On July 3, white truce flags appeared along the center of the Confederate works. A few hours later, Grant and Pemberton met beneath an oak tree, on a slope between the lines, to arrange for the capitulation of Vicksburg and its army of 29,500. It had been 14 months since Farragut’s warships had first engaged the Vicksburg batteries, 7 months since Grant’s first expedition against the city, and 47 days since the beginning of the siege. On the morning of July 4, 1863, while Northern cities celebrated Independence Day, Vicksburg was formally surrendered. The Confederate troops marched out from their defenses and stacked their rifles, cartridge boxes, and flags before a hushed Union Army which witnessed the historic event without cheering—a testimonial of their respect for the courageous defenders of Vicksburg, whose line was never broken. Into the city which had defied him for so long, and which nearly proved the graveyard rather than the springboard of his military career, rode General Grant. At the courthouse, where the Stars and Bars had floated in sight of the Union Army and Navy throughout the siege, he watched the national colors raised on the flagstaff, and then proceeded to the waterfront. With every vessel of the Navy sounding its whistle in celebration, he went aboard Porter’s flagship to express gratitude for the work of the fleet. THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE FALL OF VICKSBURG. Vicksburg, and the simultaneous repulse of Lee’s invasion at the battle of Gettysburg, marked the beginning of the end for the Confederacy. Previously, there had been confidence that victory, although demanding desperate measures, could yet be achieved. Afterward, there was only the hope that the North might sicken of the frightful cost of continuing the war and terminate hostilities. The great objective of the war in the West—the opening of the Mississippi River and the severing of the Confederacy—had been realized with the fall of Vicksburg. While in the East the Union armies battled on in bloody stalemate before Richmond, the armies of the West would now launch their columns deep into the vitals of the Confederacy.