In April of 1861, Civil War became a reality at Charleston harbor when Fort Sumter was fired upon by Southern forces. Many leaders in both North and South believed that capturing the opposing capital would quickly end the war, but Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis recognized the Mississippi River as a geographic key to victory. Flowing south for 2,320 miles and bringing commerce and prosperity to the vast interior, the River made Mississippi, which it bordered for more than 600 strategic miles, a battleground for control of the Lower Mississippi River Valley. When the war closed the River to Northern commerce, the states of the Old Northwest demanded action, and by August the Union was directing all the manpower and treasure it could muster toward reopening it. A shallow-draft gunboat fleet was rapidly built, and by mid-1862 ironclads moved with impunity on the Western waters, yet Vicksburg still held and the River remained closed from Vicksburg south for 240 miles to Port Hudson, Louisiana. In the first months of 1863, General Ulysses S. Grant planned a joint operation to open the last stretch of the River. Using multiple diversions to distract Confederate General John C. Pemberton, Grant crossed unopposed at Bruinsburg, Mississippi, on April 30, defeated a Southern force at Port Gibson on May 1, and entered Grand Gulf two days later to establish a base for his campaign. Rather than march directly north to Vicksburg, he moved northeast toward Pemberton’s railroad line of communications, then after a Confederate attack on his right flank at Raymond on May 12 failed, he pivoted east and captured Jackson on May 14. Federal forces then drove west toward Vicksburg, defeating Pemberton’s army at Champion Hill on May 16 and at Big Black Bridge on May 17. Attacks on Vicksburg on May 19 and 22 were repulsed, siege operations followed, and almost two months later Vicksburg and its army surrendered on July 4, with Port Hudson falling on July 9. The River was reopened, and as Lincoln declared, “The Father of Waters again flows unvexed to the sea.”
