position of corps commander to the head of the Army of Tennessee. There
was other evidence of the intrigue in Eiclimond. Gen. Bragg, the " mili-
tary adviser " of President Davis, visited Johnston in his lines around
Atlanta ; never apprised him that his visit was of an official nature ; put
together everything he could to make a case against Johnston, and re-
turned to Bichmond with the alarming report that he was about to give
up Atlanta to the enemy ! Of this nonsense Gen. Johnston has written :
" The proofs that I intended to hold Atlanta are, the fact that under my
orders the work of strengthening its defences was going on vigorously,
the communication on the subjact made by me to Gen. Hood, and the fact
that my family was in the town. That the public workshops were re-
moved, and no large supplies deposited in the town, as alleged by Gen.
Bragg, were measures of common prudence, and no more indicated the
intention to abandon the place than the sending the wagons of an army to
the rear, on a day of battle, proves a foregone determination to abandon
the field."

But the Presidential fiat was to go forth in the face of all facts. On
the night of the 17th July it was known in the Army of Tennessee, that a
despatch had been received from Richmond, removing Johnston from com-
mand, and appointing in his place Gen. J. B. Hood. The news struck a
chill in the army, such as no act or menace of tlie enemy had ever done.
To Sherman it was the occasion of new spirit. When he heard that Hood
was to be his future antagonist, he jumped to his feet, made a significant
motion around his forefinger, and exclaimed : " I know that follow."

Gen. J. B. Hood had been appointed by President Davis as " a fighting
General," and was prompt to vindicate the cheap reputation that had pro-
cured for him such a command. "With some reinforcements from the
Southwest and levies of Georgia militia, Gen. Hood had now under his
command an effective force of forty-one thousand infantry and artillery,
and ten thousand cavalry. With reference to other Confederate forces in
the field, his army was a large one, although it gave him but little margin
for fanciful attacks and useless sacrifice of life.



THE BATTLES OF ATLANTA.

As Sherman approached Atlanta, two of his corps had swung around

upon the Augusta road, destroying this line of communication, while

Thomas took his command across Peach Tree Creek, directly in front of

the Confederate entrenchments. While the enemy's right on the creek

37



578 THE LOST CAUSE.

was iu marcliing column, Hood, in the afternoon of the 20th July, directed
an attack upon ir, designing to take advantage of a gap between two of
its divisions. The attack was led by Walker's and Bates' divisions of
Hardee's corps ; and the massed troops, in admirable order, burst through
tlie gap in the enemy's lines, and for a time appeared about to destroy his
forces on the right. But a double fire was brought to bear upon their lines
alono the deep hollow they had penetrated ; and the attack was drawn off
in good order, but after a half hour of deadly work, in which the killed
and wounded were counted by thousands. The loss of the enemy was
about two thousand ; that of the Confederates probably twice as large, as
they were the assaulting party, and terribly exposed on the line of attack.

'Next day, McPherson moved forward, and established a line east and
south of Atlanta, and within tliree miles of the town. His command
stretched beyond the Atlanta and Augusta Railroad, which he had torn
up. Hood now hastily swimg around Hardee's corps, followed by the
others, and brought the bulk of his army against McPherson. Hardee
moved against the enemy's extreme left, drove him from his woi-ks, and
captured sixteen pieces of artillery. Gen. McPherson was shot dead as he
rode along the line. Meanwhile, Cheatham attacked the enemy's centre
with a portion of his command, and took six pieces of artillery. Affairs
looked gloomy for the enemy ; he had been repulsed at several points, he
had lost much artillery, and the stream of bleeding men going to the rear
told how severely he suffered in the conflict. But about this time the
enemy succeeded in concentrating his artillery, and Gen. Sherman sent
word to Logan, who had succeeded McPherson, to mass his troops in the
centre and charge. Exhausted, wasted, and bleeding, the Confederate
columns gave way, abandoning most of the artillery they had captured in
the early part of the day. The attack of the 22d was like that of the
20th — one of the most reckless, massive, and headlong charges of the war,
where immense prices were paid for momentary successes, and the terrible
recoil of numbers gave a lesson to the temerity of the Confederate com-
mander.

Hood's attempt on the Federal left being frustrated, he fell back to his
inner line of works. The intentions of Sherman appear now to have been
to swing his army to Hood's extreme right, threatening the Macon road,
and having in co-operation a great cavalry raid upon his rear. Stoneman
was sent with five thousand cavalry, and McCook with fom' thousand men,
to meet on the Macon road near Lovejoy's Station, where they were to de-
stroy the rail, and also to attack and drive Wheeler's command. Stone-
man requested permission to be allowed to proceed to Macon to release tho
Federal prisoners confined there. Sherman left this at liis own discretion,
m case he felt he was able to do so after the defeat of Wheeler's cavalry.
But Stoneman did not fulfil the conditions He got down in front of



OPERATIONS AROUND ATLANTA. 579

Macon, -svitliout going to Lovejoy's, and, in attempting to reti-eat, was
hemmed in by Iverson, and was himself captnred, together with one thon-
Band of his men and two guns. McCook returned after losing five liundrcd
men as prisoners. The cavalry raid was a decided failure, or as Slierman
mildly expressed it, " not deemed a success."

On the 28th July Hood made a partial attack along the Lickskillet
road, which he had occcupied with Stewart's and Lee's corps. Tlie con-
flict was desultory and without result on either side. After five hours of
action, Hood retired with a loss of about fifteen hundred killed and
wounded.

We have already noticed that Sherman did not have force enough to
invest Atlanta completely. This was the great point in Johnston's calcu-
lations, when they were upset at Richmond ; for Sherman, reduced to
strategy, would have found his master in the cool and dexterous Johnston,
whereas in Hood he had plainly his inferiour to deal with — a commander
who had indeed abundant courage, but a scant brain with which to bal-
ance it. Sherman's army was not large enough to encircle Atlanta com-
pletely, without making his lines too thin and assailable. He never con-
templated an assault upon its strong works. It was his great object to get
possession of the Macon road, and thus sever Atlanta entirely from its sup-
plies. It was not sufficient to cut the road by raids ; it must be kept
broken, and to accomplish this it was clearly necessary to plant a sufficient
force south of Atlanta.

While Sherman meditated such a movement, Hood made the very mis-
take that would secure and facilitate it, and thrust into the hands of his
adversary the opportunity he had waited for. He sent off his entire cav-
alry towards Chattanooga to raid on the enemy's line of communication —
a most absurd excursion, since Sherman had enough provisions accumu-
lated this side of that place to last him until he could restore his communi-
cations, and had also formed a second base at Allatoona.

Instantly, the Federal cavalry M-as on the Macon road. With his
flanks easily protected, Sherman followed quickly with his main army.
On the 31st August, Howard, on the right, had reached Jonesboro', on the
Macon road, twenty miles southeast of Atlanta; Thomas, in the centre,
was at Couch's ; and Schofield, on the left, was near Rough-and-Ready,
Btill closer to Atlanta.

Hood had no alternative now but to make a battle on or near the line
of the Macon road, and there settle the fate of Atlanta. He might have
moved out of the city on the north, and have overwhelmed what of Sher
man's army — the Twentieth corps — was left there ; but he would then
have been in a country destitute of supplies. He determined to make the
battle near Jonesboro', and the corps of Lee and Hardee were moved out
to attempt to dislodge the enemy frotn the entrenched position he held



680 THE LOST CAUSE.

across Flint River The attack failed with tlie loss of more than two thou-
sand men. On the evening of tlie 1st September, the enemy's colamns
converged upon Jonesboro', and Hardee's corps, finding itself about to be
flanked and overwhelmed, withdrew during the night, after having been
cut up bv two severe engagements, and with the loss of eight guns.

That night, finding his line of supply cut off, and the sum of his die as-
ters complete, Hood determined to abandon Altanta. He blew up his
magazines, destroyed all his supplies that he could not remove, consisting
of seven locomotives and eighty-one cars loaded with ammunition, and left
the place by the turnpike roads. He moved swiftly across the country
towards Macon. The next morning Sherman moved south to catch the
retreating army, but at Lovejoy's, two miles beyond Jonesboro', he. found
Hood strongly entrenched, and, abandoning the pursuit, returned to
Atlanta.

Sherman announced : " Atlanta is ours, and fairly won." His army
entered the city on the morning of the 2d September, and the successful
commander rode through the streets to his headquarters without parade or
ostentation. He declared that his army, wearied by an arduous campaign,
needed rest, and that he proposed to give it an interval of repose within
the defences of Atlanta. But the period of military inaction was to be
employed in launching measures of the most extraordinary cruelty against
the non-combatant people of Atlanta. Gen. Sherman was the author of
the sentiment, " War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it," which was
caught up in the ^Northern newspapers as a bit of very sententious and ele-
gant philosophy, when, in fact, denying, as it did, that war had any law
of order or amelioration, it was a mere plagiarism from the bloody and
detestable code of the savage. This extraordinary doctrine Sherman at
once proceeded to put in practice by depopulating Atlanta, and driving
from their homes thousands of helpless women and children. It was the
most cruel and savage act of the war. Butler, the tyrant of New Orleans,
had only banislied registered enemies. Sherman issued a sweeping edict,
covering all the inhabitants of a city, and driving them from their homes
to wander as strangers, outcasts and exiles, and to subsist on charity.
Gen. Hood, while he received the exiles within his lines, took occasion to
protest, writing to Gen. Sherman himself of the measure his sinister mind
had devised : " It transcends in studied and ingenious cruelty all acts eve?
before brought to my attention in the dark history of war." But all pro-
tests were unavailing. In vain the Mayor of Atlanta had pointed out to
Gen. Sherman that the country south of the city was crowded already with
refugees, and without houses to accommodate the people, and that many had
no other shelter but what they might find in churches, and out-buildings ;
that among the exiles were many poor women in an advanced state of
pregnancy ; that the consequences would be woe, horrour, and suffering,



PKE8IDENT DAVIs' VISIT TO GEORGIA. 581

wliich coiikl not be described by \vords. Sherman was inexorable. He
affected the belief that Atlanta might again be rendered formidable in the
hands of the Confederates, and resolved, in his own words, " to wipe it
out." The old and decrepit were hunted from their homes ; they were
packed into railroad cars ; tottering old age and helpless youth were
crowded together ; wagons were filled with wrecks of household goods ;
and tliO trains having deposited their medley freigh-t at Rough-and-Ready,
the exiles were then left to shift for themselves.

The fall of Atlanta was a terrible blow to the Southern Confederacy ;
a reanimation of the North ; the death of " the peace party " there ; the
date of a new hope of the enemy and of a new prospect of subjugation.
" On that day," said the Eichmond Examiner, " McClellan's nomination
fell still-born, and an heir was born to the Abolition dynasty. On that
day, peace waved those ' white wings,' and fled to tlie ends of the morn-
ing. On that day, calculations of the war's duration ceased to be the
amusements even of the idle." President Davis had declared, when he
removed Johnston, that " Atlanta mnst be held at all hazards." It was
the most important manufjicturing centre in the Confederacy ; it was the
key to the network of railroads extending to all portions of the Gulf
States ; it was " the Gate City " from the north and west to the southeast ;
it was an important depot of supplies, and commanded the richest granaries
of the South. Such was the prize of the enemy.

The catastrophe moved President Davis in Richmond, and mortified
the vanity that had so recently proclaimed the security of Atlanta under
the command of Hood. He determined to visit Hood's new lines, to plan
with him a new campaign, to compensate for the loss of Atlanta, and to
take every possible occasion to raise the hopes and confidence of the peo-
ple. It is remarkable that the visits of the Confederate President to the
armies were always the occasions of some far-fetched aiid empirical plan
of operations, and were always accompanied with vapours and boasts that
unduly exalted the public mind. Mr. Davis never spoke of military mat-
ters without a certain ludicrous boastfulness, which he maintained to the
last event of the war. It was not swagger or affectation ; it was the sin-
cere vagary of a mind intoxicated with conceit when occupied with a sub-
ject where it imagined it found its forte, but whore in fact it had least
aptitude. Mr. Davis, as a military commander or adviser, was weak, fan-
ciful, to excess, and much too vain to keep his own counsels. As he
travelled towards Hood's lines, he made excited speeches in South Caro-
lina and Georgia. At Macon he declared that Atlanta would be recov-
ered ; that Sherman would be brought to grief; and that this Federa.
commmander " would meet the fate that befell Napoleon in the retreat
from Moscow." These swollen assertions, so out of character, were open
advertisements to the enemy of a new plan of operations. It appears



682 THE LOST CAUSE.

that the unfortunate vanity of President Davis completely betrayed him.
Referring to this period, Gen. Grant writes : " During this time Jefferson
Davis made a speech in Macon, Georgia, which was reported in the papers
of the South, and soon became known to the whole country, disclosing the
plans of the enemy, thus enahling Gen. Sherman to fully meet them. He
exhibited the weakness of supposing that an army that had been beaten
and fearfully decimated in a vain attempt at the defensive could buccess-
fully undertake the ofiensive against the army that had so often de-
feated it."

The new offensive movement of Hood, advised by President Davis,
was soon known to the country. Not satisfied with the revelation at
Macon, President Davis addressed the army, and more plainly announced
the direction of the new campaign. Turning to CJieatham's division of
Tennesseeans, he said : " Be of good cheer, for within a short while your
faces will be turned homeward, and your feet pressing Tennessee soil."

On the 2-ith September, Hood commenced the new movement to pass
to Sherman's rear and to get on his line of communications as far as Ten-
nessee. The first step was to transfer his army, by a flank movement,
from Lovejoy's Station on the IMacon Railroad, to near Newman on the
West Point road. The significance of this might have escaped the enemy,
but for the incautious language of President Davis at Macon, which at
once gave rise to the supposition that this movement was preliminary to
one more extensive. Sherman was instantly on the alert, sending his
spare forces, wagons, and guns, to the rear, under Gen. Thomas, and, at
the same time, sending Schofield, Newton, and Corse to take up different
points in the rear of Atlanta.

On the 27th, Hood moved towards the Chattahoochee. On the 1st
October, the enemy made a reconnoissance towards Newman, and discov-
ered that Hood had crossed the Chattahoochee River on the 29th and 30th
of September. Sherman immediately followed.

On the 5th October, when Hood's advance assaulted Allatoona, Sher-
man was on Kenesaw Mountain, signalling to the garrison at Allatoona,
over the heads of the Confederates, to hold out until he relieved them.
Hood moved westward, and, crossing the Etowah and Oostananla Rivers
by forced marches, attacked Dalton on the 12th, which was surrendered.
Passing through the gap of Pigeon Mountain, he entered Lafayette on the
]5th. From this place he suddenly moved south to Gadsden, Alabama,
where he rejoined his trains, to make his fatal march towards Nashville.

Sherman waited some time at Gaylesville, until he became fully as-
sured of the direction taken by Hood ; and then abruptly prepared to
abandon the pursuit, return to Atlanta, and mobilize his army for a march
across the broad State of Georgia to the sea. His calculation was a plain
and precise one. Gen. Thomas, at Nashville, could collect troops from the



FOLLY OF THE DAVIS-HOOD CASIPAIGN. 583

u;'liole Department of the Mississippi ; Rosecrans was able to send liim
reinforcements from Missouri ; Sherman detached two corps — the Fourth
and Twenty-third — to move, by the way of Chattanooga, to the relief of
Tliomas ; and there was little doubt that with this force Thomas could ho d
the line of the Tennessee, or if Hood forced it, would be able to concen-
trate and give a good battle. Sherman was left in command of four army
coi-ps, and two divisions of superb cavalry — a force of about sixty-thou-
Band men. "When Hood wandered off in the direction of Florence, Sherman
was left free to complete his arrangements, and there was nothing to inter-
fere with his grand projected march to the sea. In October, Gen. Grant, who
was watching closely the development of the wretched Davis-Hood device
to find some compensation for the loss of Atlanta, telegraphed Sherman :
" If you were to cut loose, I do not believe you would meet Hood's army,
but would be bushwhacked by all the old men, little boys, and such rail-
road guards as are still left at home." AVitli nothing, of course, to fear
from such an opposition, Sherman telegraphed his determination " to
make a wreck of the road, and of the country from Chattanooga to Atlanta,
including the latter city ; send back all his wounded and worthless, and with
his elfective army, move through Georgia, smashing things, to the sea."

The march would, indeed, have been a perilous enterprise, if there had
been any considerable force in Sherman's front, or on his flanks. As it
was, nothing opposed his march to the sea, and he had simply to pass
through the gate-ways which the stupidity of the Davis-Hood campaign
had left open. It is amusing to the student of history to have such a
plain march entitled a grand exploit, when it was only a question of sc
many miles motion a day. Sherman knew very well that there was noth-
ing to oppose him ; he knew that the Confederacy had been compelled to
throw all its lighting power on its frontiers, for Grant had told him " it
was but an egg-shell ; " he knew that the conscription had exhausted the
interiour ; he knew that the country he would traverse was peopled
with non-combatants, women, and children ; he knew that this country
abounded with supplies, which the difficulties of transportation had with-
held from Eichmond. He simply proposed to take plain advantage of
these circumstances, and march to the sea-board. There was no genius in
this ; no daring ; it was merely looking the situation in the face. It is
said that had Sherman failed he \vould have been put down as one of the
e^^eatest charlatans of the age. But there was no chance of failure when
there was nothing to dispute the march. If, indeed, he had attempted the
movement with a Confederate army in his front or on his flank, it is highly
probable that the adventure would have taken rank with his movement
in 18G2 on Vicksburg, the greatest fiasco of the war, and his experiment
with " the strategic triangle " in 1863, a piece of charlatanism and of dis-
ordered execution that should have decided his reputation.



584 THE LOST CAUSE.

It had been the original design of the enemy to hold Atlanta, and hy
gettino- through to the west, with a garrison left on the southern railroada
leadino- east and. west through Georgia, to effectually sever the east from
the west. In other words it was proposed in the great campaign of 1864
to rei)eat the experiment of bisection of the Confederacy, first accomplished
when the enemy gained possession of the Mississippi River. It was calcu-
lated of course to tight from Atlanta to the sea, and that the second stroke
of bisection would be accomplished by cutting through a hostile array. In
originating with Hood the movement north of Atlanta, President Davis
simply saved the enemy all the trouble he had contemplated, cleared the
way of opposition and opened a plain and unencumbered way to his ori-
ginal design, with an invitation to execute it w^ithout fear and at leisure.

We must leave here the story of Sherman's march to follow the erratic
campaign of Hood. AVhen the latter was ready to leave Florence, Sher-
man was far on his way on his march towards Savannah ; and the country
beheld with amazement the singular spectacle of two antagonistic armies,
both at once acting on the offensive, day after day marching away from
each other, and moving diametrically apart. To appreciate what insanity
must have inspired such a campaign on the Confederate side, we may
remark the utter want of compensation in the two movements. Even
throwing out of consideration the great fact that Hood's movement to the
north uncovered Georgia and left her undefended to the sea, while itself
encountered a second army of the enemy, yet even if Hood was successful,
an invasion of Northern territory would be no possible equivalent for that
of the South, where the ravage and loss of material resources might be
vital ; and even in the least circumstance, the season of the year, the Con-
federate troops, badly clothed and shod, were put at the disadvantage of
marching northward, while the enemy sought the genial clime of a South-
ern latitude.



HOOD 3 TENNESSEE CAMPAIGN.

On the 20th Kovember, Gen. Hood commenced to move his army from
Northern Alabama to Tennessee. He pushed forward as if to cut off
Schofield's retreat from Pulaski ; this Federal commander having taken
position there, with the greater part of two army corps, and an aggregation
of fort-garrisons ft'om the surrounding country, while Thomas remained at
Nashville. Schofield fearing that his position was about to be flanked,
•abandoned Pulaski, and attempted by a forced march to reach Columbia.

The want of a good map of the country, and the deep mud through
which the army marched, prevented Hood overtaking the enemy before
he reached Columbia ; but on the evening of the 27th of November tho



hood's failure at speing hill. 585

Confederate army was placed in position in front of his "works at that place.
During the night, however, the enemy evacuated the town, taking position
on the opposite side of the river, about a mile and a half from the town,
which was considered quite strong in front. Late in the evening of the
2Sth November, Gen. Forrest, with most of his command, crossed Duck
River, a few miles above Columbia, and Hood followed early on the
morning of the 20th, with Stewart's and Cheatham's corps, and Johnson's
division of Lee's corps, leaving the other divisions of Lee's corps in the
enemy's front at Columbia. The troops moved in light marching order, the
object being to turn the enemy's flank by marching rapidly on roads
parallel to the Columbia and Franklin pike, at or near Spring Hill, and to
cut off that portion of the enemy at or near Columbia.

The enemy, discovering the intentions of the Confederates, began to re-
treat on the pike towards Spring Hill. About 4 r. m.. Hood's infantry
forces, Cheatham in the advance, commenced to come in contact with the
enemy, about two miles from Spring Hill, through which place the Colum-