Under Siege! by Andrea Warren

his marvelous attention to detail, and his cool self-possession. I also witnessed the devotion of his men to him, and the enthusiasm with whichthey greeted … him, when he passed along the line. Father was a splendid horseman, and visited many points of his army every day.”
    A volunteer health inspector who was visiting the camp remembered Fred, who had turned thirteen in May, on his daily rounds with his father: “Almost every day as I drove about the lines, at some point or other I would see General Grant and his brave little assistant, riding at full speed in the face of the long lines of the enemy’s batteries, and within range of their murderous fire.
    “Fred Grant shared his father’s dangers; and although he was one of the nicest boys I ever saw, few knew his real merits and bravery. Like his distinguished father, he was free from bombast and was quiet and reserved, so his heroic services during the siege were not paraded before the public… It was fortunate that his devoted mother was not there at that time to see his danger as he went out under the guns daily. Her anxiety would have been unbearable.”
    Julia Grant would also have been concerned about her son’s health, for Fred was now suffering from typhoid fever and dysentery as well as the infection in his leg. Grant finally became alarmed enough that he sent Fred to Kentucky to recuperate with Julia Grant’s sister, Emma Casey. Bands of Confederate guerrillas roamed the Kentucky countryside, and a week after Fred arrived, a man dressed like a Confederate officer came into Emma Casey’s yard on his horse and asked for a drink of water.
    She later wrote, “He said casually, ‘I guess Fred Grant is visiting you, isn’t he?’ Instantly a cold suspicion struck me like a dart through the heart and I answered him as casually as he had questioned me, ‘Why, no.’
    “‘Oh,’ he said. ‘Isn’t he?’
    “‘No, he’s gone.’
    “‘Gone, has he? Is that so?’”
    The man left and Fred’s badly frightened aunt immediately put him on a boat back to Vicksburg, certain he was safer there. Emma Casey said that later that day, eight “hard-riding, grim-looking, and tattered cavalrymen rode up to the gate. One of them, heavily armed, and looking as fierce as aGreek bandit, came up to the porch.” The man asked if a boy was visiting there and Emma said that a boy had been there but was now gone. When the man questioned whether she was sure, she said she was and that some Union gunboats would be coming up the river shortly. “Perhaps you gentlemen will be interested in seeing them,” she said bravely. The men laughed, wished her a good day, and rode away. Emma later worried about what impact Fred’s capture might have had on the Union cause. Fortunately, Fred reached his father safely. When he arrived, Grant wrote to his wife that their son did not look very well but insisted on staying until Vicksburg fell.
    So Fred stayed, and he did not lose his confidence that Vicksburg would soon surrender. He was still determined to be there on that great day.

    G RANT HAD SELECTED S HERMAN to take charge of the eastern front. During the long days of the siege, while he and his army watched and waited for Joe Johnston, Sherman sometimes took breaks by riding his horse through the countryside. One day he stopped at a nearby plantation where a number of Southern families had sought refuge. He learned that one of them was the Wilkinson family of New Orleans and asked if their son had been a cadet at Alexandria, Louisiana, when he was superintendent of the military academy there. Mrs. Wilkinson confirmed this and said her son was now fighting for the South at Vicksburg.
    Sherman wrote, “I then asked about her husband, whom I had known, when she burst into tears, and cried out in agony, ‘You killed him at Bull Run, where he was fighting for his country!’ I disclaimed killing anybody at Bull Run; but all the women present (nearly a dozen) burst into loud