Ohio 56th Volunteer Infantry (Union)

Shiloh

On the morning of April 6, 1862, 40,000 Confederate soldiers under the command of Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston poured out of the nearby woods and struck the encamped divisions of Union soldiers occupying ground near Pittsburg Landing on the Tennessee River.READ MORE

Siege of Corinth

Union forces had captured the railroad junction and important transportation center at Corinth, Mississippi in the spring of 1862 after their victory at Shiloh. After the Battle of Iuka in September, Maj. Gen. Sterling Price's Confederate Army of the West marched to Ripley, Mississippi where it joined Maj. Gen. Earl Van Dorn's Army of West Tennessee. Van Dorn took command of the combined force numbering about 22,000 men. The Rebels marched southeast toward Corinth, hoping to recapture it and then sweep int…READ MORE

Port Gibson

On April 30, 1863, Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant's army crossed the Mississippi River at Bruinsburg, 30 miles south of his objective of Vicksburg. Grant hoped to move east toward the capital at Jackson to block the Confederate army there under Gen. Joseph E. Johnston from reinforcing Vicksburg. Port Gibson, ten miles east of Bruinsburg on the Bayou Pierre River, commanded the best approach routes and was the first Federal objective. A Confederate force there was commanded by Maj. Gen. John S. Bowen. Grant's A…READ MORE

Lieutenant ColonelWilliam H. Raynor

ColonelJames R. Slack

Brigadier GeneralAlvin P. Hovey

Champion Hill

The Battle of Champion Hill was the largest and bloodiest action of Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant's Vicksburg Campaign.READ MORE

Vicksburg

In mid-May, 1863, after six months of unsuccessful attempts, Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant's Army of the Tennessee finally converged on Vicksburg, defended by a Confederate army under Lt. Gen. John C. Pemberton. Capture of the Mississippi River town was critical to Union control of the strategic river. Vicksburg was located on a high river bluff defended with artillery, and Pemberton's men had constructed a series of fortifications in an 8-mile arc surrounding the city on the landward side. After crossing the…READ MORE

Helena

Lt. Gen. Theophilus Holmes, Confederate commander in Arkansas, sought to relieve Union pressure on Vicksburg, Mississippi as the army of Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant besieged that strategic city. Holmes won approval for a plan to assault the Union-held river town of Helena, Arkansas, 170 miles north of Vicksburg, with a combined force of about 7,600 men. About 4,000 Union soldiers were in Helena under the command of Maj. Gen. Benjamin Prentiss. Four artillery batteries defended the town, surrounded on the la…READ MORE

Mansfield

The Red River Campaign of 1864 was one General-in-Chief Ulysses S. Grant's initiatives to apply simultaneous pressure on Confederate armies along five separate fronts from Louisiana to Virginia. In addition to defeating the defending Confederate army, the campaign sought to confiscate cotton stores from plantations along the river and to give support to pro-Union governments in Louisiana. By early April, Maj. Gen. Nathaniel P. Banks' Union army was about 150 miles up the Red River threatening Shreveport. C…READ MORE