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twelve thousand men, nor I think more than fifteen thousand.’
A few days afterwards, as the rebel prisoners were leaving for the North, on transports, it was announced that General Buckner's steamer was ready.
His own brigade of troops was aboard, and he invited Grant to go with him and look at his soldiers, of whom he was proud.
Grant went with him, and the rebel prisoners crowded around their captor, curiously but respectfully.
Buckner spoke to them, and told them that General Grant had behaved with kindness and magnanimity, and bade them remember this, if ever the fortune of war allowed them to show him, or any of his soldiers, the same treatment which they now received.
On the last day of the fight, Grant had twentyseven thousand men, whom he could have put into battle; some few regiments of these were not engaged.
Other reenforcements arrived on the 16th, after the surrender, swelling his number still further.
Of artillery, he had but the eight light batteries which started with him from Fort Henry, not near so many guns as he captured.
His entire losses during the siege were two thousand and forty-one, in killed, wounded, and missing; of these, four hundred and twenty-five were killed.
No exact account of the rebel loss, other than in captures, can be given; but rations were issued at Cairo, to fourteen thousand six hundred and twenty-three prisoners, captured at Fort Donelson; and Grant estimated that at least twenty-five hundred rebels were killed or wounded during the siege.1
1 There were rations issued at Cairo, to fourteen thousand six hundred and twenty-three prisoners, captured at Fort Donelson. Buckner, in his report, estimates that three thousand rebels got away with Floyd; and Pillow also says that several thousand infantry escaped during the night of the 15th. According to Forrest's account, two hundred got away with him besides his own cavalry, making at the least one thousand with Forrest. Pillow reckons the rebel losses during the siege at two thousand, which is doubtless an under estimate, as the successful party lost two thousand one hundred and forty, and the heavy fighting was all done outside of the works, where the rebels could have had no advantage of cover. The calculation is therefore simple:
| Captured, | 14,623 |
| Escaped with Floyd, | 3,000 |
| Escaped with Forrest, | 1,000 (A low estimate) |
| Killed and wounded, | 2,500 (At least) |
| —— | |
| Total rebel force at beginning of siege, | 21,123 |
New York Appleton 1885.
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