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The Battle of Vicksburg, or Siege of Vicksburg, was the final significant battle in the Vicksburg Campaign of the American Civil War. In a series of skilled maneuvers, Union Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant and his Army of the Tennessee crossed the Mississippi River and drove the Confederate army of Lt. Gen. John C. Pemberton into defensive lines surrounding the fortress city of Vicksburg, Mississippi. Grant besieged the city from May 18 to July 4, 1863, until it surrendered, yielding command of the Mississippi River to the Union.
Although there was more action to come in the Vicksburg Campaign, the fortress city had fallen and, with the capture of Port Hudson on July 8, the Mississippi River was firmly in Union hands and the Confederacy split in two.
The Fourth of July holiday was not celebrated by most of the citizens of Vicksburg until World War II, because of the surrender of the city on July 4. The works around Vicksburg are now maintained by the National Park Service as Vicksburg National Military Park.
The Confederates, determined to recapture some of these freedmen and destroy the crops, undertook an expedition from Gaines's Landing, Arkansas, to Lake Providence. The Federals had constructed a fort on an Indian mound to protect some of these leased plantations. The Rebels prepared to attack the fort on June 29, but decided to demand unconditional surrender first, which the Union forces accepted. Later in the day, Confederate Col. W.H. Parsons fought companies of the 1st Kansas Mounted Infantry. The Rebels then began burning and destroying the surrounding plantations, especially those that the Yankees leased. By the next morning, U.S. Naval boats had landed the Mississippi Marine Brigade, under the command of Brig. Gen. Alfred W. Ellet, at Goodrich's Landing. At dawn, he set out with Col. William F. Wood's African-American units to find the Rebels. Ellet's cavalry found the Confederates first and began skirmishing. The fight became more intense as Ellet's other forces approached. Parsons eventually disengaged and fell back.
Pemberton was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He graduated from the U.S. Military Academy in 1837, served in the artillery, and then the Mexican-American War.
At the start of the Civil War, Pemberton chose to resign his commission and join the Confederate States Army, despite his Northern birth. It was because of the influence of his Virginia-born wife and many years of service in the southern states before the war that he became devoted to the South.
Pemberton was promoted to lieutenant general on October 10, 1862, and assigned to defend the fortress city of Vicksburg, Mississippi, and the Mississippi River. Facing the aggressive Union commander Major General Ulysses S. Grant in the Vicksburg Campaign, Pemberton was out-numbered, but significantly out-generaled as well. After Grant surprised him by crossing the Mississippi River south of the city, he defeated Pemberton and Joseph E. Johnston in a number of battles through central Mississippi, eventually besieging Pemberton in Vicksburg. Although advised to escape with his army, sacrificing the city, Pemberton held firm for over six weeks, while soldiers and civilians were starved into submission. (Pemberton, well aware of his reputation as a northerner by birth, was probably influenced by his fear of public condemnation as a traitor if he abandoned Vicksburg.) On July 4, 1863, he surrendered the city and his army to Grant, resulting in a terrible strategic loss for the Confederacy.
After his surrender, Pemberton was exchanged as a prisoner and returned to duty, but he voluntarily resigned his general's commission and served as a lieutenant colonel of artillery for the remainder of the war, a testimonial of his loyalty to the South.
After the war, John C. Pemberton lived in Virginia on his farm and then moved to Pennsylvania in 1876. He died in Penllyn, Pennsylvania, and is buried in Laurel Hill Cemetery, Philadelphia.
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