page_title: Battle of Raymond
section_title: Chaos and irony
hierarchical_section_title: Battle of Raymond / Chaos and irony
caption_attribution_description: English: Map of battlefield core and study areas. The ABPP redrew Raymond’s Study Area to better represent the full extent of the battlefield and associated troop movements. Corridors and locations used by combatants to move from the Core Area to support areas were added, including the Federal approach route from the south and the Confederate route of withdrawal and encampment in the northeast. The ABPP reduced the battlefield Core Area to remove locations where fighting is unconfirmed by primary sources.
context_page_description: The Battle of Raymond was fought on May 12, 1863, near Raymond, Mississippi, during the Vicksburg Campaign of the American Civil War. The bitter fight pitted elements of Union Army Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant's Army of the Tennessee against Confederate forces of Lt. Gen. John C. Pemberton's Department of the Mississippi and East Louisiana. The Confederates failed to prevent the Federal troops from reaching the Southern Railroad and isolating Vicksburg from reinforcement and resupply.
  During the morning of the 12th, the Confederates enjoyed a two-to-one advantage in numbers, as they faced off across Fourteen Mile Creek against a single Federal brigade. However, as morning turned to noon with the Confederates waiting in ambush, the remainder of the Federal division secretly deployed into the fields beside the brigade, giving the Union troops a three to one advantage in numbers and a seven to one advantage in artillery. The ranking Confederate officer, Brig. Gen. John Gregg, attempted to achieve tactical surprise and rout the Federal force as it crossed the creek, but he was in turn tactically surprised and routed from the field by the Union XVII Corps under the command of Maj. Gen.
context_section_description: The men of the First and Third Brigades faced the same challenge faced by Second Brigade earlier in the day.  The vines in this area hung like ropes between the trees, and some of them boasted thorns three inches (76 mm) long.  Additionally, though Fourteen Mile Creek was just inches deep, the nearly vertical banks rose over 10 feet (3.0 m) above the creek bed in places.  To compound the command problems created by the terrain, McPherson's men were operating under drum and bugle silence and orders had to be delivered by courier, causing the line to lurch forward unevenly.  The men of the 23rd Indiana Infantry Regiment experienced what must have seemed like a stroke of luck at the time—because of a turn in the creek, their right flank rested very near the creek.  With a little effort, the unit was across the creek and standing in formation.  In order to close the gap created by the march, the unit quick-stepped back the other direction looking for the rest of the brigade, and stumbled sideways into the jaws of the Confederate trap. The only thing that saved the 23rd Indiana Infantry from wholesale slaughter was the fact that the Confederates had never been issued bayonets.
  Col. Manning Force, the commander of the 20th Ohio Infantry Regiment, heard the rebel yell, followed by the sounds of musketry, and panicked. He ordered his regiment to charge, running through the nearly impassable tangle and then leaping into the creek bed. There his men must have been stricken with horror at their mistake—the rest of the division was holding its ground to the rear, and the walls of the creek were too steep to either move forwards or retreat.  Luckily the creek made a turn here, and the soldiers utilized it as a bunker as they traded blows with the right battalion of the 7th Texas Infantry, the ends of the Texans' rifles discharging just inches away as the Confederates utilized the other side of the creek bed in the same manner. Force crawled out of the creek bed with difficulty and sought help from the rest of the division, begging Colonel Richards of the 20th Illinois Volunteer Infantry regiment to move forward and connect the Federal line.
  The left battalion of the 7th Texas Infantry, and the 3rd Tennessee Infantry, wild with their easy victory over the 23rd Indiana Infantry, had pushed across the creek and past the 20th Ohio in a wave, encountering the Union battle line still standing in the woods.  For a few minutes, the Union line and Confederate line stood obscured in the thick woods and smoke and killed each other at short range, "both lines [standing] equally firm; both equally determined as a couple of bulldogs engaged in a death struggle". Just after Force returned to the creek bed, the Federal line was ordered to leave the woods for the safety of the fence line, allowing the Union commanders to sort out what had happened.  In executing this movement, Colonel Richards was lost, and with him Manning Force's desperate plea for assistance. The Confederates, perceiving that the Federals were withdrawing, imagined that the Federal line was being forced back.  The rebels pushed forward with vigor, only to be ripped apart by a volley from federal troops now hiding behind the fence.  Aggravating the situation for the Confederates was the fact that the 31st Illinois, hearing the fighting erupt behind them, had merely to about-face from their position on the Union right flank, and step forward in line a few yards before they were in firing position to enfilade the line of the 3rd Tennessee Infantry.
  On the Confederate left flank, two Confederate regiments (50th Tennessee and consolidated 10th/30th Tennessee) were sneaking forward in complete silence, ready to stream into the field in the federal rear and seal the trap.  Skirmishers of the leading 50th Tennessee chased off the cavalry pickets with a few ill-aimed shots. In the field behind the Federal army, General Logan must have been near panic.  The cavalry protecting his right flank was scrambling from the woods, his rightmost infantry regiment was nowhere to be seen, and what was 
caption: Map of Raymond Battlefield core and study areas by the American Battlefield Protection Program.
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