Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 9.djvu/392

CHAPTER XII

THE MISSOURI BRIGADES OPPOSE GRANT BELOW VICKSBURG—DEATH OP COLONEL WILLIAM WADE—BATTLE OP PORT GIBSON—BATTLE OP BAKER'S CREEK—THE M1SSOURIANS SAVE THE ARMY—AFFAIR AT BIG BLACK RIVER—SIEGE OF VICKSBURG—PROVISIONS FAIL—GENERAL GREEN AND COLONEL IRWIN KILLED—SURRENDER OF THE CITY AND THE ARMY— DEATH OF GENERAL BO WEN—THE MISSOURI BRIGADE.

AFFTER the battle of Corinth and the extrication of the army from the cul-de-sac between two rivers and two opposing armies, in which it had been caught, by the coolness and practical military sense of General Price, the First and Second Missouri brigades encamped on the iath of February, 1863, near what had once been the pleasant little city of Grand Gulf, to rest, reorganize and recuperate. General Bowen assumed command of the First brigade, with the First and the Third Missouri cavalry still in the Second brigade, under General Green. But General Bowen, being the ranking officer, was shortly after assigned to the command of the division, and Colonel Cockrell was again in charge of the First brigade. Here they remained during the rest of the winter and well into the spring, varying the monotony of camp life by occasional incursions into the country on the west side of the Mississippi, and, fortifications having been constructed on the river side of the camp and armed with heavy guns, in fighting Federal ironclad gunboats.

In one of these fights Col. William Wade was instantly killed His battery, which had served in the Missouri State Guard, was the first organization to go into the

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