The turning point of the Civil War is a perennial matter of dispute
among historians. Some specify the Henry-Donelson-Shiloh operation of
early 1862 as the pivotal campaign; others insist that Antietam was the
key event; still others are equally sure that Gettysburg and Vicksburg
marked the watershed of military activities. Regardless of when the tide
turned, there can be little doubt that the Federal drive on Atlanta,
launched in May 1864, was the beginning of the end for the Southern
Confederacy. And Sherman’s combination assault-flanking operation of
June 27 at Kennesaw Mountain may very well be considered the decisive
maneuver in the thrust toward Atlanta. For when Joseph E. Johnston found
it necessary to pull his forces back across the Chattahoochee, the fate
of the city was sealed.
The Atlanta Campaign had an importance reaching beyond the immediate
military and political consequences. It was conducted in a manner that
helped establish a new mode of warfare. From beginning to end, it was a
railroad campaign, in that a major transportation center was the prize
for which the contestants vied, and both sides used rail lines to
marshal, shift, and sustain their forces. Yanks and Rebs made some use
of repeating rifles, and Confederate references to shooting down “moving
bushes” indicate resort to camouflage by Sherman’s soldiers. The Union
commander maintained a command post under “signal tree” at Kennesaw
Mountain and directed the movement of his forces through a net of
telegraph lines running out to subordinate headquarters. Men of both
armies who early in the war had looked askance at the employment of pick
and shovel, now, as a matter of course, promptly scooped out protective
ditches at each change of position.
The campaign was also tremendously important as a human endeavor, and
one of the most impressive features of Richard McMurry’s account is the
insight—much of it gleaned from unpublished letters and diaries—into the
motivations, experiences, and reactions of the participants. The
officers and men who endured the heat and the mud of what must have been
one of the wettest seasons in the history of Georgia and who lived in
the shadow of death day after day for 4 months of as arduous campaigning
as occurred during the whole conflict, stand out as flesh and blood
human beings. This time of severe testing led to the undoing of some of
the generals, including Joseph E. Johnston and John Bell Hood. Others,
notably William Tecumseh Sherman, capitalized on the opportunities
afforded by the campaign to prove their worth and carve for themselves
lasting niches in the military hall of fame. Still others had their
careers cut short by hostile bullets, among them Leonidas Polk, a leader
whose Civil War experience makes inescapable the conclusion that he
should never have swapped his clerical robes for a general’s stars. In
marked contrast stood James B. McPherson, great both as a man and a
combat commander, whose premature passing elicited moving statements of
grief from leaders on both sides.
Human aspects of the campaign found most vivid and revealing expression
in the letters of the lesser officers and the men whom they led. Robert
M. Gill, a Mississippi lieutenant promoted from the ranks, poured out in
full and frequent letters to his wife his homesickness, his hopes, his
fears, and his spiritual concern; in so doing, he revealed his virtues
and his frailties and his ups and downs of morale until a Yankee
fusillade snuffed out his life at Jonesborough. On June 22, 1864, he
wrote from near Marietta: “I saw a canteen on which a heavy run was made
during and after the charge. I still like whiskey but do not want any
when going into a charge for I am or at least was drunk enough yesterday
without drinking a drop.” Lieutenant Gill tried very hard to live up to
his wife’s admonitions against “the sins of the camp,” but he had great
difficulty with profanity, especially in the excitement of battle. After
the action at Resaca, he wrote apologetically: “The men did not move out
to suit me, and I forgot everything and began to curse a cowardly scamp
who got behind.” Six weeks later he reported another lapse, and
following the Battle of Atlanta he wrote: “I done some heavy swearing, I
am told.... I try to do right but it seems impossible for me to keep
from cursing when I get under fire. I hope I will do better hereafter. I
do not wish to die with an oath on my lips.” Gill’s morale remained
relatively good until after the fall of Atlanta. Shortly after that
event, he wrote: “I think this cause a desperate one ... there is no
hope of defeating Lincoln.... I wish I could be sanguine of success.”
John W. Hagan, a stalwart sergeant of Johnston’s army, in poorly spelled
words and awkwardly constructed paragraphs addressed to his wife,
demonstrated the character and strength of the lowly men who were the
backbone of both armies. From near Marietta on June 17, 1864, Hagan
wrote: “the yankees charged us ... & we finelly drove them back we all
had as much to do as we could do. James & Ezekiel acted very brave the
boys Say Ezekiel went to shooting like he was spliting rails; in fact
all the Regt acted there parts.” The combat performance of Hagan and his
men contrasted markedly with that of one of the officers who was the
acting company commander, a Lieutenant Tomlinson. On June 21, Hagan
wrote his wife: “I have been in command of our company 3 days. Lieut.
Tomlinson stays along but pretends to be so sick he can not go in a
fight but so long as I Keepe the right side up Co. ‘K’ will be all
right.” Hagan’s morale remained high, despite the fact that he had not
received any pay for more than a year. On July 4, he wrote that “some of
our troops grow despondent but it is only thoes who are all ways
despondent,” and added: “all good soldiers will fight harder the harder
he is prest but a coward is allways ready to want an excuse to run or
say they or we are whiped. I never Knew there was so many cowards untill
Since we left Dalton. I do not Speak of our Regt but some troops have
behaved very badly.”
Sergeant Hagan and other Rebs who fought in the Atlanta Campaign had a
wholesome respect for the men in blue who opposed them; and rightfully
so, for the Union rank and file, mostly lads and young adults from the
farms of the Midwest, were admirable folk, deeply devoted to the cause
of Union. One of them, Pvt. John F. Brobst of the 25th Wisconsin
Regiment, wrote his sweetheart before the campaign was launched: “Home
is sweet and friends are dear, but what would they all be to let the
country go to ruin and be a slave. I am contented with my lot ... for I
know that I am doing my duty, and I know that it is my duty to do as I
am now a-doing. If I live to get back, I shall be proud of the freedom I
shall have, and know that I helped to gain that freedom. If I should not
get back, it will do them good who do get back.”
Despite the publication during the past century of many studies on the
subject, the Atlanta Campaign—overshadowed both during the war and later
by the engagements in Virginia—has not received anything like its due
share of attention. Now for the first time, thanks to Richard McMurry’s
thoroughness as a researcher and skill as a narrator, students of the
Civil War have a clear, succinct, balanced, authoritative, and
interesting account of the tremendously important Georgia operations of
May to September 1864. This excellent work should be as comprehensible
and appealing to those who read history and tour battle areas for fun as
it is to those who have achieved expertness in Civil War history.