“Donelson”

Except for “A Scout toward Aldie,” “Donelson” is the longest poem in Battle-Pieces. It takes the form of newspaper bulletins read to an anxious crowd of Northerners from a bulletin board. The bulletins are selections worked over by Melville from the accounts of the New York Times and the Missouri Democrat, reprinted in Volume III, Documents, pp. 170-187.
The bulletins begin with an announcement that the Union forces, “Some thirty thousand the command,” have “a good position won” and begun “the siege of Donelson.” The description of Fort Donelson, some sixty miles northwest of Nashville, Melville got from a map (Documents, p. 167) and from the Times description:

This stronghold crowns a river-bluff,
A good broad mile of leveled top;
Inland the ground rolls off
Deep-gorged, and rocky, and broken up—
A wilderness of trees and brush.

The Times description:

The ground around the Fort is a rolling upland, covered with heavy timber and dense undergrowth, and broken for miles around into ravines, bordered by precipitous bluffs, whose sides, steep and rocky, almost forbid the passage of even a goat. The Fort itself is situated upon a high bluff, which slants with an easy

descent to a point at the water’s edge on the north, and is probably not less than one hundred feet above the level of the water. To the rear the bluff has been to some extent leveled for the distance of a mile. On this artificial tableland stands the Fort, whose lines of fortification and rifle-pits cover the entire leveled space. (Documents, p. 171)

Melville’s use of “vim,” which he italicizes, in his description of the troops’ morale, probably was inspired by its use by the Times correspondent, who describes an old man who is stirred by the strains of “Yankee Doodle” as the fleet passes Eddyville: “Off went his hat, and with a vim that sent his hat flying . . .” (Documents, p. 171). Melville notes that “The welcome weather/Is clear and mild,” a line for which he had the authority of the Times statement that “the weather was mild and cheerful” (Documents, p. 171).

And the phrasing of the lines “Grant’s investment is complete—/A semicircular one” follows remarks in the Times that “the Fort is completely invested” (Documents, p. 173) and that forces were extended “both up and down a line parallel with the river . . . thus enclosing the Fort in a semicircular line” (Documents, p. 171). The fighting to complete this semicircular investment was extremely bitter. As Melville puts it,

Each wood, each hill, each glen was fought for
The bold inclosing line we wrought for
Flamed with sharpshooters. Each cliff cost
A limb or life.

Melville has here drawn on the Times description of this same fighting:

This [enclosing the fort] was not done without much trouble. The enemy’s pickets and sharpshooters seemed endless in number, and had to be driven from every ravine and hill-top, at the expense of much bloodletting. (Documents, p. 171)

The account of Thursday’s battle, the manner in which “Events unfold,” follows the Times report closely:

On Thursday added ground was won,
A long bold steep: we near the Den.
Later the foe came shouting down
In sortie, which was quelled, and then
We stormed them on their left.