CHAPTER XXXIII
WINTER QUARTERS IN EAST TENNESSEE--PREPARATIONS FOR A NEW CAMPAIGN
Sending our animals to Kentucky--Consultations--Affair with enemy's cavalry--Roughing it--Distribution of troops--Cavalry engagement at Sevierville--Quarters in Knoxville--Leading Loyalists--Social and domestic conditions--Discussion of the spring campaign--Of Foster's successor--Organization of Grant's armies--Embarrassments in assignment of officers to duty--Discussion of the system--Cipher telegraphing--Control of the key--Grant's collision with Stanton--Absurdity of the War Department's method--General Stoneman assigned to Twenty-third Corps--His career and character--General Schofield succeeds to the command of the Department of the Ohio.
In connection with the movements of concentration about Knoxville, General Foster carried out his scheme of sending back to pasture in Kentucky and Tennessee all the horses and mules, except a very few teams needed to distribute supplies and two or three horses at each division headquarters for the commanding officer and an aide or two.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. pp. 203-204.]The animals were herded and driven together, an escort of cavalry accompanying them, and the whole put in charge of Captain Day of my staff, as quartermaster, the same whose energy in our journey over the mountains I have already noted. This measure definitely committed us, of course, to a quiet and defensive line of conduct for the next three months. On the 21st of January we were deliberately closing in around Knoxville, where the Fourth Corps was already concentrated, and General Foster had called upon the three corps commanders to meet him at his headquarters in the city for the purpose of putting in official form our opinion upon the necessity of suspending active operations in view of the condition of the troops and animals. We met there on the next day, and submitted our reports in response to interrogatories on several points. My own statement summarized the facts in regard to the supplies of food, forage, clothing, and the impossibility of drawing anything more from the country except some very limited quantities of bread-stuffs. My conclusion was that economy of life, animals, property, and (taking the next six months together) of time also, required that the troops should go into permanent quarters for a short period to be devoted to recuperation, drill, and instruction, organization of means of supply, and general preparation for an active campaign in the spring.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. p. 176.]I, however, added that this was on the hypothesis that no imperative military reasons existed for continued active campaigning; for in presence of such a necessity every officer and man of the corps would most cheerfully continue to undergo every hardship and endure every privation. There was complete unanimity among us in regard to the subject, and General Foster's orders were issued accordingly.
Whilst we were in conference, reports came in from General Willcox, who had been left in command of the Ninth Corps at Strawberry Plains, that the enemy were pressing him rather vigorously. Word came also from General Spears that hostile infantry and cavalry had appeared in large force at Blain's Cross-roads. Sturgis also reported from the direction of Sevierville that the whole rebel army had gone to Strawberry Plains.[Footnote:Id., pp. 163, 174.]Toward evening of the 22d our troops had come within some five or six miles of Knoxville, but the enemy showed so strong a disposition to attack that Foster ordered me to return to the front, take command of both corps (Ninth and Twenty-third) and of the cavalry with them, and check the Confederates, as there was some danger that our troops would change the concerted movement into a precipitate retreat. General Parke was suffering in health from recent exposure and remained in Knoxville. Galloping out from the town, I reached the troops a little before dark, halted them, and by a personal reconnoissance satisfied myself that only cavalry were before us. Our men had passed some wooded hills which were important to cover our position and give a starting-point for an aggressive movement on our part. Reversing their movement, I reoccupied these hills, brusquely driving back the enemy's advance-guard and checking their main body. It was now dark, and putting our forces in line of battle ready for an advance at daybreak, they were allowed to bivouac for the night, whilst I rode rapidly back to Knoxville, in accordance with my arrangement with General Foster to report to him in person the particulars of the situation. He approved my suggestion that I should advance the whole line in the morning and settle the question what force was before us. The wagons had come into the town, and my headquarters with them; so taking each of us a blanket, myself and the two staff officers who had accompanied me (Colonel Sterling and my brother) rode back again at midnight to the front, and rested till daybreak on the rough floor of a log cabin. The line then was advanced, but the enemy had taken the hint from the preparations of the evening and had decamped.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. p. 184.]Detachments went in pursuit some eight miles, but the Confederates had definitely withdrawn, and we obtained conclusive proof that only their cavalry had followed us across the Holston River.
The interrupted movement toward Knoxville was resumed, but it required me to remain another night in roughest bivouac, and another day without food, except as a mouthful could be found at hazard. I had begun the Dandridge movement with a cold which threatened pneumonia, but had grown steadily better through all the exposure, finding, as often happened to me in the course of the war, that the physical and mental stimulus of active campaigning even in the worst of weather was tonic and health-giving.
As soon as the situation was cleared up by trustworthy information of Longstreet's movements, General Foster resumed his plans for winter quarters. His first intention of sending the Fourth Corps toward Sevierville was modified by Grant's directions to put that corps where it could most readily rejoin the Army of the Cumberland. He therefore ordered me to move the Twenty-third Corps in that direction, and formally united to the corps the brigade of East Tennessee troops under Brigadier-General James G. Spears, which had theretofore been an independent organization.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. p. 162.]Sturgis, who had marched with most of the cavalry on the route thus assigned to me, reported that the road was the worst he ever saw, and, with all the experience of bad roads we had had, this meant that it was impracticable for our few and weak teams.[Footnote:Ibid.]This put an end to all hope of living on the country, and Foster accepted the necessity of distributing his troops about Knoxville and along the lines leading to Chattanooga.
On the 22d of January orders were issued assigning the Fourth Corps to quarters extending from Kingston to Loudon along the river and railroad. The Ninth Corps took post between Campbell's Station and Knoxville. The Twenty-third Corps encamped at Knoxville and in the immediate vicinity.[Footnote:Id., p. 183.]The cavalry occupied the country southeast of the Holston holding a front on the French Broad River. A few small outposts further up the valley were maintained for observation.
A brilliant cavalry combat near Sevierville on the 27th ended the active work under General Foster's command. Longstreet, hearing of the presence of our cavalry south of the French Broad, directed General Martin, commanding his cavalry corps, to get his forces across the river and meet Sturgis at once.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. p. 611.]The latter had McCook's division in advance, supported by Garrard's near Pigeon River. Martin advanced upon McCook, but was surprised to find his adversary seize the initiative. Learning of the Confederate advance, McCook marched to meet them on the road leading to Fair Garden. Martin was driven back, his right (Morgan's division) being routed by a gallant charge led by Colonel La Grange, First Wisconsin Cavalry, who commanded a brigade.[Footnote: Id. pt. i. pp. 139, 141.]Two regimental commanders, seven other commissioned officers, over a hundred privates, and two pieces of artillery were captured by the charge. General Morgan's battle-flag was also among the trophies. Our own casualties amounted to only thirty-one. Martin beat a hasty retreat across the French Broad to Dandridge, and Longstreet frankly admitted Martin's defeat with a loss of 200 men and the two guns.[Footnote:Id. pp. 149-150.]He attributed it to the inefficiency of his cavalry commander, and urged that one more competent be sent him.[Footnote:Idpt. ii. p. 632.]Sturgis followed on the 28th to Fair's Island Ford near Dandridge, where he was met by Armstrong's division of the Confederates. Longstreet now passed over an infantry force in rear of our cavalry, and they fell back to Maryville.[Footnote:Id., p. 653.]Both parties found the winter work too costly, and were now glad to take a few weeks for rest and recuperation.
As my headquarters were assigned to Knoxville, I had the opportunity of increasing my knowledge of the people and of the social complications which grew out of the war. I found quarters for myself and Lieutenant Theodore Cox, my aide, at the house of Mr. Cowen, a young merchant of the city, whose father was one of the prominent business men. The house was on the north side of a suburban street running parallel to the river, and not far from the buildings of the East Tennessee University, which were partially fortified and connected with Fort Sanders by a line of infantry trench. The fields on the opposite side of the road were open, and sloped down to the river bank, and in these my headquarters guard pitched their tents and the general quarters of the staff were also placed. A near neighbor, in the direction of the college, was the Rev. Dr. Humes, rector of the Episcopal parish, and after the war President of the University. General Burnside had spoken of him as a noble man, of devoted loyalty as well as earnest piety, and I was glad to know him as one who by his high intelligence and character was an authority on all that related to Holston valley.[Footnote: Thomas W. Humes, S.T.D. He has, since the war (1888), published a volume devoted to the East Tennessee loyalists, entitled "The Loyal Mountaineers of Tennessee."]John Williams, John M. Fleming, and O. P. Temple were among those who represented the Union sentiment of Knoxville, as did Perez Dickinson among the merchants.[Footnote: Since this chapter was written, Chancellor Temple has contributed a valuable work to the history of the Rebellion, in his "East Tennessee and the Civil War," Cincinnati. 1899.]John Baxter, afterward Judge of the United States Circuit Court, was a strong and wise friend of the government. Horace Maynard represented the district in Congress both before and after the war, and was regarded at Washington as its official representative even in the period when the Confederate occupation made him an exile from his home. William G. Brownlow was in Knoxville also, having returned as soon as our army had opened the way. His son, "Colonel Jim," was doing gallant service at the head of the First East Tennessee Cavalry. Around this group of leading men were arrayed the great majority of the people, devoted in their attachment to the Union. The men of property among them had sometimes been forced to dissimulate in order to protect their persons and their possessions; but now that the National army was in the valley, there was no mistaking the earnest satisfaction and the hearty sympathy of these people. There was a minority who had been open Secessionists, and these had been influential beyond their numbers, by reason of their wealth and social standing; for here, as well as everywhere else in the South, owners of slaves easily became champions of the extreme doctrines of what they called the constitutional guaranty of their property. They claimed to include most of the "upper class" in their numbers, though this was by no means true in this region.
The feelings of both Union men and Secessionists were very bitter, and social life was as strongly marked by these divisions as the hostile camps. The number of slaves was comparatively small, but they were the house servants in the towns, and their disposition to assert their liberty added to the social turmoil. The mistress of the house where I lodged hired her cook from a neighbor who claimed the woman as a slave; but the employer found herself obliged to make another bargain with the cook, and to pay her a second wage in order to keep her at work at all. The Unionists of East Tennessee were not yet fully advanced to the emancipation of the slaves as a result of the war. Parson Brownlow had fiercely denounced the Secessionists for arguing that secession was necessary to preserve property in slaves. Our army commanders thought it prudent not to agitate this question, and contented themselves with keeping within the limits of the statutes and the general orders of the War Department, which forbade military interference to return fugitives to the masters or to compel their obedience. The matter was left to work itself out, as it rapidly did.
After the first of February the weather became settled and gave us a more favorable opinion of the East Tennessee climate. We had sharp frosts at night with occasional light flurries of snow, but the days were usually bright, it thawed about midday, and the average temperature was such as to make active exercise delightful. The summits of the Great Smoky Mountains were covered with snow, and made a picturesque framing for the natural loveliness of the valleys. The roads were nowhere metalled, and the alternate freezing and thawing made them nearly impassable; but if we had been able to bring forward proper forage and supplies, we should have overcome the other obstacles to active campaigning. As it was, we could only await the approach of spring, when the settling of the roads and the opening of railroad communication with Chattanooga and Nashville would make it possible to bring back from Kentucky and feed our horses which had been sent to the rear.
There was, beside, the question of the change necessary in the command of the department, since there was no probability that General Foster's health would permit him to retain it and he had urgently requested that his successor should be assigned to duty. Indeed, the question of organization reached down to the regiments and brigades, and was a burning one in all the armies of Grant's Military Division. Besides this, the revival of the grade of Lieutenant-General was already mooted in Congress, and it was nearly a foregone conclusion that Grant would have the command of all the armies and the task of co-ordinating their movements. Our little army in East Tennessee was agitated not only with the speculations as to our new commander, but with debates as to our probable part in the next campaign, and the forces which would be given to us with which to do our work. Would the Ninth Corps remain in the department, or would it be ordered to the East for duty under Burnside, as was already rumored? Would our task be simply to garrison East Tennessee; should we make Longstreet's army our objective and follow him into Virginia; or should we be united to Sherman's and Thomas's armies for a campaign in Georgia? We eagerly listened for every hint which might be dropped at headquarters, but Grant's proverbial reticence left us to our conjectures, and each question was answered only when official orders were finally published. Much that was very blind to us is now easily traced in the Official Records.
When General Foster informed the War Department that the opening of his old wound made it necessary to relieve him of command in East Tennessee, the President was in some perplexity in regard to several prominent officers. He was disposed to find some adequate employment for Rosecrans, who was still backed by a very strong political coterie in Washington. He was convinced that injustice had been done Burnside, and was thinking of sending him with the Ninth Corps, largely increased in numbers, to his old field of successful work on the Carolina coast. The opposition of influential politicians of Kansas and Missouri to Schofield, whose confirmation as major-general was still obstructed in the Senate, he felt as a personal hostility to himself. Grant was also desirous of suitable assignments to command for McPherson, W. F. Smith, and Sheridan. The almost certain passage of the bill to give a higher grade in the army, and the assumption that Grant would be promoted to it, gave the opportunity to make a satisfactory arrangement of all these cases. Burnside's return to active work and the removal to the East of the Ninth Corps were determined on, with General Parke's return, at his own desire, to the position of Burnside's chief of staff. McPherson was to take the Army of the Tennessee when Sherman should be promoted to the command of the Military Division of the Mississippi. Smith and Sheridan were to have high assignments in the Eastern army. Rosecrans was sent to Missouri, and Schofield, to his great content, was appointed to command the Army of the Ohio. These changes were gradually shaped in the correspondence of Grant with army headquarters during the fall and winter.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxi. pt. iii. pp. 122, 277, 458, 529, 571; vol. xxxii. pt. ii. pp. 79, 80, 182, 202, 209, 229, 230, 251, 336; also a curious letter of Hooker to Stranton,id., pp. 467-469. See also Schofield's "Forty-six Years in the Army," pp. 108-110. I have treated these changes more in detail in chapter vii. of Force's "General Sherman" (Great Commanders' series). See preface of the work last named.]They were followed by others in the corps divisions and brigades, so that the organization of all the Western armies took permanent form before Grant was called to Washington to assume his new rank at the beginning of March.
In regard to general officers the question of assignments and promotions was always an embarrassing one for commanders of armies in the field. As the law prescribed the maximum number of major-generals and of brigadiers, political and military pressure combined to keep the list always full.[Footnote: In reply to Grant's request for the promotion of General W.F. Smith, Halleck Informed him, on Jan. 13, 1864, that there was not only no vacancy, but that by some error more had again been appointed that the law authorized, and some already in service would have to be dropped. Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. p. 80. As to brigaders, see Halleck to Grant,Id., p. 481.]Closest watch was kept by politicians and others at Washington, and if a vacancy occurred, the pressure to fill it was exactly such as would be made for a civil office in the gift of the government. Officers of the regular army found in General Halleck a powerful support, and it was assumed that those appointed from civil life would be looked after by their political friends. The effort which was made by the War Department in the winter to force into active service or into retirement all officers who for any cause had been "shelved" was well intended, but in practice it accentuated the feeling of experienced commanders that a radical reform was essential. An intelligent system was demanded, reaching from top to bottom of the army, separating its discipline, its assignments to duty, its promotions and its removals from political influences, and making merit alone the basis of advancement. In the condition of public affairs no such thorough work was possible. The embarrassments of army commanders had been very bluntly explained to the War Department in the confidential dispatches of Mr. Dana from Chattanooga. His judgments may sometimes have been hasty, but he gives a very vivid picture of the mischiefs which follow from having incompetent, intemperate, or inefficient men saddled upon an army. The same dispatches, however, showed also how unwillingly the commanders resorted to extreme severity with men toward whom they had feelings of personal kindness. In strong hands like Grant's or Sherman's the power to get promptly rid of such incumbrances (which Dana recommended) would be ably used and work well. As to political considerations, the President on more than one occasion admitted that he felt obliged, at times, to let these control his action, instead of reasons based on the efficiency of the army.[Footnote: For Dana's dispatches on this subject, see Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. i. p. 220; vol. xxxi. pt. i. pp. 69, 73, 265; pt. ii. pp. 54, 63. In his published "Recollections of the Civil War" (1898), Mr. Dana has omitted some of his most trenchant personal criticisms.]
Along with the graver embarrassments which General Grant found in organizing his armies for a new campaign were smaller ones, which though sometimes concerned with trivial matters were not on that account likely to be less annoying. When the general visited us at Knoxville and Strawberry Plains in the severe weather of early January, he came practically unattended. He had with him Lieutenant-Colonel C. B. Comstock of the engineers, who continued in confidential staff relations to him to the end of the war, well known then and ever since as an officer of rare ability and discretion. At Knoxville Grant received a dispatch in cipher which he could not read because the telegraph operator at his headquarters at Nashville alone had the key. This gave him great annoyance and might have had very serious consequences. When therefore he reached Nashville on his return ride over the mountains, he directed the operator to reveal the key to Colonel Comstock, who was always with him. The operator of course reported the fact to the superintendent of military telegraphs at Washington (Colonel Anson Stager), and on the report of the latter to the Secretary of War, Mr. Stanton ordered the operator summarily dismissed from his employment, and formally reprimanded Colonel Comstock as if the revelation had been merely on his personal order. Of course Grant, who had never dreamed that he was treading upon anybody's toes, immediately assumed the full responsibility. He showed the folly of making details of method override the public necessity to which they were subservient, and asked that the operator should be restored to his employment and not made to suffer for obeying his personal order. He said: "I could see no reason why I was not as capable of selecting a proper person to intrust with this secret as Colonel Stager." One would think this ought to have ended the matter, but it did not, though the operator was restored to duty. Mr. Stanton had the old cipher thrown away, issued a new one, and stuck to the plan of trusting it to an ordinary civilian operator, whilst it was not allowed to be known to the commanding general or the most responsible staff officer. Grant made the sensible suggestion that the key be given to military officers only, and be kept from the civilian operators; but Mr. Stanton adhered to the farcical notion of carrying on a cipher correspondence which should be open to the irresponsible transmitter, but secret as to the responsible commanding general to whom it was addressed. If it were meant for a system of espionage upon the general by thus inseparably tying to him a civilian over whom he had no control, like an agent of a secret police reporting to a Fouche or a Savary, it would be an intelligible though bungling contrivance; but as a means of secret communication with a general it was ridiculous in the extreme.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. pp. 150, 159, 161, 172, 323, 324, 361.]
The telegraph operators were young men who had learned the art usually in the northern telegraph offices and were hired for military service like other civilian employees. The operator at Grant's headquarters at Nashville had a busy place, and could not be spared to accompany the general whenever he visited a distant post, even if such inseparable attendance had been agreeable to the commander. Many of the operators were faithful and intelligent men, but there were some who were not; and an incident occurred in the Nashville campaign in the next year which showed what mischiefs were likely to happen when a telegraph operator was cowardly or untrustworthy.[Footnote: See "The Battle of Franklin," by the present writer, pp. 29, 30.]
Returning to the affairs of the Army of the Ohio, at the same time that General Schofield was ordered to report to Grant for duty, Major-General George Stoneman was sent from the East with a similar order.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. pp. 166, 182.]It had not then been announced that the Ninth Corps would return to the East, and apparently assuming that the Army of the Ohio would include more than one corps of infantry, General Grant suggested the assignment of Schofield to the department and Stoneman to the Twenty-third Corps. This was ordered accordingly on the 28th of January.[Footnote:Id., pp. 229, 251.]Stoneman's last service had been as Hooker's chief of cavalry in the Chancellorsville campaign, and under Hooker's orders he had been upon a separate expedition of cavalry during that unfortunate battle. In the general miscarriage of the campaign, he was, with questionable justice, held responsible in part for the failure and was displaced. In the general plan of setting everybody to work again, he was sent to Grant, though, as time had brought about a more favorable judgment regarding him, it would have been fair to assign him to duty again with the Army of the Potomac. I think he expected the command of the cavalry of the western army, but Grant had selected Brigadier-General William Sooy Smith for that position, and looking about for suitable duty for Stoneman, the Twenty-third Corps was seen to have no permanent commander assigned by the President, and Stoneman was nominated for it. As events turned out, the appointment was for a very short period.
My command of the corps with the rank of brigadier was of course anomalous, and would necessarily be temporary unless the appropriate rank were restored to me. Had Burnside remained in East Tennessee, it is probable that his wish would have prevailed; but he was absent, and I was a comparative stranger, forming new relations to Grant and his principal subordinates. Foster had also assured me that he would wish no change in the corps command if he stayed at the head of the Department, but as his health caused his withdrawal, the new arrangements were made without consulting him. Under these circumstances there was nothing for me to do but to accept the inevitable and take such active work as my seniority in my present rank would give.
When General Foster learned that he would soon be relieved, he very cordially offered to do anything in his power to further my wishes in regard to any choice of duty when I should be superseded in the corps. I replied that my strong desire was to get the most active field service, and as it was doubtful whether the corps would not be kept to garrison East Tennessee, I would like to be transferred to the Army of the Cumberland, which was certain to make the next campaign in Georgia. On his suggestion I wrote a letter to General Grant asking the transfer on the grounds stated. This application General Foster forwarded with a letter of his own supporting it in very friendly manner. Nothing came of this, but it was the reason for the delay which occurred in my assignment to permanent work in the Army of the Ohio. Some of my friends in the Fourth Corps, knowing that Sheridan was to leave his division, had suggested my appointment there, but the surplus of general officers prevented. Major-General Newton, one of those who came west from the Potomac army, was assigned to that division.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. i. p.18.]
Generals Schofield and Stoneman reached Knoxville on the 9th of February, and the changes in command were promptly made.[Footnote:Id., pt. ii. pp. 356, 358, 359, 364, 365.]For a fortnight I was off duty, awaiting orders. General Foster took his leave of us, thoroughly respected by all, though his crippled physical condition had interfered with his personal activity.
My separation from the corps command only affected myself and my two personal aides-de-camp. I had recommended Major Bascom, my adjutant-general, and Major Treat, my commissary, for permanent positions on the corps staff, and these recommendations were kindly adopted by General Stoneman, so that they ceased to belong to my military family, though both offered to follow my fortunes. The other staff appointments were in the nature of details, most of which were temporarily continued. Pending General Grant's action on my application, I remained at Knoxville, looking on and making the acquaintance of the officers newly arrived.
General Stoneman was a tall, thin man, full bearded, with large eyes. He had an air of habitual sadness, or gravity approaching it, and was commonly reputed to have an irritable temper, but I saw nothing of it. I think he would have made an acceptable commander of the corps if fortune had left him in that position. His place in the regular army (Major of the Fourth United States Cavalry[Footnote: He and General Sturgis were the two majors of the same regiment.]) had led to his assignment to a cavalry command at the East, and he returned to that arm of the service a little later. Grant took a dislike to Stoneman, partly on account of the manner in which he had been sent to him from the East. When the suggestion was made that, if the opposition in the Senate to Schofield's confirmation should defeat his promotion, Stoneman should succeed to his command, Grant dryly replied that he did not know General Stoneman's merits.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. p. 394]Even a year later he showed the same distrust by speaking of him as an officer who had failed. This was by no means just, but showed the persistence of Grant's impressions.[Footnote: General Stoneman retired from the army at the close of the war and made his home in California, of which State he became governor.]
With General Schofield's arrival began my close association with him which was to last until the end of the war. In person he was a solid, rather stout man, of medium height, with a round bald head and long black beard coming down on his breast. He had a reputation for scientific tastes, and had, after his graduation at West Point, been instructor in astronomy there. He was two or three years my junior in age, and was among the younger general officers. The obstruction, thus far, to his confirmation in his higher grade so far resembled my own experience as to be a ground of sympathy between us. As I was glad of his better luck in his prompt reappointment, I may also say that his hearty recognition of my own service and experience inspired me with sincere friendship. I look back to my service as his subordinate with unmixed satisfaction.
CHAPTER XXXIV
SCHOFIELD IN EAST TENNESSEE--DUTIES AS CHIEF OF STAFF--FINAL OPERATIONS IN THE VALLEY
Fresh reports of Longstreet's advance--They are unfounded--Grant's wish to rid the valley of the enemy--Conference with Foster--Necessity for further recuperation of the army--Continuance of the quiet policy--Longstreet's view of the situation--His suggestions to his government--He makes an advance again--Various demonstrations--Schofield moves against Longstreet--My appointment as chief of staff in the field--Organization of the active column--Schofield's purposes--March to Morristown--Going the Grand Rounds--Cavalry outpost--A sleepy sentinel--Return to New Market--Once more at Morristown--Ninth Corps sent East--Grant Lieutenant-General--Sherman commands in the West--Study of plans of campaign--My assignment to Third Division, Twenty-third Corps--Importance of staff duties--Colonel Wherry and Major Campbell--General Wood--Schofield and the politicians--Post at Bull's Gap--Grapevine telegraph--Families going through the lines--Local vendetta--The Sanitary Commission--Rendezvous assigned by Sherman--Preliminary movements--Marching to Georgia--A spring camp on the Hiwassee--The Atlanta campaign begun.
On assuming command in East Tennessee, Schofield was met by directions from General Grant, full of fresh urgency that Longstreet should be driven beyond the Virginia line. The occasion for this was the receipt of new intelligence that Longstreet was reinforced from the East, and would make another effort at an aggressive campaign.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. p. 337.]The recurrence of this stereotyped form of alarm looked very much like information sent from the Confederates themselves for the purpose of keeping us on the defensive; but perhaps it is only of a piece with other evidence which shows the slight value of all information which is not got by contact with the enemy. The truth was that none of the reports that Ewell and others had been sent to Longstreet had any foundation. He was left to his own resources, with only the authority to call his next neighbor in southwestern Virginia to his assistance if he were in danger of being overwhelmed. But Grant was annoyed by these recurrent alarms, and his aggressive nature chafed at it. "I intend to drive him out or get whipped this month," he said to Thomas before Schofield's arrival; and on the 11th of February he wrote to the latter: "I deem it of the utmost importance to drive Longstreet out immediately, so as to furlough the balance of our veterans and to prepare for a spring campaign of our own choosing, instead of permitting the enemy to dictate it for us."[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. p. 367.]
Nothing would have pleased Schofield better than to have had Longstreet come down to Knoxville and fight there, but the cogent reasons which had made Foster suspend active operations and devote every energy to getting his men and animals in condition for a vigorous spring campaign, had lost none of their force. Our animals had already been sent away to save their lives, and by the help of the little steamboats built at Kingston and for which General Meigs had sent engines from the North, we were beginning to receive at Knoxville some of the clothing for which our men were suffering.
Grant had already ordered Thomas to be prepared to march at once to reinforce Schofield,[Footnote:Id., p. 359.]when he had a personal interview at Nashville with General Foster, who was on his way home. Foster so fully explained the impossibility of supplying troops much further up the valley than Knoxville, and the absolute need of building up the physical strength of man and beast after the half starvation since winter set in, that Grant yielded to the inevitable and directed Schofield to remain on the defensive till the approach of spring should give a prospect of activity which should not be destructive to the little army.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. pp. 373-375.]He ordered that the re-enlisting veterans should have their furloughs as soon as possible, and that men and animals should have all the rest they could get, preparatory for early operations in the spring.
After his retreat from Knoxville, Longstreet had kept up an active correspondence with Mr. Davis, and with Lee, Johnston, and Beauregard, in reference to further plans of campaign. The ease with which Thomas could reinforce Schofield was so plain to him that he saw nothing attractive in another advance on Knoxville. The plan which seemed to attract him most was to mount his infantry on mules and make a dash through the mountains into Kentucky by way of Pound Gap.[Footnote:Id., pp. 652-789, 790-792.]To collect ten thousand mules and send them to him, to make a depot for rations and forage at Abingdon sufficient to support the column on its journey through the mountains, to furnish a train to carry it,--all this seemed evidently chimerical to those to whom he proposed it.[Footnote:Id., p. 760.]The Confederacy had all it could do to feed its existing armies where they were, and was living from hand to mouth.
The thing which the Confederate government seemed most to desire was that Longstreet should effect a junction with Johnston and the two open an offensive campaign against Thomas.[Footnote:Id.,pp. 806, 808, 810.]The evil consequences of Bragg's blunder in detaching Longstreet before the battle of Missionary Ridge became more evident every day; but how were the commands to be reunited? A long and perilous flank march must be made by both armies, with an almost certainty that Grant would concentrate first and fall upon them in succession.
Longstreet was restless and anxious to do something pending this discussion,[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. p. 699.]and resolved to try an advance from Morristown upon Knoxville. He began his movement just as Grant had concluded to allow Schofield's army to remain quiet till spring. On the 19th of February he reached New Market, seven or eight miles above Strawberry Plains and twenty-five from Knoxville. The information he got gave him the idea that our troops were "demoralized," and that it was a favorable opportunity for an effort to capture Schofield's army.[Footnote:Id.,p. 735.]He was quite wrong as to themoraleof our troops, though we were depleted by furloughs and were nearly immovable for lack of train animals. He urged Johnston to move toward Knoxville to co-operate with him,[Footnote:Id.,p. 744.]but Polk was now in trouble by reason of Sherman's march from Vicksburg upon Meridian and Johnston was ordered to assist Polk.[Footnote:Id.,p. 763.]Then Grant, to balk both efforts, ordered Thomas to make a demonstration against Johnston, which was effective in preventing co-operation in either direction.[Footnote:Id.,p. 480.]
Schofield was at first disposed to regard the enemy's advance as an effort to find forage and to strip the country more bare than it already was, if that were possible. On the 18th, however, Longstreet advanced again, and threatened to cross the Holston at Strawberry Plains, scouring the country in the angle between that river and the French Broad. The rumors which reached Schofield were[Footnote:Id.,p. 415.]that his real purpose was to cross the French Broad, move along the foot of Chilhowee Mountains and make his way to Johnston. It is very probable that this was his real purpose. On the 19th he was ordered to send at any rate Martin's cavalry to rejoin Johnston,[Footnote:Id.,p. 772.]and to make the junction complete would so evidently please the Confederate government that it may be assumed Longstreet would do it if he saw the way open. Schofield therefore prepared to concentrate and move in either direction, but took no active step for a few days. On the 23d the information was sufficient to make it clear that Longstreet was not moving in force toward Georgia, but was retiring toward Morristown,[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. pp. 449, 455.]and Schofield immediately issued orders of march to his troops to follow. The fact was that Longstreet was so much disturbed by the withdrawal of Martin's cavalry[Footnote: Martin's cavalry at this time was what remained of Wheeler's corps which had accompanied Longstreet from Bragg's army the previous autumn.]that he declared this forced him to leave East Tennessee and place his forces at Bristol on the Virginia border. On getting a second dispatch from Mr. Davis, he modified his reasons, saying that Schofield had been reinforced from Chattanooga.[Footnote:Id., pp. 788-790.]This was incorrect, for the Fourth Corps was the only part of the Army of the Cumberland which joined the Army of the Ohio at any time during the winter, and only Wood's division of it participated in Schofield's present movement. He also wrote as if he had been near enough to Knoxville to discover for himself that the fortifications were greatly strengthened;[Footnote:Id., p. 810.]but as he had not approached nearer than seventeen miles, he could hardly have gained much information on this subject. No doubt rumors of work on the defences of the city had spread through the country during the winter, but there could hardly have been any discovery at this time. The use of it to smooth the appearance of an abortive effort was only a passage in military apologetics.
I had been awaiting orders in Knoxville a fortnight when the advance against Longstreet began, and as no definite answer had come to my application for transfer, General Schofield invited me to act as his chief of staff in the field during active operations or until my assignment to permanent duty should be settled. I gladly accepted the general's proposal and joined headquarters at once.[Footnote: See Official Records vol. xxxii. pt. ii. p. 495.]Our little army consisted nominally of parts of three corps, but the column in the field consisted of one division of the Twenty-third Corps, under the immediate command of General Stoneman, one of the Fourth Corps under Brigadier-General Thomas J. Wood, and the skeleton of the Ninth Corps under General Parke.[Footnote:Id. p. 455.]We had also Colonel Garrard's division of cavalry. Another division of the Twenty-third Corps under Brigadier-General Milo S. Hascall was left as the garrison of Knoxville, with the heavy artillery organization under Brigadier-General Davis Tillson and a small detachment of cavalry. Hascall was particularly directed to scout far out to the eastward, watching for any attempt of the enemy to pass along the mountain base, as well as against any effort to capture the city by acoup de main.
Our marching column numbered 13,873 officers and men, distributed thus: Wood's division, 5477; Parke's detachments of two divisions of the Ninth Corps, 3031; Stoneman with the second division of the Twenty-third Corps, 3363; Garrard's cavalry, 2002.[Footnote:Id. pp. 502, 504.]Longstreet's forces were 20,787, of which 5034 were cavalry. Schofield's purpose was essentially that of a reconnoissance in force to learn definitely the composition and apparent plans of the enemy, though willing to accept a defensive battle if a favorable opportunity should occur. If Longstreet were finally leaving East Tennessee, Grant's intention was to send all troops of the Fourth Corps back to Thomas, so as to concentrate the Army of the Cumberland in preparation for the spring campaign in Georgia.[Footnote:Id., pp. 456, 490.]
On the 24th of February we were at Strawberry Plains. The long trestle bridge of the railway had been destroyed when our forces had concentrated at Knoxville a month before, and our first task was to complete a wagon bridge across the Holston so that we could move onward toward New Market and Morristown with a possibility of keeping up a supply of food. We did not wait for the bridge to be completed, however, and orders were issued on the 26th to begin crossing,[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. ii. p. 474.]using flatboats for the men, whilst the artillery and wagons used a ford that was then passable. Grant did not expect Schofield to march his infantry farther than Strawberry Plains, but to push the reconnoissance beyond that point with cavalry.[Footnote: Id., p. 495.]Schofield, however, felt that to do his work thoroughly, his horsemen should be strongly and closely supported. On the 29th our headquarters were at New Market and the column on its way to Morristown. We overtook it in the afternoon and occupied the town that evening. As so often happens in war, our movement had hardly begun when the fine weather ended, and we marched from Strawberry Plains in pouring rain, over wretched roads which rapidly became worse. This delayed the troops and only part were at Morristown when darkness fell. These were disposed so as to cover the town in front with pickets well out, and a detachment of cavalry a mile or two farther forward. Most of the horsemen were on our flanks, covering roads by which our position could be turned.
All the information we could get pointed to an abandonment of East Tennessee by the enemy, but it was hard for us to believe that the sudden retreat of Longstreet, after his announced intention to attack Knoxville, was not under orders which indicated a plan we ought to fathom. We had heard of his first purpose at many places on our road, for it is almost impossible to keep the people of the country from learning the destination of a moving column, and now the inhabitants who remained at Morristown were aware that Longstreet's men regarded Bristol as their destination. There were, however, rumors and some evidence that Longstreet had stopped his retreat and was about to turn upon us. This called for a careful disposal of our troops and preparation for supporting them promptly with those that were still on the road. As nothing came of it, there would be no reason for mentioning it, except that it was the occasion for an amusing bit of personal experience of my own.
Some of the more pronounced Secessionists had left the town with Longstreet, through fear that the loyalists might take vengeance on them for some of the wrongs they had suffered. We occupied as headquarters a house thus vacated, but it was absolutely empty and gave us only a roof over our heads. We had a few camp stools and a camp desk or two, and slept on the bare floor wrapped in our blankets, with our saddles for pillows. Late in the evening some loyal men brought in such reports of the enemy advancing to attack us at daybreak, that as a measure of prudence determined to go the "grand rounds" an hour or two before day, and especially to visit the cavalry outpost at the front and send forward a reconnoissance from it to make sure of full warning if there was any need of it. When I was roused by the sergeant of the headquarters guard and my horse was brought to the door, it was not a night for a pleasure excursion. A cold winter rain was pouring down, and the blackness of darkness was intense. I took only a single orderly with me, buttoned my cape close over my great-coat, pulled down the rim of my felt hat and started off, trusting to my horse to keep the road till my eyes should get a little used to the darkness. As both armies had encamped around the town, the fences were of course all gone and the wagons had cut so many tracks to right and left that it seemed all road, or rather all mire and no road. Whilst we were among the camps the smouldering camp-fires were of some help, but when we got beyond these we could only splash along cautiously, steering for the smaller fires which marked the picket reserves. Beyond the line of sentries there was nothing to guide us, and keeping our direction as well as we could, we plodded on until a faint glimmer showed the camp of the cavalry outpost. It was in an open wood, and the dying camp-fires gave only light enough to show the tall trunks of the forest trees, black against a background of dull red. Part of Longstreet's army had been in cantonments here during the winter, and many of the huts were still standing, their dim outlines and irregular forms hardly visible, but giving an air of weird mystery to the surroundings. Some of these huts were occupied by the cavalry, and the first we came upon had as its tenant an Irish dragoon, and him we turned out to guide us to the captain's quarters. The occasionally flashing light only seemed to make the darkness visible, and the Irishman told us to follow him closely, "and look out," says he, "for there's pits every little way where thim ribils dug foundations for their chimbleys." He started on and I followed, keeping my horse's nose close to his shoulder. Suddenly he disappeared, and as I jerked my horse back on his haunches, Paddy sung out: "Och! I've found one, sorr!" and sure enough he had gone in, head and heels, in one of the "pits." He scrambled out and cautiously led my horse around the hole, but we had hardly gone a rod further before Pat went out again, like a candle, with "Be jabers, I've found another." But he took his mud baths good-humoredly, and led us without further accident to the captain. From him I got the reports from the vedettes at the front, and after ordering a reconnoissance to be pushed well forward, turned back to inspect the infantry line of sentinels. These were generally found on the alert and well instructed, but as we went across ditches and miry fields we came suddenly upon one asleep in a fence corner where he had tried to make some shelter from the storm. When the horses halted beside him, he sprang up bewildered, and stood bolt upright, trying to look at us, evidently uncertain whether we were rebels, but too confused to utter a single word. I ordered him to call the corporal of the guard, and asked him if that was the way he guarded the camp. He began to stammer out denials of being asleep with a foreign accent and in broken English, which made his stupidity seem more stupid. I reported him to the officer of the guard, but finding he was a raw recruit, I refrained from ordering him before a general court-martial, and directed a lighter summary punishment that his regimental officers could impose.
After examining the more important part of the line, we splashed back to quarters as day was breaking, got a fire built in our cheerless room, hung my coat, which was heavy with water, before it to dry, and crossing my mud-cased legs, sat down for half an hour of rest and revery, listening for carbine shots at the front that would tell if the scouting party had found an enemy. The rest of the staff were still sleeping, oblivious of war's alarms and preparing for the work of the day by trusting the watching to those on duty, as they would be trusted in turn when similarly on guard. How often were such incidents repeated, night and day, through campaign after campaign, till they became so familiar that it seems almost puerile to mention them!
On beginning the movement to Morristown, orders had been given to press the rebuilding of the railroad bridge at Strawberry Plains, for our continuance so far from our supplies depended upon it. We had no trains of wagons to keep up our communication with our base, and the utmost we could do was to carry four or five days' supply with us. We therefore spent three or four days in vigorous efforts to gain information of the enemy by means of our cavalry. We learned that Longstreet held the line of Bays Mountain, where the railway passes through Bull's Gap, thirteen miles above Morristown. His right flank seemed to be at Rogersville on the Holston, and his left rested near the Nolachucky beyond Greeneville. We could not learn that any of his forces except Martin's cavalry had left him, though we were mystified by the disappearance of Ransom's division from the accounts of the enemy's organization. The fact was that that officer was transferred to the cavalry command, and the organization of his division was merged in the others.
On the 2d of March Grant directed that McCook's division of cavalry should go back to Thomas as soon as they could possibly be spared, and on Schofield's reporting the results of our reconnoissances, he advised the latter not to bring on an engagement, but to content ourselves with holding as much of the country as we could.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. p. 14.]The bill creating the grade of lieutenant-general was now the law, and Grant had been promoted to it. On the invitation of the President he was about to go to Washington for consultation, keeping in telegraphic communication with his department commanders.[Footnote:Id., p. 17.]Consequently it agreed well with his views to let affairs remain quiet during his absence. The rains continued, however, and even if he had desired further advance it would have been out of the question till the bridge at Strawberry Plains was rebuilt. The rations brought with us were exhausted, and on the 4th we withdrew the infantry fourteen miles, to a position four miles above New Market, where we hoped to be able to feed the troops with our few wagons, until the railroad should again be available.
Headquarters in the field were established at New Market, and I remained there with authority to direct and support the cavalry movements actively kept up in our front. General Schofield was thus enabled to spend part of his time at Knoxville attending to the clothing and supply of the troops, the gathering of reinforcements, return of veterans, and all the matters of department administration which centred there. In case of the necessity of combined action in Grant's absence, Thomas was authorized to assume command.
The Holston bridge at Strawberry Plains was completed on March 11th, and our forces were at once put in motion for Morristown, where we once more encamped on the 12th. Nothing new had been learned of the enemy; but there was nothing to learn, for Longstreet quietly occupied the line of Bays Mountain, and, like ourselves, was busy getting his troops clothed and shod, while he discussed with the Richmond authorities various plans of campaign. The cavalry ordered back to Johnston was making its way along the base of the mountains, and occasional news of their advance was exaggerated into stories of all Longstreet's army being in motion. Schofield very wisely thought the best way to know what his enemy was doing was to be as near him as practicable without assaulting his strong positions with an inferior force, and therefore ordered the fresh advance as soon as the railway could be made to transport supplies.
On the 14th Grant was again at Nashville, and took immediate steps to send the Ninth Corps to Burnside at Annapolis,[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. p. 67.]in accordance with an arrangement which was settled at the Washington conferences. Schofield was directed to have no delay in getting the Ninth Corps off, and he issued his formal orders to that effect on the 16th.[Footnote:Id., p. 82.]This reduced the forces in East Tennessee to a very small number, but a bold front was preserved and active reconnoitering kept up. On the 18th Stoneman's infantry was placed at Mossy Creek, between New Market and Morristown, and Wood with two brigades of his division was ordered to Rutledge about half-way to Cumberland Gap. The other brigade was placed at Strawberry Plains to protect the stores accumulated there. The cavalry which remained to Schofield was divided, part reporting to Stoneman and part to Wood, and the country was carefully watched from the Nolachucky on the east to Cumberland Gap on the northwest.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. pp. 88, 89.]I was personally directed to keep headquarters in the field, with power to act, in emergencies and in matters of detail, in Schofield's name, while the general returned to the department headquarters at Knoxville, where he made to Sherman, as his now superior, a full report of the situation, with suggestions as to the future work of the army of the Ohio.[Footnote:Id., p. 96.]It was now settled that a new campaign, both East and West, should open in April, if possible, and everything else was to be made subservient to preparation for it. Steps were taken to bring back the furloughed veterans, to remount the cavalry in Kentucky and bring it forward, and to secure such additional infantry as should enable Schofield to take the field with three strong divisions of foot, and at least two of horse, besides leaving about ten thousand men in Kentucky and five thousand in East Tennessee.
The question what should be the work of the Army of the Ohio had naturally interested us who belonged to it, and while Grant was in Washington I prepared and submitted to General Schofield a sketch of a plan of campaign. It was based on the assumption that the Army of the Potomac would not operate by its left along the lowlands of Virginia, as McClellan had done, but would follow the railway through Culpepper and Orange Court House to Richmond. This route was in a high and healthy country, the streams would be crossed where they were comparatively insignificant, and the natural obstacles to an advance seemed much less formidable than upon the coast line. True, the army would have to depend upon the railway for its supplies, but so must Sherman in the West, and the Virginia line was only a fraction of his in length. It had the advantage of covering the Shenandoah valley as it advanced, and saving the large detachment which had to be devoted to that region and to the protection of Washington. But besides this (and this was the feature directly affecting us in East Tennessee), it opened for the Army of the Ohio a rôle of usefulness which seemed to me very important.
If Schofield were to take the field in Georgia, he could carry to Sherman, at most, some twelve or fourteen thousand infantry and six or eight of cavalry. The proper protection of Kentucky and East Tennessee required just about the same number of troops. His active column in the decisive campaign would therefore be only half of the forces in his department. Whenever it should be apparent that Georgia was our field of operations, Longstreet's twenty thousand men would be set free to join Lee in Virginia (as actually happened), or could be used in any other theatre of operations, whilst our garrisons could not be greatly reduced because small raids of mounted men could harry the wide expanse of country behind us unless all the important points were fully guarded. This also was demonstrated by our actual experience, and was a plain deduction from facts and principles. To drive Longstreet into Virginia and destroy the railroad so that he could not return was, therefore, to force the enemy to do the thing most advantageous to himself; that is, to concentrate his forces at the East in entire security that he would not be troubled by any advance on our part into southwestern Virginia.
If, on the other hand, we could move eastward along the railroad, we could bring our supplies to our camps as we advanced. Sherman's army behind us would make our base at Chattanooga safe; the great mountain barrier on the right would so cover our flank that scarce any force need be left in Tennessee, but all could be put in the aggressive column: the troops in Kentucky could be brought forward as we progressed, for our movement would cover that district; finally, on reaching the New River valley we could be joined by the forces in West Virginia. The advance, therefore, instead of being with a dwindling column would be with a growing one, and when the Army of the Potomac should approach the valley of the James, we should be ready with about forty thousand to come into line as the right wing of that army. Approaching Richmond from the north and west, the south side railroad would be at once in our grasp, and that to Petersburg within easy reach.
The objection to such a plan which would first occur to a critic, would be that convergent movements from so distant bases are proverbially uncertain; but this objection is greatly weakened by a study of the topography of the country. The Holston valley is so isolated that, approached by the railway line with a good base behind the column, it is strongly defensible, and if the advance is so timed as not to pass the New River before the Army of the Potomac should be swinging in toward Richmond from the northwest, Lee's army would be too fully occupied to make a detachment strong enough to oppose us, and the line by which he would operate against us would be threatened by the army of our friends. There would also be a safe line of retreat always open for us, in case of check.[Footnote: Napoleon was a master of strategy who fully appreciated the objections to exterior lines, but in the campaign of Wagram in 1809 he ordered Marmont to lead a column from Italy to Vienna by a route having strong resemblances to that which I have sketched. He regarded the character of the route itself, protected as it was by mountain ranges, and giving the assurance of a line of retreat, as making an exception to ordinary cases and overcoming the objections which would have been conclusive against attempting it in an open country.]Another interesting feature in this plan is that if railway communication between Sherman and the Potomac Army had been opened in the summer of 1864, it would have been an interior line of immense importance, not improbably modifying essentially the final campaign of the war.
General Schofield thought well enough of my sketch to adopt it as a suggestion to General Grant, which he submitted as soon as the latter returned from the East. The General-in-Chief had, however, already made arrangements which committed him to operating by the left of the Potomac Army. He had sent General W. F. Smith to Fortress Monroe for the purpose of taking the field at the head of the movable part of Butler's Army of the James, and Burnside's command at Annapolis was at that time expected to make another line of operations from the seacoast in North Carolina. There was also a disposition to leave in Sherman's hands all the departments which constituted the Military Division of the Mississippi, and allow him to concentrate the movable forces of all in his operations against Johnston. Grant therefore adhered to his original purpose of destroying enough of the railroad near the Watauga River to make a serious obstruction to hostile movements against East Tennessee from the east, and turn everything that could be spared into the advance upon Atlanta. Another thing which had weight with him was the fact that Schofield's confirmation as major-general was still delayed and opposed in the Senate, and he intended, if it were finally defeated, to consolidate the Department of the Ohio with that of the Cumberland under General Thomas.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. p. 11.]
On the 29th of March General Sherman visited Schofield at Knoxville, and a full understanding was reached regarding the place the Army of the Ohio was to take in the great campaign of the spring. All the troops in the department were to constitute the Twenty-third Corps, and Schofield was to command the moving column in the field as well as the department. To avoid the inconvenience of having a double head to this column, Stoneman was to be transferred to the command of the cavalry in place of Sturgis, and Schofield was to be assigned to the formal command of the corps.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. pp. 221, 268, 312.]Sturgis was then to be sent to Memphis to take command of the column there organizing for the purpose of operating against Forrest.
As to operations in the upper valley of the Holston, it was determined to occupy Bull's Gap at an early day, and to keep up such an apparent purpose of advancing as should detain Longstreet in East Tennessee as long as possible. If he retreated he was to be followed, so as to induce him to burn the railway bridges, and thus to avoid disclosing our own purpose of leaving that portion of the valley which we should plainly proclaim if we ourselves should destroy the railway. Everything was to be ready for movement, and at the last moment, if the enemy had not already done it, we were to burn railway bridges and tear up the track for a considerable distance. Then the divisions which were to take the field in Georgia were to march rapidly to Cleveland, and come in on the left of Sherman's grand army as he advanced from Chattanooga.
As the plan of campaign thus took definite shape, it gave the occasion also for a settlement of my personal problem of permanent assignment to duty. It had become evident that there was no room for transfer to another command, and the active part marked out for the Twenty-third Corps removed the only ground for wishing it. No better soldiers could be found than those which made up our divisions, and my acquaintance with General Schofield had ripened into a confidence which made me entirely content to follow him as my commander. He warmly invited me to continue permanently in the position of chief of staff, but gave me the alternate choice of one of the divisions of the active column. My preference for responsible command in the field decided me to take a division, and by his further permission I chose the third, in which were a considerable number of officers who had served with me in other campaigns.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. p. 245.]I would not be understood, however, to depreciate the position of chief of staff of such a department and army. Properly filled, few positions in active service could be pleasanter or more useful. I had tested this during the six weeks preceding, and had found the associations and the duty every way most agreeable. The general was always prompt to assume his proper responsibility and to order the movements or the administrative acts which are peculiarly the province of the commander; but he gave me the task of arranging the subordinate details, and the authority to direct them in his name. To distribute the parts each corps or division was to perform; to co-ordinate all the arrangements so that they should move harmoniously; to bring to a common centre all the information, external and internal, which affected the conduct and efficiency of the whole; to supervise the matters of organization, of equipment, and of supply; to consult with the medical director as to hospital work and the sanitary condition of the army, and to be guarantor that the common end is vigorously and intelligently pursued by every part of the army,--all this, as scarcely needs telling, makes a chief of staff the right arm of the commander, and his most trusted adviser and confidant. He makes his commander feel free to give his own thought to the larger problems of a campaign, with confidence that the whole machinery of the army will work smoothly toward the object which he has in view. I did not then, nor do I now, underestimate the importance of the duty which an industrious staff officer may thus perform, and I had found it made personally pleasant by the even temper and appreciative justice of General Schofield's rule. I had, however, formed so strong a predilection for the immediate and active conduct of troops in the field, that this determined me to choose the division command. In the new organization of the corps I should, in this, report directly to the general, and should be next in rank to him (in the infantry) by virtue of seniority, so that in his absence, or when two divisions were temporarily detached from the army, I should exercise a superior command. These were advantages which every experienced soldier estimates highly, and I was to enjoy them, until good fortune and the steady friendship of my superiors gave me, a second time, and this time in permanent form, the corps command with the rank belonging to it. There was no mistake, therefore, in my choice of duty; and considering the part Sherman's whole army was to play in the remaining campaigns of the war, it was a matter of personal good fortune also that the Army of the Ohio became an integral part of the great western organization, and marched southward, not eastward.
On the staff I had been thrown into intimate relations to Colonel William M. Wherry, senior aide-de-camp, and Major J. A. Campbell, adjutant-general. These officers continued to the end of the war in these positions, which they filled with great credit and usefulness. Major Campbell was admirably fitted for the supervision of the records and the correspondence of the army, and for reducing to the form of clear and succinct orders the directions of the general. He was accurate, systematic, and untiring; always at his post, whether it were at his desk in camp, or by the side of his chief in the field. Of slight, almost frail body, with an intellectual face, he looked unequal to rough field work, but showed a stamina in fact which many a more robust man envied. Colonel Wherry was the incessantly active personal representative of the general, intrusted with his oral orders, and making for him those examinations and investigations which are only satisfactory when the commander has learned to trust the eye and the cool judgment of his assistant as his own. Wherry had been with General Schofield from the first campaign in Missouri in 1861, and both were with Lyon when he fell at Wilson's Creek. He remained his confidential aide through the whole war, and for years afterward, being early appointed from Missouri to the line of one of the new regiments of the regular army. Lithe, graceful, and genial, he was always welcome, when he came to a point where fighting was going on, to learn for the general the actual situation or to bring his orders.[Footnote: Wherry is now (1899) Brigadier-General of the United States Army, retired, after brilliant service in the campaign of Santiago, Cuba.]
During the winter the division of the Fourth Corps commanded by Brigadier-General Thomas J. Wood had been in closest connection with us. It had taken part in all the marchings and countermarchings of the period when I was chief of staff, and I had thus begun an acquaintance with its commander which was to grow into lasting friendship. General Wood was colonel of the Second Regular Cavalry, a Kentuckian who had earnestly taken the National side, and an influential officer of the old army. His intelligence and activity were very marked, and his courage was of the cool indomitable character most highly prized in divisions of a great army. Of medium height, solid but not large build, dark hair and complexion, high forehead, he was a noticeable man in any assemblage of officers. A fluent talker, attentive to polite forms of speech as well as of conduct, he was liked and respected throughout the army, and especially in the Army of the Cumberland, where he had served throughout the war. He had won promotion by gallant and meritorious services again and again, when at the battle of Chickamauga it was his ill fortune to receive the famous order to "close up on Brannan and support him." The situation made the order ambiguous, but Wood understood it to mean that he should move to the left till he should find himself in rear of Brannan's division, since another division was between them in the line. He thought it a strange order, but thought also that Rosecrans must know why he sent it, and that it was "his not to reason why" but to obey. The obedience opened the gap through which Longstreet's men poured, breaking the line and routing part of the right wing. Wood took the place assigned him by Thomas in the horse-shoe curve around the Snodgrass hill, and did his full share of the desperate fighting which held that part of the field. But he had thus become the subject of a controversy, and the friends of Rosecrans charged him with a too literal obedience, and a failure to use a sound discretion in his action. The result was that whilst Rosecrans was removed from active field service, Wood still found himself under a cloud, and opposed by influences which stood in the way of his promotion till the war was almost ended. He continued to be distinguished in every engagement of the Atlanta campaign and that of Nashville, and no division saw harder or more honorable service than his.
The first week in April saw the changes in the organization of the Twenty-third Corps which I have indicated. On the 3d I was relieved of staff duty and assigned to the third division, with orders to proceed at once to Bull's Gap and take temporary command of the corps whilst General Stoneman should hasten to Kentucky to prepare the cavalry corps for active service.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. pp. 245, 259, 268.]I think the change was agreeable to Stoneman, for he was most at home with mounted troops and liked that service. Schofield's permanent assignment to the Twenty-third Corps was made on April 4th by the President, though the general had still to await for some time the action of the Senate on the confirmation of his promotion.[Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. p. 258.]His enemies were still persistent, and even succeeded in obtaining a report of the Senate committee against his confirmation. General Sherman wrote to his brother, the senator, in behalf of his subordinate;[Footnote:Id., pp. 332, 343.]but it was not till General Grant was back in Washington and used his powerful personal influence that the confirmation was finally secured after the campaign had opened. It seemed at one time that not even the manifest mischief of deranging the organization of the army, as deliberately settled by both Grant and Sherman, would overcome the political hostility arrayed against him. This was without any reasonable foundation. Although Schofield was not given to political discussion, my closeness to him enabled me to know that he was an earnestly loyal man whose heart was warmly engaged in the National cause. He believed in emancipation as a right and politic war measure, and in fighting the rebellion vigorously till it should be conquered. He had made enemies among the Kansas politicians because he tried to prevent the war on that frontier from degenerating into a vendetta when murder and robbery should take the place of civilized warfare. Some influential radicals in Missouri were hostile because he held the scales even between them and the conservative Union men.
At Bull's Gap I found the corps headquarters in a shingle-palace which had been built for a hotel at the railway station, and which was now the only house there. It was empty as a barn and fast going to ruin, but it gave shelter for our office work. Wood's division of the Fourth Corps was put in march to join the Army of the Cumberland, and we were left to watch the enemy and await the moment when the destruction of the railway and our own march southward should begin. We soon had a curious bit of evidence that Longstreet had finally abandoned the expectation of re-occupying East Tennessee. It was found in the applications made by women to join their husbands who were in the Confederate service. The "grapevine telegraph" was an "institution" during the whole war. News which was either interesting or important was passed on through the lines, and it was impossible to be so rigid in precautions as greatly to delay it. To stop it was utterly futile. Longstreet had hardly received the orders from his government to prepare to rejoin Lee's army in Virginia, when the headquarters of our army at Knoxville felt the pressure of applications for leave to pass the lines. On the 6th of April a party of forty women and children came up by railway, to be sent through the lines under a flag. They were of course without tents or any means of camping out, and the crazy building in which I had my quarters was that night as crowded and as picturesque as an Asiatic caravanserai. The rain and the almost impassable roads made their journey anything but one of pleasure, but by the aid of the few wagons at the post they went forward in a day or two. A second party, about as large, followed in the course of a week, and had even a rougher time than the first. There were delays on the part of their friends, in sending trains and escort to meet them at the break in the railway, but the hope of rejoining loved ones gave them courage, and they bore cheerfully their sufferings and privations.