concentrated between Lee and Gordon's and Lafayette. He moved with five
infantry and two cavalry corps. Narrow roads, small bridges, difficult
fords, and dense forests delayed operations, so that at nightfall of the
18th his troops were not in position to attack. In fact, he was scarcely
ready to deliver battle under his plan on the morning of the 19th, when
Thomas's unexpected attack, far on the rebel right, deranged Bragg's
plan, and forced him to battle several miles from the point where he was
about to open it on Crittenden, who he supposed still constituted the
Union left.
It was nothing less than the inversion of the Union army under cover of
a night that had thus disconcerted Bragg and enabled Rosecrans to array
himself for battle between Bragg and Chattanooga, and across the roads
and in front of the passes which led to that city. It was this night
march of two corps which constituted the supreme movement of the
concentration, and which at the same time defeated Bragg's purpose to
fight with the back of his own army to Chattanooga with a view to its
recovery.
The map given below will make this inversion and final concentration
clear, and show the position of the two armies at daylight on the 19th,
when the battle began.
[Illustration: MAP OF FIRST DAY'S BATTLE.]
On the 17th General Thomas's corps was in the vicinity of Pond Spring,
Negley on the left, and so nearest to a junction with Crittenden at Lee
& Gordon's, Baird next to the right, and Brannan next. Reynolds was
thrown to the front. The left of McCook had closed on Thomas at Fond
Spring.
During the day Bragg, strongly threatening Crittenden at Lee & Gordon's
with two divisions, held him fast, and started the rest of his army down
the Chickamauga to cross and sweep in on Crittenden's left and rear,
expecting to find him still constituting the left of the Union army, and
to double this left back on Thomas and McCook.
Bushrod Johnson had crossed at Reed's Bridge, driven Wilder nearly to
the State road at Vineyard's, and bivouacked a mile and a half from
Crittenden's left. Walker had also crossed at Lambert's Ford with three
divisions and Forrest's cavalry division, and halted for the night about
a mile in the rear of Hood. For the most part Bragg's army had the full
night for rest.
On the other hand, the Union columns were alive with motion. That night
was to cover the inversion of an army. About 4 o'clock Thomas started
his whole corps from Pond Spring toward Crittenden, McCook following
him. This was doubtless interpreted by Bragg as a closing in on
Crittenden. But it was far more than that.
As soon as night shut the columns in they were pressed rapidly to the
left. Negley, as he drew near to Crittenden, was moved to the
Chickamauga in front of Crawfish Springs. This prevented a night attempt
to cut the column by occupying the roads intersecting at that point.
Meantime Thomas, with his other three divisions, pushed on. It was a
long, weary night. Heavy trains of supplies and ammunition occupied the
road. The troops moved mostly through the adjacent fields, both for
celerity of marching and as guards to the trains. Heavy flanking forces
streamed along parallel to the road, and well out toward the river.
There were constant interruptions to continuous movement, causing
frequent halts of the infantry. The night was cool, and, as the commands
stopped, the men warmed themselves by starting fires in the fences. The
result was that toward midnight the trains were everywhere driving
between two continuous lines of fires, and the men on either side, or in
the road, had constant facilities for warming themselves. It was a
tedious and most fatiguing night, but at daylight the vitally important
task was done. Thomas's head of column, Baird in advance, reached the
Kelly farm at daylight, with Brannan well closed up and Reynolds a short
distance in the rear. Brannan was on the State or Lafayette road, near
the intersection of the road leading into it from Reed's bridge. McCook
had reached a point to the right and rear of Crittenden, near Crawfish
Springs. And so at sunrise the Union right, instead of resting far up
the Chickamauga from Crittenden's position, as Bragg expected to find
it, had become the left of Rosecrans' army and Crittenden was the right.
More than this, Rosecrans had established his lines two miles beyond
Bragg's right, and between it and Chattanooga. The victory of
concentration had been followed by the equally important success of
inverting the army and thus thrusting its columns between the enemy and
the objective of the campaign. These second stages of the movement
deserve to take rank with the matchless strategy with which it was
inaugurated.
But the battle for the firm and final possession of Chattanooga was
still to come. It opened suddenly for both sides, and for Bragg in a
wholly unexpected quarter. The weary Union troops had scarcely time to
cook their coffee after the night march, and some of them no time at
all, before the storm broke and the army was summoned to the battle
which Thomas had opened.
H. V. B.
WASHINGTON, _August 14_.--[Special.]--The last letter in this series
left the Army of the Cumberland on the morning of the 19th of September,
concentrated for battle on the field of Chickamauga. By an energetic
night march the army had been thrown forward on its left by inversion
into line, and thrust between the enemy and Chattanooga, the objective
of the campaign. It was a difficult and dangerous movement, where two
armies, intent on battle, were only separated by such a stream as the
Chickamauga, which was everywhere easily fordable above Lee & Gordon's.
But General Thomas, who led this column, is the one commander of a great
army of whom it can be said with accuracy that from the first of the war
to the close no movement of his miscarried. At daylight of the 19th he
held the Lafayette and Chattanooga road at the Kelly farm.
Bragg's army, though re-enforced from all parts of the Confederacy, and
though it had been well concentrated between Lafayette and Gordon's
mills for several preceding days, had been skillfully foiled by General
Rosecrans in the efforts to strike his isolated corps. During the 18th
it had been pressed by Bragg down the winding and thickly-wooded valley
of the Chickamauga in execution of an order for battle. This order was
based upon the idea that Crittenden's corps at Lee & Gordon's was the
left of the Union army. While he was to be held there by strong force
threatening attack from the other side of the stream, the bulk of
Bragg's army was to cross at the various fords and bridges below, and,
turning up stream, was then to join in sweeping Crittenden back on
Thomas and McCook, whom Bragg supposed still to constitute the Union
center and right. In execution of this plan Bushrod Johnson had crossed
at Reed's bridge, and pushed up to within a mile and a half of Lee &
Gordon's, and westward to within a mile of the Lafayette road, where
night overtook him. Walker's corps had crossed below Alexander's Bridge,
and bivouacked after a short advance toward Crittenden. Minty and
Wilder, with their mounted men, and Dan McCook, with his brigade, had
stoutly resisted and greatly delayed these columns. The most of Bragg's
army had rested through the night. Two corps of Rosecrans's forces had
marched continuously since four o'clock the preceding afternoon. They
were about to move into battle without time for breakfast or further
rest. Bragg, upon Longstreet's arrival, would have 70,000 men available
for the fight. Rosecrans's strength for battle was not over 56,000.
At daylight all of Bragg's army, wholly concealed by the forests, was in
motion. A considerable portion of it was still crossing the river at the
various fords and bridges from Tedford's to Reed's bridge, and deploying
on the other side toward Crittenden, who was still supposed to hold the
Union left.
Suddenly, about 9 o'clock, there came to Bragg's ears the sounds of
heavy and unexpected battle far down the Chickamauga and well toward
Rossville. Thomas, whose head of column rested at the Kelly farm, for
the double purpose of exploring the forests in his front and to test the
truth of a report that an isolated brigade of the enemy was on the west
side of the river near Reed's bridge, moved Brannan and Baird directly
into the forest on the road towards Reed's. At this time two-thirds of
Bragg's army, concealed by the forests, had crossed the Chickamauga and
was directing its columns up that stream toward Crittenden. Just at the
time when Bragg expected that his right would have swung across the
Lafayette road, and that his center divisions would have opened on
Crittenden's position at Lee & Gordon's, these portentous sounds of
battle from Thomas's line astonished and perplexed him. After vainly
waiting for them to cease, under the first impression that the affair
was a movement of his forces in reconnaissance, and that some Union
cavalry had been encountered, he found it so serious as to derange his
whole plan of battle, and force him to meet an enemy who had turned his
right. To do this he was obliged to move a portion of his troops that
had not crossed the river down stream to Reed's. By the circuitous roads
which they were obliged to travel, it required a march of six miles to
reach the left of Thomas.
This destruction of the rebel plan was due to Thomas opening the battle
with the divisions of Brannan and Baird in the vicinity of Reed's
bridge. At 6.30 o'clock Brannan left Kelly's, and moving north, turned
in from the Lafayette road at McDaniel's toward Reed's. A quarter of a
mile from McDaniel's he deployed his division. Van Derveer was on the
left, and thus became the left of the Union army. Connell's brigade was
in the center, and Croxton on the right. In like manner Baird advanced
with a front line of two brigades. King, with the regulars, was on the
left, next to Brannan, and Scribner on the right of King, while
Starkweather marched by the flank behind Scribner's right.
The last disposition was promptly made by Baird upon his discovering
that the enemy was in strong force to his right.
Thus while neither army was aware that the other was in heavy force in
the woods which surrounded them, and while Bragg's forces were forming
to move up the Chickamauga, and so away from Thomas's line of march,
both Brannan and Baird came in force on Bragg's right, in front of
Reed's bridge, at a point near Jay's Mills, and opened the battle of
Chickamauga. Croxton struck first with a vigorous attack on Forrest,
who, with the two divisions of his corps, was guarding the Confederate
right. The cavalrymen were forced back to the sawmill, where they
rallied, dismounted, and began to fight as infantry. Croxton held his
own, and even advanced slightly. Forrest sent for infantry, and Wilson's
brigade of Walker's division hurried from Alexander's and rushed into
the fight.
Meantime re-enforcements were turning from all portions of Bragg's line
toward the sound of furious battle. Shortly the advance toward
Crittenden ceased, so vigorous had Thomas's battle become. Connell and
Van Derveer at first meeting no enemy on their fronts pressed toward the
vortex of Croxton's fighting. Forrest, relieved by Walker's infantry,
met this advance of Brannan's left with his whole force and fought for
the most part on foot. Croxton, out of ammunition, was obliged to retire
somewhat before Walker, when Baird pushed King in to support him, while
Van Derveer and Connell moved in first on Forrest and next on Ector's
brigade of Walker's reserve. The battle became terrific. Forrest hurried
in person after infantry supports, and for portions of his own command
left near Alexander's.
At 11 o'clock Bragg had become convinced that Rosecrans had forced
battle upon him on the extreme rebel right. With such vigor did Thomas's
two divisions fight that Walker was ordered at that hour to go to
Forrest with all his force, and Cheatham, of Polk's corps, who had the
strongest division of the army, consisting of five brigades, then
stationed as the reserve of Bragg's left. Hardly had Cheatham started
before Stewart, of Buckner's corps, which was near Tedford's Ford, ready
to move toward Crittenden, was also dispatched in haste to the
Confederate right, and at 1 o'clock Cleburne, of Hill's corps, posted
near the extreme left of the Confederate line, was ordered to the scene
of action before Brannan and Baird. These movements show how Bragg's
plan of battle had been wholly overturned, and how fierce the fighting
of these two divisions of Thomas must have been to decide Bragg to send
four infantry divisions to the assistance of Forrest's corps of two
divisions.
Meantime Walker had moved Govan's brigade obliquely on the right flank
of Scribner and forced him back. Simultaneously Walthall's brigade
struck King in flank and drove him in disorder over Van Derveer's
brigade. Guenther's regular battery, one of the best and most efficient
in the service, was captured. We shall see how it was shortly after
retaken by the splendid Ninth Ohio.
Thus, while Baird's lines were shaken by the overwhelming concentration
against them, and Brannan was facing and fighting superior numbers,
matters were hot for Thomas, who was slowly moving to and fro along his
divisions and closely watching them. Baird was restoring his lines under
fire and in the face of a flank attack. Croxton's men, with fresh
ammunition, were holding their place. Connell's brigade was immovable,
and poured its fire into the very faces of the enemy. Van Derveer, on
the left, was busily maneuvering to meet flank attacks, and fighting
desperately, but with unvarying success.
At this moment, when Baird was scarcely able to maintain position, and
must have soon yielded to numbers, Johnson, of McCook's corps, came on
the field from Crawfish Springs, and was led by Thomas to the right of
Baird. Here, with the brigades of Willich and Baldwin on the front and
Dodge in reserve, Johnson, by heavy fighting, relieved the pressure on
Baird, restored the line, and checked Bragg's new center.
Following came Palmer, most opportunely ordered forward by Crittenden
from Lee & Gordon's, who saw plainly from the development of furious
battle on the Union left that troops would surely be wanted there.
Palmer followed Johnson into line, and under the personal direction of
Rosecrans the brigades of Hazen, Cruft, and Grose were formed in echelon
and ordered forward, immediately encountering Cheatham's men and
becoming fiercely engaged. Hazen on the left fell with great vigor on
Walker's left and relieved Starkweather, of Baird, from precarious
position. At the same time Van Derveer was thrown by Brannan on the
right of Walker and by terrific fighting crushed Walthall's line and
drove it well back into the forests.
It was here that the Ninth Ohio, the German Turner regiment of Bob
McCook--both regiment and commander of glorious memory--recaptured the
regular battery and brought it into the Union lines. The regiment had
been with the trains during the night march and it was chafing far in
the rear when Van Derveer sent for it. Sore was his need. The repeated
attacks of the enemy on his front and flank in the attempt to crush the
Union left and reach the Lafayette road in its rear were becoming so
frequent and heavy that, in spite of the fact that every man under him
was fighting where he stood and yielding no inch of ground, it seemed as
if the limit of human endurance even for iron veterans must soon be
reached. Then from the near distance came the well-known hurrah of the
Ninth advancing from the right. As all waited to welcome the head of its
column, its charging shout was heard to the front of its line of
advance, followed at once by rapid musketry, and then their great
"hurrah" of victory. The story is brief. Colonel Kammerling at the head
of his regiment, coming on at double-quick, saw to his right and front
the captured artillery of the regulars, just taken by Govan. Without
orders he halted his line, fronted it, and with the command "Links
Schwengket," swung it to the left, faced toward the hill where the
battery stood in the hands of its captors, and with a sweeping charge
drove the rebels back, bayoneting some among the guns, and rushed with
guns and many prisoners back to the Union line. A few minutes after he
came in on the run to Van Derveer, just in time to take part in the last
and supreme effort of the enemy to crush that unyielding left. Forrest's
men had passed beyond Van Derveer's left and formed for assault on his
front, and also directly on his flank. But the vigilant skirmishers and
prisoners taken by them made known the movement. The left was thrown
back in time, and the line presented an obtuse angle opening toward the
enemy. Into this, and heavily against the left of it, Forrest hurled his
columns, four deep. On came these men in gray in magnificent lines,
which showed clearly through the open forest bending their faces before
the sleet of the storm, and firing hotly as they advanced. As they came
within the range of the oblique fire from Van Derveer's right they
halted within forty yards of his left and for a few moments poured in a
destructive fire. A wheel of Smith's regular battery, and of a section
of Church's guns which had reported, brought them where they poured a
nearly enfilading fire of cannister down those long lines, standing
bravely there and fighting almost under the mouths of the guns. Thomas
and Brannan and Van Derveer were looking on and encouraging the line. It
had seemed almost beyond the probabilities to hold it till those well
served batteries opened. An instant later it seemed as if the lines of
gray had sunk into the earth. When the smoke lifted from the third round
the front was clear of everything but the heaps of dead and wounded, and
the work of the day at that point of the Union left was done.
The fight still raged bitterly, however, along the lines of Johnson, and
of Palmer to the right of him. Brannan and Baird were withdrawn from the
front which they had held, the former being sent toward the center to
provide against contingencies there, and the latter posted to prevent
any movement toward the Lafayette road at McDaniel's. Forrest and
Cheatham's brigades of infantry next attacked Johnson (of McCook), who
then held the advanced portion of the Union left. Here the contest soon
became furious again, partly on the ground of Baird's morning battle.
Maney's splendid brigade rushed to a hand-to-hand fight, but was borne
back. Wright, Strahl, Jackson, and Smith, with their brigades, all under
Cheatham, each delivered bold and most courageous attacks, but without
carrying the Union line. Rosecrans's army, under the successive
hammering of the Confederate onslaughts, was fast being solidly formed
from left to right. Willich, Baldwin, and Dodge, of Johnson, and Hazen,
Cruft, and Grose, of Palmer, were fairly aligned, having fought
themselves forward into good positions.
The battle next fell heavily on the right of Palmer, as Bragg at last
had his whole army in rapid motion toward his right. As Palmer's
ammunition began to fail, Reynolds moved up to his right and rear, and
made most excellent dispositions just east of the Lafayette road. Upon
call, he pushed Willich and Edward King in on Palmer's right, and at
once became hotly engaged. Crittenden sent Van Cleve with Samuel
Beatty's and Dick's brigades to the right of Reynold's, leaving Barnes's
brigade with General Wood at Lee & Gordon's.
As fast as the Union line could be extended to the left it became sorely
pressed by Bragg's troops, then well massed west of the Chickamauga.
General Davis, from McCook, pressed rapidly to the left and was sent in
near Vineyard's. At 3 o'clock Wood was ordered from Lee & Gordon's to
the field of the growing fight. As Bragg still had some forces opposite
this point, General Lytle's brigade, of Sheridan's division, was
directed to relieve Wood and hold the crossing. Thus in six hours from
the time Bragg was directing his army on Crittenden at Lee & Gordon's, a
single brigade, posted there only from prudence, served for all demands
against Confederate movement from that direction. This indicates how
completely Bragg had been driven from his plan.
Wood and Davis had not been dispatched a moment too soon. Van Cleve,
Davis, and Wood were confronted with solid masses of Bragg's
concentrated troops, and the scenes and splendid fighting of the morning
at the left were repeated hereby these divisions. Stewart, Johnson, and
Preston, of Buckner's corps, and Hindman, of Longstreet's advance, were
assaulting these lines. Davis had been ordered to wheel in on the
enemy's left flank, and this movement led to one of the bravest and
bloodiest contests of the day in front of Vineyard's. Wood advanced his
lines into the vortex just when Davis was hardest pressed, and, when all
seemed about to be compelled to yield, Sheridan appeared on the flank,
and Wilder's mounted brigade came up in the rear. Every division of the
Union army was in line except the reserve under Granger, which was some
miles away toward Ringgold, with orders to hold Red House bridge.
The battle along Rosecrans's center and right waxed hotter and fiercer.
He seemed everywhere present and he was everywhere alert. Van Cleve
encountered the left of Stewart marching to relieve Cheatham, and a
fight muzzle to muzzle took place between Clayton of Stewart's and the
two brigades of Van Cleve, Sam Beatty and Dick.
Reynolds, by magnificent generalship and fighting, restored the broken
line in his front, and firmly established himself there. His brigades,
under Turchin and Edward King, covered themselves with laurels as they
swayed back and forth on the tides of battles which rushed and swirled
over all that portion of the field.
Davis, with the brigades of Carlin and Heg, delivered their fire at
short range, and stood their ground long and well, till borne back by
overwhelming forces. It was just as this slow retrograde movement began
that Wood had appeared, having marched rapidly from Lee and Gordon's
with Harker's and Buell's brigade of his own division and Barnes's of
Van Cleve's. They swept in on the right, and by splendid fighting
checked the rebel line and held it on their front in spite of its
vigorous and splendid fighting.
At this point two exactly opposite movements were in progress along the
lines of the armies. Bragg, who seemed determined to push his right
between the Union left and Chattanooga, ordered Cleburne from Tedford's
Ford to the extreme right, the scene of the morning fighting. At the
same time General Thomas, convinced that no perilous attack could be
delivered at that hour from that extreme point, was bringing Brannan
from the left to the support of Reynolds just as the latter was fighting
to push the enemy from the Lafayette road. Brannan arrived in time to
help, and with Croxton's assistance Reynolds restored the lines on his
front and flank, and regained possession of the road. Negley also
arrived opportunely from the right and took active part at this point.
Wood repulsed Bushrod Johnson's division, though at great cost. Trigg,
of Preston's division, entirely fresh, moved in with splendid pluck and
movement to restore the line, but Sheridan, from McCook, with Bradley
and Laiboldt's brigades, met and checked this advance, and with its
recoil the heat of battle on the Union right began to subside.
About 5 o'clock the field on both sides was still. But Cleburne and
Walker were moving again far on the rebel right, in obedience to Bragg's
order to again attack the Union left. The Confederate march was over the
field of the morning, where the dead of Walker were thickly strewed. It
was a depressing advance. Still those veterans formed and moved on
without a sign of shrinking, and about six o'clock the hour of silence
was broken by a terrific attack in the gathering dusk upon Johnson, near
the ground occupied by Baird in the morning. The assault fell also upon
Baird further to the left. Cleburne, with a front of a mile, filled by
three brigades, had suddenly burst upon Thomas's left. Cleburne had
three brigades--Polk, Wood, and Deshler. Walthall and Govan, of
Liddell's division, and three brigades of Cleburne--Strahl, Johnson, and
Preston Smith--supported him. The assault was tremendous. Night was
falling, and the aim of each side was directed by the flashes of the
guns.