Vicksburg

I went back to Vicksburg this morning for my guided tour.  For those unfamiliar with it,Vicksburg was the Confederate stronghold that kept the Mississippi closed to Union shipping.  U.S. Grant was the Union general assigned to capture it.  He did so after months of campaigning, culminating in a 47 day siege in 1863.  This was a key turning point in the Civil War, increasing the Confederacy’s supply problems, and boosting Grant to hero status, which would eventually make him the head of the American military, and would send him to the White House 5 years later.  I took some pictures, would really like to spend about a week here, but will just share a few pictures here.

Various views of the battlefield are shown, but to really understand what it was like, you would have to imagine it without trees.  The building is the Illinois monument.  Illinois supplied about half of the Union army at Vicksburg.

Below are pictures of the U.S.S. Cairo (pronounced like the corn syrup, not like the city in Egypt), which was one of the ironclad gunboats that assisted Grant in his campaign.  This was the first ship sunk by a mine (they called them torpedoes then).

The ship was steam driven, with a paddlewheel in the middle of the ship, so it was kind of like a catamaran.

Finally, I visited Rosswood, a plantation that is now a privately owned home, that they use as a bed-and-breakfast.  Pretty home, only connection to the Civil War is that a shell hit the kitchen (a detached building) destroying it.

I do have more pictures, but I don’t want to bore you with travel pictures, so if you want to see more, let me know, and I’ll either post them here, or on Facebook.  Happy Road-Tripping!

Author: ramblingsofawanderingman

I'm a man who feels more at home driving down the road on an adventure than almost anywhere else. View all posts by ramblingsofawanderingman