Grierson's Raid

"The most brilliant expedition of the Civil War." --General William Tecumseh Sherman In 1863 Union colonel Benjamin H. Grierson was chosen for a secret mission: to lead three regiments of horsemen and a battery of artillery -- seventeen hundred men in all -- on a slashing raid through the state of Mississippi. Their objective was to damage a major Confederate rail line, spreading alarm and destroying enemy supplies in the process. Union leaders were relying on Grierson to provide cover as they moved thousands of troops into position for a major and ultimately victorious assault on Vicksburg, the South's vital transportation hub on the Mississippi River. Owing to Grierson's shrewd tactics, as well as luck and the skilled soldiering of his men, the raid was wildly successful in every respect.Here is an exciting day-by-day account of this grueling sixteen-day adventure, which weaves together several first-person accounts from Grierson and his soldiers themselves and is heavily illustrated with maps and period photographs.