A Vicksburg woman who watched the entry of Union soldiers pronounced an epitaph on the campaign: “What a contrast [these] stalwart, well-fed men, so splendidly set-up and accoutered [were] to . . . the worn men in gray, who were being blindly dashed against this embodiment of modern power.” But in Richmond an embittered Jefferson Davis attributed the loss of Vicksburg not to the enemy’s power but to Joe Johnston’s timidity. When a War Department official commented that lack of provisions had doomed the garrison, Davis responded: “Yes, from want of provisions inside and a General outside who
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