THE BATTLE OF CHATTANOOGA.
GRANT'S ARRIVAL AT CHATTANOOGA--GENERAL ROSECRANS'S INACTION--OPENING
A NEW LINE OF SUPPLY--DESPERATE FIGHTING UNDER GENERAL
SHERMAN--PAROLED PRISONERS FORCED INTO THE CONFEDERATE ARMY--FIGHTING
AROUND KNOXVILLE--THE BATTLE ABOVE THE CLOUDS--CAPTURE OF MISSIONARY
RIDGE--BRAGG'S ARMY COMPLETELY DEFEATED--PICTURESQUE AND ROMANTIC
INCIDENTS.
A month after the battle of Chickamauga the National forces in the
West were to some extent reorganized. The departments of the Ohio, the
Cumberland, and the Tennessee were united under the title of Military
Division of the Mississippi, of which General Grant was made
commander, and Thomas superseded Rosecrans in command of the Army of
the Cumberland. General Hooker, with two corps, was sent to Tennessee.
Grant arrived at Chattanooga on the 23d of October, and found affairs
in a deplorable condition. It was impossible to supply the troops
properly by the one wagon road, and they had been on short rations for
some time, while large numbers of the mules and horses were dead.
From the National lines the tents and batteries of the Confederates on
Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge were in plain sight; their
sentinels walked the rounds in a continuous line not a thousand yards
away; and from these heights their guns occasionally sent a shot
within the lines. When General Sherman, on his arrival, walked out and
surveyed the situation, he turned to Grant and exclaimed in surprise,
"Why, General, you are besieged." "Yes," said Grant, "it is too true,"
and pointed out to him a house on Missionary Ridge which was known to
be Bragg's headquarters. General Rosecrans, like a similar commander
at the East, was able to give most excellent reasons for his prolonged
inaction. And so able a soldier as Gen. David S. Stanley, in an
article read by him before the Ohio Commandery of the Loyal Legion,
seems to justify Rosecrans. The unpleasant and unsatisfactory
correspondence of this period, between Rosecrans and the War
Department, culminated when the former, having reported the success of
an expedition against McMinnville, received a despatch from General
Halleck, which said: "The Secretary of War says you always report your
successes, but never report your reverses." And Rosecrans replied: "If
the Secretary of War says I report my successes, but do not report my
reverses, the Secretary of War lies."
It may be that the poor condition of the cavalry, and other
discouraging circumstances, were really a proper cause for non-action
to a general who was more inclined to study the safety of his own army
than the destruction of the enemy; but somehow or other, wherever
General Grant appeared, reasons for inactivity seemed to melt away,
and the spirit of determined aggression to take their place.
[Illustration: GENERAL SHERMAN'S HEADQUARTERS AT CHATTANOOGA.]
Grant's first care was to open a new and better line of supply.
Steamers could come up the river as far as Bridgeport, and he ordered
the immediate construction of a road and bridge to reach that point by
way of Brown's Ferry, which was done. Within five days the "cracker
line," as the soldiers called it, was opened, and thenceforth they had
full rations and abundance of everything. The enemy attempted to
interrupt the work on the road; but Hooker met them at Wauhatchie,
west of Lookout Mountain, and after a three hours' action drove them
off.
Chattanooga was now no longer in a state of siege; but it was still
seriously menaced by Bragg's army, which held a most {306} singular
position. Its flanks were on the northern ends of Lookout Mountain and
Missionary Ridge, the crests of which were occupied for some distance,
and its centre stretched across Chattanooga Valley. This line was
twelve miles long, and most of it was well intrenched.
Grant ordered Sherman to join him with one corps, and Sherman promptly
obeyed; but, as he did considerable railroad repairing on the way, he
did not reach Chattanooga till the 15th of November. Moreover, he had
to fight occasionally, and be ready to fight all the time. At
Colliersville he was aroused from a nap in the car by a great noise
about the train, and was informed that the pickets had been driven in,
and there was every reason to suppose that a large cavalry force would
soon make an attack. Sherman immediately got his men out of the train
and formed them in a line on a knoll near a railroad cut. Presently a
Confederate officer appeared with a flag of truce, and Sherman sent
out two officers to meet him, secretly instructing them to keep him in
conversation as long as possible. When they returned, it was with the
message that General Chalmers demanded the surrender of the place.
Sherman ordered his officers to return again to the line and talk as
long as possible with the Confederate officer, but finally give him a
negative answer. In the little time thus gained he got a telegraph
message sent to Memphis and Germantown, ordering Corse's division to
hurry forward, and at the same time backed the train into the depot,
which was a loopholed brick building, and drew his men into some
smaller works that surrounded it. In a few minutes the enemy swooped
down, cutting the wires and tearing up the rails on both sides, and
then attacked Sherman's little band in their intrenchments. Sherman
ordered all the houses that were near enough to shelter the enemy's
sharp-shooters to be set on fire, and, finding some muskets in the
depot, put them into the hands of the clerks and orderlies, making
every man available for an active defence. The Confederates had some
artillery, with which they knocked his locomotive to pieces, and set
fire to the train; but many of Sherman's men were excellent marksmen
and trained soldiers, and they not only kept the enemy at bay but
managed to put out the fire. This state of things lasted about three
hours, when the approach of Corse's division caused the enemy to
withdraw. Corse's men had come twenty-six miles on the double quick.
[Illustration: BREVET MAJOR-GENERAL JOHN W. GEARY.]
[Illustration: DESPATCHES FOR HEADQUARTERS.]
General Sherman, in his graphic "Memoirs," gives many incidents of
this march, some of which were not only interesting but significant.
Just before he set out, a flag of truce came in one day, borne by a
Confederate officer with whom he was acquainted, and escorted by
twenty-five men. Sherman invited the officer to take supper with him,
and gave orders to his own escort to furnish the Confederate escort
with forage and whatever else they wanted during their stay. After
supper the conversation turned upon the war, and the Confederate
officer said: "What is the use of your persevering? It is simply
impossible to subdue eight millions of people. The feeling in the
South has become so embittered that a reconciliation is impossible."
Sherman answered: "Sitting as we are here, we appear to be very
comfortable, and surely there is no trouble in our becoming friends."
"Yes," said the Confederate officer, "that is very true of us; but we
are gentlemen of education, and can easily adapt ourselves to any
condition of things; but this would not apply equally well to the
common people or the common soldiers." Thereupon, General Sherman took
him out to the campfires behind the tent and showed him the men of the
two escorts mingled together, drinking coffee, and apparently having a
happy time. "What do you think of that?" said he. And the Confederate
officer admitted that Sherman had the best of the argument.
Nevertheless, in spite of the fact that the war had now continued more
than two years, that the territory held by the Confederates had
steadily diminished, that they had passed the climax of their military
resources while those of the North were still abundant, that
Gettysburg and Vicksburg had rendered their terrible verdicts, and
that all hope of foreign assistance or even recognition was at an
end--the opinions {307} expressed by the officer just quoted were very
generally held at the South. It is perhaps not wonderful that the
ordinary people and the soldiers in the ranks, few of whom understood
the philosophy of war in its larger aspects, and to all of whom their
generals and their Government continually misrepresented the state of
affairs, should have believed that they were invincible. But their
educated generals and statesmen ought to have known better; yet either
they did not know better, or they concealed their real opinions.
Alexander H. Stephens, by many considered the ablest statesman in the
Confederacy, late in July of this year (1863), made a speech at
Charlotte, N. C., in which he assured his hearers that there was no
reason for anything but the most confident hope. He said that the loss
of Vicksburg was not as severe a blow as the loss of Fort Pillow,
Island No. 10, or New Orleans, and, as the Confederacy had survived
those losses, it would also survive this one. He declared that if they
were to lose Mobile, Charleston, and Richmond, it would not affect the
heart of the Confederacy, which would survive all such losses and
finally secure its independence. The enemy, he said, had made two
years of unsuccessful war, and thus far had not broken the shell of
the Confederacy. He alluded to the fact that during the Revolutionary
war the British at one time had possession of North Carolina, South
Carolina, New York, and Philadelphia, and yet did not conquer our
forefathers; and he added: "In the war of 1812 the British captured
the capital of the nation, Washington city, and burned it, yet they
did not conquer us; and if we are true to ourselves now, true to our
birthright, the Yankee nation will utterly fail to subjugate us.
Subjugation would be utter ruin and eternal death to Southern people
and all that they hold most dear. Reconstruction would not end the
war, but would produce a more horrible war than that in which we are
now engaged. The only terms on which we can obtain permanent peace is
final and complete separation from the North." With such argument and
appeal as this, from statesmen, demagogues, generals, ministers of the
gospel, journalists, and other citizens of lesser note, the Southern
people were induced to continue the terrible struggle, until, when the
final surrender came, they had hardly anything left to surrender
except the ground on which they stood.
Another incident of the march was one that gave the Fifteenth Corps
its badge. An Irish soldier of that corps one day straggled out and
joined a party of the Twelfth Corps at their campfire. Seeing a star
marked on every tent, wagon, hat, etc., he asked if they were all
brigadier-generals in that corps; and they explained that the star was
their corps badge, and then in turn asked him what was the badge of
his (the Fifteenth) corps. Now, this corps as yet had not adopted any
badge, and the Irishman had never before even heard of a corps badge;
but he promptly answered, "Forty rounds in the cartridge box and
twenty in the pocket." When General Logan heard this story, he adopted
the cartridge box and forty rounds as the badge of his corps.
[Illustration: MAJOR-GENERAL HUGH EWING.]
[Illustration]
[Illustration: BREVET MAJOR-GENERAL ABSALOM BAIRD.]
The condition of affairs at this time in that department, and the
reasons for it, are set forth with admirable clearness in a letter
addressed by General Halleck to General Grant, under date of October
20, 1863:
"It has been the constant desire of the Government, from the beginning
of the war, to rescue the loyal inhabitants of East Tennessee from the
hands of the rebels, who fully appreciated the importance of
continuing their hold upon that country. In addition to the large
amount of agricultural products drawn from the upper valley of the
Tennessee, they also obtained iron and other materials from the
vicinity of Chattanooga. The possession of East Tennessee would cut
off one of their most important railroad communications, and threaten
their manufactories at Rome, Atlanta, etc.
"When General Buell was ordered into East Tennessee in the summer of
1862, Chattanooga was comparatively unprotected; but Bragg reached
there before Buell, and, by threatening his communications, forced him
to retreat on Nashville and Louisville. Again, after the battle of
Perryville, General Buell {308} was urged to pursue Bragg's defeated
army and drive it from East Tennessee. The same was urged upon his
successor; but the lateness of the season, or other causes, prevented
further operations after the battle of Stone River.
"Last spring, when your movements on the Mississippi River had drawn
out of Tennessee a large force of the enemy, I again urged General
Rosecrans to take advantage of that opportunity to carry out his
projected plan of campaign, General Burnside being ready to coöperate
with a diminished but still efficient force. But he could not be
persuaded to act in time, preferring to lie still till your campaign
should be terminated.
"When General Rosecrans finally determined to advance, he was allowed
to select his own lines and plans for carrying out the objects of the
expedition. He was directed, however, to report his movements daily,
till he crossed the Tennessee, and to connect his left, so far as
possible, with General Burnside's right. General Burnside was directed
to move simultaneously, connecting his right, as far as possible, with
General Rosecrans's left, so that, if the enemy concentrated upon
either army, the other could move to its assistance. When General
Burnside reached Kingston and Knoxville, and found no considerable
number of the enemy in East Tennessee, he was instructed to move down
the river and coöperate with General Rosecrans. These instructions
were repeated some fifteen times, but were not carried out, General
Burnside alleging as an excuse that he believed that Bragg was in
retreat, and that General Rosecrans needed no reinforcements. When the
latter had gained possession of Chattanooga he was directed not to
move on Rome as he proposed, but simply to hold the mountain-passes,
so as to prevent the ingress of the rebels into East Tennessee. That
object accomplished, I considered the campaign as ended, at least for
the present.
"The moment I received reliable information of the departure of
Longstreet's corps from the Army of the Potomac, I ordered forward to
General Rosecrans every available man in the Department of the Ohio,
and again urged General Burnside to move to his assistance. I also
telegraphed to Generals Hurlbut, Sherman, and yourself, to forward all
available troops in your department. If these forces had been sent to
General Rosecrans by Nashville, they could not have been supplied; I
therefore directed them to move by Corinth and the Tennessee River.
The necessity of this has been proved by the fact that the
reinforcements sent to him from the Army of the Potomac have not been
able, for the want of railroad transportation, to reach General
Rosecrans's army in the field.
"It is now ascertained that the greater part of the prisoners paroled
by you at Vicksburg, and General Banks at Port Hudson, were illegally
and improperly declared exchanged, and forced into the ranks to swell
the rebel numbers at Chickamauga. This outrageous act, in violation of
the laws of war, of the cartel entered into by the rebel authorities,
and of all sense of honor, gives us a useful lesson in regard to the
character of the enemy with whom we are contending. He neither regards
the rules of civilized warfare, nor even his most solemn engagements.
You may, therefore, expect to meet in arms thousands of unexchanged
prisoners released by you and others on parole not to serve again till
duly exchanged. Although the enemy, by this disgraceful means, has
been able to concentrate in Georgia and Alabama a much larger force
than we anticipated, your armies will be abundantly able to defeat
him. Your difficulty will not be in the want of men, but in the means
of supplying them at this season of the year. A single-track railroad
can supply an army of sixty or seventy thousand men, with the usual
number of cavalry and artillery; but beyond that number, or with a
large mounted force, the difficulty of supply is very great."
Meanwhile, General Longstreet, with about twenty thousand men, was
detached from Bragg's army and sent against Burnside at Knoxville,
which is about one hundred and thirty miles northeast of Chattanooga.
After Sherman's arrival, Grant had about eighty thousand men. He
placed Sherman on his left, on the north side of the Tennessee,
opposite the head of Missionary Ridge; Thomas in the centre, across
Chattanooga valley; and Hooker on his right, around the base of
Lookout Mountain. He purposed to have Sherman advance against Bragg's
right and capture the heights of Missionary Ridge, while Thomas and
Hooker should press the centre and left just enough to prevent any
reinforcements from being sent against Sherman. If this were
successful Bragg's key-point being taken, his whole army would be
obliged to retreat. Sherman laid two bridges in the night of November
23d, and next day crossed the river and advanced upon the enemy's
works; but he met with unexpected difficulties in the nature of the
ground, and was only partially successful. Hooker, who had more genius
for fighting than for strictly obeying orders, moved around the base
of Lookout Mountain, and attacked the seemingly impregnable heights.
General Geary's command led the way, encountering intrenchments and
obstructions of all sorts, both in the valley and on the slope of the
mountain. Having crossed the Tennessee River below, it moved eastward
across Lookout Creek, and thence marched directly up the mountain till
its right rested on the palisaded heights. At the same time Grose's
brigade advanced farther up stream, drove the Confederates from a
bridge, put it into repair, and then moved on. At this moment the
Confederates were seen leaving their camps on the mountain and coming
down to the rifle-pits and breastworks at its foot to dispute the
progress of their enemy. Then another brigade was sent still farther
up the stream to make a crossing, and a section of artillery was
placed where it could enfilade the position just taken by the
Confederates, while another section was established to enfilade the
route they had taken in coming down the mountain. All the batteries
within range began to play upon the Confederates, and it was made so
hot for them that they were glad to abandon their intrenchments in the
valley. Then the remainder of Hooker's men were pushed across the
stream, and the ascent of the mountain began in earnest. They climbed
up over ledges and bowlders directly under the muzzles of the guns on
the summit, driving their enemy from one position after another, and
following him as closely as possible, in order to make him a shield
from the fire of the batteries. The advance had begun at eight o'clock
in the morning, and by noon Geary's men had reached the summit of the
mountain. Other brigades came up in rapid succession at various
points, and on the summit the Confederates found themselves surrounded
and subjected to a rapid fire from every direction save one, in which
direction (southward along the ridge) all of them who could get away
retreated, but many were taken prisoners. At this point the movement
of Hooker's men was arrested by darkness. Clouds had been hanging over
the summit of the mountain during the morning, and had gradually
settled down toward the valley, so that the last of the battle was
fought above them, spectators from below seeing the troops go up into
those clouds and disappear. Hooker's line was then established on the
east side of the mountain, with the left near the mouth of Chattanooga
Creek, {309} and the right on the palisades. To prevent the bringing
forward of artillery, the Confederates had undermined the road and
covered it with felled timber. During the night Hooker's men removed
the timber and placed the road in a serviceable condition, while all
the time an irregular fire was kept up along the line, and once a
serious attack was threatened by the Confederates. But before morning
they abandoned the mountain entirely, leaving behind the camp equipage
of three brigades. This action is famous as Hooker's "battle above the
clouds," and that evening, when the moon rose over the crest of the
mountain, a strange spectacle was seen of troops apparently marching
across its yellow disk.
[Illustration: BATTLE OF LOOKOUT MOUNTAIN.]
The next day, the 25th, Hooker was to pass down the eastern slope of
Lookout Mountain, cross Chattanooga valley, and strike the left of
Bragg's position, as now held on the crest and western slope of
Missionary Ridge. But the destruction of a bridge by the retreating
enemy delayed him four hours, and Grant saw that Bragg was weakening
his centre to mass troops against Sherman. So, without waiting longer
for Hooker, he ordered an advance of the centre held by Thomas. Under
the immediate leadership of Generals Sheridan and Wood, Thomas's men
crossed the valley, walked right into the line of Confederate works at
the base of Missionary Ridge, followed the retreating enemy to a
second line halfway up the slope, took this, and still keeping at the
very heels of the Confederates, who thus shielded them from the
batteries at the top, reached the summit and swept everything before
them.
{310} [Illustration: LOOKOUT MOUNTAIN AND TENNESSEE RIVER. (From a
photograph owned by the United States Government.)]
General Sherman advanced, according to orders, against Missionary
Ridge, but met with a more determined resistance, and had a much
slower fight on the 25th. The enemy massed heavily in his front, and
Thomas sent a division to his assistance, when the whole line was
pushed forward; and at length the enemy retired hastily, abandoning
the works at the foot of the hill, and were closely followed up the
slope to the crest, which was soon captured, with many prisoners and
all the guns. Gen. Thomas J. Wood says in his report:
"Troops in line and column checkered the broad plain of Chattanooga.
In front, plainly to be seen, was the enemy, so soon to be encountered
in deadly conflict. My division seemed to drink in the inspiration of
the scene, and, when the advance was sounded, moved forward in the
perfect order of a holiday parade.
"It has been my good fortune to witness, on the Champs-de-Mars and on
Long Champ reviews of all arms of the French service, under the eye of
the most remarkable man of the present generation. I once saw a
review, followed by a mock battle, of the finest troops of El Re
Galantuomo. The pageant was held on the plains near Milan, the queen
city of Lombardy, and the troops in the sham conflict were commanded
by two of the most distinguished officers of the Piedmontese
service--Cialdini, and another whose name I cannot now recall. In none
of these {311} displays did I ever see anything to exceed the
soldierly bearing and the steadiness of my division, exhibited in the
advance on Monday afternoon. There was certainly one striking
difference in the circumstances of these grand displays. The French
and Italian parades were peaceful pageants; ours involved the
exigencies of stern war--certainly an immense difference. I should do
injustice to the brave men who thus moved forward to the conflict in
such perfect order, were I to omit to record that not one straggler
lagged behind to sully the magnificence and perfectness of the grand
battle array.... As soon as our troops began to move forward, the
enemy opened a terrific fire from his batteries on the crest of the
ridge. It would not, perhaps, be an exaggeration to say that the enemy
had fifty pieces of artillery disposed on the crest of Missionary
Ridge. But the rapid firing of all this mass of artillery could not
stay the onward movement of our troops. When the first line of
intrenchments was carried, the goal for which we had started was won.
Our orders carried us no further. We had been instructed to carry the
line of intrenchments at the base of the ridge, and then halt. But the
enthusiasm and impetuosity of the troops were such that those who
first reached the intrenchments at the base of the ridge bounded over
them and pressed on up the ascent after the flying enemy. Moreover,
the intrenchments were no protection against the enemy's artillery on
the ridge. To remain would be destruction; to retire would be both
expensive in life and disgraceful. Officers and men all seemed
impressed with this truth. In addition, the example of those who
commenced to ascend the ridge so soon as the intrenchments were
carried was contagious. Without waiting for an order, the vast mass
pressed forward in the race of glory, each man eager to be the first
on the summit. The enemy's artillery and musketry could not check the
impetuous assault. The troops did not halt to fire; to have done so
would have been ruinous. Little was left to the immediate commanders
of the troops but to cheer on the foremost, to encourage the weaker of
limb, and to sustain the very few who seemed to be faint-hearted."
[Illustration: COLONEL GREEN B. RAUM.]
[Illustration: BREVET BRIGADIER-GENERAL JOHN B. TURCHIN.]
[Illustration: BRIGADIER-GENERAL CHARLES R. WOODS.]
By this brilliant battle, which occupied portions of three days,
Bragg's army was completely defeated, and its captured guns were
turned upon it as it fled. His men seemed to have lost all respect for
him, for when he rode among the fugitives and vainly tried to rally
them by shouting, "Here's your commander," he was derisively answered,
"Here's your mule," and was obliged to join in the flight. This
practically closed his military career. He had been a special favorite
of Mr. Davis, who is accused by some Confederate writers of
obstinately placing him where it was obvious he should have placed an
abler man. He was relieved soon after this battle from command, and
called to Richmond as the military adviser of Mr. Davis.
In these battles the National loss was nearly six thousand men. The
Confederate loss was about ten thousand (of whom six thousand were
prisoners) and forty-two guns. Bragg established the remainder of his
army in a fortified camp at Dalton, Ga., and was soon superseded by
Gen. Joseph E. Johnston. Granger and Sherman were sent to the relief
of Burnside at Knoxville, and Longstreet withdrew to Virginia.
The Chattanooga campaign was perhaps the most picturesque of any in
the war, and was full of romantic incidents.
[Illustration: A DEAD CONFEDERATE IN THE TRENCHES.]
[Illustration: WAITING FOR ORDERS.]
All the armies were followed by correspondents of the great
newspapers, some of whom were men of high literary ability and were
alive to the inspiration of the great drama they witnessed. Americans
may be pardoned for some considerable degree of pride when they
consider that in the emergency of that great war they not only had men
of sufficient skill and valor for every possible and some seemingly
impossible tasks, but also had the resources and the art to
manufacture nearly all the arms and material that were called for, and
writers capable of putting into dignified and often brilliant
literature the rapidly moving story of those terrible days. Among
these correspondents was Benjamin F. Taylor, the journalist and poet,
who followed the Army of the Cumberland as the representative of the
_Chicago Journal_. He witnessed the battles before Chattanooga, and
had a son among the blue-coated boys that scaled the mountain. From
his description, written very soon after the events, we take the
following passages:
"Let me show you a landscape that shall not fade out from 'the lidless
eye of time' long after we are all dead. A half mile {312} from the
eastern border of Chattanooga is a long swell of land, sparsely
sprinkled with houses, flecked thickly with tents, and checkered with
two or three graveyards. On its summit stand the red earthworks of
Fort Wood, with its great guns frowning from the angles. Mounting the
parapet and facing eastward you have a singular panorama. Away to your
left is a shining elbow of the Tennessee, a lowland of woods, a
long-drawn valley, glimpses of houses. At your right you have wooded
undulations with clear intervals extending down and around to the
valley at the eastern base of Lookout. From the fort the smooth ground
descends rapidly to a little plain, a sort of trough in the sea, then
a fringe of oak woods, then an acclivity, sinking down to a second
fringe of woods, until full in front of you, and three-fourths of a
mile distant, rises Orchard Knob, a conical mound, perhaps a hundred
feet high, once wooded, but now bald. Then ledges of rocks, and narrow
breadths of timber, and rolling sweeps of open ground for two miles
more, until the whole rough and stormy landscape seems to dash against
Missionary Ridge, three miles distant, that lifts like a sea-wall
eight hundred feet high, wooded, rocky, precipitous, wrinkled with
ravines. This is, in truth, the grand feature of the scene, for it
extends north as far as you can see, with fields here and there cut
down through the woods to the ground, and lying on the hillsides like
brown linen to bleach; and you feel, as you look at them, as if they
are in danger of slipping down the Ridge into the road at its base.
And then it curves to the southwest, just leaving you a way out
between it and Lookout Mountain. Altogether the rough, furrowed
landscape looks as if the Titans had ploughed and forgotten to harrow
it. The thinly fringed summit of the Ridge varies in width from twenty
to fifty feet, and houses looking like cigar-boxes are dotted along
it. On the top of that wall are rebels and batteries; below the first
pitch, three hundred feet down, are more rebels and batteries; and
still below are their camps and rifle-pits, sweeping five miles. At
your right, and in the rear, is Fort Negley, the old 'Star' fort of
Confederate _régime_; its next neighbor is Fort King, under the frown
of Lookout; yet to the right is the battery of Moccasin Point. Finish
out the picture on either hand with Federal earthworks and saucy
angles, fancy the embankment of the Charleston and Memphis Railroad
drawn diagonally, like an awkward score, across the plain far at your
feet, and I think you have the tremendous theatre.... At half-past
twelve the order came; at one, two divisions of the Fourth Corps made
ready to move; at ten minutes before two, twenty-five thousand Federal
troops were in line of battle. The line of skirmishers moved lightly
out, and swept true as a sword-blade into the edge of the field. You
should have seen that splendid line, two miles long, as straight and
unwavering as a ray of light. On they went, driving in the pickets
before them. Shots of musketry, like the first great drops of summer
rain upon a roof, pattered along the line. One fell here, another
there, but still, like joyous heralds before a royal progress, the
skirmishers passed on. From wood and rifle-pit, from rocky ledge and
mountain-top, sixty-five thousand rebels watched these couriers
bearing the gift of battle in their hands. The bugle sounded from Fort
Wood, and the divisions of Wood and Sheridan began to move; the
latter, out from the right, threatened a heavy attack; the former,
forth from the left, dashed on into the rough road of the battle.
Black rifle-pits were tipped with fire; sheets of flame flashed out of
the woods; the spatter of musketry deepened into volleys and rolled
like muffled drums; hostile batteries opened from the ledges; the
'Rodmans' joined {313} in from Fort Wood; bursting shell and gusts of
shrapnel filled the air; the echoes roused up and growled back from
the mountains; the rattle was a roar--and yet those gallant fellows
moved steadily on. Down the slope, through the wood, up the hills,
straight for Orchard Knob as the crow flies, moved that glorious wall
of blue. The air grew dense and blue, the gray clouds of smoke surged
up the sides of the valley. It was a terrible journey they were
making, these men of ours; and three-fourths of a mile in sixty
minutes was splendid progress. They neared the Knob; the enemy's fire
converged; the arc of batteries poured in upon them lines of fire,
like the rays they call a 'glory' about the head of the Madonna and
Child;--but they went up the rugged altar of Orchard Knob at the
double-quick with a cheer; they wrapped like a cloak round an Alabama
regiment that defended it, and swept them down on our side of the
mound. Prisoners had begun to come in before; they streamed across the
field like files of geese. Then on for a second altar, Brush Knob,
nearly a half-mile to the northeast, and bristling with a battery; it
was swept of foes and garnished with Federal blue in thirty minutes.
Perhaps it was eleven o'clock on Tuesday morning when the rumble of
artillery came in gusts from the valley to the west of Lookout.
Climbing Signal Hill, I could see volumes of smoke rolling to and fro,
like clouds from a boiling caldron. The mad surges of tumult lashed
the hills till they cried aloud, and roared through the gorges till
you might have fancied all the thunders of a long summer tumbled into
that valley together. And yet the battle was unseen. It was like
hearing voices from the under-world. Meanwhile it began to rain;
skirts of mist trailed over the woods and swept down the ravines. But
our men trusted in Providence, kept their powder dry, and played on.
It was the second day of the drama; it was the second act I was
hearing; it was the touch on the enemy's left. The assault upon
Lookout had begun! Glancing at the mighty crest crowned with a
precipice, and now hung round about, three hundred feet down, with a
curtain of clouds, my heart misgave me. It could never be taken.
Hooker thundered, and the enemy came down like the Assyrian; while
Whittaker on the right, and Colonel Ireland of Geary's command on the
left, having moved out from Wauhatchie, some five miles from the
mountain, at five in the morning, pushed up to Chattanooga Creek,
threw over it a bridge, made for Lookout Point, and there formed the
right under the shelf of the mountain, the left resting on the creek.
And then the play began; the enemy's camps were seized, his pickets
surprised and captured, the strong works on the Point taken, and the
Federal front moved on. Charging upon him, they leaped over his works
as the wicked twin Roman leaped over his brother's mud wall, the
Fortieth Ohio capturing his artillery and taking a Mississippi
regiment, and gained the white house. And there they stood, 'twixt
heaven and--Chattanooga. But above them, grand and sullen, lifted the
precipice; and they were men, and not eagles. The way was strewn with
natural fortifications, and from behind rocks and trees they delivered
their fire, contesting inch by inch the upward way. The sound of the
battle rose and fell; now fiercely renewed, and now dying away. And
Hooker thundered on in the valley, and the echoes of his howitzers
bounded about the mountains like volleys of musketry. That curtain of
cloud was hung around the mountain by the God of battles--even our
God. It was the veil of the temple that could not be rent. A captured
colonel declared that, had the day been clear, their sharp-shooters
would have riddled our advance like pigeons, and left the command
without a leader; but friend and foe were wrapped in a seamless
mantle, and two hundred will cover the entire Federal loss, while our
brave mountaineers strewed Lookout with four hundred dead, and
captured a thousand prisoners. Our entire forces bore themselves
bravely; not a straggler in the command, they all came splendidly up
to the work, and the whole affair was graced with signal instances of
personal valor. Lieutenant Smith, of the Fortieth Ohio, leaped over
the works, discharged his revolver six times like the ticking of a
clock, seized a sturdy foe by the hair, and gave him the heel of the
'Colt' over the head. Colonel Ireland was slightly wounded, and Major
Acton, of the Fortieth Ohio, was shot through the heart while leading
a bayonet charge. And now, returning to my point of observation, I was
waiting in painful suspense to see what should come out of the roaring
caldron in the valley, now and then, I confess, casting an eye up to
the big gun of Lookout, lest it might toss something my way, over its
left shoulder--I, a non-combatant, and bearing no arms but a Faber's
pencil 'Number 2'--when something was born out of the mist (I cannot
better convey the idea) and appeared on the shorn side of the
mountain, below and to the west of the white house. It was the head of
the Federal column! And there it held, as if it were riveted to the
rock, and the line of blue, a half mile long, swung slowly around from
the left, like the index of a mighty dial, and swept up the brown face
of the mountain. The bugles of this city of camps were sounding high
noon, when in two parallel columns the troops moved up the mountain,
in the rear of the enemy's rifle-pits, which they swept at every fire.
Ah, I wish you had been here! It needed no glass to see it; it was
only just beyond your hand. And there, in the centre of the columns,
fluttered the blessed flag. 'My God! what flag is that?' men cried.
And up steadily it moved. I could think of nothing but a gallant
ship-of-the-line grandly lifting upon the great billows and riding out
the storm. It was a scene never to fade out. Pride and pain struggled
in my heart for the mastery, but faith carried the day; I believed in
the flag, and took courage. Volleys of musketry and crashes of cannon,
and then those lulls in a battle even more terrible than the tempest.
At four o'clock an aid {314} came straight down the mountain into the
city--the first Federal by that route in many a day. Their ammunition
ran low--they wanted powder up on the mountain. He had been two hours
descending, and how much longer the return!
"Night was closing rapidly in, and the scene was growing sublime. The
battery at Moccasin Point was sweeping the road to the mountain. The
brave little fort at its left was playing like a heart in a fever. The
cannon upon the top of Lookout were pounding away at their lowest
depression. The flash of the guns fairly burned through the clouds;
there was an instant of silence, here, there, yonder, and the tardy
thunder leaped out after the swift light. For the first time, perhaps,
since that mountain began to burn beneath the gold and crimson sandals
of the sun, it was in eclipse. The cloud of the summit and the smoke
of the battle had met halfway and mingled. Here was Chattanooga, but
Lookout had vanished! It was Sinai over again, with its thunderings
and lightnings and thick darkness, and the Lord was on our side. Then
the storm ceased, and occasional dropping shots told off the evening
till half-past nine, and then a crashing volley, and a rebel yell, and
a desperate charge. It was their good-night to our boys; good-night to
the mountain. They had been met on their own vantage-ground; they had
been driven one and a half miles. The Federal foot touched the hill,
indeed, but above still towered the precipice.
"At ten o'clock a growing line of lights glittered obliquely across
the breast of Lookout. It made our eyes dim to see it. It was the
Federal autograph scored along the mountain. They were our campfires.
Our wounded lay there all the dreary night of rain, unrepining and
content. Our unharmed heroes lay there upon their arms. Our dead lay
there, 'and surely they slept well.' At dawn Captain Wilson and
fifteen men of the Eighth Kentucky crept up among the rocky clefts,
handing their guns one to another--'like them that gather
samphire--dreadful trade!'--and stood at length upon the summit. The
entire regiment pushed up after them, formed in line, threw out
skirmishers, and advanced five miles to Summerton. Artillery and
infantry had all fled in the night, nor left a wreck behind.
"If Sherman did not roll the enemy along the Ridge like a carpet, at
least he rendered splendid service, for he held a huge ganglion of the
foe as firmly on their right as if he had them in the vice of the
'lame Lemnian' who forged the thunderbolts. General Corse's, General
Jones's, and Colonel Loomis's brigades led the way, and were drenched
with blood. Here Colonel O'Meara, of the Ninetieth Illinois, fell.
Here its lieutenant-colonel, Stuart, received a fearful wound. Here
its brave young captains knelt at the crimson shrine, and never rose
from worshipping. Here one hundred and sixty of its three hundred and
seventy heroes were beaten with the bloody rain. The brigades of
Generals Mathias and Smith came gallantly up to the work. Fairly blown
out of the enemy's guns, and scorched with flame, they were swept down
the hill only to stand fast for a new assault. Let no man dare to say
they did not acquit themselves well and nobly. To living and dead in
the commands of Sherman and Howard who struck a blow that day--out of
my heart I utter it--hail and farewell! And as I think it all over,
glancing again along that grand, heroic line of the Federal epic--I
commit the story with a childlike faith to history, sure that when she
gives her clear, calm record of that day's famous work, standing like
Ruth among the reapers in the fields that feed the world, she will
declare the grandest staple of the Northwest is Man."
[Illustration: MAJOR-GENERAL A. P. STEWART, C. S. A.]
[Illustration: MAJOR-GENERAL WILLIAM B. BATE, C. S. A.]
[Illustration: MAJOR-GENERAL JEREMY F. GILMER, C. S. A. Chief Engineer
Army of the Tennessee.]
[Illustration: A TYPICAL SOUTHERN MANSION. (From a war-time
photograph.)]
{315}