Hey everyone, before we get to the real start of the show, we have some exciting news that we wanted to share with y'all.

Yep, you see, ever since we had a couple of podcast t-shirts made for ourselves, just for fun a while ago,

we've had people asking us how they could get one too. Well, now you can.

We've partnered with an online marketplace called T-Public to sell podcast t-shirts and other merchandise.

T-Public has been around since 2013 and is used by many other podcasters as well as hundreds of artists to sell lots of products and not just t-shirts.

But also sweatshirts, coffee mugs, stickers, notebooks.

Even one-zies.

Yes, so anyway, we have several designs up already and we're very excited to offer this as another way for you to support the podcast.

We've already posted links to our T-Public storefront on Twitter and Facebook and on the podcast website.

So as soon as you're done listening to this show, you can head over there and check out that podcast stuff.

And hey, if you're wearing one of our t-shirts while you're at a civil war battlefield sometime, be sure to send us a photo.

Hey everyone, welcome to episode number 281 of our

Civil War Podcast. My name is Rich. And I'm Tracy. Hello, y'all. Thanks for tuning into the show.

As you guys were recall in the last episode, Ulysses S. Grant had been advancing down the line of the Mississippi Central Railroad toward the Mississippi State Capitol of Jackson, threatening the Confederates line of communication and supply with their position over at Vicksburg on the Mississippi River.

That's a lot of times to say the word Mississippi in one sentence.

Ah, it was, but you know, there was no getting around it.

Okay. So anyway, as y'all know from listening to the last show, Grant's advance was derailed when a Confederate cavalry raid led by Earl Van Dorn destroyed the federal supply depot at Holley Springs.

More Confederate cavalry, led by Nathan Bedford Forest, had also wreaked havoc on grants supply lines in Western Tennessee, which made it impossible for the federal to quickly restock the depot at Holley Springs.

And so with his logistics in disarray due to the rebel cavalry raids, Grant decided to withdraw from northern Mississippi.

Meanwhile though, the other part of Grant's two-pronged offensive was already underway as William to come to Sherman took another federal force down the Mississippi River from Memphis.

And Grant, unfortunately, had no way to get word to Sherman and recall him.

This was bad because with Grant withdrawing and no longer a threat, the Confederate commander, John C. Pemberton, was free to shift his forces to meet another threat from another direction.

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