“Vicksburg is the Key” – Part 1: Illinois and Jasper

“Vicksburg is the key.  The war can never be brought to a close until that key is in our pocket.”

– Abraham Lincoln

When my boyfriend Steve and I visited Vicksburg National Military Park in 1991, I secretly wished I was from Illinois.  Illinois had the most impressive memorial in the park, and – judging from the number of smaller monuments along the driving tour – its soldiers appeared to have played a more prominent role in the Union’s victory than those from my home state of Minnesota, or Steve’s home state of Iowa.

Steve was on break from medical school at the University of Iowa and had come to visit me in nearby Natchez, Miss., where I was working as a newspaper reporter.  We spent a few hours that day exploring the park’s hills and ravines, and imaging the horrors of war experienced by both sides during the 47-day siege of the city, perched on a bluff 300 feet above the Mississippi River.

I didn’t know then that we’d return 18 years later, a married couple with three adventurous children, armed with an important discovery: my Riggs family history ties directly to the impressive Illinois State Memorial I’d admired, and to the Iowa State Memorial that’s located on the park’s southern loop.

The Illinois State Memorial is 62 feet tall and is modeled after the Pantheon in Rome.

I had known, growing up, that a Riggs ancestor from Illinois had fought in the Civil War, but I’d never attempted to find out more details.  A few years ago, when I began researching the musical career of my great-grandfather, G. Oliver Riggs, I learned that his father, Jasper Riggs, had fought with the 45th Illinois Infantry, Co. I.  I looked up Jasper’s regiment history and was stunned to discover that he’d fought at Vicksburg, as did two of his brothers, and at least one brother-in-law.  And, what I was even more fascinated to learn, his regiment had participated in three dangerous assaults on the Confederate’s formidable defenses.

Steve and I decided several months ago that Louisa, Sebastian and Elias were probably the perfect ages to take on a tour of Civil War battlefields (14, 12 and 10), so we planned an October vacation that would include visits to both Vicksburg and Shiloh, where Jasper also fought.  I had a particular quest in mind for our Oct. 24 visit to Vicksburg; I’d read somewhere that the names of all 36,325 Illinois soldiers who fought at Vicksburg are listed on bronze tablets inside of the memorial.  I wanted to find Jasper’s name.

Louisa, Elias and Sebastian pause on the steps of the memorial.  There are 47 steps; one for each day of the siege.

We locate the 45th Infantry panel on the wall.

Jasper's name, listed with other members of the 45th Illinois Infantry, Co. I.

Louisa makes a rubbing of Jasper's name.

The 45th Illinois Regiment was positioned on Jackson Road near the Shirley House, the park’s only surviving wartime structure.  Called “the white house” by soldiers, it’s currently under renovation and is located near the Illinois Memorial.  It’s also near the site where Jasper’s regiment made three failed attempts at attacking one of the Confederate’s major fortifications (the Third Louisiana Redan), before Gen. Ulysses S. Grant called off the attacks and prepared for a siege.  I learned from reading Jasper’s pension file that he injured his left wrist during the June 25 attack, when the 45th exploded a mine and splinters from a log struck Jasper in the face and arm.

A sign at the Third Louisiana Redan tour stop explains the mine explosions.

During our visit to the park with the kids, we ate a picnic lunch in our rental car while parked in the lot by the Illinois Memorial and the Shirley House.  We feasted on ham and cheese sandwiches, chicken wraps, chips and soda, in the same place where Jasper likely had meals of hardtack, beans and coffee.  His meals don’t sound that desirable, but they would have been welcomed by the poor Confederate soldiers and Vicksburg civilians who resorted to eating dogs, cats and mules during the siege.

With no reinforcements, and food running low, Confederate Gen. John C. Pemberton decided to surrender to Grant.  Union troops rode into the city on July 4, 1863, and replaced the Confederate flag on top of the Vicksburg courthouse with the Stars and Stripes.  They also raised the regimental flag of the 45th Illinois Infantry, in recognition of its role in the campaign.

In my next post, I will tell the story of how my great-grandfather, G. Oliver, made his own pilgrimage  to the Vicksburg military park in 1906.