MARIETTA AND KENESAW. 403 We arrived at Marietta-once beautiful and delightsome Marietta-about e miles from Kenesaw, toward evening, where we lodged in one of the ses which had escaped the ravages of war. That town, having about thousand inhabitants when the war broke out, was noted for the beauty ts situation among the wooded hills, the salubrity of its climate, and the lth, taste, and refinement of its people. It was a favorite summer resort the hill-country of Georgia, for the residents of the coast. When we ted it, it was a ghastly ruin. Much of the natural beauty of its surround5 was preserved; and we can never forget the delight experienced by us an early morning k along the broad - winding Powder ings road, shaded h magnificent old est trees, that led up the eminence on ich stood the Geor- Military Institute, il, by the torch of tional soldiers, it sall reduced to nes, excepting the oken ruins delineated EUINS OF GEORGIA MILITARY INSTITUTE, MARIETTA. the engraving. In that sketch, made during the morning ramble, Kenev is seen in the distance, on the right. A few hours later we were on the nmit of that great hill, whither we rode on spirited horses, in con company th W. H. Tucker, of Marietta, as cicerone, who was the guide of General hnston in that region during his campaign. At the foot of the mountain struck the Confederate intrenchments, and found them winding up its rtheastern slopes, so as to cover and command the railroad. They were a continuous line of rifle-pits, redans, and redoubts, all the way to the nmit, on which were the remains of a battery, and the signal station for th armies.1 From that lofty eminence we had a broad view of the surrounding coun, and overlooked a theater of some of the most wonderful military events ich history has recorded. It was within a circle of vision with an average thirty miles radius, and every point was familiar to our guide. To the stward we-looked off over the wooded country to Dallas and New Hope urch. Farther to the north and northwest were Lost and Pine mountains, d the Allatoona hills; and eastward, away beyond Atlanta, at a distance thirty-six miles, arose, seemingly from a level country covered with rest, the magnificent dome of Stone Mountain. The air was full of little owers in all directions, which sometimes veiled what we desired to see; d just as we had finished our sketches and observations, one passed over nesaw, and drenched us gently while we descended to the rollplain, and galloped back to Marietta. There we lodged again at night, and on the following morning went on to Atlanta, 1 See page 378. * May 18, 1866. 404 ATLANTA AND ITS VICINITY. passing through heavy fortifications on the right bank of the Chattahoochee River, near the railway bridge, and then among others more thickly strewn around the ruined city. We spent a greater portion of two days in and about Atlanta, visiting places of chief interest connected with the siege, accompanied by Lieutenant Holsenpiller, the post commander, and two other officers. Then we went down to Jonesboro', twenty-one miles south of Atlanta, on the Macon road. It was a little village of seven hundred inhabitants when the war began. It, like others in the track of the armies, was nearly ruined. The Courthouse, and almost twenty other buildings, were destroyed. An intelligent young man, who was a Confederate soldier in the battle there between Howard and Hardee, accompanied us to places of interest connected with that struggle, and at about noon we returned to the village and took the cars for Atlanta. We went out to Marietta that night and lodged, and on the following morning we journeyed by railway from that town to Cleveland, in East Tennessee, on our way to Richmond, in Virginia, by way of Knoxville. 1 See page 398. 2 See page 284. THE NATIONAL ARMY AT ATLANTA. 405 CHAPTER XV. RMAN'S MARCH TO THE SEA.-THOMAS'S CAMPAIGN IN MIDDLE TENNESSEE.-EVENTS IN EAST TENNESSEE. S HERMAN'S force, with which he proposed to march to the sea, was composed of four army corps in two grand divisions, the right wing commanded by Major-General O. O. Howard, and the left wing by Major-General H. W. Slocum. The right was composed of the Fifteenth Corps, led by General P. J. Osterhaus, and the Seventeenth, commanded by General F. P. Blair. The left sisted of the Fourteenth Corps, commanded by General J. C. Davis, and Twentieth, led by General A. S. Williams.1 General Kilpatrick comnded the cavalry, consisting of one division. Sherman's entire force nbered sixty thousand infantry and artillery, and five thousand five hund cavalry. On the 14th of November, as we have observed, Sherman's troops, desed for the great march, were grouped around Atlanta. Their last channel communication with the Government and the loyal people of the North s closed, when, on the 11th, the commander-in-chief cut the telegraph wire t connected Atlanta with Washington City. Then that army became an ated moving column, in the heart of the enemy's country. It moved on morning of the 14th, Howard's wing marching by way of Macdonough Gordon, on the railway east of Macon, and Slocum's by the town of catur, for Madison and Milledgeville. Then, by Sherman's order, and Her the direction of Captain O. M. Poe, chief engineer, the entire city of anta (which, next to Richmond, had furnished more war materials for the nfederates than any in the South), excepting its Court-house, churches, and ellings, was committed to the flames. In a short space of time, the builds in the heart of the city, covering full two hundred acres of ground, were fire; and when the conflagration was at its height, on the night the 15th, the band of the Twenty-third Massachusetts played, I the soldiers chanted, the air and words of the stirring song, ohn Brown's soul goes marching on." Sherman left desolated Atlanta following morning, and accompanied Slocum's wing in its march, at the inning. November 1864. The Fifteenth Corps, General Osterhaus commanding, was composed of four divisions, commanded respectby Generals C. R. Woods, W. B. Hazen, J. M. Corse, and J. E. Smith. The Seventeenth Corps, General consisted of three divisions, commanded by Generals J. Mower, M. D. Leggett, and Giles A. Smith. The teenth Corps, General Davis, consisted of three divisions, commanded by Generals W. P. Carlin, J. D. Morand A. Baird. The Twentieth Corps, General Williams, was composed of three divisions, commanded by rals N. J. Jackson, J. W. Geary, and W. T. Ward. 406 BEGINNING OF THE MARCH. Sherman's first object was to place his army in the heart of Georgia, between Macon and Augusta, and so compel his foe to divide his forces, to defend not only these two important places, but also Millen (where a large number of Union prisoners were confined), and Savannah and Charleston, • Nov. 22, 1864 For that purpose his troops marched rapidly. Kilpatrick swept around to, and strongly menaced Macon, while Howard moved steadily forward and occupied Gordon, on the Georgia Central railroad, east of Macon, on the 23d. Meanwhile, Slocum moved along the Augusta railway to Madison, and after destroying the railroad bridge over the Oconee River, east of that place, turned southward and occupied Mil ledgeville, the capital of Georgia, on the same day when Howard Nov. 28. reached Gordon. In these marches the National troops found no military resistance of any consequence, excepting near Macon, and no serious obstacle, excepting such as wretched roads presented. Each wing had its separate pontoon train; and during the march to the sea, Sherman accompanied first one wing, and then the other, with his personal staff of only five officers, none of them above the rank of major. 1 At Augusta were some of the most important works in the Confederacy for the manufacture of cannon, shot and shell. A report of Colonel Rains, superintendent of those works, made in May previous to the time we are considering, gives the following list of war materials supplied to the Confederate army, by the works at Augusta, in the space of two months: "1,400,000 small-arm cartridges; 6,000 fixed ammunition (shot and shell attached to cartridges for field batteries); 2,500 Colonel Rains's percussion hand-grenades; 1,500 rifle she is for field artillery; 54 tons eight and ten-inch shot and shell for columbiads; 100 tons of gunpowder: 8 complete batteries of brass twelve-pounder Napoleon guns, with carriages, limbers, caissons, harness, equipments, ammunition, traveling forges, &c.; one battery of three-inch rifle and banded iron guns, and twelve-pounder brotze howitzers; 1 battery of four twelve-pounder bronze howitzers. The above two batteries were complete at a points, with carriages, limbers, caissons, harness, amnmunition, equipments, &c. "All of these guns, except the rifle battery (for General Morgan), were sent to General Johnston's army. which has altogether sixteen complete batteries of brass guns, which were mainly manufactured in every part at the government foundery and machine works and gun-carriage department in this place. "The most of these batteries are composed of the new twelve-pounder Napoleon guns, introduced in the service of the war by the present Emperor of the French; of these, over 85, weighing in the aggregate more than 50 tons, have been cast at the government foundery in this city, mainly within the past year. In the saгте period, over 500 tons of the first quality of gunpowder have been made at the powder works and distributed throughout the Confederacy. "In addition to the foregoing, there has been an immenso number of small-arm cartridges, cartridge bags, fixed ammunition, canteens, haversacks, horse-shoes, time-fuses, and percussion-caps made at the arsenal, as well as large amounts of signal rockets, portfires, sets of artillery harness, infantry accouterments, &e, marufhetured within the past twelve months." The legislature of Georgia was in session when Slocum approached. The members fled, without the for mality of adjournment. The Governor followed their example, and a large number of the white citizens did likewise. Many of the young officers of Sherman's army took the places of the fugitive legislators at the Capi tol, and immediately rescinded the Georgia Ordinance of Secession and other obnoxious acts, and declared that State to be back again in the Union. They elected General Sherman governor of the commonwealth, and mode an immense appropriation for the pay of the new legislature. The currency in which they were paid was Comfederate. About a million dollars were disbursed by the treasurer for that purpose, Colonel Coggswell, of New York. Some of the members received $50,000 for their few hours of service. 3 The Conspirator, Howell Cobb, who plotted treason while in Buchanan's cabinet as Secretary of the Treas nry (see page 41, volume I.), was in command of the Georgia militia in that section of the State, and was very careful to keep out of the way of peril. Like Toombs, he seems to have been brave in boasting, but otherwise in acting. Sherman encamped on one of his plantations, not far from Milledgeville, and there received a Maoni newspaper containing a proclamation by Cobb, in which he called upon his fellow white citizens to "rise and defend their liberties and homes" from the invader, and "to burn and destroy every thing in his front, and assa him on all sides." Cobb had left the defense of his own home to his slaves, and had omitted the patriotic duty be enjoined upon others, of burning his own buildings and crops. This fact reminds us of the manifesto put forth by this man and his fellow-conspirator, Toombs, the year before. (See note 2, page 471, volume IL) These selfconstituted leaders were willing to sacrifice others while sparing themselves. Major Nichols, who was with Sherman, thus wrote concerning Cobb: "Becoming alarmed, Cobb sent for and removed all the able-bodied mules, horses, cows, and slaves. He left here some fifty old men cripples-and women and children, with nothing scarcely covering their nakedness, with little or no food, and without means of procuring it. A more forlorn, neglected set of human beings I never saw."-Story of the Great March, page 58. These were Major M'Coy, aid-de-camp; Captain Andenried, aid-de-camp; Major Hitchcock, assistant adjutant-general; Captain Dayton, aid-de-camp, and Captain Nichols, aid-de-camp. "Attached to his head THE CONFEDERATES ALARMED. 407 The army had moved, with twenty days' provision of bread, forty days' beef, coffee, and sugar, and three of forage in their wagons, with instrucons to each subordinate commander to live off the country, and save the pplies of the train for an expected time of need, when the army should ach the less productive region near the sea-coast. This they were enabled do, for the hill country through which they were moving was very fertile, d had not been exhausted by the presence of great armies. Sherman's dacity, and the uncertainty concerning his real destination, because of the idely separated lines of march of the two wings of his army, astounded, wildered and paralyzed the inhabitants and the armed militia, and very tle resistance was offered to foragers, who swept over the country in all rections. Kilpatrick's march from Atlanta to Gordon had appeared to em, like a meteor-flash to the supersitious, mysterious and evil-boding. At ast Point he met some of Wheeler's cavalry, which Hood had left behind to Derate against Sherman. These were attacked and driven across the Flint iver. Kilpatrick crossed that stream at Jonesboro', and pursued them to ovejoy, where Murray's brigade, dismounted, expelled them from intrenchents, captured the works, took fifty prisoners, and, in the pursuit, Atkins's igade seized and held two of their guns. Pressing forward, Kilpatrick ent through Macdonough and Monticello to Clinton, and then made a dash Don Macon, driving in some of Wheeler's cavalry there, threatening the rongly-manned works, burning a train of cars, tearing up the railway, and reading the greatest consternation over that region. By this time the Confederates began to comprehend the grand object of herman's movement, but could not determine his final destination. The evient danger to Georgia and the Carolinas caused the most frantic appeals to be Lade to the people of the former State. "Arise for the defense of your native il," shouted Beauregard in a manifesto, as he was hastening from the Appoattox to the Savannah. He told them to destroy "all the roads in Sheran's front, flank and rear," and to be confident, and resolute, and trustful in 1 overruling Providence. He dismayed the thinking men of the State by ying, "I hasten to join you in defense of your homes and firesides," for ney knew his incompetency and dreaded his folly. From Richmond, B. Н. Cill, a Georgia "Senator," cried to the people of his State: "Every citizen ith his gun, and every negro with his spade and ax, can do the work of a oldier. You can destroy the enemy by retarding his march. Be firm!" eddon, the "Secretary of War," indorsed the message; and the representaves of Georgia in the Confederate "Congress" sent an earnest appeal to the eople to fly to arms, assuring them that "President Davis and the Secreary of War" would do every thing in their power to help them in "the ressing emergency." "Let every man fly to arms," they said. "Remove our negroes, horses, cattle, and provisions from Sherman's army, and burn hat you cannot carry. Burn all bridges, and block up the roads in his Dute. Assail the invader in front, flank and rear, by night and by day. Larters," says Brevet-Major G. W. Nichols, in his Story of the Great March, "but not technically members his staff, were the chiefs of the separate departments for the Military Division of the Mississippi." These ere General Barry, chief of artillery; Lieutenant-Colonel Ewing, inspector-general; Captain Poe, chief of engieers: Captain Baylor, chief of ordnance: Dr. Moore, chief medical director; Colonel Beckwith, chief of the mmissary department; and Captain Bachtal, chief of the signal corps. |