wrenched commission after commission from their unwilling hands, until he had won the wreath of Lieutenant-General, which had never been bestowed upon any other than regularly educated West Point soldiers. Without the advantages of learning, he exhibited a remarkable originality in the conduct of the war, and was the practical author of one of the most important reforms in the service. It was this uneducated man who, above all others, divined the true uses of cavalry in the war, and gave it a new and terrible power. The improvements in modern warfare may be said to have annihilated the uses of cavalry as an arm of attack to be employed against infantry formations. Six hundred Scots Greys rode against the Russian rifles at Balaklava, and of that gallant corps only one hundred and sixty returned from the charge. The infantry line, or square, engages the cavalry column of attack as far as it can be distinctly descried, and it is annihilated before it has reached the point-blank range of the smooth-bore musket. This important fact was fully recognized and acted upon by Forrest, and he aimed to make his mounted troops a body of swift infantry centaurs. The immemorial sabre was almost entirely discarded, and the long-range carbine, or rifle, and navy revolver, usurped its place. It was this change that confounded the enemy, converted the operations of Forrest's cavalry from mere raids to more important service, and made it a practicable and formidable arm on the regular field of battle.

Gen. Forrest had none of that polish which the popular imagination usually ascribes to the chivalric hero. His education was wofully deficient, and his extreme illiterate condition almost surpasses belief. He was the coarse Western man, ungrammatical whenever he opened his mouth, guilty of slang and solecism, but full of the generous fire of conflict, alive with every instinct of chivalry, and with an enthusiasm as simple as that of a boy. He had an immense brain; he was named by a distinguished Confederate General as the most wonderful man of the war, next to Stonewall Jackson; he was quite as peripatetic; he fought through four States in the war; and his quickness of movement and strike in battle gained for him the title of "War Eagle of the West." Forrest never refused an open fight; he disdained ambuscades and surprises; his orders against guerillas who might stray from his command to such dishonourable service, were even more severe

than those of the enemy. He once offered a reward for the apprehension of a step-brother, because of his reported unauthorized depredations as a guerilla. Fair-play was the jewel of the man. When in the last periods of the war, Wilson, with a largely superiour force, chose to harass and weaken him without a battle, Forrest, tired of the game of strategy, sent him word: "If you will come out, I'll give you a fair field, and a square fight, the longest pole to take the persimmon." In this coarse language there is yet something severely and undeniably chivalric.

He was

His prowess in the war was almost marvellous. wounded four times and had twenty-nine horses shot under him. He is reported to have said "I have with my own hand killed a man for every horse I lost in the war, and I was a horse ahead at its close. At Selma, I killed two Yankees, and jumped my horse over a wagon, and got away. My provost-marshal's book will show that I have taken 31,000 prisoners during the war!" The Great Cavalryman "fought for blood." Simple in his conversation, sometimes as full of boisterous humour as a school-boy when relating his exploits, he was yet volcanic in his wrath, and in the gloom of his aroused passions his dearest friends dared not approach him. There is something terrible in such a character, and yet sublime, when the passions are intelligent and not merely exhibitions of temper. Forrest was the incarnation of vengeance in the war, but there was not a trait of personal malice in his record. He was the fierce combatant for the cause of right, the champion with the vizor up, and the blazing countenance fighting to the point of death. His passions were the inspirations of a great contest, not the fume of low personal animosities. The great events of 1861 found him leading an obscure and amiable life, called out an unconscious greatness, touched a hidden enthusiasm, and suddenly raised from this simple man the apparition of a new glory and a new flame in the war.

LIEUT.-GEN. EDMOND KIRBY SMITH.

CHAPTER LXXI.

Early military life of E. Kirby Smith.-His first conspicuous service in the Con federate States army at Manassas. His campaign with Bragg in Kentucky.Great success of Gen. Smith's part of the campaign.-Put in command of the Trans-Mississippi Department.-Extraordinary spirit of this part of the Confederacy.-Peculiar military difficulties of the department.-The Red River cam. paign.-Why Gen Smith did not pursue Banks.-Affairs with the Federal General Steele. Judgment and prudence of Gen. Smith in deciding an alternative of campaigns.-Injustice of the popular censure on this subject.-Results and fruits of the Red River campaign.-Prejudice in Richmond against the TransMississippi States.-What they accomplished in the war.-Gen. Smith's resolution to hold out after Lee's surrender. His troops demoralized, clamourous, and excited against their commander.-Terrible scenes of disorder.-History of the surrender of the Trans-Mississippi.-Review of Gen. Smith's military character. Some explanation of unjust popular accusations.

EDMOND KIRBY SMITH is a native of Florida. His father was a Connecticut lawyer of repute, and shortly after the war of 1812, in which he served as a Major and Colonel, was appointed United States Judge for the District of Florida, and removed with his family to St. Augustine. Two sons were educated for the army. The elder graduated at West Point, was a Captain in the regular army during the Mexican War, and was killed at Molino del Rey. The younger, Edmond, graduated at West Point in 1845, and was ordered as Brevet Second-Lieutenant to the 5th Infantry, then with Gen. Taylor in Mexico. He was afterwards with Scott at Vera Cruz; and such was his activity and merit in this war, that he received three brevets for gallant conduct in the space of less than a year-a brilliant record, where all were so brave and eager to win renown.

In 1854, he was Captain in the same cavalry regiment with

R. E. Lee, and others already mentioned. This regiment was assigned to the duty of checking the incursions of the Comanche Indians, and its principal field of operations was Texas. In the desperate and decisive battle with these savages, which occurred in May, 1859, Capt. Smith was severely wounded.

When the State of Florida seceded, Capt. Smith promptly resigned his commission in the United States army, and was among the first of its old officers to offer his services to President Davis, by whom he was sent to Virginia, to serve with Gen. Johnston, then commanding at Harper's Ferry. His first conspicuous ser vice in the war was very brilliant and popular, as he reached the field of Manassas at the head of a brigade, in the heat of the battle, when the Confederate left wing was being hard pressed, and by his timely arrival made such an extension of the Confederate line, as to enable it to turn the enemy's flanking movement, and save the day. While executing this movement he was struck by a ball, and severely wounded. He was promoted Brigadier-General for his service on this field; but medical attention to his wound. detained him many months, and it was not until the second year of the war he was again in active command.

The defeat of Gen. Crittenden and the death of Gen. Zollicoffer, in East Tennessee, was the forerunner of all those disasters which followed each other with such rapidity in that quarter of the Confederacy. To repair the first-named disaster as far as possible, Gen. Smith was placed in command in East Tennessee. How completely he succeeded was not known until he had an opportunity to march into Kentucky. This march was concerted with Gen. Bragg, and was part of a grand strategic operation, which appeared likely to result in the liberation of Kentucky. Gen. Smith moved directly on Lexington, determined to strike at the very heart of the blue-grass country. At Richmond he encountered 10,000 men, under "Bull" Nelson, drawn up to dispute his progress. On the 30th August, 1862-the day on which the second battle of Manassas was fought in Virginia-he attacked this force. An utter route ensued. 3,000 men threw down their arms and surrendered. All the enemy's stores, all his cannon, all his baggage-everything he had-were captured. The flight and pursuit were continued almost to the gates of Lexington, which, a few days after, surrendered, as did also Frankfort. The Legisla

ture fled to Louisville, and the Confederate flag was displayed on the capitol of the State. Gen. Smith pushed his reconnoissances to within a few miles of Cincinnati. Great expectations were excited by these successes, and at one time Gen. Smith dispatched to Richmond that he had the prospect of obtaining 10,000 recruits in the State. Unfortunately, however, the columns of Gen. Bragg, in the other part of Kentucky, did not balance the successes of Gen. Smith. The campaign, as has been elsewhere related, terminated with the withdrawal of Bragg to Tennessee, and Gen. Smith was recalled to the main army, in time to join in its retreat through Cumberland Gap, and sorrowful abandonment of Kentucky.

Gen. Smith's largest figure in the war was as commander of the Trans-Mississippi Department. In March, 1863, having been made a Lieutenant-General, he was appointed to the command of this extensive Department, including the States west of the Mississippi River. This vast territory had been seriously affected by the fall of New Orleans, and at one time it was feared that it would prove delinquent in the war, under the pressure of Federal armies, and with but little hope of assistance from the government at Richmond. But it should be recorded to the credit of this large section of the Confederacy, that despite everything done to conquer or corrupt its arms, and the little support, and even sinister countenance, it had from Richmond, it preserved to the last its allegiance to the Confederate cause, exhibited undiminished courage, and never lost the true inspiration of the war. This much it is proper to say, because of an unjust accusation long prevalent in Richmond of a languid or disloyal sentiment in the States of the Trans-Mississippi. In the face of the great disaster at New Orleans, and when events tended to the isolation from the central government of the States of Texas, Arkansas, and Missouri, and a large portion of Louisiana, and demagogues were plying schemes of "reconstruction," and attempting a return to the Federal rule, the Governors of these States assembled and issued a stirring address, evoking every patriotic effort to sustain the Confederate cause. In this appeal these high officers and brave men declared: "We have every confidence in the Confederate authorities; we believe that they will fully sustain the credit of the government here, and provide amply for our future defence. But in order that they may