At the first news of Morgan's advance into Kentucky, Burnside had directed General Hartsuff, who commanded in that State, to concentrate his forces so as to capture Morgan if he should attempt to return through the central part of it. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. i. pp.13, 679, etc.] Judah's and Boyle's divisions were put in motion toward Louisville, and the remainder of the mounted troops not already with Hobson were also hurried forward. These last constituted a provisional brigade under Colonel Sanders. It may help to understand the organization of the National troops to note the fact that all which operated against Morgan were parts of the Twenty-third Corps, which was composed of four divisions under Generals Sturgis, Boyle, Judah, and White. The brigades were of both infantry and mounted troops, united for the special purposes of the contemplated campaign into East Tennessee. For the pursuit of Morgan the mounted troops were sent off first, and as these united they formed a provisional division under Hobson, the senior brigadier present. Quite a number of the regiments were mounted infantry, who after a few months were dismounted and resumed their regular place in the infantry line. For the time being, however, Hobson had a mounted force that was made up of fractions of brigades from all the divisions of the corps; and Shackelford, Wolford, Kautz, and Sanders were the commanders of the provisional brigades during the pursuit. Its strength did not quite reach 3000 men. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. i. p. 658.]

Morgan's first course was due north, and he marched with some deliberation. On the 10th he reached Salem, about forty miles from the river, on the railway between Louisville and Chicago. [Footnote: Id., pp. 717, 719.] A small body of militia had assembled here, and made a creditable stand, but were outflanked and forced to retreat after inflicting on him a score of casualties. The evidences Morgan here saw of the ability of the Northern States to overwhelm him by the militia, satisfied him that further progress inland was not desirable, and turning at right angles to the road he had followed, he made for Madison on the Ohio. There was evidently some understanding with a detachment he had left in Kentucky, for on the 11th General Manson, of Judah's division, who was on his way with a brigade from Louisville to Madison by steamboats under naval convoy, fell in with a party of Morgan's men seeking to cross the river at Twelve-mile Island, a little below Madison. Twenty men and forty-five horses were captured. [Footnote: Id., pt. ii. pp. 729, 745.] If any of this party had succeeded in crossing before (as was reported) they would of course inform their chief of the reinforcements going to Madison, and of the gunboats in the river. Morgan made no attack on Madison, but took another turn northward in his zigzag course, and marched on Vernon, a railway-crossing some twenty miles from Madison, where the line to Indianapolis intersects that from Cincinnati to Vincennes. Here a militia force had been assembled under Brigadier-General Love, and the town was well situated for defence. Morgan, declining to attack, now turned eastward again, his course being such that he might be aiming for the river at Lawrenceburg or at Cincinnati.

The deviousness of his route had been such as to indicate a want of distinct purpose, and had enabled Hobson greatly to reduce the distance between them. Hanson's brigade on the steamboats was now about 2500 strong, and moved on the 12th from Madison to Lawrenceburg, keeping pace as nearly as possible with Morgan's eastward progress. Sanders's brigade reached the river twenty miles above Louisville, and General Boyle sent transports to put him also in motion on the river. At the request of Burnside, Governor Tod, of Ohio, called out the militia of the southern counties, as Governor Morton had done in Indiana. Burnside himself, at Cincinnati, kept in constant telegraphic communication with all points, assembling the militia where they were most likely to be useful and trying to put his regular forces in front of the enemy. It would have been easy to let the slippery Confederate horsemen back into Kentucky. The force in the river, both naval and military, unquestionably prevented this at Madison, and probably at Lawrenceburg. On the 13th Morgan was at Harrison on the Ohio State line, and it now became my turn as district commander to take part in the effort to catch him. I had no direct control of the troops of the Twenty-third Corps, and the only garrisons in Ohio were at the prison camps at Columbus and Sandusky. These of course could not be removed, and our other detachments were hardly worth naming. Burnside declared martial law in the counties threatened with invasion, so that the citizens and militia might for military purposes come directly under our control. The relations between the general and myself were so intimate that no strict demarcation of authority was necessary. He authorized me to give commands in his name when haste demanded it, and we relieved each other in night watching at the telegraph.

A small post had been maintained at Dayton, since the Vallandigham disturbance, and Major Keith, its commandant, was ordered to take his men by rail to Hamilton. He went at once and reported himself holding that town with 600 men, including the local militia, but only 400 were armed. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. i. pp.742, 743.] Lieutenant-Colonel Neff commanded at Camp Dennison, thirteen miles from Cincinnati, and had 700 armed men there, with 1200 more of unarmed recruits. [Footnote: Id., p.749.] At both these posts systematic scouting was organized so as to keep track of the enemy, and their active show of force was such that Morgan did not venture to attack either, but threaded his way around them. At Cincinnati there was no garrison. A couple of hundred men formed the post at Newport on the Kentucky side of the river, but the main reliance was on the local militia. These were organized as soon as the governor's call was issued on the evening of the 12th. Batteries were put in position covering the approaches to the city from the north and west, and the beautiful suburban hills of Clifton and Avondale afforded excellent defensive positions.

The militia that were called out were of course infantry, and being both without drill and unaccustomed to marching, could only be used in position, to defend a town or block the way. In such work they showed courage and soldierly spirit, so that Morgan avoided collision with all considerable bodies of them. But they could not be moved. All we could do was to try to assemble them at such points in advance as the raiders were likely to reach, and we especially limited their task to the defensive one, and to blockading roads and streams. Particular stress was put on the orders to take up the planking of bridges and to fell timber into the roads. Little was done in this way at first, but after two or three days of constant reiteration, the local forces did their work better, and delays to the flying enemy were occasioned which contributed essentially to the final capture.

No definite news of Morgan's crossing the Ohio line was received till about sunset of the 13th when he was marching eastward from Harrison. Satisfied that Lawrenceburg and lower points on the Ohio were now safe, Burnside ordered the transports and gunboats at once to Cincinnati. Manson and Sanders arrived during the night, and the latter with his brigade of mounted men was, at dawn of the 14th, placed on the north of the city in the village of Avondale. Manson with the transports was held in readiness to move further up the river.

Feeling the net drawing about him, Morgan gave his men but two or three hours' rest near Harrison, and then took the road toward Cincinnati. He reached Glendale, thirteen miles northwest of the city, late in the night, and then turned to the east, apparently for Camp Dennison, equally distant in a northeast direction. His men were jaded to the last degree of endurance, and some were dropping from the saddle for lack of sleep. Still he kept on. Colonel Neff, in accordance with his orders, had blockaded the principal roads to the west, and stood at bay in front of his camp. Morgan threw a few shells at Neff's force, and a slight skirmish began, but again he broke away, forced to make a detour of ten miles to the north. We had been able to warn Neff of their approach by a message sent after midnight, and he had met them boldly, protecting the camp and the railroad bridge north of it. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. i. pp. 748, 750.] The raiders reached Williamsburg in Clermont County, twenty-eight miles from Cincinnati, in the afternoon of the 14th, and there the tired men and beasts took the first satisfactory rest they had had for three days. Morgan had very naturally assumed that there would be a considerable regular force at Cincinnati, and congratulated himself that by a forced night march he had passed round the city and avoided being cut off. He had, in truth, escaped by the skin of his teeth. Could Burnside have felt sure that Lawrenceburg was safe a few hours earlier, Manson and Sanders might have been in Cincinnati early enough on the 13th to have barred the way from Harrison. He had in fact ordered Manson up at two o'clock in the afternoon, but the latter was making a reconnoissance north of the town, and was detained till late in the night. As soon as it was learned on the 14th that Morgan had passed east of the Little Miami River, Sanders was ordered to join Hobson and aid in the pursuit. [Footnote: In the reports of Hobson and Sanders there seems to be a mistake of a day in the dates, from the 12th to the 16th. This may be corrected by the copies of current dispatches given in Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. i. pp. 730-750.] Hobson's horses were almost worn out, for following close upon Morgan's track, as he was doing, he found only broken down animals left behind by the rebels, whilst these gathered up the fresh animals as they advanced. Still he kept doggedly on, seldom more than ten or fifteen miles behind, but unable to close that gap till his opponent should be delayed or brought to bay.

After entering Clermont County, the questions as to roads, etc, indicated that Morgan was making for Maysville, hoping to cross the river there. [Footnote: Id., p. 749.] Manson's brigade and the gunboats were accordingly sent up the river to that vicinity. The militia of the Scioto valley were ordered to destroy the bridges, in the hope that that river would delay him, but they were tardy or indifferent, and it was a day or two later before the means of obstruction were efficiently used. Judah's forces reached Cincinnati on the 14th, a brigade was there supplied with horses, and they were sent by steamers to Portsmouth. Judah was ordered to spare no effort to march northward far enough to head off the enemy's column. On the 16th General Scammon, commanding in West Virginia, was asked to concentrate some of his troops at Gallipolis or Pomeroy on the upper Ohio, and promptly did so. [Footnote: Id., p. 756.] The militia were concentrated at several points along the railway to Marietta. Hobson was in the rear, pushing along at the rate of forty miles a day.

Morgan had soon learned that the river was so patrolled that no chance to make a ferry could be trusted, and he made his final effort to reach the ford at Buffington Island, between Marietta and Pomeroy. He reached Pomeroy on the 18th, but Scammon was occupying it, and the troops of the Kanawha division soon satisfied Morgan that he was not dealing with militia. He avoided the roads held by our troops, and as they were infantry, could move around them, though a running skirmish was kept up for some miles. Hobson was close in rear, and Judah's men were approaching Buffington. Morgan reached the river near the ford about eight o'clock in the evening. The night was pitchy dark, and his information was that a small earthwork built to command the ford was occupied by a permanent garrison. He concluded to wait for daylight. The work had in fact been abandoned on the preceding day, but at daybreak in the morning he was attacked. Hobson's men pushed in from west and north, and Judah from the south. The gunboats came close up to the island, within range of the ford, and commanded it. Hobson attacked vigorously and captured the artillery. The wing of the Confederate forces, about 700 in number, surrendered to General Shackelford, and about 200 to the other brigades under Hobson. The rest of the enemy, favored by a fog which filled the valley, evaded their pursuers and fled northward. Hobson ordered all his brigades to obey the commands of Shackelford, who was in the lead, and himself sought Judah, whose approach had been unknown to him till firing was heard on the other side of the enemy. Judah had also advanced at daybreak, but in making a reconnoissance he himself with a small escort had stumbled upon the enemy in the fog. Both parties were completely surprised, and before Judah could bring up supports, three of his staff were captured, Major Daniel McCook, paymaster, who had volunteered as an aide, was mortally wounded, ten privates were wounded, and twenty or thirty with a piece of artillery captured. Morgan hastily turned in the opposite direction, when he ran into Hobson's columns; Judah's prisoners and the gun were recaptured, and the enemy driven in confusion, with the losses above stated. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. i. pp. 775-777.]

As Hobson was regularly a brigade commander in Judah's division, the latter now asserted command of the whole force, against Hobson's protest, who was provisionally in a separate command by Burnside's order. Fortunately, Shackelford had already led Hobson's men in rapid pursuit of the enemy, and as soon as Burnside was informed of the dispute, he ordered Judah not to interfere with the troops which had operated separately. By the time this order came Shackelford was too far away for Hobson to rejoin him, and continued in independent command till Morgan's final surrender. He overtook the flying Confederates on the 20th, about sixty miles further north, and they were forced to halt and defend themselves. Shackelford succeeded in getting a regiment in the enemy's rear, and after a lively skirmish between 1200 and 1300 surrendered. [Footnote: Id., pp. 778, 781.] Morgan himself again evaded with about 600 followers. Shackelford took 500 volunteers on his best horses and pressed the pursuit. The chase lasted four days of almost continuous riding, when the enemy was again overtaken in Jefferson County, some fifteen miles northwest of Steubenville. General Burnside had collected at Cincinnati the dismounted men of Hobson's command, had given them fresh horses, and had sent them by rail to join Shackelford. They were under command of Major W. B. Way of the Ninth Michigan Cavalry and Major G. W. Rue of the Ninth Kentucky Cavalry. They brought five or six hundred fresh men to Shackelford's aid, and their assistance was decisive. Morgan's course to the river at Smith's Ferry on the border of Columbiana County was intercepted, and near Salineville he was forced to surrender with a little less than 400 men who still followed him. About 250 had surrendered in smaller bodies within a day or two before, and stragglers had been picked up at many points along the line of pursuit. Burnside reported officially that about 3000 prisoners were brought to Cincinnati. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. i. p. 14.] General Duke states that some 300 of Morgan's command succeeded in crossing the Ohio about twenty miles above Buffington, and escaped through West Virginia. He also gives us some idea of the straggling caused by the terrible fatigues of the march by telling us that the column was reduced by nearly 500 effectives when it passed around Cincinnati. [Footnote: Hist. of Morgan's Cavalry, pp. 442, 443.] It is probable that these figures are somewhat loosely stated, as the number of prisoners is very nearly the whole which the Confederate authorities give as Morgan's total strength. [Footnote: A note attached to Wheeler's return of the cavalry of his corps for July 31st says that Morgan's division was absent "on detached service," effectives 2743. Add to this the officers, etc., and the total "present for duty" would be a little over 3000. Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. ii. p. 941. For Bragg's circular explaining the term "effectives" as applying only to private soldiers actually in the line of battle, see Id., p. 619, and ante, p. 482.] Either a considerable reinforcement must have succeeded in getting to him across the river, or a very small body must have escaped through West Virginia. Burnside directed the officers to be sent to the military prison camp for officers on Johnson's Island in Sandusky Bay, and the private soldiers to go to Camp Chase at Columbus and Camp Morton at Indianapolis. Soon afterward, however, orders came from Washington that the officers should be confined in the Ohio penitentiary, in retaliation for unusual severities practised on our officers who were prisoners in the South. Morgan's romantic escape from the prison occurred just after I was relieved from the command of the district in the fall, for the purpose of joining the active army in East Tennessee.

A glance at the raid as a whole, shows that whilst it naturally attracted much attention and caused great excitement at the North, it was of very little military importance. It greatly scattered for a time and fatigued the men and horses of the Twenty-third Corps who took part in the chase. It cost Indiana and Ohio something in the plunder of country stores and farm-houses, and in the pay and expenses of large bodies of militia that were temporarily called into service. But this was all. North of the Ohio no military posts were captured, no public depots of supply were destroyed, not even an important railway bridge was burned. There was no fighting worthy of the name; the list of casualties on the National side showing only 19 killed, 47 wounded, and 8 missing in the whole campaign, from the 2d of July to the final surrender. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxlii. pt. i. p.637.] For this the whole Confederate division of cavalry was sacrificed. Its leader was never again trusted by his government, and his prestige was gone forever. His men made simply a race for life from the day they turned away from the militia at Vernon, Indiana. Morgan carefully avoided every fortified post and even the smaller towns. The places he visited after he crossed the Ohio line do not include the larger towns and villages that seemed to lie directly in his path. He avoided the railroads also, and these were used every day to convey the militia and other troops parallel to his route, to hedge him in and finally to stop him. His absence was mischievous to Bragg, who was retreating upon Chattanooga and to whom the division would have been a most welcome reinforcement. He did not delay Burnside, for the latter was awaiting the return of the Ninth Corps from Vicksburg, and this did not begin to arrive till long after the raid was over. None of the National army's communications were interrupted, and not a soldier under Rosecrans lost a ration by reason of the pretentious expedition. It ended in a scene that was ridiculous in the extreme. Morgan had pressed into his service as guides, on the last day of his flight, two men who were not even officers of the local militia, but who were acting as volunteer homeguards to protect their neighborhood. When he finally despaired of escape, he begged his captive guides to change their role into commanders of an imaginary army and to accept his surrender upon merciful and favorable terms to the vanquished! He afterward claimed the right to immediate liberation on parole, under the conditions of this burlesque capitulation. Shackelford and his rough riders would accept no surrender but an unconditional one as prisoners of war, and were sustained in this by their superiors. The distance by the river between the crossing at Brandenburg and the ferry above Steubenville near which Morgan finally surrendered, was some six hundred miles. This added to the march from Tennessee through Kentucky would make the whole ride nearly a thousand miles long. Its importance, however, except as a subject for an entertaining story, was in an inverse ratio to its length. Its chief interest to the student of military history is in its bearing on the question of the rational use of cavalry in an army, and the wasteful folly of expeditions which have no definite and tangible military object. [Footnote: For Official Records and correspondence concerning the raid, see Burnside's report (Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. i. pp.13, 14) and the miscellaneous documents (Id., pp.632-818).]



CHAPTER XXV

THE LIBERATION OF EAST TENNESSEE

News of Grant's victory at Vicksburg—A thrilling scene at the opera—Burnside's Ninth Corps to return—Stanton urges Rosecrans to advance—The Tullahoma manoeuvres—Testy correspondence—Its real meaning—Urgency with Burnside—Ignorance concerning his situation—His disappointment as to Ninth Corps—Rapid concentration of other troops—Burnside's march into East Tennessee—Occupation of Knoxville—Invests Cumberland Gap—The garrison surrenders—Good news from Rosecrans—Distances between armies—Divergent lines—No railway communication—Burnside concentrates toward the Virginia line—Joy of the people—Their intense loyalty—Their faith in the future.

During the Morgan Raid and whilst we in Ohio were absorbed in the excitement of it, events were moving elsewhere. Lee had advanced from Virginia through Maryland into Pennsylvania and had been defeated at Gettysburg by the National army under Meade. Grant had brought the siege of Vicksburg to a glorious conclusion and had received the surrender of Pemberton with his army of 30,000 Confederates. These victories, coming together as they did and on the 4th of July, made the national anniversary seem more than ever a day of rejoicing and of hope to the whole people. We did not get the news of Grant's victory quite so soon as that of Meade's, but it came to us at Cincinnati in a way to excite peculiar enthusiasm.

An excellent operatic company was giving a series of performances in the city, and all Cincinnati was at Pike's Opera House listening to I Puritani on the evening of the 7th of July. General Burnside and his wife had one of the proscenium boxes, and my wife and I were their guests. The second act had just closed with the famous trumpet song, in which Susini, the great basso of the day, had created a furore. A messenger entered the box where the general was surrounded by a brilliant company, and gave him a dispatch which announced the surrender of Vicksburg and Pemberton's army. Burnside, overjoyed, announced the great news to us who were near him, and then stepped to the front of the box to make the whole audience sharers in the pleasure. As soon as he was seen with the paper in his hand, the house was hushed, and his voice rang through it as he proclaimed the great victory and declared it a long stride toward the restoration of the Union. The people went almost wild with excitement, the men shouted hurrahs, the ladies waved their handkerchiefs and clapped their hands, all rising to their feet. The cheering was long as well as loud, and before it subsided the excitement reached behind the stage. The curtain rose again, and Susini came forward with a national flag in each hand, waving them enthusiastically whilst his magnificent voice resounded in a repetition of the song he had just sung, and which seemed as appropriate as if it were inspired for the occasion,—

"Suoni la tromba, e intrepido Io pugnero da forte, Bello e affrontar la morte, Gridando liberta!"

The rejoicing and the cheers were repeated to the echo, and when at last they subsided, the rest of the opera was only half listened to, suppressed excitement filling every heart and the thought of the great results to flow from the victories absorbing every mind.

Burnside reckoned with entire certainty on the immediate return of the Ninth Corps, and planned to resume his expedition into East Tennessee as soon as his old troops should reach him again. The Morgan raid was just beginning, and no one anticipated its final scope. In the dispatch from the Secretary of War which announced Grant's great victory, Burnside was also told that the corps would immediately return to him. In answering it on the 8th July, he said, "I thought I was very happy at the success of General Grant and General Meade, but I am still happier to hear of the speedy return of the Ninth Corps." He informed Rosecrans of it on the same day, adding, "I hope soon to be at work again." [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. ii. pp.522, 524.]

The Washington authorities very naturally and very properly wished that the tide of success should be kept moving, and Secretary Stanton had exhorted Rosecrans to further activity by saying, on the 7th, "You and your noble army now have the chance to give the finishing blow to the rebellion. [Footnote: Id., p.518.] Will you neglect the chance?" Rosecrans replied: "You do not appear to observe the fact that this noble army has driven the rebels from middle Tennessee, of which my dispatches advised you. I beg in behalf of this army that the War Department may not overlook so great an event because it is not written in letters of blood." He, however, did not intimate any purpose of advancing. No doubt the manoeuvering of Bragg out of his fortified positions at Shelbyville and Tullahoma had been well done; but its chief value was that it forced Bragg to meet the Army of the Cumberland in the open field if the advantage should be promptly followed up. If he were allowed to fortify another position, nothing would be gained but the ground the army stood on. Had Rosecrans given any intimation of an early date at which he could rebuild the Elk River bridge and resume active operations, it would probably have relieved the strain so noticeable in the correspondence between him and the War Department. He did nothing of the kind, and the necessity of removing him from the command was a matter of every-day discussion at Washington, as is evident from the confidential letters Halleck sent to him. The correspondence between the General-in-Chief and his subordinate is a curious one. A number of the most urgent dispatches representing the dissatisfaction of the President and the Secretary were accompanied by private and confidential letters in which Halleck explains the situation and strongly asserts his friendship for Rosecrans and the error of the latter in assuming that personal hostility to himself was at bottom of the reprimands sent him on account of his delays. It was with good intentions that Halleck wrote thus, but the wisdom of it is very questionable. It gave Rosecrans ground to assume that the official dispatches were only the formal expression of the ideas of the President and Secretary whilst the General-in-Chief did not join in the condemnation of his dilatory mode of conducting the campaign. To say to Rosecrans, as Halleck did on July 24th, "Whether well founded or without any foundation, the dissatisfaction really exists, and I deem it my duty as a friend to represent it to you truly and fairly," [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. ii. pp. 552, 555, 601.] is to neglect his duty as commander of the whole army to express his own judgment and to give orders which would have the weight of his military position and presumed knowledge in military matters. When, therefore, a few days later he gave peremptory orders to begin an active advance, these orders were interpreted in the light of the preceding correspondence, and lost their force and vigor. They were met by querulous and insubordinate inquiries whether they were intended to take away all discretion as to details from the commander of an army in the field. [Footnote: Aug. 4, Id., p. 592.] It has been argued that Rosecrans's weakness of character consisted in a disposition to quarrel with those in power over him, and that a spirit of contradiction thwarted the good military conduct which his natural energy might have produced. I cannot help reading his controversial correspondence in the light of my personal observation of the man, and my conviction is that his quarrelsome mode of dealing with the War Department was the result of a real weakness of will and purpose which did not take naturally to an aggressive campaign that involved great responsibilities and risks. Being really indecisive in fixing his plan of campaign and acting upon it, his infirmity of will was covered by a belligerence in his correspondence. A really enterprising commander in the field would have begun an active campaign in the spring before any dissatisfaction was exhibited at Washington; and if he had a decided purpose to advance at any reasonably early period, there was nothing in the urgency shown by his superiors to make him abandon his purpose. He might have made testy comments, but he would have acted.

Halleck's correspondence with Burnside in July is hard to understand, unless we assume that it was so perfunctory that he did not remember at one time what he said or did earlier. In a dispatch to the General-in-Chief dated the 11th, Rosecrans had said, "It is important to know if it will be practicable for Burnside to come in on our left flank and hold the line of the Cumberland; if not, a line in advance of it and east of us." [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. ii. p. 529.] It was already understood between Rosecrans and Burnside that the latter would do this and more as soon as he should have the Ninth Corps with him; and the dispatch must be regarded as a variation on the form of excuses for inaction, by suggesting that he was delayed by the lack of an understanding as to co-operation by the Army of the Ohio. On receipt of Rosecrans's dispatch, Halleck answered it on the 13th, saying, "General Burnside has been frequently urged to move forward and cover your left by entering East Tennessee. I do not know what he is doing. He seems tied fast to Cincinnati." On the same day he telegraphed Burnside, "I must again urge upon you the importance of moving forward into East Tennessee, to cover Rosecrans's left." [Footnote: Id., p. 531.] It is possible that Burnside's telegraphic correspondence with the Secretary of War was not known to Halleck, but it is hard to believe that the latter was ignorant of the proportions the Morgan raid had taken after the enemy had crossed the Ohio River. The 13th of July was the day that Morgan marched from Indiana into Ohio and came within thirteen miles of Cincinnati. Burnside was organizing all the militia of southern Ohio, and was concentrating two divisions of the Twenty-third Corps to catch the raiders. One of these was on a fleet of steamboats which reached Cincinnati that day, and the other, under Hobson, was in close pursuit of the enemy. Where should Burnside have been, if not at Cincinnati? If the raid had been left to the "militia and home guards," as Halleck afterward said all petty raids should be, this, which was not a petty raid, would pretty certainly have had results which would have produced more discomfort at Washington than the idea that Burnside was "tied fast to Cincinnati." Burnside was exactly where he ought to be, and doing admirable work which resulted in the capture of the division of 3000 rebel cavalry with its officers from the general in command downward. That the General-in-Chief was entirely ignorant of what was going on, when every intelligent citizen of the country was excited over it and every newspaper was full of it, reflects far more severely upon him than upon Burnside.

But this was by no means the whole. He forgot that when he stopped Burnside's movement on 3d June to send the Ninth Corps to Grant, it was with the distinct understanding that it prevented its resumption till the corps should return. He had himself said that this should be as early as possible, and meanwhile directed Burnside to concentrate his remaining forces as much as he could. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. ii. p.384.] Burnside had been told on the 8th of July, without inquiry from him, that the corps was coming back to him, and had immediately begun his preparation to resume an active campaign as soon as it should reach him. Not hearing of its being on the way, on the 18th he asked Halleck if orders for its return had been given. To this dispatch no answer was given, and it was probably pigeonholed and forgotten. Burnside continued his campaign against Morgan, and on the 24th, when the last combinations near Steubenville were closing the career of the raider, Halleck again telegraphs that there must be no further delay in the movement into East Tennessee, [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. ii. p.553.] and orders an immediate report of the position and number of Burnside's troops organized for that purpose! He was still ignorant, apparently, that there had been any occasion to withdraw the troops in Kentucky from the positions near the Cumberland River.

Burnside answered temperately, reciting the facts and reminding him of the actual state of orders and correspondence, adding only, "I should be glad to be more definitely instructed, if you think the work can be better done." Morgan's surrender was on the 26th, and Burnside immediately applied himself with earnest zeal to get his forces back into Kentucky. Judah's division at Buffington was three hundred miles from Cincinnati and five hundred from the place it had left to begin the chase. Shackelford's mounted force was two hundred miles further up the Ohio. This last was, as has been recited, made up of detachments from all the divisions of the Twenty-third Corps, and its four weeks of constant hard riding had used up men and horses. These all had to be got back to the southern part of central Kentucky and refitted, returned to their proper divisions, and prepared for a new campaign. The General-in-Chief does not seem to have had the slightest knowledge of these circumstances or conditions.

On the 28th another Confederate raid developed itself in southern Kentucky, under General Scott. It seemed to be intended as a diversion to aid Morgan to escape from Ohio, but failed to accomplish anything. Scott advanced rapidly from the south with his brigade, crossing the Cumberland at Williamsburg and moving through London upon Richmond. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. ii. p. 568.] Colonel Sanders endeavored to stop the enemy at Richmond with about 500 men hastily collected, but was driven back. He was ordered to Lexington and put in command of all the mounted men which could be got together there, 2400 in all, and advanced against Scott, who now retreated by Lancaster, Stanford, and Somerset. At Lancaster the enemy was routed in a charge and 200 of them captured. Following them up with vigor, their train was destroyed and about 500 more prisoners were taken. At the Cumberland River Sanders halted, having been without rations for four days. The remnant of Scott's force had succeeded in crossing the river after abandoning the train. Scott claimed to have taken and paroled about 200 prisoners in the first part of his raid, but such irregular paroles of captured men who could not be carried off were unauthorized and void. The actual casualties in Sanders's command were trifling. [Footnote: Id., pt. i. pp. 828-843; pt. ii. pp. 568, 589.]

The effect of this last raid was still further to wear out Burnside's mounted troops, but he pressed forward to the front all his infantry and organized a column for advance. In less than a week, on August 4, he was able to announce to the War Department that he had 11,000 men concentrated at Lebanon, Stanford, and Glasgow, with outposts on the Cumberland River, and that he could possibly increase this to 12,000 by reducing some posts in guard of the railway. [Footnote: Id., p. 591.] Upon this, Halleck gave to Rosecrans peremptory orders for the immediate advance of the Army of the Cumberland, directing him also to report daily the movement of each corps till he should cross the Tennessee. On the next day Burnside was ordered in like manner to advance with a column of 12,000 men upon Knoxville, on reaching which place he was to endeavor to connect with the forces under Rosecrans. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. ii. pp.592-593.] The dispatch closed with what was called a repetition of a former order from the Secretary of War for Burnside to leave Cincinnati and take command of his moving column in person. Burnside had never dreamed of doing anything else, as everybody near him knew, though he had in fact been quite ill during the latter part of July. The mention of a former order was another sheer blunder on General Halleck's part, and Burnside indignantly protested against the imputation contained in it. [Footnote: Id., pp.593, 594.] The truth seems to be that Halleck was in such a condition of irritation over his correspondence with Rosecrans, that nothing pertaining to the Department of the Ohio was accurately placed in his mind or accurately stated when he had occasion to refer to it. In cutting the knot by peremptory orders to both armies to move, he was right, and was justified in insisting that the little column of 12,000 under Burnside should start although it could only be got together in greatest haste and with the lack of equipment occasioned by the "wear and tear" of the operations against Morgan. If, in insisting on this, he had recognized the facts and given Burnside and his troops credit for the capture of the rebel raiders and the concentration, in a week, of forces scattered over a distance of nearly a thousand miles, no one would have had a right to criticise him. The exigency fairly justified it. But to treat Burnside as if he had been only enjoying himself in Cincinnati, and his troops all quietly in camp along the Cumberland River through the whole summer,—to ignore the absence of the Ninth Corps and his own suspension of a movement already begun when he took it away,—to assume in almost every particular a basis of fact absolutely contrary to the reality and to telegraph censures for what had been done, under his own orders or strictly in harmony with them,—all this was doing a right thing in as absurdly wrong a way as was possible. A gleam of humor and the light of common sense is thrown over one incident, when Mr. Lincoln, seeing that Burnside had full right from the dispatches to suppose the Ninth Corps was to come at once to him from Vicksburg and that no one had given him any explanation, himself telegraphed that the information had been based on a statement from General Grant, who had not informed them why the troops had not been sent. "General Grant," the President quaintly added, "is a copious worker and fighter, but a very meagre writer or telegrapher. No doubt he changed his purpose for some sufficient reason, but has forgotten to notify us of it." [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. ii. p. 561.] The reference to copious work as contrasted with the copia verborum gains added point from a dispatch of Halleck to Rosecrans, quite early in the season, in which the latter is told that the cost of his telegraph dispatches is "as much or perhaps more than that of all the other generals in the field." [Footnote: Id., p. 255.] The form of the reference to Grant enables us also to read between the lines the progress he was making in reputation and in the President's confidence. He kept "pegging away," and was putting brains as well as energy into his work. The records show also that Burnside took the hint, whether intended or not, and in this campaign did not err on the side of copiousness in dispatches to Washington.

To avoid the delay which would be caused by the distribution of his mounted force to the divisions they had originally been attached to, Burnside organized these into a division under Brigadier-General S. P. Carter, and an independent brigade under Colonel F. Wolford. He also reorganized the infantry divisions of the Twenty-third Corps. The first division, under Brigadier-General J. T. Boyle, was to remain in Kentucky and protect the lines of communication. The second was put under command of Brigadier-General M. D. Manson, and the third under Brigadier-General M. S. Hascall. Each marching division was organized into two brigades with a battery of artillery attached to each brigade. Three batteries of artillery were in reserve. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. ii. pp. 553-555.]

On the 11th of August General Burnside went to Hickman's Bridge, and the forward movement was begun. [Footnote: Id., pt. iii. p. 16. Hickman's Bridge, as has already been mentioned, was at the terminus of the Central Kentucky Railroad. There, on the bank of the Kentucky River, Burnside made a fortified depot from which his wagon trains should start as a base for the supply system of his army in East Tennessee. It was called Camp Nelson in honor of the dead Kentucky general.] At this date the Confederate forces in East Tennessee under General Buckner numbered 14,733 "present for duty," with an "aggregate present" of 2000 or 3000 more. Conscious that the column of 12,000 which Halleck had directed him to start with was less than the hostile forces in the Holston valley, Burnside reduced to the utmost the garrisons and posts left behind him. Fortunately the advanced division of the Ninth Corps returning from Vicksburg reached Cincinnati on the 12th, and although the troops were wholly unfit for active service by reason of malarial diseases contracted on the "Yazoo," they could relieve some of the Kentucky garrisons, and Burnside was thus enabled to increase his moving column to about 15,000 men. The earlier stages of the advance were slow, as the columns were brought into position to take up their separate lines of march and organize their supply trains for the road. On the 20th Hanson's division was at Columbia, Hascall's was at Stanford, Carter's cavalry division was at Crab Orchard, and independent brigades of cavalry under Colonels Wolford and Graham were at Somerset and Glasgow. [Footnote: Id., pt. ii. p. 548.] On that day orders were issued for the continuous march. General Julius White relieved Manson in command of the second division, and the two infantry divisions were to move on Montgomery, Tenn., Hascall's by way of Somerset, Chitwoods, and Huntsville, and White's by way of Creelsboro, Albany, and Jamestown. Carter's cavalry, which covered the extreme left flank, marched through Mt. Vernon and London to Williamsburg, where it forded the Cumberland, thence over the Jellico Mountains to Chitwoods where it became the advance of Hascall's column to Montgomery. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. ii. p. 548.] At this point the columns were united and all moved together through Emory Gap upon Kingston. Burnside accompanied the cavalry in person, and sent two detachments, one to go by way of Big Creek Gap to make a demonstration on Knoxville, and the other through Winter's Gap for the same purpose of misleading the enemy as to his line of principal movement.



Nothing could be more systematic and vigorous than the march of Burnside's columns. [Footnote: Id., p. 569.] They made from fifteen to twenty or twenty-five miles a day with the regularity of clock-work, though the route in many parts of it was most difficult. There were mountains to climb and narrow gorges to thread. Streams were to be forded, roads were to be repaired and in places to be made anew. On the 1st of September Burnside occupied Kingston, having passed through Emory Gap into East Tennessee and communicated with Crittenden's corps of Rosecrans's army. [Footnote: Itinerary, Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. ii. pp. 576-578.] Here he learned that upon the development of the joint plan of campaign of the National commanders, Bragg had withdrawn Buckner's forces south of the Tennessee at Loudon, there making them the right flank of his army about Chattanooga. There was, however, one exception in Buckner's order to withdraw. Brigadier-General John W. Frazer was left at Cumberland Gap with 2500 men, and though Buckner had on August 30th ordered him to destroy his material and retreat into Virginia, joining the command of Major-General Samuel Jones, this order was withdrawn on Frazer's representation of his ability to hold the place and that he had rations for forty days. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. ii. p. 608.] There being therefore no troops in East Tennessee to oppose its occupation, Burnside's advance-guard entered Knoxville on the 3d of September. Part of the Twenty-third Corps had been sent toward London on the 2d, and upon their approach the enemy burned the great railroad bridge at that place. A light-draught steamboat was building at Kingston, and this was captured and preserved. [Footnote: Id., pt. iii. p. 333.] It played a useful part subsequently in the transportation of supplies when the wagon-trains were broken down and the troops were reduced nearly to starvation. No sooner was Burnside in Knoxville than he put portions of his army in motion for Cumberland Gap, sixty miles northward. He had already put Colonel John F. DeCourcey (Sixteenth Ohio Infantry) in command of new troops arriving in Kentucky, and ordered him to advance against the fortifications of the gap on the north side. General Shackelford was sent with his cavalry from Knoxville, but when Burnside learned that DeCourcey and he were not strong enough to take the place, he left Knoxville in person with Colonel Samuel Gilbert's brigade of infantry and made the sixty-mile march in fifty-two hours. Frazer had refused to surrender on the summons of the subordinates; but when Burnside arrived and made the demand in person, he despaired of holding out and on the 9th of September surrendered the garrison. A considerable number got away by scattering after the flag was hauled down, but 2,205 men laid down their arms, and twelve pieces of cannon were also among the spoils. [Footnote: Id., pt. ii. pp. 548, 599, 604, 611.] DeCourcey's troops were left to garrison the fortifications, and the rest were sent to occupy the upper valley of the Holston toward the Virginia line.

On the 10th, and while still at Cumberland Gap, Burnside received a dispatch from General Crittenden with the news that he was in possession of Chattanooga, that Bragg had retreated toward Rome, Ga., and that Rosecrans hoped with his centre and right to intercept the enemy at Rome, which was sixty miles south of Chattanooga. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. iii. p. 523.] Everything was therefore most promising on the south, and Burnside had only to provide for driving back the Confederates under Jones, at the Virginia line, a hundred and thirty miles northeast of Knoxville. It becomes important here to estimate these distances rightly. Knoxville is a hundred and eleven miles distant from Chattanooga by the railroad, and more by the country roads. From Bristol on the northeast to Chattanooga on the southwest is two hundred and forty-two miles, which measures the length of that part of the Holston and Tennessee valley known as East Tennessee. If Rosecrans were at Rome, as General Crittenden's dispatch indicated, he was more than a hundred and seventy miles distant from Knoxville, and nearly three hundred miles from the region about Greeneville and the Watauga River, whose crossing would be the natural frontier of the upper valley, if Burnside should not be able to extend his occupation quite to the Virginia line. It will be seen therefore that the progress of the campaign had necessarily made Rosecrans's and Burnside's lines of operation widely divergent, and they were far beyond supporting distance of each other, since there was no railway communication between them, and could not be for a long time. Burnside captured some locomotives and cars at Knoxville; but bridges had been destroyed to such an extent that these were of little use to him, for the road could be operated but a short distance in either direction and the amount of rolling stock was, at most, very little. Complete success for Rosecrans, with the reopening and repair of the whole line from Nashville through Chattanooga, including the rebuilding of the great bridge at London, were the essential conditions of further co-operation between the two armies, and of the permanent existence of Burnside's in East Tennessee.

Efforts had been made to extend the lines of telegraph as Burnside advanced, [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. ii. p. 574; pt. iii. p. 717.] but it took some time to do this, and even when the wires were up there occurred a difficulty in making the electric circuit, so that through all the critical part of the Chickamauga campaign, Burnside had to communicate by means of so long a line of couriers that three days was the actual time of transmittal of dispatches between himself and Washington. [Footnote: Id., pt. iii. p. 718.] The news from Rosecrans on the 10th was so reassuring that Burnside's plain duty was to apply himself to clearing the upper valley of the enemy, and then to further the great object of his expedition by giving the loyal inhabitants the means of self-government, and encouraging them to organize and arm themselves with the weapons which his wagon trains were already bringing from Kentucky. He had also to provide for his supplies, and must use the good weather of the early autumn to the utmost, for the long roads over the mountains would be practically impassable in winter. The route from Kentucky by way of Cumberland Gap was the shortest, and, on the whole, the easiest, and a great system of transportation by trains under escort was put in operation. The camp at Cumberland Gap could give this protection through the mountain district, and made a convenient stopping-place in the weary way when teams broke down or had to be replaced. Other roads were also used whilst they seemed to be safe, and the energies and resources of the quartermaster's department were strained to the utmost to bring forward arms, ammunition for cannon and muskets, food and medical supplies, and all the munitions of war. The roads were covered with herds of beeves and swine, and feeding stations for these were established and the forage had to be drawn to them, for nothing could be got, along the greater part of the route. Burnside hoped that the railway by Chattanooga would be put in repair and be open before winter should shut in, but he very prudently acted on the principle of making the most of his present means. It was well he did so, for otherwise his little army would have been starved before the winter was half over.

From Cumberland Gap the courier line was sixty miles shorter than from Knoxville, and the first dispatches of Burnside announcing his capture of Frazer's troops reached Washington more quickly than later ones. At noon of the 11th Mr. Lincoln answered it with hearty congratulations and thanks. This was quickly followed by a congratulatory message from Halleck accompanied by formal orders. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. iii. p. 555.] These last only recapitulated the points in Burnside's further operations and administration which were the simplest deductions from the situation. Burnside was to hold the country eastward to the gaps of the North Carolina mountains (the Great Smokies) and the valley of the Holston up to the Virginia line. Halleck used the phrase "the line of the Holston," which would be absurd, and was probably only a slip of the pen. The exact strength of General Jones, the Confederate commander in southwestern Virginia, was not known, but, to preserve his preponderance, Burnside could not prudently send less than a division of infantry and a couple of brigades of cavalry to the vicinity of Rogersville or Greeneville and the railroad crossing of the Watauga. This would be just about half his available force. The other division was at first divided, one of the two brigades being centrally placed at Knoxville, and the other at Sevierville, thirty miles up the French Broad River, where it covered the principal pass over the Smokies to Asheville, N. C. The rest of his cavalry was at London and Kingston, where it covered the north side of the Tennessee River and communicated with Rosecrans's outposts above Chattanooga.

Halleck further informed Burnside that the Secretary of War directed him to raise all the volunteers he could in East Tennessee and to select officers for them. If he had not already enough arms and equipments he could order them by telegraph. As to Rosecrans, the General-in-Chief stated that he would occupy Dalton or some other point south of Chattanooga, closing the enemy's line from Atlanta, and when this was done, the question would be settled whether the whole would move eastward into Virginia or southward into Georgia and Alabama. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. iii. p. 555.] Burnside's present work being thus cut out for him, he set himself about it with the cordial earnestness which marked his character. He had suggested the propriety of his retiring as soon as the surrender of Frazer had made his occupation of East Tennessee an assured success, but he had not formally asked to be relieved. [Footnote: Id., p. 523.] His reasons for doing so dated back to the Fredericksburg campaign, in part; for he had believed that his alternative then presented to the government, that he should be allowed to dismiss insubordinate generals or should himself resign, ought to have been accepted. His case had some resemblance to Pope's when the administration approved his conduct and his courage but retired him and restored McClellan to command, in deference to the supposed sentiment of the Army of the Potomac. Halleck's persistent ignoring of the officially recorded causes of the delay in this campaign, and his assumption that the Morgan raid was not an incident of any importance in Burnside's responsibilities, had not tended to diminish the latter's sense of discomfort in dealing with army head-quarters. A debilitating illness gave some added force to his other reasons, which, however, we who knew him well understood to be the decisive ones with him. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. iii. p. 523; vol. xxxi. pt. i. p. 757.] Mr. Lincoln's sincere friendship and confidence he never doubted, but his nature could not fully appreciate the President's policy of bending to existing circumstances when current opinion was contrary to his own, so that he might save his strength for more critical action at another time. Burnside had now the eclat of success in a campaign which was very near the heart of the President and full of interest for the Northern people. This, he felt, was a time when he could retire with honor. Mr. Lincoln postponed action in the kindest and most complimentary words, [Footnote: Id., vol. xxx. pt. iii. p. 554. "Yours received. A thousand thanks for the late successes you have given us. We cannot allow you to resign until things shall be a little more settled in East Tennessee. If then, purely on your own account you wish to resign, we will not further refuse you."] and when he finally assigned another to command the department, did not allow Burnside to resign, but laid out other work for him where his patriotism and his courage could be of use to the country.

The advent of the army into East Tennessee was, to its loyal people, a resurrection from the grave. Their joy had an exultation which seemed almost beyond the power of expression. Old men fell down fainting and unconscious under the stress of their emotions as they saw the flag at the head of the column and tried to cheer it! Women wept with happiness as their husbands stepped out of the ranks of the loyal Tennessee regiments when these came marching by the home. [Footnote: Temple's East Tennessee and the Civil War, pp. 476, 478. Humes's The Loyal Mountaineers, pp. 211, 218.] These men had gathered in little recruiting camps on the mountain-sides and had found their way to Kentucky, travelling by night and guided by the pole-star, as the dark-skinned fugitives from bondage had used to make their way to freedom. Their families had been marked as traitors to the Confederacy, and had suffered sharpest privations and cruel wrong on account of the absence of the husband and father, the brother, or the son. Now it was all over, and a jubilee began in those picturesque valleys in the mountains, which none can understand who had not seen the former despair and the present revulsion of happiness. The mountain coves and nooks far up toward the Virginia line had been among the most intense in loyalty to the nation. Andrew Johnson's home was at Greeneville, and he was now the loyal provisional governor of Tennessee, soon to be nominated Vice-President of the United States. General Carter, who had asked to be transferred from the navy to organize the refugee loyalists into regiments, was a native of the same region. It was at the Watauga that the neighboring opponents of secession had given the first example of daring self-sacrifice in burning the railway bridge. For this they were hanged, and their memory was revered by the loyal men about them, as was Nathan Hale's by our revolutionary fathers. East Tennessee was full of such loyalty, but here were good reasons why Burnside should push his advance at least to the Watauga, and if possible to the Virginia line. His sympathies were all alive for this people. The region, he telegraphed the President, is as loyal as any State of the North. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. iii. p. 523.] It threw off all disguise, it blossomed with National flags, it took no counsel of prudence, it refused to think of a return of Confederate soldiers and Confederate rule as a possibility. It exulted in every form of defiance to the Richmond government and what had been called treason to the Confederate States. The people had a religious faith that God would not abandon them or suffer them to be again abandoned. If such an incredible wrong were to happen, they must either leave their country in mass, or they must be ready to die. They could see no other alternative.



CHAPTER XXVI

BURNSIDE IN EAST TENNESSEE

Organizing and arming the loyalists—Burnside concentrates near Greeneville—His general plan—Rumors of Confederate reinforcements—Lack of accurate information—The Ninth Corps in Kentucky—Its depletion by malarial disease—Death of General Welsh from this cause—Preparing for further work—Situation on 16th September—Dispatch from Halleck—Its apparent purpose—Necessity to dispose of the enemy near Virginia border—Burnside personally at the front—His great activity—Ignorance of Rosecrans's peril—Impossibility of joining him by the 20th—Ruinous effects of abandoning East Tennessee—Efforts to aid Rosecrans without such abandonment—Enemy duped into burning Watauga bridge themselves—Ninth Corps arriving—Willcox's division garrisons Cumberland Gap—Reinforcements sent Rosecrans from all quarters—Chattanooga made safe from attack—The supply question—Meigs's description of the roads—Burnside halted near Loudon—Halleck's misconception of the geography—The people imploring the President not to remove the troops—How Longstreet got away from Virginia—Burnside's alternate plans—Minor operations in upper Holston valley—Wolford's affair on the lower Holston.

For a week after the capture of Cumberland Gap Burnside devoted himself to the pleasing task of organizing the native loyalists into a National Guard for home defence, issuing arms to them upon condition that they should, as a local militia, respond to his call and reinforce for temporary work his regular forces whenever the need should arise. The detailed reports from the upper valley reported the enemy under Jones at first to be 4000, and later to be 6000 strong. These estimates came through cool-headed and prudent officers, and were based upon information brought in by loyal men who had proven singularly accurate in their knowledge throughout the campaign. Point was added to these reports by the experience of one of his regiments. A detachment of 300 men of the One Hundredth Ohio had been sent to support a cavalry reconnoissance near Limestone Station on the railroad, whilst Burnside was investing Cumberland Gap, and these had been surrounded and forced to surrender by the enemy. This showed the presence of a considerable body of Confederates in the upper valley, and that they were bold and aggressive. It was the part of prudence to act upon this information, and Burnside ordered all his infantry except one brigade to march toward Greeneville. Two brigades of cavalry were already there, and his purpose was to concentrate about 6000 infantry, try to obtain a decisive engagement with the Confederates, and to punish them so severely that the upper valley would be safe, for a time at least, from invasion by them, so that he might be free to withdraw most of his troops to co-operate with Rosecrans in a Georgia campaign, if that alternative in Halleck's plans should be adopted. He felt the importance of this the more, as the news received from Virginia mentioned the movement of railway rolling-stock to the East to bring, as rumor had it, Ewell's corps from Lee to reinforce Jones. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. iii. pp. 661, 717.] The sending of the railway trains was a fact, but the object, as it turned out, was to transport Longstreet's corps to reinforce Bragg. [Footnote: Id., p. 731.] Of this, however, Burnside had no intimation, and must act upon the information which came to him.

The Ninth Corps began to arrive at Cincinnati from Vicksburg on the 12th of August, half of it coming then, and the second division arriving on the 20th. It was reduced to 6000 by casualties and by sickness, and was in a pitiable condition. Being made up of troops which had served in the East, the men were not acclimated to the Mississippi valley, and in the bayous and marshes about Vicksburg had suffered greatly. Malarial fevers ate out their vitality, and even those who reported for duty dragged themselves about, the mere shadows of what they had been. General Parke reported their arrival and was then obliged to go upon sick-leave himself. General Welsh, who had distinguished himself at Antietam, reported that his division must recuperate for a few weeks before it could take the field. He made a heroic effort to remain on duty, but died suddenly on the 14th, and his loss was deeply felt by the corps. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. iii. p. 45.] Potter's division was as badly off as Welsh's, and both were for a short time scattered at healthful camps in the Kentucky hills. Each camp was, at first, a hospital; but the change of climate and diet rapidly restored the tone of the hardy soldiery.

General Willcox, who commanded the Indiana district, belonged to the corps, and asked to be returned to duty with it. He was allowed to do so on the 11th of September, and the War Department sent with him a new division of Indiana troops which had been recruited and organized during the summer. Burnside had ordered recruits and new regiments to rendezvous in Kentucky, and prepared to bring them as well as the Ninth Corps forward as soon as the latter should be fit to march. Every camp and station at the rear was full of busy preparation during the last of August and the beginning of September, and at the front the general himself was now concentrating his little forces to strike a blow near the Virginia line which would make him free to move afterward in any direction the General-in-Chief should determine.

On the 16th of September Hascall's division was echeloned along the road from Morristown back toward Knoxville; White's division passed Knoxville, moving up the valley to join Hascall. Hartsuff, who commanded the Twenty-third Corps, had been disabled for field work by trouble from his old wounds and was at Knoxville. Burnside was also there, intending to go rapidly forward and overtake his infantry as soon as they should approach Greeneville. In the night the courier brought him a dispatch from Halleck, [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. iii. p. 617.] dated the 13th, directing a rapid movement of all his forces in Kentucky toward East Tennessee, where the whole Army of the Ohio was to be concentrated as soon as possible. [Footnote: Id., pt. ii. p. 550.] He also directed Burnside to move his infantry toward Chattanooga, giving as a reason that Bragg might manoeuvre to turn Rosecrans's right, and in that case Rosecrans would want to hand Chattanooga over to Burnside so that he himself could move the whole Army of the Cumberland to meet Bragg.

There was nothing in this dispatch which intimated that Rosecrans was in any danger, nor was Burnside informed that Bragg had been reinforced by Longstreet's corps. On the other hand, his information looked to Ewell's joining Jones against himself. The object Halleck had in view seemed to be to get the Ninth Corps and other troops now in Kentucky into East Tennessee as rapidly as possible, and then to move the whole Army of the Ohio down toward Rosecrans. It certainly could not be that he wished Cumberland Gap abandoned, and the trains and detachments coming through it from Kentucky left to the tender mercies of Jones and his Confederates, who could capture them at their leisure and without a blow. It was equally incredible that the government could wish to stop the organization of the loyalists just as weapons were being distributed to them, and to abandon them to the enemy when their recent open demonstrations in favor of the Union would make their condition infinitely worse than if our troops had never come to them. The rational interpretation, and the one Burnside gave it, was that the alternative which had been stated in the earlier dispatch of the 11th had been settled in favor of a general movement southward instead of eastward, and that this made it all the more imperative that he should disembarrass himself of General Jones and establish a line on the upper Holston which a small force could hold, whilst he with the rest of the two corps should move southward as soon as the Ninth Corps could make the march from Kentucky. This was exactly what General Schofield did in the next spring when he was ordered to join Sherman with the Army of the Ohio; and I do not hesitate to say that it was the only thing which an intelligent military man on the ground and knowing the topography would think of doing. To make a panicky abandonment of the country and of the trains and detachments en route to it, would have been hardly less disgraceful than a surrender of the whole. To Burnside's honor and credit it should be recorded that he did not dream of doing it. He strained every nerve to hasten the movement of his troops so as to get through with his little campaign against Jones by the time the Ninth Corps could come from Kentucky, and if he could accomplish it within that limit, he would have the right to challenge the judgment of every competent critic, whether he had not done that which became a good soldier and a good general.

On the 17th of September the concentration of Burnside's infantry toward Greeneville had so far progressed that he was preparing to go personally to the front and lead them against the enemy. It is noticeable in the whole campaign that he took this personal leadership and activity on himself. In Hartsuff's condition of health it would have been within the ordinary methods of action that the next in rank should assume command of the Twenty-third Corps, and that the department commander should remain at his headquarters at Knoxville. But Hartsuff was able to attend to office business, and so Burnside practically exchanged places with him, leaving his subordinate with discretion to direct affairs in the department at large, whilst he himself did the field work with his troops. He had done it at Cumberland Gap when he received the surrender of Frazer; he was doing it now, and he was to do it again, still later, when he met Longstreet's advance at the crossing of the Holston River.

In preparation for an absence of some days, he wrote, on the date last mentioned, a long dispatch to General Halleck, in the nature of a report of the state of affairs at that date. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. iii. p. 717.] He explained the failure of the telegraph and the efforts that were making to get it in working order. He gave the situation of the troops and stated his purpose to attack the enemy. He noticed the report of Ewell's coming against him and promised stout resistance, finding satisfaction in the thought that it would give Meade the opportunity to strike a decisive blow against Lee's reduced army. He reported the condition of his trains and cattle droves on the road from Kentucky, and the contact of his cavalry in the south part of the valley with Rosecrans's outposts. The bridge over the Hiwassee at Calhoun, he said, could be finished in ten days, and the steamboat at Kingston would soon be completed and ready for use. All this promised better means of supply at an early day, though at present "twenty-odd cars" were all the means of moving men or supplies on the portion of the railroad within his control.

Later in the same day he received Halleck's dispatch of the 14th, which said it was believed the enemy would concentrate to give Rosecrans battle, and directed him to reinforce the latter with all possible speed. [Footnote: Burnside's dispatches of the 17th in answer to Halleck's seem to show that both those of 13th and 14th were received by him after he had written the long one in the morning. The internal evidence supports this idea, and his second dispatch on the 17th acknowledges the receipt of Halleck's two together. Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. iii. p. 718. In his official report, however, Burnside says the dispatch of 13th was received "on the night of the 16th" (Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. ii. p. 550), and I have followed this statement, although his report was not written till November, 1865, when lapse of time might easily give rise to an error in so trifling a detail. The matter is of no real consequence in the view I have taken of the situation.] Still, no information was given of the movement of Longstreet to join Bragg, and indeed it was only on the 15th that Halleck gave the news to Rosecrans as reliable. [Footnote: Official Records, xxx. pt. ii. p. 643.] Burnside must therefore regard the enemy concentrating in Georgia as only the same which Rosecrans had been peremptorily ordered to attack and which he had been supposed to be strong enough to cope with. No time was stated at which the battle in Georgia would probably occur. To hasten the work in hand, to put affairs at the Virginia line in condition to be left as soon as might be, and then to speed his forces toward Chattanooga to join in the Georgia campaign, was plainly Burnside's duty. If it would be too rash for Rosecrans to give battle without reinforcements, that officer was competent to manoeuvre his army in retreat and take a defensible position till his reinforcements could come. That course would be certainly much wiser than to abandon East Tennessee to the enemy, with all the consequences of such an act, quite as bad as the loss of a battle. As matters turned out, even such instantaneous and ruinous abandonment would not have helped Rosecrans. It was now the afternoon of the 17th of September. The battle of Chickamauga was to begin in the early morning of the 19th and to end disastrously on the 20th. One full day for the marching of troops was all that intervened, or two at most, if they were only to reach the field upon the second day of the battle. And where were Burnside's men? One division at Greeneville and above, more than two hundred miles from Chattanooga, and the other near New Market and Morristown, a hundred and fifty miles. Burnside's "twenty-odd cars" were confined to a section of the railroad less than eighty miles long, and could hardly carry the necessary baggage and ammunition even for that fraction of the way. The troops must march, and could not by any physical possibility make a quarter of the distance before Rosecrans's fate at Chickamauga should be decided. The authorities at Washington must bear the responsibility for complete ignorance of these conditions, or, what would be equally bad, a forgetfulness of them in a moment of panic.

But Burnside did not know and could not guess that a battle was to be fought so soon. All he could do was to prepare to carry out the wishes of the War Department as speedily as could be, without the total ruin of East Tennessee and all he had accomplished. Such ruin might come by the fate of war if he were driven out by superior force, but he would have been rightly condemned if it had come by his precipitate abandonment of the country. He did more to carry out Halleck's wish than was quite prudent. He stopped the troops which had not yet reached Greeneville and ordered a countermarch. He hastened up the country to make the attack upon the Confederates with the force he already had in their presence, and then to bring the infantry back at once, hoping the cavalry could hold in check a defeated enemy.

The necessity of delivering a blow at General Jones was afterwards criticised by Halleck, but it was in accordance with the sound rules of conducting war. To have called back his troops without a fight would have been to give the enemy double courage by his retreat, and his brigades would have been chased by the exulting foe. They would either have been forced to halt and fight their pursuers under every disadvantage of loss of prestige and of the initiative, or have made a precipitate flight which would have gone far to ruin the whole command as well as the Tennessee people they had just liberated. It is true that this involved an advance from Greeneville upon Jonesboro, but the cavalry were already in contact with the enemy near there, and this was the only successful mode of accomplishing his purpose. [Footnote: Messrs. Nicolay and Hay, in their "Life of Lincoln," give the draft of a letter to Burnside which Mr. Lincoln wrote but did not send, in which he expressed his surprise that Burnside should be moving toward Virginia when they at Washington were so anxious to have him in Georgia. Mr. Lincoln's judgments of military affairs were excellent when he was fully possessed of the facts; and I have elaborated somewhat my statement of the circumstances in East Tennessee, and of the distances, etc., to show how little they were known or understood in Washington. Nicolay and Hay's Lincoln, vol. viii. p. 166.]

Making use of the portion of the railroad which could be operated, Burnside reached Greeneville on the 18th and rode rapidly to Jonesboro. On the 19th a brigade of cavalry under Colonel Foster attacked the enemy at Bristol, defeated them, tore up the railroad, and destroyed the bridges two miles above the town. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. ii. p. 592.] Foster then returned to Blountsville, and marched on the next day to Hall's Ford on the Watauga, where, after a skirmishing fight lasting several hours, he again dislodged the enemy, capturing about fifty prisoners and a piece of artillery with slight loss to himself. These were flanking movements designed to distract the attention of the enemy whilst Burnside concentrated most of his force in front of their principal position at Carter's Station, where the most important of the railway bridges in that region crosses the Watauga. To impress his opponent with the belief that he meant to make an extended campaign, Burnside, on the 22d, notified Jones to remove the non-combatants from the villages of the upper valley. Foster's brigade of cavalry was again sent to demonstrate on the rear, whilst Burnside threatened in front with the infantry. The enemy now evacuated the position and retreated, first burning the bridge. This was what Burnside desired, and the means of resuming railway communication to support an advance toward Knoxville being taken from the Confederates for a considerable time, he was now able to put all his infantry except two regiments in march for Knoxville. A brigade of cavalry with this small infantry support at Bull's Gap was entrusted with the protection of this region, and by the help of the home guards of loyal men, was able to hold it during the operations of the next fortnight. Burnside's purpose had been, if he had not been interrupted, to have pressed the Confederates closely with a sufficient force in front to compel a retreat, whilst he intercepted them with the remainder of his army, moving by a shorter line from Blountsville. He made, however, the best of the situation, and having driven the enemy over the State line and disengaged his own troops, he was free to concentrate the greater part of them for operations at the other end of the valley.

The Ninth Corps was now beginning to arrive, and was ordered to rendezvous first at Knoxville. Willcox had assembled his division of new troops, mostly Indianans, and marched with them to Cumberland Gap, where he relieved the garrison of that post, and was himself entrusted by Burnside with the command of that portion of the department, covering the upper valleys of the Clinch and Holston as well as the lines of communication with Cincinnati and the Ohio River.

In the days immediately preceding the battle of Chickamauga, Halleck had urged reinforcements forward toward Rosecrans from all parts of the West. Pope in Minnesota, Schofield in Missouri, Hurlbut at Memphis, and Sherman at Vicksburg had all been called upon for help, and all had put bodies of troops in motion, though the distances were great and the effect was a little too much like the proverbial one of locking the stable door after the horse had been stolen. As there was no telegraphic communication with Burnside, the General-in-Chief gave orders through the adjutant-general's office in Cincinnati directly to the Ninth Corps and to the detachments of the Twenty-third Corps remaining or assembling in Kentucky, to march at once into East Tennessee. An advisory supervision of the department offices in Cincinnati had been left with me, and Captain Anderson, the assistant adjutant-general, issued orders in General Burnside's name after consultation with me. General Parke cut short his sick-leave, and, though far from strong, assumed command of the Ninth Corps and began the march for Cumberland Gap. The guards for the railways and necessary posts were reduced to the lowest limits of safety, and every available regiment was hurried to the front.

By the end of September Burnside's forces were pretty well concentrated between Knoxville and Loudon, the crossing of the Holston River. It had now been learned that Bragg's army had suffered even more than Rosecrans's in the battle of Chickamauga, and notwithstanding the rout of the right wing of the Cumberland Army, the stubborn fighting of the centre and left wing under Thomas had made the enemy willing to admit that they had not won a decisive victory. Our army was within its lines at Chattanooga, and these had been so strengthened that General Meigs, who had been sent out in haste as a special envoy of the War Department, reported to Mr. Stanton on the 27th of September that the position was very strong, being practically secure against an assault, and that the army was hearty, cheerful, and confident. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. iii. p. 890.] Meigs was himself a distinguished officer of the Engineer Corps as well as quartermaster-general, and the weight of his opinion at once restored confidence in Washington. He saw at a glance that the only perilous contingency was the danger of starvation, for the wagon roads over the mountains on the north side of the Tennessee were most difficult at best, and soon likely to become impassable. The army was safe from the enemy till it chose to resume the offensive, provided it could be fed. He concluded his dispatch by saying, "Of the rugged nature of this region I had no conception when I left Washington. I never travelled on such roads before." [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. iii. p. 890.] It was only too evident that Halleck shared this ignorance, and had added to it a neglect to estimate the distances over these mountains and through these valleys, and the relations of the points, he directed Burnside to hold, with the immediate theatre of Rosecrans's operations.

On the same date as Meigs's report, Burnside was also sending a full statement of his situation and an explanation of his conduct. [Footnote: Id., p. 904.] The telegraphic communication was opened just as he finished his dispatch, and for the first time he had the means of rapid intercourse with army headquarters. He patiently explained the misconceptions and cross purposes of the preceding fortnight, and showed how impossible and how ruinous would have been any other action than that which he took. Halleck had said that it would now be necessary to move the Army of the Ohio along the north side of the Tennessee till it should be opposite Chattanooga and reinforce Rosecrans in that way. Burnside pointed out that this would open the heart of East Tennessee to Bragg's cavalry or detachments from his army. He offered to take the bolder course of moving down the south side of the rivers, covering Knoxville and the valley as he advanced.

Mr. Lincoln replied by authorizing Burnside to hold his present positions, sending Rosecrans, in his own way, what help he could spare. [Footnote: Id., p. 905.] Halleck's answer was an amazing proof that he had never comprehended the campaign. He reiterated that Burnside's orders, before leaving Kentucky and continuously since, had been "to connect your right with General Rosecrans's left, so that if the enemy concentrated on one, the other would be able to assist." [Footnote: Id., p. 906.] If this meant anything, it meant that Burnside was to keep within a day's march of Rosecrans; for two days was more than enough to fight out a battle like Chickamauga. Yet he and everybody else knew that Burnside's supply route from Kentucky was through Cumberland Gap, and he had warmly applauded when Burnside turned that position, and by investing it in front and rear, had forced Frazer to surrender. He had explicitly directed Burnside to occupy and hold the upper Holston valley nearly or quite to the Virginia line, and one gets weary of repeating that between these places and Chattanooga was a breadth of two hundred miles of the kind of country Meigs had described and more than ten days of hard marching. His present orders are equally blind. Burnside is directed to reinforce Rosecrans with "all your available force," yet "East Tennessee must be held at all hazards, if possible." To "hold at all hazards" might be understood, but what is the effect of the phrase "if possible"? It must amount in substance to authority to do exactly what Burnside was doing,—to hold East Tennessee with as small means as he thought practicable, and to reinforce Rosecrans with what he could spare.

It was, on the whole, fortunate for the country that Burnside was not in telegraphic communication with Washington sooner. Had he been actually compelled to abandon East Tennessee on the 13th or 14th of September, incalculable mischief would have followed. The Ninth Corps was en route for Cumberland Gap, and it with all the trains and droves on the road must either have turned back or pushed on blindly with no probability of effecting a junction with the Twenty-third Corps. Even as it was, the terror in East Tennessee, when it became known that they were likely to be abandoned, was something fearful. Public and private men united in passionate protests, and the common people stood aghast. Two of the most prominent citizens only expressed the universal feeling when, in a dispatch to Mr. Lincoln, they used such language as this,—

"In the name of Christianity and humanity, in the name of God and liberty, for the sake of their wives and children and everything they hold sacred and dear on earth, the loyal people of Tennessee appeal to you and implore you not to abandon them again to the merciless dominion of the rebels, by the withdrawal of the Union forces from East Tennessee." [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. iv. p. 401. ]

With the evidence of the ability of the Army of the Cumberland to hold its position at Chattanooga, there came a breathing spell and a quick end of the panic. It was seen that there was time to get all desirable reinforcements to Rosecrans from the West, and Hooker was sent with two corps from the East, open lines of well-managed railways making this a quicker assistance than could be given by even a few days' marches over country roads. The culmination of the peril had been caused by the inactivity of the Army of the Potomac, which had permitted the transfer of Longstreet across four States; and now Hooker was sent from that army by a still longer route through the West to the vicinity of Bridgeport, thirty miles by rail below Chattanooga on the Tennessee River, but nearer fifty by the circuitous mountain roads actually used. It became evident also that Burnside's army could only subsist by making the most of its own lines of supply through Kentucky. To add its trains to those which were toiling over the mountains between Chattanooga and Bridgeport, would risk the starvation of the whole. Until a better line could be opened, Burnside was allowed to concentrate most of his forces in the vicinity of Loudon, where he guarded the whole valley. His cavalry connected with Rosecrans on the north side of the Tennessee, and also held the line of the Hiwassee on the left.

On the last day of September Burnside reported the concentration of his forces and submitted three alternate plans of assisting Rosecrans: [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. iii. p. 954.] First, to abandon East Tennessee and move all his forces by the north bank of the Tennessee River to Chattanooga. This was what Halleck had seemed to propose. Second, to cross the Holston and march directly against Bragg's right flank whilst Rosecrans should attack in front. This was essentially what Grant afterward did, putting Sherman in a position similar to that which Burnside would have taken. Third, to march with 7000 infantry and 5000 cavalry entirely around Bragg by the east, and strike his line of communications at Dalton or thereabouts. This had a strong resemblance to the strategy of Sherman next spring, when he forced Johnston out of Dalton by sending McPherson to his rear at Resaca. Burnside added to it the plan of a march to the sea, proposing that if Bragg pursued him, he should march down the railroad to Atlanta, destroying it as thoroughly as possible, and then make his way to the coast, living on the country.

The last of these plans was that which Burnside preferred and offered to put into immediate execution. Neither of them was likely to succeed at that moment, for Rosecrans was so far demoralized by the effects of his late battle that he was in no condition to carry out any aggressive campaign with decisive energy. He declared in favor of the first [Footnote: Id., pt. iv. p. 72.] (for they were communicated to him as well as to Halleck), and this only meant that he wanted his army at Chattanooga reinforced by any and every means, though he could not supply them, and the fortifications were already so strong that General Meigs reported that 10,000 men could very soon hold them against all Bragg's army. The plans, however, give us interesting light on Burnside's character and abilities, and show that he was both fertile in resources and disposed to adopt the boldest action. Halleck in reply said that distant expeditions into Georgia were not now contemplated, nor was it now necessary to join Rosecrans at Chattanooga. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxx. pt. iv. p. 25.] It was sufficient for Burnside to be in position to go to Rosecrans's assistance if he should require it. He was, however, to "hold some point near the upper end of the valley," which kept alive the constant occasion for misunderstanding, since it implied the protection and occupation of all East Tennessee, and the general there in command was the only one who could judge what was necessary to secure the object. The necessity for activity soon showed itself. About the 6th of October General Jones was reported to be showing a disposition to be aggressive, and Burnside determined to strike a blow at him again and with more force than that which had been interrupted a fortnight before. Willcox was ordered from Cumberland Gap to Morristown with his four new Indiana regiments; the Ninth Corps (having now only about 5000 men present for duty) was moved up the valley also, whilst the Twenty-third Corps, with two brigades of cavalry, was left in its positions near Loudon. The rest of the cavalry, under Shackelford, accompanied the movement up the valley of which Burnside took command in person. Leaving the cavalry post at Bull's Gap and advancing with his little army, he found the enemy strongly posted about midway between the Gap and Greeneville. Engaging them and trying to hold them by a skirmishing fight, he sent Foster's cavalry brigade to close the passage behind them. Foster found the roads too rough to enable him to reach the desired position in time, and the enemy retreating in the night escaped. The pursuit was pushed beyond the Watauga River, and a more thorough destruction was made of the railroad to and beyond the Virginia line. Considerable loss had been inflicted on the enemy and 150 prisoners had been captured, but no decisive engagement had been brought about, Jones being wary and conscious of inferiority of force. Willcox was left at Greeneville with part of the cavalry, while Burnside brought back the Ninth Corps to Knoxville. The activity was good for the troops and was successful in curbing the enemy's enterprise, besides encouraging the loyal inhabitants. There was now a lull in affairs till November, broken only by a mishap to Colonel Wolford's brigade of cavalry on the south of the Holston, where he was watching the enemy's advanced posts in the direction of Athens and Cleveland. Burnside had sent a flag of truce through the lines on the 19th of October, and the enemy taking advantage of it, delivered an unexpected blow upon Wolford, capturing 300 or 400 of his men and a battery of mountain howitzers, together with a wagon train which was several miles from camp. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxi. pt. i. p. 273.] Wolford heard that his train was attacked and sent two regiments to protect it. These were surrounded by a superior force, and Wolford then brought up the rest of his command, only 700 strong, and made a bold effort to rescue his comrades. This he did, with the loss of the prisoners mentioned and the howitzers, which were taken after they had fired their last cartridge. The wagons were burned, but the men bravely cut their way out. Approaching Loudon, they were met by General Julius White with infantry reinforcements. The tables were now turned on the Confederates, who fled over the Hiwassee again, losing in their turn about 100 prisoners. [Footnote: Id., pp. 5, 6.]



APPENDIX A

List of Letters and Dispatches relating to the campaign in the Great Kanawha valley, 1861, which are not found in the publication of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate armies (see footnote, chapter iv. p. 60).

Letters and Dispatches of General McClellan to General J. D. Cox, of dates July 6th, 12th, 13th, 14th, 15th, 16th, 20th, August 1st.

Letters and Dispatches of General J. D. Cox to General McClellan, of dates July 4th, 6th, 10th, 17th.

Letters and Dispatches of General Rosecrans to General Cox of dates July 26th, 29th, 31st, four of August 5th, one of August 6th, 8th, two of 13th, three of 16th, one of 17th, 18th, two of 20th, one each of 26th, 27th, 29th, 30th.

Letters and Dispatches of General Cox to General Rosecrans, of dates August 6th, 7th, 10th, 19th, 28th, two each of 30th and 31st, one of September 2d (enclosing Colonel Tyler's report of engagement at Cross Lanes), 3d, 9th, 22d, October 5th (order of withdrawal from Sewell Mountain), two of October 7th, one each of 8th, 9th, three of 10th, one of 16th.

There are also missing numerous ones from and to Colonel Tyler, Colonel W. Sooy Smith, Colonel J. V. Guthrie, and other officers.



APPENDIX B

Letters of Generals R. B. Hayes and George Crook as to the discipline and conduct of the Kanawha Division in the campaign of September, 1862. The death of President Hayes has removed any objections to the publication of his letter.

FREMONT, OHIO, 8th September, 1882.

MY DEAR GENERAL,—Your note of the 4th instant came during a brief absence from home. I appreciate your kindness and your friendly suggestions. After sleeping on it, I am not inclined to depart from my custom in dealing with attacks upon me.... Besides, to give a correct relation of the Reno altercation would be to disparage an officer who died in battle a few days after the affair, and who cannot now give his side of the controversy.

THE END