23. The Grierson Raid Sought to Divert Attention From US Grant’s Plans, and Demonstrate the Union Cavalry’s Prowess
In addition to the damage inflicted, both physical and psychological, Grierson’s raid was intended as the opening salvo of the Vicksburg Campaign. The raiders were to divert attention from General Ulysses S. Grant’s planned attack against Vicksburg, Mississippi. They also sought to challenge and change the narrative that had prevailed until then, of the Confederate cavalry being superior Union horsemen, with the Rebels literally riding circles around the Yankees. Grierson and his men wanted to demonstrate what federal horsemen could do with a daring exploit of their own to match the headline-grabbing ones of Confederate cavalrymen J.E.B. Stuart and Nathan Bedford Forrest.
Commanded by a former music teacher who hated horses, Grierson’s cavalrymen traveled light. They packed only 5 days’ worth of rations for what planners envisioned would be a 10-day-mission, 40 rounds of ammunition, and oats for their mounts. Preceded by scouts in Confederate uniform, they rode for 600 miles through enemy territory that had never before seen hostile soldiers or felt the touch of war. Mississippi felt it now, and went into panic as Union cavalrymen burned storehouses, tore up railroads and twisted them atop burning cross ties, freed slaves, wrecked bridges, destroyed trains, and put commissaries to the torch.
