation to yourself and the President of the order of mine which you regard as having resulted in the surrender of the army; yet my communication addressed to you from Richmond remains unnoticed, and I still rest under the censure of this order.

From the above history of the operations of: the army at Donelson it is manifest that the position of peril to which the army was reduced, which produced the necessity of its surrender, was caused by General Buekner’s unsuccessful attack on the Wynn’s Ferry road battery and his failure to hold.his rifle pits and by his afterwards advocating the necessity of a surrender, and not by any error of judgment on my part; and yet in your order I am made to bear all the odium of that measure, while he who caused it is held blameless and uncensured. That I should’ feel deeply aggrieved by such treatment at the hands of my Government might be expected. Against such injustice I solemnly protest. If the Government is determined to shut its eyes to the light of truth, and at

. no time to do me justice, it is time for me to retire.

Again, after being solong held suspended I was ordered to report to General Bragg for orders. He ordered me by telegram to report to General Van Dorn. and placed General Buckner in command of the division which General A. S. Johnston had organized for me, and which was under my command when I was suspended. I have twice reported

“to General Van Dorn, and yet I have no command now after the lapse

of about à month. The Secretary of War has been informed by telegram of the state of faets. I have applied for permission to raise à new command of war volunteers or to take ten regiments of skeleton returned voluuteers and fill them up, but have failed to get any favorable response.

Believing now that I am the vietim of injustice; that my past services are not and ‘never will be appreciated; being without command after every effort on my part to procure one, and believing that I can

render the country no service, I am forced to the conclusion that it is

my duty to retire from the service. Yet I have determined to make the very last effort at vindication and to procure à command before retiring finally from the service.

I need not say that the promotion of my juniors in rank, who, when promoted had fought no battle, had no experience in high command and little of any sort, taken from the very forces organized by myself as a part of the Army of Tennessee, of which I was the commander—promo320 OPERATIONS IN KY., TENN., N. ALA., AND S.W. VA. [Cuar. XVII.

tions made over me while I was suspended under an unjust order—adds additional poignancy to other acts of injustice I have sustained.

I am the more induced to hesitate in taking final action from personal considerations affecting my family. My whole fortune, large as it was, has been swept away by the enemy. -In evacuating my portion of Tennessee the enemy took away my negro property from that State also. The policy of my own Government induced it to burn all my cotton. In this way I am reduced to poverty, with a large and dependent family of grown-up and unmarried daughters on my hands. While I see no means of supporting my family in the future, I am, on the other hand, doubly important to them. In addition to this source of embarrassment my taxes for the present year were assessed on my whole estate, and amount to some $5,000. “This sum I have no means of paying, and my lands will be sacrificed to pay this sum unless the Government make me advances on the cotton burned. The consideration of these matters does not properly belong to official communications, but yet are proper to be made known to the Government, as having their influence on the course I feel constrained to inform you I am about to take.

Protesting, as I solemnly do, against the injustice of this last order of the Government (explained above), and claiming a right that this my protest shall be filed on record in its archives, and having no command after a month’s delay waiting for one, I now inform the Government that I shall proceed to my residence in Tennessee and there await the action and orders of the Government upon this communication. It is proper to state likewise that I never expect to take further part in this struggle unless upon a review of its own action in regard to myself it shall do me full justice. If satisfied no such action on its part will be taken, I shall, of course, promptly forward my resignation.

I transmit this by Major Cheatam, who will bring to me your reply.

With great respect, your obedient servant,

Brigadier-General, C. S. Army.