The Events which followed the Truce—General Hood’s Army in Motion
—Battle at Allatoona Pass—He is left to the care of the
gallant Thomas—The New and Magnificent Campaign of General
Sherman—The Field of his Operations—Burning of Rome—The
Advance—Atlanta partially Burned—The Rebel Fears and Hopes—
The March.
DURING the truce which closed September 22d, General Hood had moved
his army toward Macon, to protect that important town. But the startling
rumor reached his ear that his bold antagonist would turn his front
toward Mobile, away on the shores of the Gulf. This drew the rebel chief
from his position, and brought him by a westward movement across the
track toward the seaboard.
On Sunday, September 25th, at Macon, Jeff Davis addressed the soldiers,
assuring them their feet would soon press the soil of Tennessee,
spreading before them golden visions of conquest and abundance of
supplies. To compel General Sherman to abandon his southern march, and
follow him into Tennessee, the desperate leader of treason’s battalions
wheeled about and recrossed the Chattahoochie River. Thus was abandoned
the great State of Georgia, and the “hotbed of secession,” South
Carolina, to the Union army. Generals Hood and Forrest began to cut
railroad lines and burn bridges.
At Allatoona Pass the enemy made a furious assault on our garrison to
regain this Thermopylæ of the campaign, but dashed in vain upon the
valor of our unyielding ranks. The commander-in-chief of our forces, who
had signalled General Corse from the top of Kenesaw Mountain to meet the
enemy there, sent the “boys” his warm congratulations:
“HEADQUARTERS MILITARY DIVISION OF THE MISSISSIPPI, }
IN THE FIELD, KENESAW MOUNTAIN, _Oct. 7, 1864_. }
“The General commanding avails himself of the opportunity, in
the handsome defence made of ‘Alatoona,’ to illustrate the most
important principle in war, that fortified posts should be
defended to the last, regardless of the relative numbers of the
party attacking and attacked.
“Allatoona was garrisoned by three regiments, commanded by
Colonel Tourtelotte, and reënforced by a detachment from a
division at Rome, under command of Brigadier-General J. M.
Corse, on the morning of the 5th, and a few hours after was
attacked by French’s division of Stewart’s corps, two other
divisions being near at hand, and in support. General French
demanded a surrender, in a letter, to ‘avoid a useless effusion
of blood,’ and gave but five minutes for answer. General Corse’s
answer was emphatic and strong, that he and his command were
ready for the ‘useless effusion of blood’ as soon as it was
agreeable to General French.
“This was followed by an attack which was prolonged for five
hours, resulting in the complete repulse of the enemy, who left
his dead on the ground, amounting to more than two hundred, and
four hundred prisoners, well and wounded. The ‘effusion of
blood’ was not ‘useless,’ as the position at Allatoona was and
is very important to our present and future operations.
“The thanks of this army are due, and are hereby accorded, to
General Corse, Colonel Tourtelotte, officers and men, for their
determined and gallant defence of Allatoona, and it is made an
example to illustrate the importance of preparing in time, and
meeting the danger, when present, boldly, manfully, and well.
“The army, though unseen to the garrison, was cöoperating by
moving toward the road by which the enemy could alone escape,
but unfortunately were delayed by the rain and mud; but this
fact hastened the retreat of the enemy.
“Commanders and garrisons of the posts along our railroads are
hereby instructed that they must hold their posts to the last
minute, sure that the time gained is valuable and necessary to
their comrades at the front.”
While General Hood was thus retracing his steps, capturing Dalton and
threatening Chattanooga, General Sherman was on his track, pursuing him
to the Tennessee. The lion-hearted Thomas was at Nashville, and, quite
sure that he could “take care of Hood,” as the order ran, the great
commander turned his face again southward.
He had telegraphed to the Secretary of War that his army needed rest at
Atlanta. It was true, but General Sherman did not intend to have it
then. The rebels and the country were bewildered by his mysterious
movements. Early in November he was between the Tennessee and
Chattahoochie, his headquarters at Kingston, with Rome on the line to
Atlanta. The deeply-laid game was played by the master hand in the dark
to others. Preparations were at once made for a grander campaign than
that which had just closed.
On the 10th, when the evening darkened around the beautiful Rome of
Georgia, the heavens glowed with its conflagration. A fearful storm had
ceased, the advance was at hand, and it was necessary, in the stern
demands of war, to make a torch and desolation of that place, in the
wake of the march. The fire was kindled by General Corse, according to
the orders of the commander. A spectator wrote of the scenes of that
terrific conflagration:
[Illustration: MARCHING TO SAVANNAH.]
“All the barracks were laid in ashes, and a black veil of dense smoke
hung over the war-desolated city nearly all day, arising from the
smouldering ruins.
“Owing to the great lack of railroad transportation, General Corse was
obliged to destroy nearly a million of dollars’ worth of property, among
which was a few thousand dollars’ worth of condemned and unserviceable
government stores. Nine rebel guns, captured at Rome by our troops, were
burst, it being deemed unsafe to use them. One thousand bales of fine
cotton, two flour mills, two rolling mills, two tanneries, one salt
mill, an extensive foundry, several machine shops, together with the
railroad depots and storehouses, four pontoon bridges, built by General
Corse’s pioneer corps for use on the Coosa and Etowah rivers, and a
substantial trestle bridge, nearly completed for use, were destroyed.
This trestle, constructed by the Engineer corps, I am told, would have
cost fifty thousand dollars North. Recollecting the outrages perpetrated
upon Colonel Streight by the ‘Romans,’ our troops, as soon as they
learned that the town was to be abandoned and a portion of it burned,
resolved to lay Rome in ashes in revenge. The roaring of the flames, as
they leaped from window to window, their savage tongues of fire darting
high up into the heavens, and then licking the sides of the buildings,
presented an awful but grand spectacle, while the mounted patrol and the
infantrymen glided along through the brilliant light like the ghostly
spectres of horrid war.”
Concentrating at Atlanta, the last use made of the stronghold and
cherished hope of the Confederacy was the finishing work of getting a
vast army in motion—a grand start into hostile country, away from the
base of supplies.
After the men had bivouacked for the night, the following orders, issued
by General Sherman, were read to the troops, and were greeted with many
manifestations of approbation by the veterans, who, in so many bloody
battles, have followed the lead of Sherman:
“HEADQUARTERS, MILITARY DIVISION OF THE MISSISSIPPI, }
IN THE FIELD, KINGSTON, GA., _Nov. 8, 1864_. }
“The General commanding deems it proper at this time to inform
the officers and men of the Fourteenth, Fifteenth, Seventeenth,
and Twentieth Corps, that he has organized them into an army for
a special purpose well known to the War Department and to
General Grant. It is sufficient for you to know that it involves
a departure from our present base, and a long and difficult
march to a new one. All the chances of war have been considered
and provided for as far as human sagacity can. All he asks of
you is to maintain that discipline, patience and courage which
have characterized you in the past, and he hopes, through you,
to strike a blow at our enemy that will have a material effect
in producing what we all so much desire, his complete overthrow.
Of all things the most important is, that the men, during
marches and in camp, keep their places, and not scatter about as
stragglers or foragers, to be picked up by hostile people in
detail.
“It is also of the utmost importance that our wagons should not
be loaded with anything but provisions and ammunition. All
surplus servants, non-combatants, and refugees should now go to
the rear, and none should be encouraged to encumber us on the
march. At some future time we will be enabled to provide for the
poor whites and blacks who seek to escape the bondage under
which they are now suffering.
“With these few simple cautions in your minds, he hopes to lead
you to achievements equal in importance to those of the past.
“By order of
“Major-General W. T. SHERMAN.”
The grand army, of more than fifty thousand men, was divided into two
wings, although in some of its movements arranged in three or more
separate columns. General Slocum commanded the left wing, composed of
the Fourteenth and Twentieth Corps, and General Howard the right wing,
made up of the Fifteenth and Seventeenth Corps. The dashing, brilliant
Kilpatrick was chief of a cavalry force. The marching orders were
issued, and flew along the extended battle front, meeting with a glad
welcome from the troops. The clear directions of the chieftain will
present the line and method of march:
“IN THE FIELD, KINGSTON, GA., _November 9, 1864_.
“I. For the purpose of military operations, this army is divided
into two wings, viz.: The right wing, Major-General O. O.
Howard, commanding the Fifteenth and Seventeenth Corps; the left
wing, Major-General H. W. Slocum, commanding the Fourteenth and
Twentieth Corps.
“II. The habitual order of march will be, whenever practicable,
by four roads, as nearly parallel as possible, and converging at
points hereafter to be indicated in orders. The cavalry,
Brigadier-General Kilpatrick commanding, will receive special
orders from the Commander-in-Chief.
“III. There will be no general trains of supplies, but each
corps will have its ammunition and provision train, distributed
habitually as follows: Behind each regiment should follow one
wagon and one ambulance; behind each brigade should follow a due
proportion of ammunition wagons, provision wagons, and
ambulances. In case of danger, each army corps should change
this order of march by having his advance and rear brigade
unencumbered by wheels. The separate columns will start
habitually at seven A. M., and make about fifteen miles per day,
unless otherwise fixed in orders.
“IV. The army will _forage liberally on the country_ during the
march. To this end each brigade commander will organize a good
and sufficient foraging party, under the command of one or more
discreet officers, who will gather, near the route travelled,
corn or forage of any kind, meat of any kind, vegetables,
corn-meal, or whatever is needed by the command; aiming at all
times to keep in the wagon trains _at least ten days’ provisions
for the command and three days’ forage. Soldiers must not enter
the dwellings_ of the inhabitants or commit any trespass; during
the halt or a camp they may be permitted to gather turnips,
potatoes, and other vegetables, and drive in stock in front of
their camps. To regular foraging parties must be intrusted the
gathering of provisions and forage at any distance from the road
travelled.
“V. To army corps commanders is intrusted the power _to destroy
mills, houses, cotton-gins, etc._, and for them this general
principle is laid down: In districts and neighborhoods _where
the army is unmolested, no destruction_ of such property should
be permitted; but should guerillas or bushwhackers molest our
march, or should the inhabitants burn bridges, obstruct roads,
or otherwise manifest local hostility, then army corps
commanders should order and _enforce a devastation more or less
relentless, according to the measure of such hostility_.
“VI. As for horses, mules, wagons, etc., belonging to the
inhabitants, the cavalry and artillery may appropriate freely
and without limit; discriminating, however, between the rich,
who are usually hostile, and the poor or industrious, usually
neutral or friendly. Foraging parties may also take mules or
horses to replace the jaded animals of their trains, or to serve
as pack mules for the regiments or brigades. In all foraging, of
whatever kind, the parties engaged will refrain from abusive or
threatening language, and may, when the officer in command
thinks proper, give written certificates of the facts, but no
receipts; and they will endeavor to leave with each family a
reasonable portion for their maintenance.
“VII. _Negroes who are able-bodied and can be of service to the
several columns, may be taken along_; but each army commander
will bear in mind that the question of supplies is a very
important one, and that his first duty is to see to those who
bear arms.
“VIII. The organization at once of a good pioneer battalion for
each corps, composed, if possible, of negroes, should be
attended to. This battalion should follow the advance guard,
should repair roads and double them if possible, so that the
columns will not be delayed after reaching bad places. Also,
army commanders should study the habit of giving the artillery
and wagons the road, and marching their troops on one side; and
also instruct their troops to assist wagons at steep hills or
bad crossings or streams.
“IX. Captain O. M. Poe, chief engineer, will assign to each wing
of the army a pontoon train, fully equipped and organized, and
the commanders thereof will see to its being properly protected
at all times.
“By order of Major-General W. T. SHERMAN.”
The feeling of the troops is expressed in the words of another who was
with them: “They do not stop to ask questions. Sherman says ‘Come,’ and
that is the entire vocabulary with them. A most cheerful feature of the
situation is the fact that the men are healthful and jolly as men can
be, hoping for the best, daring to do the worst.
“Behind us we leave a track of smoke and flame. Half of Marietta was
burned up, not by orders, however, for the command is that proper
details shall be made to destroy all property which can ever be of use
to the rebel armies. Stragglers will get into these places, and
dwelling-houses are levelled to the ground. In nearly all cases these
are the deserted habitations formerly owned by rebels, who are now
refugees.
“Yesterday, as some of the men were marching toward the Chattahoochie
River, they saw in the distance pillars of smoke rising along its banks;
the bridges were in flames. Says one, hitching his musket a bit on the
shoulder in a free and easy way, ‘I say, Charley, I believe Sherman has
set the river on fire.’ ‘Reckon not,’ replied the other, with the same
indifference. ‘If he has, it’s all right.’ And so they pass along,
obeying orders, not knowing what is before them, but believing in their
leader.”
The foraging parties were to bring in from the country along the
war-path, supplies for the long cavalcade, sweeping over a belt of land
twenty to seventy miles wide, right across the proud State of Georgia.
The regulations respecting retaliation for outrages were wise and
humane, because they prevented the very ruin which the rebels,
unrestrained by fear, would have drawn upon themselves. It was not an
idle threat, but proved to be a most timely, useful one.
November 12th, you might have seen the magnificent spectacle a great war
alone affords. Mounted on his steed, his cork hand on the rein, General
Howard led the right wing in bristling ranks, to the sound of martial
airs, from Atlanta. And here I must tell you about that cork hand. You
may recollect that the heroic chief lost his arm at Fair Oaks, fighting
under General McClellan. He returned soon after to his home in Lewiston,
Maine. It happened that I was there upon a beautiful summer day, when
the Sabbath-school children had a meeting in Rev. Mr. Adams’s church, at
Auburn, across the river. General Howard was present, the first time he
had attended a public gathering since the wound was received. And many
hearts were touched to hear him talk earnestly of truth and duty, while
the yet unhealed stump would try to gesticulate, as the arm did of old.
He is a complete man, and appreciated by his general-in-chief.
The imposing pageant of the advancing host was repeated on the 14th,
when General Slocum marched at the head of the left wing from the doomed
city. Then General Sherman, with his staff and body-guard, gave a last
look, and took his road to Macon. “Let Hood go North; our business is
down South,” was his brief comment upon the rebel general’s movements.
The torch was applied to the public buildings and railroad depots,
flinging at night a lurid light over the dismantled ruined
fortifications, and upon the surrounding hills. The scene was grand and
awful, memorable to all who witnessed this burning of the “Gate City.”
No private residences were designedly given to the flames. “The evidence
of the rebels themselves has since appeared to show, that though Atlanta
had been besieged, captured, and depopulated, there was no heartless or
unavoidable destruction of private property, such as the enemy have
delighted to charge upon General Sherman. Thus abandoned, it was left in
the rear of our army, whose face was now seaward, and the hand of time,
with a higher degree of civilization, can only efface the marks
inflicted by a warlike occupation. Before the war Atlanta was one of the
most thriving inland cities of the South, and contained 12,000
inhabitants.
“The rebels at Richmond received their first news of Sherman’s departure
from Atlanta, from the North, but refused to place confidence in it. ‘It
is a big Yankee lie,’ said the Richmond _Examiner_, ‘and if Sherman
really has burnt Atlanta, it is to cover a retreat northward, to look
after Hood.’ ‘But if Sherman is really attempting this prodigious
design,’ it continued, ‘his march will only lead him to the “Paradise of
Fools.”’ The more Southern papers, those of Augusta, Savannah, etc.,
were alike incredulous with those of Richmond, upon the receipt of the
first news of Sherman’s movement. ‘It is rumored that Atlanta is
evacuated,’ said the Augusta _Chronicle_, of November 15, ‘and we trust
the rumor will prove correct.’ The same paper of November 18, implores
the citizens of Augusta to ‘look at the situation without nervousness or
fear—pray to God, but keep your powder dry—meet the storm like
men—it’s always darkest just before day.’
“It is only necessary to follow Sherman’s course, to note the precision
with which he moved, the width of country which he covered, and the
directness of his march upon his objective point, to realize the
impotency of all the shrieks, invocations, and proclamations that only
spoiled so much valuable paper in the Confederacy.”
While the heavens hung like curtains of glowing crimson above and around
the circular theatre of ruin, whose cinders shot through the hot
atmosphere continually, the fine band of the Thirty-third Massachusetts
were playing, “John Brown’s soul goes marching on!” The effect was
awfully grand; the strange stirring anthem rising over the advance of
that mighty host whose way was flashing with the torchlights of burning
buildings.
Let us suppose we were upon an eminence near Atlanta, with power of
vision to look away over the “heart of Georgia,” the goal of General
Sherman’s moving columns. Running through it are two railroads, the only
lines traversing the State of Georgia, and forming the chief link of
railway connection between Virginia and the States of Alabama and
Mississippi, now the southwestern limit of the so-called Confederacy.
One of these railroads is the Georgia Central, running from Savannah to
Macon, 190 miles, thence to Atlanta, by the Macon and Western Railroad,
101 miles, making the total distance from Savannah to Atlanta by
railroad, 291 miles. The other is the Georgia Railroad, running from
Augusta to Atlanta, at from 40 to 60 miles north of the Georgia Central
Railroad, and making the distance to Atlanta, from Augusta, 171 miles.
At Millen, on the Georgia Central road, 79 miles north of Savannah, is
the junction of a branch road, called the Waynesboro’ Railroad, which
connects with Augusta, 53 miles distant, and makes the distance by rail
from Savannah to Augusta 132 miles. Along these lines of travel the
country is thickly settled, and richly productive. Cotton, wheat, and
corn fields, with forests and streams, mansions and slave huts, make a
southern landscape inviting to a great army, whose thousands of men must
have food to eat, and plenty of it. To cover the railroads and destroy
them as the troops advanced, making Milledgeville, the capital, a point
of rendezvous, was the first object of the commander. General
Kilpatrick’s splendid cavalry protected flank and front—“the eyes of
the army.” On, on, the extended wings move; while a cavalry force sweeps
off toward Macon, where General Cobb commands the rebel militia, to make
him believe an attack upon him is designed. The “fire-eater” is awake to
his perilous position, and ready to defend “Southern rights;” when, lo!
the horsemen suddenly disappear. Their enterprise seems a serious joke,
provoking a laugh; for it was to keep at Macon the only force that could
dispute the way, excepting some cavalry brigades at Macon, till left
fairly in the rear. This being done, General Sherman cared little where
the Confederate hero went. The enemy was amazed and bewildered—the bold
invader’s plans baffled his attempts to decipher them. An extract from a
Richmond paper will be both a curious and interesting illustration.
The _Sentinel_ with assurance declared: “It is not Sherman’s object to
make his way to the Atlantic to assist Meade, leaving Thomas heir to his
far higher honors and responsibilities in the West. If he shall succeed
in penetrating the circle that now surrounds him, and escaping to Port
Royal, his first anxiety, like Kilpatrick’s, will be for ships to take
him away. Steam to Annapolis, and steam to Nashville, if Nashville be
not already fallen, will be all too slow to quiet his impatience and to
mollify his chagrin. While his own course through Georgia will have been
that of an arrow through the air, or a ship over the sea, leaving no
track behind; while his exploits and his honors will have been those of
the baffled fox hounded from the barn-yard, or the disappointed wolf,
chased and pelted by the shepherds; he will return to Tennessee to find
Hood, we trust, in possession of the State. He will return to find that
his campaign into Georgia, so boastfully entered upon, has but lost the
territories won by his predecessors.”
While the editors and other leading minds at the Confederate capital
were thus speculating and wondering, General Sherman was having a most
auspicious start on the long march over rebel soil. “The right wing
moved directly south from Atlanta, which is in Fulton County, to Rough
and Ready and Jonesboro’ stations on the Macon and Western Railroad, in
Fayette County. On November 16th one column of the right wing passed
through Jonesboro’, twenty-six miles south of Atlanta, Wheeler’s cavalry
and Cobb’s militia retiring upon Griffin. Another column of the right
wing occupied McDonough, November 17th, the county seat of Henry County,
some distance east of Jonesboro’, and about thirty-five miles southeast
of Atlanta. Henry County is one of the largest and richest of Georgia,
and here our forces found large supplies of provisions and forage. On
the 16th Wheeler engaged our cavalry at Bear Creek station, ten miles
north of Griffin, and telegraphed General Hardee that he had ‘checked
the Yankee advance.’ The very same evening, at six o’clock, his ragged
troopers fell back through Griffin, in the direction of Barnesville,
where Cobb’s militia had already preceded him. Our cavalry occupied
Griffin, which is the county seat of Spalding County, on the 17th, and
on the 18th drove Wheeler out of Barnesville, in Pike County, and
through Forsyth, the county seat of Monroe County, seventy-six miles
south of Atlanta and twenty-five miles northwest of Macon.”
Turning to the map you will see the Ocumulgee River, on whose banks
Macon is situated, northeast of which, on the Oconee, is Milledgeville,
the State capital. November 20th General Sherman crossed the former
stream with his face toward the seat of government; this was the first
intelligence the rebels had of his purpose to pass by Macon. Meanwhile
General Howard’s columns moved rapidly through Monticello, the shire
town of Jasper County, burning the courthouse, thence to Hillsboro’, the
county seat of Jones County, to reach the Georgia Central Railroad at
Gordon, where the branch track to Milledgeville has its junction. Thus
General Sherman left General Cobb behind, and sending to Griswoldville a
rear-guard of infantry, pushed on the 21st to Milledgeville, with
General Howard’s troops ready to join him.
The march, so far, had averaged thirteen and a half miles each day,
making ninety-five miles from Atlanta. There was no need of great haste,
and the strength of the men was spared for the vast enterprise before
them. “General Sherman camped on the plantation of Howell Cobb. We found
his granaries well filled with corn and wheat, part of which was
distributed and eaten by our animals and men. A large supply of syrup
made from sorghum, which we have found at nearly every plantation on our
march, was stored in an out-house. This was also disposed of to the
soldiers and the poor decrepit negroes, which this humane,
liberty-loving major-general, abandoned to die in this place a few days
ago.
“General Sherman distributed to the negroes with his own hands the
provisions left here, and assured them that we were their friends, and
they need not be afraid that we were foes. One old man answered him: ‘I
spose dat you’se true; but, massa, you’se’ll go way tomorrow, and
anudder white man will come.’ He had never known any thing but
oppression, and had been kept in such ignorance that he did not dare put
faith in any white man. The negroes were told that as soon as we got
them into our power, they were put into the front of the battle, and we
killed them if they did not fight; that we threw the women and children
into the Chattahoochie, and when the buildings were burned in Atlanta,
we filled them with negroes, to be devoured by the flames.
“General Sherman invited all able-bodied negroes (others could not make
the march) to join the column, and he takes especial pleasure when they
join the procession, on some occasions telling them they are free: that
Massa Lincoln has given them their liberty, and that they can go where
they please; that if they earn their freedom they should have it, but
that Massa Lincoln had given it to them anyhow. Thousands of negro women
join the column, some carrying household truck; others, and many of them
there are, who bear the heavy burdens of children in their arms, while
older boys and girls plod by their sides. All these women and children
are ordered back, heartrending though it may be to refuse them liberty.
“But the majority accept the advent of the Yankees as the fulfilment of
the millennial prophecies. The ‘day of jubilee,’ the hope and prayer of
a lifetime, has come. They cannot be made to understand that they must
remain behind, and they are satisfied only when General Sherman tells
them, as he does every day, that we shall come back for them some time,
and that they must be patient until the proper hour of deliverance
comes.”
The enemy finding our army had deceived them and was gone, General Cobb
sent a force from Macon to attack the rear-guard at Griswoldsville, a
part of which had been employed to threaten Macon, where a sharp
skirmish resulted in a loss to them of several hundred killed and
wounded; the severest battle of all the march. General Slocum’s left
wing had pressed on through De Kalb County to Covington, burning
railroad buildings on the way. Near this town, while foraging in the
fine fertile country, a force from one of the brigades of the Twentieth
Corps was assailed by a party of “bushwhackers,” and one of our soldiers
killed. Then followed the execution of General Sherman’s threat of
devastation, involving in it the burning of the Methodist College at
Oxford. The large libraries, the cabinets and apparatus, all were swept
away by the fires of war, the charred ruins of an institution which cost
nearly a million of dollars, only remaining in the wake of relentless
Mars. General Slocum pushed forward his troops, living on the “fat of
the land,” destroying railways, and flinging on his path the flames of
burning warehouses, markets, and bridges. The same day that General
Howard reached Gordon, General Slocum was at Eatonton, the northern
terminus of the branch railroad. The troops came together at
Milledgeville, General Howard entering it first with his troops; because
the far-seeing commander-in-chief found that the best point for crossing
the Oconee was there.
The legislature, which was in session on the 18th, hearing of the
advance of General Sherman’s resistless columns, prepared to flee before
them. Governor Brown departed in his private carriage for Macon, taking
with him the public papers, funds, and whatever of personal effects he
could convey. Never was such a stampede of the law-making chivalry of
Georgia dreamed of by them. Members of this terrified body hurried away
to Augusta, and others followed the Governor to Macon; some in
carriages, some on horses, and others on foot, not having Confederate
currency enough to pay for other means of escape. Two of the honorable
fugitives paid one thousand dollars to be carried eight miles. Scarcely
had Governor Brown reached Macon when he hastened to the City Hall and
issued a flaming proclamation—chanticleer crowing after he is driven
from the field by his rival in the fight.
Catching the contagious alarm, in the wake of the fugitive legislature,
the citizens able to get away, carrying with them to the depot their
household treasures, then also fled, until the infirm and the negroes
only represented the just now proud and defiant population. The latter
were wild with joy, embracing the soldiers, and exclaiming, “Bless de
Lord! tanks be to Almighty God, the Yanks is come; the day of jubilee
hab arrived!” Such was their simple recognition of God in the war, and
of the friends of liberty. General Sherman’s headquarters were at the
Executive Mansion, its former occupant having, with extremely bad grace,
in fleeing from his distinguished visitor, taken with him the entire
furniture of the building. As General Sherman travels with a roll of
blankets, and haversack full of hard tack, which is as complete an
outfit for a life out in the open air as in a palace, this discourtesy
of Governor Brown was not a serious inconvenience.
The campaign toward the sea was now fairly opened, and successful in all
its details: “At first, moving his army in three columns, with a column
of cavalry on his extreme right, upon eccentric lines, he diverted the
attention of the enemy, so that he concentrated his forces at extreme
points, Macon and Augusta, leaving unimpeded the progress of the main
body. In this campaign it was not the purpose of the General to spend
his time before fortified cities, nor yet to encumber his wagons with
wounded men. His instructions to Kilpatrick were to demonstrate against
Macon, getting within five miles of the city.
“With that ignorance of danger common to new troops, the rebels rushed
upon our veterans with the greatest fury. They were received with
grape-shot and musketry at point blank range, our soldiers firing coolly
while shouting derisively to the quivering columns to come on, as if
they thought the whole thing a nice joke. The rebels resumed the attack,
but with the same fatal results, and were soon in full flight, leaving
more than three hundred dead on the field. Our loss was some forty
killed and wounded, while their killed, wounded, and prisoners, are
estimated to exceed two thousand five hundred. A pretty severe lesson
they received. It is said, ‘_Ce n’est que le premier pas qui coûte._’
This first step has been a most expensive one, and judging from the fact
that we have not heard from them since, they seem to have interpreted
the proverb otherwise than in the recognized sense.”
Gov. Brown reluctantly left in Milledgeville three thousand muskets and
several thousand pounds of powder, to be destroyed by our troops. Then
came a comic episode in the march. A number of officers and men took
possession of the State House, elected a speaker, a clerk, and a
chaplain, and went to work upon bills and resolutions in earnest. Calls
to order, deciding between members claiming the floor, and humorous
hits, filled up the time. When in the midst of the amusing excitement, a
courier rushed in, saying, the “Yankees are coming!” then there was a
sudden suspension of business, a panic, and a run for the doors. This
was succeeded by an uproar of laughter.
Somehow the entreaty of the politicians and editors of the Confederacy
to burn and otherwise destroy property likely to fall into our hands,
did not move the hearts of traitors. Each waited to see his neighbor
commence the havoc, and excepting what the army appropriated, and the
rebels carried off, but little damage was done. The enemy was completely
in the mist of mystery, and General Sherman’s skilful, blinding
movements, successfully deluded his antagonists. Their blows were always
hesitating, and, when given by them, were equally ineffectual. It was
evident, however, that the Oconee River must be passed at some point by
our troops. Accordingly, the enemy posted himself where the railroad
crosses the river, five miles east of Gordon, and here burned the
bridge. Wednesday, the 23d, brought our troops well up to the river.
The people along the line of march seldom expressed their sentiments to
the army. A few illustrations from those who saw and heard for
themselves, will give the general feeling: “When they do speak it is not
in vain eulogy of the rebel army and the cause in which they are
engaged. They are broken in spirits, and the haughty secession ladies,
who by force of ‘arms’ and tongue drove their brothers, sons, and
lovers, into the army, are now as meek as singed kittens, and only too
glad to smile upon a good-looking Yankee. They all frankly admit that
their cause is hopeless—that subjugation awaits them in the future, and
all they now wish is for the storm to burst and pass; that peace with
them, crushed beneath the Yankee heel, is preferable to the present
state of things.
“‘Great God!’ exclaimed one very intelligent Milledgeville lady, whose
all had been taken, ‘little did I think, when I bade my dear boys, who
now sleep in their graves, good-bye, and packed them off, that this day
would come, when old, impoverished, and childless, I must ask the men
whom they fought against for a meal of victuals to satisfy my hunger.
But it serves me right; I was deceived, drove them to battle, death, and
infamy, and here I stand, their murderer.’
“Riding up to a house one day, I met an old woman and three grown-up
daughters at the door uttering frantic appeals for help. I inquired what
was wrong, when the old woman pointed to a burning cotton gin, and
exclaimed, ‘Put it out! You uns are burnin’ me child!’ I asked where the
child was, and succeeded in learning that it was in the burning gin
house. Away I went, with some men, to rescue the innocent, and at the
door met a ten year old boy, who, badly singed, issued forth from the
fiery furnace. Returning to the house, I inquired how the boy came
there? Putting the pipe between her lips, to compose her nerves, the old
lady at last ventured an explanation: ‘Well,’ said she, ‘we uns heard
that you uns killed all the little boys, to keep them out from growing
up to fight ye, and we hid ’em.’ Strange as this may seem, among the
poor, ignorant dupes of Davis, it is a common belief that the Yankees
slay all the male children. We found many infant Moseses and Jeffs hid
away in cellars and corn-cribs, but none in bulrushes. An officer called
upon a lady in Effingham County, whose plantation had been stripped of
every thing, and found her in tears and her children crying for bread.
He endeavored to soothe her, when she lifted up her beautiful eyes
beseechingly, and implored, ‘Give me something for my starving
children.’ Away the officer went to his mess and fed the children from
his private larder. On the following morning he was quite chagrined to
witness two oak boxes, one barrel of flour, four trunks, and other
articles exhumed from the garden by the soldiers.”
The eight days’ march to Millen, seventy-five miles from Milledgeville,
was full of varied and remarkable interest. General Kilpatrick, with his
“ubiquitous cavalry,” galloped away to the Central Railroad bridge, over
the Oconee, twenty-five miles southeast of Milledgeville, where General
Howard was trying to build a pontoon bridge, which the rebel General
Wayne, with a brigade of released inmates of the penitentiary, and of
militia, was determined to prevent; a battle followed, and the enemy was
driven back. Then again the unrivalled trooper acted as “a curtain” upon
the extreme left, having covered in the same way the right wing in the
earlier part of the campaign; while all the time he had the nobler aim,
if possible, to reach Millen in time to rescue our incarcerated and
dying prisoners of war. “The stockade or coop in which our prisoners
were confined, after their removal from Andersonville, was located in a
dense pine forest, six miles from Millen station, on the Savannah and
Augusta Railroad. It was a square of fifteen acres, enclosed by pine
logs set upright in the ground, very close together. At intervals of
twenty feet along the palisades were the sentry boxes, fifteen feet from
the ground; access to them could only be had by means of ladders on the
outside. The palisade logs were uniformly ten inches thick, and so
straight and close were they that all view of the pine woods beyond them
was shut out from the unfortunates within. Entering at the broad gate
they crossed the ‘dead line’ (single rail fence) fearlessly, and
approached the burrows or adobe huts where the ‘Yankees’ had slept in
confinement. These were not filthy, because no considerable amount of
filth could accumulate during the three weeks our men were kept there;
but they were cheerless and comfortless. There was no attempt at
regularity in laying out this village of Kennel. In one of them the dead
body of a Union soldier, name unknown, was found unburied. Decidedly the
most comfortable looking appendage to the stockade was the brick
cook-house near the centre, with accommodation for a dozen or fifteen
men to work at a time. At the southeast angle of the stockade, on the
outside, stood a square earthwork, built to command with its guns both
the burrows inside and the approaches to the logs on the outside. In the
hospital huts, a quarter of a mile from the pen, were good
accommodations for three hundred men, and there were evidences that they
were not sufficient. A fine large spring, where excellent water bubbled
out, completed the lists of objects familiar to the brave boys who had
lived in that silent clearing in the pine woods. The dead prisoners were
buried in rows, a short distance from the hospital, graves being
numbered as high as six hundred and fifty. The prisoners were kept at
Millen only three weeks.”
November 29th the “boys” kept Thanksgiving upon the luxuries of Georgia
plantations. The Ogeehee was crossed on November 30th. It is a stream
sixty yards wide, where the troops passed over on a bridge which was put
in repair, and with pontoons.
In a sketch from a reliable source, we have an explanation of the false
charge made by a distinguished orator against General Sherman, that he
removed a bridge, and left unprotected negroes to the enemy. He knew
nothing of the sad affair when it occurred:
“From the time we left Atlanta, with fifty or one hundred contrabands,
the ‘colored brigades’ continued to swell in numbers until we arrived at
the Ogeechee River, when fully ten thousand were attached to the various
columns. They represented all shades and conditions, from the almost
white housemaid servant, worth $15,000 in rebel currency, to the tar
black, pock-marked cotton picker, who never crosses massa’s door sill. A
very large majority of them were women and children, who, mounted on
mules, sometimes five on an animal, in ox wagons, buggies, and vehicles
of every description, blocked the roads and materially delayed the
movement of the columns. It was no unusual sight to behold a slave
mother carrying two young children and leading a third, who, in a half
nude state, trudged along the thorny path to freedom. Columns could be
written descriptive of the harrowing scenes presented by this
unfortunate class of fugitives. So much difficulty did General Davis
find in moving his column, that at the Ogeechee River, as a military
necessity, he placed a guard at the bridge, who halted the caravan of
contrabands until the rear of the column passed, and then removed the
pontoon. The negroes, however, not to be frustrated, constructed a
foot-bridge and crossed. Next day the column had its full complement of
negroes.
“Arriving at Ebenezer Creek, the same method was taken to clear the
column, with better success. The creek runs through a half mile of
swamp, which is covered by water, and can only be crossed by a narrow
bridge. This bridge was taken up, and the moment our forces disappeared
the brutal Wheeler was in our rear. Next day only a few darkies came up.
Another day passed and still fully two-thirds were missing. Inquiries
elicited the information that Wheeler, on finding the defenceless
negroes blocked, drove them pellmell into the water, where those who
escaped say they struggled to reach the opposite bank, amidst
heartrending shrieks; but most of the mothers went down in the water
with their children clasped to their bosoms, while Wheeler and his
inhuman band looked on with demoniac smiles. How far true this may be I
know not, but all the negroes who escaped, with whom I have talked, seem
to agree in their account of the hellish slaughter.”
The bridges over the Oconee and Fisher’s Creek were burned behind the
army. The rebels were compelled to speak well, on the whole, of General
Sherman’s command. I shall add their testimony, given at the time:
“In their route they destroyed, as far as possible, all mills, cribs,
and gin-houses, cotton screws and gins, cotton implements, etc., and
carried off all stock, provisions, and negroes. When their horses gave
out they shot them. At Eatonton they killed over one hundred. At
Milledgeville they only destroyed the arsenal, depot, and penitentiary.
They did not burn the factory near that place. The right wing of the
Federal army, under General Howard, crossed the Ocmulgee River between
Adams’s Ferry and Macon. It is said that the town of Forsyth was
completely demolished. The Federals expressed great astonishment at the
rich country they were passing, and the abundance of provisions in it.
General Slocum gave orders to the citizens along his route to shoot down
his stragglers without mercy. One punishment inflicted by some of the
Federal generals for plundering, was severe whipping. A portion of Major
Graham’s command reached this city last night. They report that they
visited Atlanta several days since, and found it completely evacuated
and burned. They state that the Federals took all the cattle and forage
in their route, but did not molest those who stayed at home.”
“The most pathetic scenes occur upon our line of march daily and hourly.
Thousands of negro women join the column, some carrying household truck;
others, and many of them there are, who bear the burden of children in
their arms, while older boys and girls plod by their sides. All these
women and children are ordered back, heartrending though it may be to
refuse them liberty. They won’t go. One begs that she may go to see her
husband and children at Savannah. Long years ago she was forced from
them and sold. Another has heard that her boy was in Macon, and she is
‘done gone with grief goin’ on four years.’
“The other day a woman with a child in her arms was working her way
along amongst the teams and crowds of cattle and horsemen. An officer
called to her kindly: ‘Where are you going, aunty?’
“She looked up into his face with a hopeful, beseeching look, and
replied:
“‘I’se gwine whar you’se gwine, massa.’
“At a house a few miles from Milledgeville we halted for an hour. In an
old hut I found a negro and his wife, both of them over sixty years old.
In the talk which ensued nothing was said which led me to suppose that
either of them was anxious to leave their mistress, who, by the way, was
a sullen, cruel-looking woman, when all at once the old negress
straightened herself up, and her face, which a moment before was almost
stupid in its expression, assumed a fierce, almost devilish, aspect.
“Pointing her shining black finger at the old man, crouched in the
corner of the fire-place, she hissed out: ‘What for you sit dar? you
spose I wait sixty years for nutten? Don’t yer see de door open? I’se
follow my child; I not stay. Yes, nodder day I goes ’long wid dese
people; yes sar, I walks till I drops in my tracks.’ A more terrible
sight I never beheld. I can think of nothing to compare with it, except
Charlotte Cushman’s Meg Merrilies. Rembrandt only could have painted the
scene, with its dramatic surroundings.
“It was near this place that several factories were burned. It was odd
to see the delight of the negroes at the destruction of places known
only to them as task-houses, where they had groaned under the lash.
“Pointing to the Atlanta and Augusta Railroad, which had been destroyed,
the question was asked, ‘It took a longer time to build this railroad
than it does to destroy it?’
“‘I would think it did, massa; in dat ar woods over dar is buried ever
so many black men who were killed, sar, yes, killed, a working on dat
road—whipped to deth. I seed em, sar.’
“‘Does the man live here who beat them?’
“‘Oh no, sar; he’s dun gone long time.’
“I have seen blind and lame mules festooned with infants in bags, and
led by fond parents so aged and weak they could hardly totter along.
‘Mars’r Sherman was a great man, but dis am de work ob de Lord,’ they
said.”
The swampy borders were belted with “corduroy,” and their heavy fogs
hung over the halting columns. At evening the spectacle was weird-like
in its wild romance. “A novel and vivid sight was it to see the fires of
pitch pine flaring up into the mist and darkness, the figures of men and
horses looming out of the dense shadows in gigantic proportions.
Torchlights are blinking and flashing away off in the forests, while the
still air echoed and reëchoed with the cries of teamsters and the wild
shouts of the soldiers. A long line of the troops marched across the
foot-bridge, each soldier bearing a torch, their light reflected in
quivering lines in the swift running stream. Soon the fog, which settles
like a blanket over the swamps and forests of the river bottoms, shut
down upon the scene, and so dense and dark was it that torches were of
but little use, and men were directed here and there by the voice.”
Not far from this spot the troops encountered a singular character. He
had been depot-master before the railroad was destroyed—a shrewd,
intelligent old man, so far as the war is concerned. He said to the
soldiers: “They say you are retreating, but it is the strangest sort of
retreat I ever saw. Why, the newspapers have been lying in this way all
along. They allers are whipping the Federal armies, and they allers fall
back after the battle is over. It was that ar’ idee that first opened my
eyes. Our army was allers whipping the Feds, and we allers fell back. I
allers told ’em it was a humbug, and now by —— I know it, for here you
are right on old John Wells’s place; hogs, potatoes, corn, and fences
all gone. I don’t find any fault. I expected it all.
“‘Jeff. Davis and the rest,’ he continued, ‘talk about splitting the
Union. Why if South Carolina had gone out by herself, she would have
been split in four pieces by this time. Splitting the Union! Why, the
State of Georgia is being split right through from end to end. It is
these rich fellows who are making the war, and keeping their precious
bodies out of harm’s way. There’s John Franklin went through here the
other day running away from your army. I could have played dominoes on
his coat tails. There’s my poor brother, sick with small-pox at Macon,
working for eleven dollars a month, and hasn’t got a cent of the stuff
for a year. Eleven dollars a month and eleven thousand bullets a minute.
I don’t believe in it, sir.
“‘My wife came from Canada, and I kind o’ thought I would some time go
there to live, but was allers afraid of the ice and cold; but I can tell
you this country is getting too hot for me. Look at my fence-rails
burning there. I think I can stand the cold better.
“‘I heard as how they cut down the trees across your road up country and
burn the bridges; why, one of your Yankees can take up a tree and carry
it off, tops and all; and there’s that bridge you put across the river
in less than two hours—they might as well try to stop the Ogeechee as
you Yankees.
“‘The rascals who burnt this yere bridge thought they did a big thing; a
natural born fool would have more sense than any of them.
“‘To bring back the good old time,’ he said, ‘it’ll take the help of
Divine Providence, a heap of rain, and a deal of hard work, to fix
things up again.’”
It is interesting to look over the sea and get a glimpse of the
impressions of our English _friends_ regarding the “wandering host.” The
organ of the army and navy said: “It is clear that, so long as he roams
about with his army inside the Confederate States, he is more deadly
than twenty Grants, and that _he must be destroyed if Richmond or any
thing is to be saved_. Lee will probably be forced by this condition of
affairs to assume the offensive, because he cannot afford to let Grant
hold his hands whilst Sherman is committing burglary in the Southern
mansion. If Sherman has really left his army in the air, and started off
without a base to march from Georgia into South Carolina, he has done
either one of the most brilliant or one of the most foolish things ever
performed by a military leader.”
The great leader and his intelligent troops must have enjoyed the
mystery in which both friends and foes were living; knowing well that in
public and private circles, in the periodical press and the national
councils, the speculations and theories about him, the fears and hopes,
were manifold and often ludicrous, while his battalions were having a
triumphal march over the proudest portion of the Confederacy. “The great
army, over the lands and into the dwellings of the poor and rich alike,
through towns and cities, like a roaring wave, swept, and paused,
revelled and surged on. In the day-time, the splendor, the toil, the
desolation of the march; in the night-time, the brilliance, the gloom,
the music, the joy and the slumber of the camp. Memorable the music
‘that mocked the moon’ of November of the soil of Georgia; sometimes a
triumphant march, sometimes a glorious waltz, again an old air stirring
the heart alike to recollection and to hope. Floating out from throats
of brass to the ears of soldiers in their blankets and generals within
their tents, these tunes hallowed the eves to all who listened.
“Sitting before his tent in the glow of a camp fire one evening, General
Sherman let his cigar go out to listen to an air that a distant band was
playing. The musicians ceased at last. The general turned to one of his
officers; ‘Send an orderly to ask that band to play that tune again.’
“A little while, and the band received the word. The tune was ‘The Blue
Juniata,’ with exquisite variations. The band played it again, even more
beautifully than before. Again it ceased, and then, off to the right,
nearly a quarter of a mile away, the voices of some soldiers took it up
with words. The band, and still another band, played a low
accompaniment; camp after camp began singing; the music of ‘The Blue
Juniata’ became, for a few minutes, the oratorio of half an army.
“Back along the whole wide pathway of this grand march from border to
coast, the eye catches glimpses of scenes whose savage and poetic images
an American, five years ago, would have thought never could have been
revived from the romantic past.”
History records no war scenes so full of poetic interest, with so little
bloodshed, as those along the path of this advancing host.