Very soon after our rear-guard was aboard, General Sherman learned from Admiral Porter that McClernand had arrived at the mouth of the Yazoo.

He went, taking me and one other staff-officer, to see McClernand, and found that, under an order from the President, he had taken command of the Army of the Mississippi.

He and his staff, of whom I only remember two-Colonels Scates and Braham, assistant adjutant-general and aide-de-camp--seemed to think they had a big thing, and, so far as I could judge, they had just that.

All hands thought the country expected them to cut their way to the Gulf; and to us, who had just come out of the swamp, the cutting didn't seem such an easy job as to the new-comers.

Making due allowance for the elevation they seemed to feel in view of their job, everything passed off pleasantly, and we learned that General Grant's communications had been cut at Holly Springs by the capture of Murphy and his force (at Holly Springs), and that he was either in Memphis by that time or would soon be.