Southern Patriots

James stood up, stretched his cramped legs and headed back down to his command post. It was time for him to rouse up his men. They had work to do. It was time for them to earn their pay.

Thousands of Union troops in blue uniforms rapidly crossed the open fields trying to close the distance between themselves and the Confederate defensive positions. They did this while the Union artillery rained down hell on their opponents. The Union cannons did their best to pin the Confederates down while the brave men from their own side made their advance across the battlefield.

For as much as James could see from his vantage point, it looked to him like twelve thousand Union infantry were making their way across the battlefield towards his defenses. As many of them as there were, James knew that this wouldn’t be near enough. James was confident that if his men carried out their orders, this attack was going to end in a quick and resounding defeat for the Union.

James quietly watched the massive advance of the Union army as they made their way across the battlefield from his vantage point on the little rise.

Once a cannonball landed about fifty yards from where he was sitting and there were a couple of times spent mini balls kicked up a little dirt not more than ten feet from him. James was not concerned about these small threats on his life though. He had things to do.

James just watched as the Union continued their advance against the temporarily silent weapons of the Confederacy. He knew that Grant really had no idea what he was up against and was content to let the Yankees fall into his trap before he allowed his men to unleash a hell of their own against their enemy.

The signal system James’s subordinates had put in place over the last several days worked. The Confederate artillery batteries opened fire on the Union forces when they were no more than two hundred yards out from James’s front line defenses. At the same time, the men in the Confederate trenches all opened fire against the blue wave that was rapidly approaching them. Thousands of rifles all opened fire in unison and sent a virtual hailstorm of mini balls at the Union infantry.

The men making up the ranks of the Union’s frontal assault had no choice. They were  caught well out in the open when James ordered his regiments to open fire upon them. The Union infantry only had the choice of continuing their meager advance against the Southern defenses and surely die at the hands of their enemy or retreat back across the ground they had just crossed to relative safety. The later of these choices was the most popular among the men in blue still standing after the first major response of retaliation the Confederate forces threw at them. The battlefield was void of men in just a matter of minutes. The Northern assault was over so quickly that it even caught James by surprise. In just a matter of minutes, the Union forces that were so intent on crossing the field and taking control of Vicksburg had retreated back to their own lines. The only thing different down on the open battlefield now from when the Union forces had first set foot on it was the thousand or so men laying prostrate in the lush grass.

When the men in James’s ranks fully realized that they had met the enemy and had taken the best they had to offer, there came a wild cheer from within his own ranks. James’s men gave a new meaning to what a Rebel yell really was.

With relief and a bit of sadness, James headed back down off the small rise towards his command post. He was relieved that the first conflict of Vicksburg was over and the Confederacy had reigned supreme. He was also sad to think that so many men, regardless of what color uniform they were wearing had to die.

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