Van Dorn began his campaign on September 29, leaving Ripley, Mississippi and marching north for the Tennessee line (see Map 2, Pg. 10). His plan was to march into the Volunteer State and threaten the Federal garrisons at Bolivar and Jackson without revealing Corinth as his intended target until the last possible moment. The Confederates proceeded north and crossed into Tennessee on October 1. Three miles north of the state line a halt was called for the evening and the Southerners bivouacked along the road between the villages of Metamora and Pocahontas. At Metamora the road from Ripley crossed the aptly named State Line Road and it was here the column would turn east. A half mile east of Metamora, Maj. Gen. Mansfield Lovell, commanding Van Dorn’s lead division, discovered that Davis Bridge over the Hatchie River had been destroyed. Earlier in the day the advance cavalry guard had skirmished with a portion of the 3rd Michigan Cavalry, the men who had burned the bridge before falling back in the direction of Corinth. Lovell immediately set about rebuilding it while many of the soldiers took a swim in the muddy waters of the Hatchie.9

On October 2, the Confederates crossed the Hatchie on the rickety but serviceable bridge. Four miles down the road the advance guard reached the Tuscumbia, “A small sluggish but miry river,” and learned the bridge over this stream had been damaged as well. Known as Young’s Bridge for a local who had built his house on the heights dominating the east bank, Brig. Gen. John S. Bowen’s brigade was ordered forward to make repairs. As the column came to a halt the soldiers took advantage of the break and fanned out into the swampy grounds on each side of the road to gather muscadines. During this interlude Van Dorn paused at the junction of the State Line Road with the Boneyard Road. This was a byway that took its name from the small community of Boneyard, which a Federal described as “one of the most God forsaken looking places.” Here at the junction with the Boneyard Road, and for nearly a mile in each direction, Van Dorn left his cumbersome wagon train with a guard consisting of the 1st Texas Legion, Wirt Adams’ brigade of cavalry, and the four artillery pieces of Dawson’s Saint Louis Battery, in all about 1,000 men (see Map 3, Pg. 11). Van Dorn’s decision to leave the lengthy train of 500 wagons behind would permit him to make a quick march to Chewalla, six miles to the east, followed by an attack on Corinth from the northwest. (A much smaller train would follow the troops bearing ammunition for the coming fight.) Van Dorn had another concern that prompted him to leave the rear guard at the Boneyard Road. A sizeable Union force in Bolivar could potentially disrupt his plan if they were allowed to come from behind while he was engaged at Corinth. His need for sufficient warning of an approaching enemy column was essential if he was to remain mobile and defeat his enemy in detail. With repairs to Young’s Bridge on the Tuscumbia complete, the army moved on, leaving the 1,000-odd members of the wagon guard in their wake.10

Col. William Wirt Adams was the senior man in the rear guard. A native of Frankfort, Kentucky, and brother of Confederate Brig. Gen. Daniel W. Adams, Wirt was a successful planter, banker and member of the Mississippi legislature. A friend of President Jefferson Davis, Adams had been offered the position of postmaster-general but had declined in order to recruit a regiment of Mississippi cavalry. Adams’ unit operated in a semi-independent status for the first year of the war, conducting reconnaissances through North Mississippi and West Tennessee. After directing the infantry and artillery to remain with the wagons, Adams took his command, consisting of his own Mississippi regiment and the 2nd Arkansas Cavalry, and recrossed the Hatchie. His column moved an additional three miles to the west, waiting and watching for any enemy movements from Bolivar.11

The next two days passed slowly for the troops detailed as the wagon guard. The early fall weather was unseasonably hot, and the men sweated away the hours in near 100 degree heat. Van Dorn’s attack on Corinth began early on October 3, and if they could not hear the distant guns, they soon learned of the battle as hundreds of stragglers made their way back from the fighting. Early rumors of Confederate success on the first day were tempered the next afternoon when news of defeat was confirmed.12

All day on the 3rd the Confederates had advanced taking one Union position after the other. The cost was heavy, but by nightfall they had forced the enemy into the innermost line of works. Van Dorn ordered the attack to resume at dawn but delays prevented the attack until mid-morning; within two hours it was all over. Though the Confederates managed to pierce the Union lines in two places, they did not have the reserves to exploit the breakthroughs and were thrown back by Union counterattacks. At Battery Robinett, a key position in the Union line, three desperate assaults left the ground littered with the dead and wounded of Van Dorn’s army (see Map 4, Pg. 12, and the photo on Pg. 54). The bold plan of Van Dorn and Price had failed.13

A critical element of the Southern plan to defeat Grant in detail was always to strike a numerically inferior force. Van Dorn believed the Federal garrison at Corinth to number less than 15,000, when he actually faced a combined force of 23,000. William S. Rosecrans, promoted to major general after the engagement at Iuka, lost 2,520 killed, wounded and missing, a figure just under eleven percent of his command. Van Dorn’s army of 21,000 men suffered over 4,000 casualties, nearly 500 being killed outright. At Corinth, 19 percent of his troops that began the battle never left the small railroad town, and never again would this Confederate army assume the offensive.14

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