In 1863 the small community of
Bridgeport was located along the east bank of the Big Black River
approximately 2-1/2 miles northwest of Edwards
where the Bridgeport road (modern name is Goat Hill Road) crossed
the stream on a sturdy floating bridge. The skeleton bridge at
the present site, known as Askew Bridge, is no longer usable.
Confederate Col. A. W. Reynolds,
assisted by a detachment of Col. Wirt Adams' Mississippi Cavalry
Regiment, was able to shepherd the 200-plus wagons of the Army
of Vicksburg's train across the floating bridge at Bridgeport
during the early hours of darkness on May 16, 1863. The Confederates
destroyed the bridge behind them, thus preventing Union Col. Clark
Wright's 6th Missouri Cavalry from pursuing. Reynolds left a detachment
of snipers behind to discourage any Union attempts to cross the
river.
Union Maj. Gen. Francis Blair's
division, escorting the pontoon train of the Union Army of the
Tennessee, arrived at Bridgeport about mid-afternoon on May 17.
Blair brought up artillery to force the Confederate snipers away,
and then immediately began the construction of a pontoon bridge
across the river. The bridge was completed well before dark, after
which Blair's division crossed and marched 2 miles northwest up
the Bridgeport road toward Vicksburg before camping for the night.
In the meantime, Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman, with the divisions
of Maj. Gen. Frederick Steele and Brig. Gen. James M. Tuttle (XV
Corps) had arrived during the late afternoon. Maj. Gen. Ulysses
S. Grant arrived from the battlefield of Big Black River Bridge
about dark, and he and Sherman seated themselves on a convenient
log and watched Steele's division cross the river by torchlight.
Steele bivouacked on the flats along the west bank of the river.
The next morning (May 18) Grant
crossed the Big Black River with Tuttle's division, leaving a
detachment of Pioneers behind to pick up the bridge and move it
to Vicksburg.
