GRANT, HALLECK AND SHERMAN--JOHNSTON AND MR. DAVIS
Grant's desire for activity in the winter--Scattering to
live--Subordinate movements--The Meridian expedition--Use of the
Mississippi--Sherman's estimate of it--Concentration to be made in
the spring--Grant joins the Potomac Army--Motives in doing so--Meade
as an army commander--Halleck on concentration--North Carolina
expedition given up--Burnside to join Grant--Old relations of
Sherman and Halleck--Present cordial friendship--Frank
correspondence--The supply question--Railway administration--Bridge
defences--Reduction of baggage--Tents--Sherman on spies and
deserters--Changes in Confederate army--Bragg
relieved--Hardee--Beauregard--Johnston--Davis's suggestion of
plans--Correspondence with Johnston--Polk's
mediation--Characteristics--Bragg's letters--Lee writes
Longstreet--Johnston's dilatory discussion--No results--Longstreet
joins Lee--Grant and Sherman have the initiative--Prices in the
Confederacy.
The threshold of the new campaign is a fit place to pick up the
threads of the relations of Sherman to his superiors and his
subordinates, and to notice the manner in which he laid out the
responsible work before him.
Grant had no thought of suspending operations in winter, further
than circumstances should make it imperative. As soon as the siege
of Knoxville was raised, he applied himself earnestly to the
question, What next? His first choice would have been to start from
Chattanooga as a base, and make the Confederate Army his object. The
insuperable obstacle to this was the impossibility, at the time, of
supplying the forces already collected on the upper Tennessee.
[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxi. pt. iii. p. 503.] The
railroad to Nashville must be practically rebuilt and made much more
efficient than it was, or both Thomas's and Foster's armies would be
tied fast without the possibility of advancing. To make it possible
to feed Sherman's auxiliary force, he sent it down the river to
Bellefonte, some thirty miles below Bridgeport, opened steamboat
communication with it, and set it at work repairing the railway from
Nashville to Decatur and from Decatur to Stevenson. This would
furnish an additional line to Chattanooga when completed, and would
make an accumulation of stores there a possibility. He saw the risks
involved in this scattering of forces, but he had no choice; they
must scatter to live. He did not mean that the army should be
inactive, however; as early as the 7th of December, 1863, he wrote
quite fully to Halleck suggesting a movement from the lower
Mississippi on Mobile, using for this purpose the forces that would
be relieved from guarding the lines about Chattanooga. [Footnote:
Official Records, vol. xxxi. pt. iii. p. 349.]
By the middle of the month he had begun to organize a cavalry force
under Gen. W. Sooy Smith, to move against Forrest in West Tennessee,
and was giving shape to other plans of activity. [Footnote: _Id._,
pp. 429, 431, 473.] Sherman had taken a short leave of absence to
visit his family upon the death of one of his sons, a bright lad,
whose loss was a severe bereavement. On his return to duty, he was
directed to go down the Mississippi, visit the important posts of
his department, and take steps to suppress guerilla interference
with the navigation of the Mississippi. Before leaving his command,
he had suggested an active movement of part of his army in northern
Alabama, to break up the railroad in the neighborhood of Corinth,
whilst he himself led a force up the Yazoo River to attack Granada
from the south, with a similar purpose. He thought he could do this
and get back in time to take part in the "plan of grand campaign"
which Grant was studying. In the same letter he said he deemed Sooy
Smith "too mistrustful of himself for a leader against Forrest," and
suggested Brigadier-General Joseph A. Mower, of whose energy and
courage he had a high opinion. [Footnote: Official Records, vol.
xxxi. pt. iii. p. 445.]
On the subject of the necessity of protecting the river navigation
by every means, Sherman expressed himself in superlatives, as he was
apt to do, but his meaning was plain and sensible. He said to Logan,
to secure its safety "I would slay millions. On that point I am not
only insane, but mad," and will convince the natives that "though to
stand behind a big cotton-wood and shoot at a passing boat is good
sport and safe, it may still reach and kill their friends and
families hundreds of miles off." [Footnote: _Id._ vol. xxx. pt. iii.
p. 459.] Out of this discussion came finally his suggestion of an
extensive movement from Vicksburg upon Meridian for the purpose of
destroying the railway lines, especially in the vicinity of the
latter place, and of isolating the region bordering on the
Mississippi, so that a small force could garrison it and protect
commerce. The suggestion was adopted by Grant. With Sherman's column
the cavalry under Sooy Smith was to co-operate. [Footnote: _Id._,
pp. 473, 527.]
Meridian was made the objective point of this movement, though Grant
intimated to Halleck that if Sherman found it would not too greatly
prolong the subordinate campaign, he might march on Mobile.
[Footnote: _Id._, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. p. 100.] When the march began,
Sherman allowed it to be given out that he would attack Mobile, but
this was to deceive the enemy. In his correspondence with General
Banks he limited his task to that which has been stated, though he
asked Banks to help him keep up the notion that Mobile was aimed at,
as it would deter the enemy from heavily reinforcing General Polk by
the garrison there and by troops sent from Atlanta. "I must return
to the army in the field in Alabama in February," said he, "but
propose to avail myself of the short time allowed me here in the
department, to strike a blow at Meridian and Demopolis." [Footnote:
Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. p. 114.] In this view the
movement was a success, notwithstanding the failure of the cavalry
column to co-operate. [Footnote: _Id._, p. 498.] The biographer of
General Polk disputes the importance and the permanence of the
interruption of railway communication in Mississippi; [Footnote:
Leonidas Polk, Bishop and General, vol. ii. p. 309.] but it is
certain that no important hostile movement from that region was made
again till Hood's campaign against Thomas a year later, and that was
seriously if not fatally delayed by the want of railway
communication between Florence or Tuscumbia and the interior of the
Gulf States.
On his first visit to Washington after he became lieutenant-general,
Grant found that it was the general expectation of members of
Congress that he should infuse his personal energy into the next
campaign of the army in Virginia. He learned also that the
President, the Cabinet, and General Halleck despaired of the
accomplishment of this by any stringency of orders from a distance,
and thought it could be done only when he should be near enough to
solve questions as they arose by his personal presence and
influence. As a subordinate, few men could do better service than
General Meade; but he seemed to develop a caution amounting almost
to inaction in the presence of the Confederate Army under General
Lee. This had allowed the Richmond government to send Longstreet's
corps to reinforce Bragg at the west; and it was because the grand
opportunity was not improved by Meade that it became necessary to
send Hooker a thousand miles with the Eleventh and Twelfth Corps to
reinforce Rosecrans. Halleck expressed the sentiment of the
administration and of the country when he wrote to Grant on December
13th, "As General Meade's operations have failed to produce any
results, Lee may send by rail reinforcements to Longstreet without
our knowing it. This contingency must also be considered."
[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxi. pt. iii. p. 396.] It was, in
fact, what Longstreet strenuously urged his government to do. As
late as February 17th, when it was certain that Grant would soon be
in command of all the National armies, Halleck, in a long letter of
which the burden was that Lee's army must be made the objective in
the Eastern campaign, plainly intimated that Meade could not give
the Army of the Potomac the necessary aggressive energy. "Meade
retreated before Lee with a very much larger force," he said, "and
he does not now deem himself strong enough to attack Lee's present
army." [Footnote: _Id_., vol. xxxii. pt. ii. pt. ii. p. 411] After
mentioning the opportunities to break or defeat the enemy which had
been lost or not improved at Antietam and Chancellorsville, he adds
that of Meade after Gettysburg, and continues: "I am also of opinion
that General Meade could have succeeded recently at Mine Run had he
persevered in his attack." [Footnote: _Id_., p. 412.] Pointing out
that McClellan had operated by exterior lines, and Burnside, Hooker,
and Meade by interior ones, and that all had alike failed, he argues
that this does not prove anything against either line of operation,
whether by the James River or by Culpepper; but the sound military
principle still is to avoid scattering the eastern army by North
Carolina expeditions and the like, which were then mooted, and to
concentrate the forces in the east against Lee's army and fight it
out to a finish. [Footnote: _Id_. p. 413.] The letter is an able
one, but the reference to it is now made for the sole purpose of
showing how the problem was placed before General Grant when the
supreme responsibility was cast upon him. He accepted the view so
ably presented. He did not allow the proposed expedition to be made
by Burnside, though he had himself favored it before; but united his
troops to the army on the Rapidan. [Footnote: Official Records, vol.
xxxii. pt. ii. p. 143.] He kept up for a time a nominal duality of
organization, not putting Burnside under Meade or Meade under
Burnside. This made an ostensible reason for the next step, which
was to take the field there in person and try what effect his own
inflexible will might have in giving an aggressive impetus to that
army. It seemed to him to be a choice between that and a continued
dead-lock to the end of the chapter. Thus it was that Grant gave up
his own desire to continue at the head of the western armies which
he had led to successive and glorious victories. Thus it was that
Sherman was right in saying to him, "Like yourself, you take the
biggest load." [Footnote: _Id_., pt. iii. p. 313.] The decision was
not prompted by egotism. There was no vanity in Grant's composition.
He simply saw, as he thought, that in that way decisive progress
might be made, and so he quietly went that way.
Sherman's relations to Halleck had always been close and most
friendly. Outside of official communications they had kept up a
personal correspondence, part of which is found in the Official
Records. From the day when it became apparent that Grant was to
become lieutenant-general, Sherman yielded to his impulse to comfort
and reassure his older friend on what must necessarily involve
disappointment if not humiliation. In a long letter from the
Mississippi in January, he takes pleasure in telling how he had
spoken in public of Halleck's good qualities and talents. "I spoke
of your indomitable industry and called to mind how, when Ord,
Loeser, Spotts, and I were shut up in our stateroom, trying to keep
warm with lighted candles and playing cards on the old Lexington,
off Cape Horn, you were lashed to your berth studying, boning harder
than you ever did at West Point." [Footnote: _Id_., pt. ii. p. 261.]
This was on their voyage out to California during the Mexican War.
In a cordial answer (February 16th), Halleck said he expected Grant
to receive the promotion, and should most cordially welcome him to
the chief command, glad himself to be relieved from so thankless and
disagreeable a position. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii.
pt. ii. p. 408.] He enlarged upon its difficulties, though he did
not see, apparently, that it had been in his power to take the field
as Grant afterward did, and that it was by his own act that he had
become "simply a military adviser of the Secretary of War and the
President." He bore witness to the fact that there was more harmony
in the western army than in the eastern, saying, "There is less
jealousy and backbiting and a greater disposition to assist each
other." [Footnote: _Ibid_.] In reply Sherman assured Halleck of his
own belief that Grant would prefer to command the "army of the
centre" which was to advance from Chattanooga, and did not want the
position of general-in-chief at Washington. [Footnote: _Id_., p.
498.]
At the beginning of April Sherman wrote again to Halleck, expressing
his belief that he could make his army a unit in action and feeling.
"We have never had," he said, "and God grant we never may have the
dissensions which have so marred the usefulness of our fellows whom
a common cause and common interests alone ought to unite as
brothers." [Footnote: _Id_., pt. iii. p. 222.] It was in this letter
that he asked Halleck to say to the President that he would prefer
not to be nominated to the vacant major-generalship in the regular
army. "I have now all the rank necessary to command, and I believe
all here concede to me the ability, yet accidents may happen, and I
don't care about increasing the distance of my fall. The moment
another appears on the arena better than me, I will cheerfully
subside. Indeed, now, my preference would be to have my Fifteenth
Corps, which was as large a family as I feel willing to provide for;
yet I know Grant has a mammoth load to carry. He wants here some one
who will fulfil his plans, whole and entire and at the time
appointed, and he believes I will do it. I hope he is not mistaken.
I know my weak points, and thank you from the bottom of my heart for
past favors and advice, and will in the future heed all you may
offer, with the deepest confidence in your ability and sincerity."
A single reference more will complete this sketch of the relations
of those prominent men. The week before the opening of his campaign
(April 24th) Sherman wrote again: "I see a mischievous paragraph
that you are dissatisfied and will resign; of course I don't believe
it. If I did, I would enter my protest. You possess a knowledge of
law and of the principles of war far beyond that of any other
officer in our service. You remember that I regretted your going to
Washington for your own sake, but now that you are there you should
not leave." [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. p.
469.] This hearty friendship and cordial comradeship lasted unbroken
till Halleck's too famous advice to Mr. Stanton after Lincoln was
assassinated, to direct Sherman's subordinates in the Gulf States
and in the West not to obey the orders he might issue in pursuance
of his convention with the Confederate General Johnston. That was a
sore blow which shattered this lifelong friendship, though it now
seems probable that had Halleck's dispatch to Stanton not been
published without the rest of the correspondence, Sherman might have
found possible a more innocent meaning for his words than they
seemed to have when they were read by themselves. This, however, is
not the place to discuss that subject. [Footnote: See Chap. L.,
_post_.]
In considering Sherman's means of supplying his army in the field,
we must note the situation and connections of Nashville, which made
it naturally the principal depot for operations in Alabama and
Georgia. A hundred and eighty-six miles by rail south of the Ohio
River, centrally situated as the capital of Tennessee, it was
directly connected with Chattanooga by a hundred and fifty miles of
railroad, and indirectly by way of Decatur, Alabama, and Stevenson,
a line thirty-five miles longer. These railway connections would of
themselves make Nashville an important post, but it had also the
advantage of water communication with the Ohio. It lies at the
southern bend of the Cumberland River, the course of which is nearly
due north from the city to its mouth, and the stream is navigable
for steamboats the greater part of the year. The Tennessee, a much
larger river, is nearly parallel to the Cumberland in this part of
its course, and a partially constructed railroad from its banks at
Johnsonville to Nashville, seventy-odd miles, was completed during
the winter. With these three lines of communication, there was very
little danger that the great Nashville depot could run short of
munitions or rations, or be seriously isolated by raids of the
enemy. It was to communication between Chattanooga and Nashville
that Sherman had to give his best thought and will. The War
Department had sent out Colonel McCallum, the General Superintendent
of Military Railways in January, and improvements had then been
begun, which under Sherman's energetic command made a brilliant
success of this part of the military administration through the
whole campaign. [Footnote: See "Sherman" (Great Commanders Series),
pp. 199 _et seq_. Also letter of McCallum to Stanton, Official
Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. pp. 143-145: Order appointing Adna
Anderson general superintendent of transportation and W. W. Wright
chief engineer of construction, _Id_., p. 365: Sherman's order
organizing the military use of the railways, _Id_., pt. iii. p.
279.] The management of the railways in use was given to Adna
Anderson, and the engineering and bridge-construction to W. W.
Wright. These gentlemen were both civil engineers and experts in
railroad building and management. Military rank was given them later
in order to enable them to control officers and men of the army on
proper occasions. Their skill and energy were of inestimable value
to the army, and gave them brilliant reputations which they fully
earned. They remained in their military railway duties to the end of
the war, and were distinguished in the same profession in civil life
to the end of their lives. When Sherman assumed command of the
Division of the Mississippi, about eighty carloads a day was the
limit of the capacity of the road and the delivery at Chattanooga.
It was only half of what was needed to insure rapid progress of the
campaign. By the 1st of May it had increased to a hundred and thirty
cars a day, with exceptional days on which the delivery ran higher;
but a steady average of a hundred and fifty (the needed quantity)
had not been reached, and every day's advance into Georgia would
increase the length of the line. [Footnote: Official Records, vol.
xxxii. pt. iii. pp. 466, 490.]
In a characteristic letter to General Thomas, Sherman explained the
necessity of having the railway management directed from his own
headquarters instead of those of the Army of the Cumberland, and in
one to Mr. Lincoln he tersely repelled the idea that he was unduly
hard on the inhabitants of the country and their business.
[Footnote: _Id_., p. 489; and vol. xxxviii. pt. iv. pp. 25, 33.]
General Meigs, the quartermaster-general, who knew the country by
personal inspection, fully agreed with Sherman and wrote him on
April 20th, advising him to "resist the pressure of civilians and
private donations and supplies; march your troops, and devote the
cars solely to transportation of military necessities.... Many
civilians," he added, "can give charitable, patriotic, benevolent,
and religious reasons to be allowed to go to the front; the reasons
are so good that nothing but an absolute and unchangeable
prohibition of all such travel will do any good." [Footnote: _Id_.,
vol. xxxii. pt. iii. p. 434.]
The business management of the military railways was a matter of
greatest importance, but it must be supplemented by an adequate
system of defence. To cut the long line and interrupt the
communications of the army would, of course, be the constant effort
of the enemy. Every wooden bridge across a stream was a most
vulnerable point. A burnt bridge meant a delay of trains till it
could be rebuilt, and Sherman's estimate that he must receive at the
front a hundred and fifty car-loads daily, shows how soon trouble
would be caused if the steady roll of car-wheels should cease. For
the freight cars of that day, ten tons made a load, and with the
light locomotives and iron rails then in use, twenty or thirty cars
made a full train. A system of blockhouses for the protection of the
bridges had been gradually developed by the engineers of the Army of
the Cumberland on suggestions made by General Halleck and others,
and was under the charge of Colonel W. E. Merrill, who enlarged and
improved it. This able officer was retained at the head of the
defensive system, and his success in it was noteworthy. [Footnote:
Colonel Merrill has given a valuable memoir on the construction and
use of the blockhouses, in "Ohio Loyal Legion Papers," vol. iii. p.
389. After the war, he was for many years United States Engineer in
charge of Ohio River improvements.]
With a careful system of railway work went also thorough study of
the wagon trains necessary in the field to carry the baggage of the
army, its ammunition, and a few days' rations, its hospital
supplies, and the records and papers of all the business
departments. Besides the supplies for men, the food for the teams,
for the cavalry horses, and for the horses of mounted officers makes
in the aggregate a bulk and weight astonishing to those who for the
first time undertake the calculation. Great droves of beef cattle
accompanied the march, and were coming forward on all the roads from
the country in the rear where they could be bought and collected.
The purchase, driving, coralling, feeding, and distributing of these
made, of itself, a great business for the commissaries of
subsistence. The introduction of the shelter tent of two
india-rubber blankets got us rid of the regimental trains, which at
the beginning of the war had been the most unwieldy of all our
_impedimenta_. The two soldiers who were thus partners in the little
house they carried on their backs, clubbed all their arrangements
for comfort, and by working together greatly reduced the hardships
of campaigning. Sherman applied the full force of his mind and the
strong impulse of his personal example to discarding everything not
essential to the army work, and to securing the utmost mobility in
his columns. Throughout the campaign his own headquarters looked
small and bare compared with those of many of his subordinates. Some
writers have ridiculed this, as if it were a mere "fad" of the
general; but it was both wise and shrewd to keep before the army the
constant lesson that privation was necessary, and that the orders on
the subject must be obeyed, since the commander set the example of
obedience. It was akin to Bonaparte's marching on foot through the
burning sands of Syria after his repulse from St. Jean d'Acre. It
was speaking to the soldiers in the ranks a language which they
understood, and which helped them in their arduous work more than
proclamations.
A marked trait of Sherman's military intellect was his accurate
judgment of the force of his enemy, and his freedom from the common
fault of overestimating the army opposed to him. In his
correspondence with General Thomas in April, discussing the
preparations for the campaign and the severe reduction of burdens to
a scale which was "rather the limit of our aim than what we can
really accomplish," he had occasion to acknowledge the receipt of
information concerning the enemy which Thomas had collected. "I read
the reports of your scouts with interest," he said, but added, "I
usually prefer to make my estimate of the enemy from general
reasoning rather than from the words of spies or deserters."
[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. p. 323.] The
remark is significant. Prior to the opening of a campaign, whilst
affairs are quiet, pretty reliable information of an enemy's
strength and positions may usually be got; but when the time of
action comes, the very air is full of excitement, and the "secret
service" is apt to be a machine for self-delusion. Precedent
knowledge supplemented by actual contact with the enemy is the best
reliance for a capable general. His own reasoning from trustworthy
data at the earlier point of departure, is, with such aids, his best
guide. He knows where his enemy must be and what his force ought to
be, better than his spies, or the enemy's deserters who, by a common
stratagem, may be really hostile spies stuffed with the disturbing
information they are sent to reveal.
In the Confederate Army changes had also been occurring under the
stress of Bragg's great defeat which culminated in the loss of
Missionary Ridge on the 25th of November. Dissatisfaction with the
conduct of the campaign was prevalent in both military and civil
circles. Lee pointed out the embarrassment which must result to
Longstreet from Bragg's misfortune, especially as the retreat of the
latter had been promptly followed by Grant's occupation of
Cleveland. Communication between Longstreet and Bragg was thus
interrupted, and unless short work was made of Burnside, Longstreet
would have to retreat into Virginia or North Carolina. [Footnote:
_Id_., vol. xxxi. pt. iii. p. 779.] In the letter to President Davis
which contained these suggestions, Lee added a strong hint that
Beauregard was the most available officer of proper rank to succeed
to the command of which Bragg asked to be relieved on the 29th.
[Footnote: _Id_., pt. ii. p. 682.] The unfortunate Bragg coupled
with this request another; namely, that the causes of the defeat
should be investigated. In his official report [Footnote: Official
Records, vol. xxxi. pt. ii. p. 665] he attributed it to a panic
amongst the troops holding the apparently impregnable heights of
Missionary Ridge, and he characterized the conduct as shameful. "The
position was one," he said, "which ought to have been held by a line
of skirmishers against any assaulting column." He declared that our
troops reached the crest so exhausted by climbing as to be
powerless, and that "the slightest effort would have destroyed
them." One who stands on that ridge and looks down into the valley
can easily agree with this opinion, and believe that no commander
would order his troops to attack the position in front. The impulse
of Wood's and Sheridan's divisions to attack, and the feebleness of
the resistance of the astonished Confederates, are both phenomenal,
and in a superstitious age would certainly have been attributed to
supernatural influences.
The truth, however, seems to be that the confidence of the
Confederate Army in its leader had declined so far that it lost hope
when opposed to the prestige of the conqueror of Vicksburg, and was
morally prepared for disaster. Mr. Davis's prompt acceptance of
Bragg's retirement can only be understood in this way, for the
general was with good reason reckoned a favorite with the
Confederate President. Except for this loss of prestige he would
have been answered as Lee was when he made a similar suggestion
after Gettysburg,-that confidence was undiminished, and that neither
the army nor the people wished for a change.
Bragg was directed to turn over the command to Lieutenant-General
William J. Hardee, next in rank, and the evidence indicates that
Hardee could have retained it, had he been willing. But, surpassed
by none in ability and soldierly quality in command of a corps, he
shrunk from the burden of chief responsibility for a campaign, and
declined the permanent appointment. [Footnote: Official Records,
vol. xxxi. pt. iii. p. 764.] Mr. Davis seems to have taken no notice
of Lee's suggestion of Beauregard, but asked whether Lee himself
could not, even temporarily, go to the West and by a vigorous
campaign restore the prestige of the Army of Tennessee. Lee calmly
presented the objections to this, from the point of view of the army
of northern Virginia as well as that of the western army; though he
submitted fully to the decision the President might reach after
further consideration. [Footnote: _Id_., pp. 785, 792.] Mr. Davis
was convinced that it would be unwise to transfer Lee, but he did
not take kindly to the idea of appointing Beauregard. The
estrangement between them which began in the first campaign in
Virginia had not been removed, but had rather been intensified by
the fact that Beauregard had, as he thought, failed in the command
of the army after A. S. Johnston fell at Shiloh, and now seemed to
have a party of friends and supporters in the Confederate Congress
who were looked upon as an organized opposition to his
administration. [Footnote: For some indications of this, see
Beauregard's letters to Pierre Soulé and to W. Porcher Miles,
Official Records, vol. xxxi. pt. iii. pp. 812, 843. Davis's Rise and
Fall of the Southern Confederacy, vol. ii. p. 69.]
Whilst the subject was under consideration, General Polk, who was a
warm friend both of President Davis and of General Johnston, wrote
to Mr. Davis a strong letter urging Johnston's appointment. He
advocated it on the double ground of the wish of the army and of the
country. He did not ignore the fact that the personal friendship
once existing between Davis and Johnston had been broken, but
appealed to the sense of public duty to yield to a general desire,
and to motives of magnanimity to overlook personal differences.
[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxi. pt. iii. p. 796.]
Beauregard and Johnston were in fact the only ones, out of the five
officers of the full rank of general, who were available to take
Bragg's place; for the Confederate grades were much less flexible
than ours, where any major-general by assignment of the President
acquired the legal right to command an army, and a superiority over
him who had just laid down the power. [Footnote: Official Records,
vol. xxxi. pt. iii. p. 835.] Mr. Davis felt the embarrassment
keenly, but finally decided to appoint Johnston. On the 16th of
December the latter was ordered to turn over the command of the Army
of the Mississippi to Lieutenant-General Polk, and proceed to Dalton
to assume command of the Army of Tennessee. [Footnote: General W. W.
Mackall, who had been chief of staff to Johnston and Bragg in turn,
wrote to Johnston on December 9th: "I never did believe that Mr. D.
would give you your place as long as he can help it; but he can't."
The letter has other piquant passages. _Id_., p. 801.]
The result of conferences with Lee, and correspondence with
Longstreet and others, had been the conviction on the part of the
Confederate President that the only promising military policy in the
West was for the Army of Tennessee to take early aggressive action,
turning Chattanooga by the east, getting between Thomas and
Schofield by the occupation of Cleveland, and, if both the National
commanders kept within their fortifications, move boldly over the
Cumberland Mountains by way of the gaps near Kingston. As part of
this plan Longstreet should advance close to Knoxville, and join
Johnston either by turning Knoxville on the east before Johnston
passed far beyond Cleveland, or by the west if Johnston had got to
Kingston.
This indication of the wishes of the Richmond Government was
gradually developed. The earliest suggestions were of the necessity
for a prompt renewal of the aggressive. Mr. Seddon, Secretary of
War, in the letter informing Johnston of his transfer (December
18th), had said it was hoped that he would assume the offensive as
soon as the condition of the army would allow it. [Footnote:
Official Records, vol. xxxi. pt. iii. p. 843.] A few days later
(December 23d) Mr. Davis himself wrote, quoting General Bragg as to
the good effect a prompt resumption of the initiative would have on
the _morale_ of the army, and General Hardee as to the fit condition
of the troops for action. [Footnote: _Id_., p. 856.] To this he
added that an "imperative demand for prompt and vigorous action
arises, not only from the importance of restoring the prestige of
the army, and averting the dispiriting and injurious results that
must attend a season of inactivity, but from the necessity of
reoccupying the country upon the supplies of which the proper
subsistence of our armies materially depends."
Johnston's reply (January 2d) was a presentation of the difficulties
in the way of action. [Footnote: _Id_., vol. xxxii. pt ii. p. 510.]
He said that Bragg and Hardee had made the considerable
reinforcement of the army a precedent condition of resuming the
offensive. His conclusion was that without large reinforcements
there was "no other mode of taking the offensive here than to beat
the enemy when he advances and then move forward." A fortnight later
he said: "My recent telegrams to you have shown, not only that we
cannot hope soon to assume the offensive from this position, but
that we are in danger of being forced back from it by the want of
food and forage, especially the latter." [Footnote: _Id_., p. 559.]
The shortness of forage he attributed to bad management of the
Georgia Railroad, owned by the State. Supposing this were remedied
(as a little later he said it was), he compared the advantages of
two routes of advance into Middle Tennessee,--one by Rome,
Gunterville, and Huntsville, the other by East Tennessee through the
Cumberland Mountains. He pronounced in favor of the former, which
would turn the mountains by the south and save the task of
surmounting them. If, whilst this was going on, the National army
should push for Atlanta, two or three thousand cavalry could, he
thought, prevent it from reaching that place in less than a month.
Large reinforcements were, however, essential for any aggressive
movement. He was willing to try the East Tennessee route and unite
with Longstreet, if he were satisfied that the country could furnish
the provisions and forage for the march. To both of these routes, he
preferred one which should make a base still farther west, in
northern Mississippi.
At the beginning of February he reviewed the situation as he then
believed it to be, and concluded that it was impracticable to assume
the offensive from northern Georgia. He advised the collection of as
large an army as possible in northern Mississippi, with a bridge
equipage for the passage of the Tennessee. This army, he thought,
should be larger than his and Folk's united. [Footnote: Official
Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. p. 644.]
Sherman's Meridian expedition now interrupted the discussion of
plans for a month, except that Mr. Davis suggested a movement of
Johnston's army to strike Sherman's column in co-operation with
General Polk. [Footnote: _Id_., p. 729.] Assuming that Sherman was
aiming at Mobile, Johnston declared it impossible to strike him
before he should establish a new base. Hardee's corps was, however,
put in motion to reinforce Polk. [Footnote: _Id_., p. 769.]
Beauregard was ordered to send ten thousand men from his department
on the southern seacoast to Johnston, if possible, but he reported
that it was not practicable. [Footnote: _Id_., p. 772.]
It must be said that making the correspondence a personal one on the
part of Mr. Davis, instead of carrying it on through the War
Department, was a waiving of etiquette, and thus it was also a step
toward a cordial and frank understanding. It must equally be noted
that General Johnston's tone remained that of cold formality, and
his letters do not show the hearty readiness to bend his views to
meet those of the President which is always apparent (for instance)
in the letters of General Lee. The situation was not one in which a
general may say, "I need certain supplies, equipment, transportation
or pontoon bridges, and must have them before I can move." The
Confederate cause was unquestionably in great straits, and calling
for men and means was a good deal like Glendower's call, "Will they
come?" Every commanding officer was expected to act with what he had
or could get, were it much or little. Very warm friends of Johnston
saw that his attitude was one likely to increase estrangement.
General Polk, the mutual friend who had probably thrown the casting
influence which gave Johnston the command, wrote to him through a
confidential intimate of both (Colonel Harvie, Johnston's
inspector-general), suggesting that he take private steps toward a
reconciliation with Mr. Davis. He urged the general, as he had urged
the President, that private feeling and personal pride should be
sacrificed to the cause in which both were engaged. [Footnote:
Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. p. 593.] The appeal seems to
have failed, and cold formality continued to be the tone of
Johnston's communications with the government. About the first of
March Mr. Davis dropped the correspondence, turning it over to
General Bragg, now his chief of staff.
Johnston had written to Bragg (February 27th) that the President's
letters had given him the impression that a forward movement was
intended _in the spring_; but if this were so, much preparation
would be necessary, and large reinforcements and equipment.
[Footnote: _Id_., p. 808.] He assumed that Longstreet was to unite
with him, if the President's plan had not changed. This treatment of
the matter as problematic and intended only as a plan for the
spring, must be admitted to be somewhat exasperating to Mr. Davis,
as the pressure from Richmond since the 18th of December had been
for immediate aggressive action, and had been so emphatically put
that to speak of it as creating only "an impression" sounded very
like a sneer, and was unfortunate if not so intended.
Bragg answered in good temper, and after disposing of the matters of
business, he added: "The enemy is not prepared for us, and if we can
strike him a blow before he recovers, success is almost certain. The
plan which is proposed has long been my favorite, and I trust our
efforts may give you the means to accomplish what I have ardently
desired but never had the ability to undertake. Communicate your
wants to me freely and I will do all I can to give you strength and
efficiency. We must necessarily encounter privations and hardships,
and run some risk; but the end will justify the means." [Footnote:
Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. p. 592.]
This, of course, implied prompt action whilst Grant's forces
remained scattered and were still suffering from the dearth of
supplies which had so nearly approached starvation and nakedness.
Schofield's forces were at Knoxville, over a hundred miles northeast
of Chattanooga. Part of Sherman's were on the Meridian expedition or
now returning to Vicksburg on the Mississippi. Another part, under
Logan, were about Huntsville, as far to the southwest as Schofield
was to the northeast. In this condition of things a quick blow at
Thomas would find him isolated. He could be turned by the north
before Schofield could join him if he stayed in his fortifications,
and he could be fought on equal terms in the field if he came out of
his lines. This made the southern opportunity. To wait for spring
was to wait for Grant and Sherman to concentrate the now scattered
armies, to have them clothed and fed, and to have the horses and
mules ready for a campaign. It is no wonder the government at
Richmond thought it worth while to "encounter privations and
hardships and to run some risk."
Lee had been in Richmond and was in accord with this plan. He wrote
to Longstreet on the day after the date of Bragg's letter just
quoted, urging him to drop all other schemes and to unite in
influencing Johnston to adopt it. "If you and Johnston could unite
and move into Middle Tennessee," he said, "it would cut the armies
of Chattanooga and Knoxville in two and draw them from those points,
where either portion could be struck at as opportunity offered....
By covering your fronts well with your cavalry, Johnston could move
quietly and rapidly through Benton, cross the Hiwassee, and then
push forward in the direction of Kingston, while you, taking such a
route as to be safe from a flank attack, would join him at or after
his crossing the Tennessee River. The two commands, upon reaching
Sparta, would be in position to select their future course; would
necessitate the evacuation of Chattanooga and Knoxville, and by
rapidity and skill unite on either army." [Footnote: Official
Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. p. 594.]
There were no doubt difficulties in the way--when are there not? But
we who were in Grant's command are glad that we were not called upon
to meet the enemy under this plan of campaign vigorously executed.
We did not lack faith that we could defeat it, but we were much
better pleased to have the enemy await the completion of our own
preparation and allow us to take the initiative. It cannot be denied
that it was based on sound strategy. With his usual considerateness,
Lee said that Johnston and Longstreet on the ground should be better
able to judge the plan and to decide; but he urged it with much more
earnestness than was common in his letters. That Johnston rejected
it must be admitted to be very strong evidence that he lacked
enterprise. His abilities are undoubted, and when once committed to
an offensive campaign, he conducted it with vigor and skill. The
bent of his mind, however, was plainly in favor of the course which
he steadily urged,--to await his adversary's advance, and watch for
errors which would give him a manifest opportunity to ruin him.
Longstreet had written to Johnston on the 5th of March that Mr.
Davis had directed a conference between them on the practicability
of uniting their armies between Knoxville and Chattanooga, with a
view to the movement into Middle Tennessee. Longstreet thinks he can
make his part of the movement, but must leave the question of
supplies to Johnston after they unite. [Footnote: Official Records,
vol. xxxiii. pt. ii. p. 587.] Lieutenant-General John B. Hood, who
had been assigned to a corps in Johnston's army, wrote to Mr. Davis
on the 7th that the army was well clothed, well fed, with abundant
transportation, in high spirits, anxious for battle, and needing
only a few artillery horses. A junction with Longstreet's army he
thought would make it strong enough to take the initiative, and he
strongly supported the plan of moving before Grant could
concentrate. [Footnote: _Id_., p. 606.]
Johnston wrote to Bragg on the 12th that no particular plan of
campaign had been communicated to him. [Footnote: _Id_., p. 613.] He
does not appear to have telegraphed a brief inquiry on this subject,
but wrote at some length in regard to his requirements before he
could be in condition to take the field. He referred to his first
opinion in favor of a defensive campaign as unchanged. The ordinary
course of mail seems to have required about a week for a letter to
reach Richmond. It happened that on the same day Bragg at Richmond
was writing to Johnston outlining the plan of campaign mentioned
above, adding that it was intended to throw a heavy column of
cavalry into West Tennessee as a diversion, and that if by rapid
movement Johnston could capture Nashville, Grant would be in a
precarious position. The President, on assurance of the immediate
execution of the plan, would order to him 5000 men from General
Polk, 10,000 from Beauregard, and Longstreet's command estimated at
16,000, but which was really nearer 20,000. Putting these
reinforcements and Johnston's own army at lowest figures, his column
would amount to 75,000 men. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii.
pt. iii. p. 614.]
After posting his letter of the 12th, Johnston went on an inspection
tour to Atlanta, and there on the 13th he received and answered
Longstreet's letter of the 5th. He pronounced impracticable the plan
submitted to them, and reiterated his fixed opinion that it was best
to wait for Grant's advance. In any event, he thought a forward
movement should "wait for the grass of May." [Footnote: _Id_., p.
618.] He argued that it was better to let the enemy's forces
advance, and fight them far from their base and near his own. Bragg,
on the other hand, had urged the recovery of the populous region of
Middle Tennessee as necessary both for obtaining army subsistence
and forage, and for the recruitment of the ranks. Both these
resources he estimated very highly, and as Tennessee was still
claimed as a seceding State, the Confederate conscription laws would
be enforced there. On the other hand, every movement in retreat cut
off a part of their area for supplies and men, was discouraging to
the army, and was followed by numerous desertions of soldiers whose
families were within our lines.
In answering Longstreet, Johnston had said that he would execute
zealously any plan the President would order; but he evidently
insisted on definite and formal commands if he were to depart from
his preconceived views to which he held tenaciously. On the 16th of
March he wrote again, this time in answer to Bragg's of the 7th.
After telling of the impossibility of collecting artillery horses in
northern Georgia, he mentions Longstreet's letter to him, to say
that he thinks the point of junction suggested is too near the
enemy, and that his army should have an accumulation of eighteen or
twenty days' supplies before entering upon such a movement. They
must also have ordnance stores for a campaign, and wagon trains to
carry it all. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. p.
636.] Two days later he received Bragg's full letter of the 12th
sent by the hand of Colonel Sale as special messenger, and he now
answers by telegraph. He says that Grant is back at Nashville, and
is not likely to stand on the defensive. To meet at Dalton his
expected advance, the reinforcements that had been spoken of must be
sent at once. "Give us those troops," he says; "and if we beat him
we follow. Should he not advance, we will thus be ready for the
offensive. The troops can be fed as easily here as where they now
are." [Footnote: _Id_., p. 649.] Next day he elaborated the same
ideas in a letter, adding the suggestion before made by him that the
line of advance by way of North Alabama was a preferable one to the
route through East Tennessee.
The telegram was answered from Richmond whilst the longer letter was
on its way. The answer conveyed the information that Grant would not
personally lead the western army, but would turn over its command to
Sherman. It also briefly noted the fact that Johnston had not
accepted the aggressive policy on which the large reinforcements
were made conditional. [Footnote: I do not find this dispatch in the
Official Records. It is given in Johnston's "Narrative of Military
Operations," p. 298.] He replied that his dispatch expressly
accepted taking the offensive, and the only difference was as to
details. He therefore repeats the urgent request that the troops be
sent at once. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. p.
666.]
It is not easy to accept his interpretation of his former dispatch.
Waiting indefinitely to see whether the National army would advance,
and declaring the administration plan impracticable, hardly looks
like assuming the initiative. It was not a difference as to details.
The very gist of the subject under discussion was a prompt advance
against the parts of our army before they could be united for any
purpose. The question would naturally arise, What might happen in
the places from which troops were drawn, if they were not used by
Johnston immediately? The latter had already said to Longstreet that
his requisitions on the commissaries and quartermaster's departments
for supplies and wagon-trains were so large as to make filling them
"a greater undertaking than anything yet accomplished by those
departments, and if they succeed, it will not be very soon."
[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. p. 618.] Yet these
were only part of the conditions which he considered essential to
any advance.
There seems to have been no rejoinder to Johnston's last telegram,
and the subject was dropped. Longstreet was persuaded by his
correspondence with Johnston that the combined movement could not be
made, and turned to the scheme (already mentioned), of mounting his
troops and making an expedition from southwestern Virginia into
Kentucky. This was decisively rejected by the Richmond government.
[Footnote: _Id._, p. 748.] Grant was now known to be in Virginia,
inspecting the commands there and preparing for an active campaign.
Concentration on both sides, and not further morselling of armies
was to be the wholesome order of the day, and Longstreet was soon
ordered to report to Lee. Between Bragg and Johnston correspondence
was limited to the current business of the army, and general plans
of campaign were not again mentioned. In April, Johnston became
uneasy at the silence which indicated that the President regarded it
unprofitable to discuss plans with him, and sent Colonel B. S. Ewell
of his staff to Richmond to make explanations in person. He was
politely received, and his visit no doubt tended to relax a little
the strain in the relations between Mr. Davis and Ewell's chief; but
it was too late to accomplish what had been hoped for in January.
[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. pp. 839, 842.]
Spring had come, and Sherman's concentration was in progress; indeed
it was almost completed. Ewell reported to Johnston again on the
29th of April. On the 1st of May Schofield was at the Hiwassee River
in touch with the left wing of Thomas's army, whilst McPherson was
closing in on the right.
The certainty that Grant was in Virginia had brought the Confederate
government to the conclusion that Lee must be reinforced by
Longstreet and by whatever troops Beauregard could spare. The
Atlantic coast States were thus to supply Lee with men and means.
About four thousand men were to be immediately added to Johnston's
army, mostly drawn from Mobile. Polk's infantry would be sent to him
also, if, as was nearly certain, Sherman's advance on Atlanta should
prove to be our great effort in the West. [Footnote: _Id._, p. 841.]
The doubt whether one of our columns might not move through Alabama
made it necessary to continue to the last moment ready for either
event. The Gulf States would then become the feeders of Johnston's
army in the campaign.
The very unsatisfactory relations between Mr. Davis and General
Johnston cannot be overlooked if we would judge intelligently the
events of the Atlanta campaign. It may be that the general was right
in thinking a winter advance impracticable, though Lee's concurrence
in the President's plan is no small argument in its favor. It is,
nevertheless, the indisputable province of a government to
determine, in view of the whole situation, political and military,
whether continued operations are necessary. The army is organized
for the sole purpose of reaching the ends at which its government
aims in the war. The expenditure of life and treasure should be
stopped and the government should sue for peace, unless its armies
can be relied upon to act in hearty subordination to its view of the
existing exigencies. The general should meet it with absolute
ingenuousness and the promptest and clearest decision. He should act
at once or ask to be relieved in time to let another carry out the
plan. Mr. Davis, like Mr. Lincoln on several occasions, had reason
to feel that a prolonged discussion had in fact thwarted him, and
that he had not the cordial service he might fairly expect.
One of the results of the financial embarrassments of the
Confederacy was the great and growing depreciation of its paper
currency. Its officers in the field found their pay a merely nominal
pittance, and those who had no independent fortune were reduced to
the greatest straits. Interesting evidence of this has been
preserved in petitions forwarded to the War Department in February,
asking that rations might be issued to them as to the private
soldiers. The scale of prices attached to their petition was that at
which the government sold the enumerated articles to its officers,
and was supposed to show the average cost and not a market price
fixed by the retail trade. They paid for bacon $2.20 per pound, for
beef 75 cents, for lard $2.20, for molasses $6 per gallon, for sugar
$1.50 per pound, for a coat $350, for a pair of boots $250, for a
pair of pantaloons $125, for a hat from $80 to $125, for a shirt
$50, for a pair of socks $10. [Footnote: Official Records, vol.
xxxii. pt. ii. p. 658.] Their statements were verified and approved
by their superiors, and General Johnston, in forwarding the
petitions, said that at existing prices the pay of company officers
was worth less than that of the private soldiers. [Footnote: _Id._,
p. 661.]