Chapter XLVIII
Assignment of General J. E. Johnston to the Command of the Army of Tennessee.--Condition of his Army.--An Offensive Campaign suggested.--Proposed Objects to be accomplished.--General Johnston's Plans.--Advance of Sherman.--The Strength of the Confederate Position.--General Johnston expects General Sherman to give Battle at Dalton.--The Enemy's Flank Movement via Snake Creek Gap to Resaca.--Johnston falls back to Resaca.--Further Retreat to Adairsville.--General Johnston's Reasons.--Retreat to Cassville.-- Projected Engagement at Kingston frustrated.--Retreat beyond the Etowah River.--Strong Position at Alatoona abandoned.--Nature of the Country between Marietta and Dallas.--Engagements at New Hope Church.--Army takes Position at Kenesaw.--Senator Hill's Letter.-- Death of Lieutenant-General Polk.--Battle at Kenesaw Mountain.-- Retreat beyond the Chattahoochee.--Results reviewed.--Popular Demand for Removal of General Johnston.--Reluctance to remove him.-- Reasons for Removal.--Assignment of General J. B. Hood to the Command.--He assumes the Offensive.--Battle of Peach-tree Creek.-- Death of General W. H. T. Walker.--Sherman's Movement to Jonesboro.--Defeat of Hardee.--Evacuation of Atlanta.--Sherman's Inhuman Order.--Visit to Georgia.--Suggested Operations.--Want of coöperation by the Governor of Georgia.--Conference with Generals Beauregard, Hardee, and Cobb, at Augusta.--Departure from Original Plan.--General Hood's Movement against the Enemy's Communications.-- Partial Successes.--Withdrawal of the Army to Gadsden and Movement against Thomas.--Sherman burns Atlanta and begins his March to the Sea.--Vandalism.--Direction of his Advance.--General Wheeler's Opposition.--His Valuable Service.--Sherman reaches Savannah.-- General Hardee's Command.--The Defenses of the City.--Assault and Capture of Fort McAlister.--The Results.--Hardee evacuates Savannah.
On December 16, 1863, I directed General J. E. Johnston to transfer the command of the Department of Mississippi and East Louisiana to Lieutenant-General Polk, and repair to Dalton, Georgia, to assume command of the Army of Tennessee, representing at that date an effective total of 43,094. My information led me to believe that the condition of that army, in all that constitutes efficiency, was satisfactory, and that the men were anxious for an opportunity to retrieve the loss of prestige sustained in the disastrous battle of Missionary Ridge. I was also informed that the enemy's forces, then occupying Chattanooga, Bridgeport, and Stevenson, with a detached force at Knoxville, were weaker in numbers than at any time since the battle of Missionary Ridge, and that they were especially deficient in cavalry and in artillery and train-horses. I desired, therefore, that prompt and vigorous measures be taken to enable our troops to commence active operations against the enemy as early as practicable. It was important to guard against the injurious results to the morale of the troops, which always attend a prolonged season of inactivity; but the recovery of the territory in Tennessee and Kentucky, which we had been compelled to abandon, and on the supplies of which the proper subsistence of our armies mainly depended, imperatively demanded an onward movement. I believed that, by a rapid concentration of our troops between the scattered forces of the enemy, without attempting to capture his intrenched positions, we could compel him to accept battle in the open field, and that, should we fail to draw him out of his intrenchments, we could move upon his line of communications. The Federal force at Knoxville depended mainly for support on its connection with that at Chattanooga, and both were wholly dependent on uninterrupted communication with Nashville. Could we, then, by interposing our force, separate these two bodies of the enemy, and cut off his communication from Nashville to Chattanooga by destroying the railroad, both conditions were fulfilled. Of the practicability of this movement I had little doubt; of its expediency, if practicable, there could be none. I impressed repeatedly upon General Johnston by letter, and by officers of my staff and others, sent to him by me for the purpose of putting him in possession of these views, the importance of a prompt aggressive movement by the Army of Tennessee. The following were among the considerations presented to General Johnston, at my request, by Brigadier-General W. N. Pendleton, chief of artillery of the Army of Northern Virginia, on April 16, 1864:
1. To take the enemy at disadvantage while weakened, it is believed, by sending troops to Virginia, and having others still absent on furlough.
2. To break up his plans by anticipating and frustrating his combinations.
3. So to press him in his present position as to prevent his heavier massing in Virginia.
4. To defeat him in battle, and gain great consequent strength in supplies, men, and productive territory.
5. To prevent the waste of the army incident to inactivity.
6. To inspirit the troops and the country by success, and to discourage the enemy.
7. To obviate the necessity of falling back, which might probably occur if our antagonist be allowed to consummate his plans without molestation.
General Johnston cordially approved of an aggressive movement, and informed me of his purpose to make it as soon as reënforcements and supplies, then on the way, should reach him. He did not approve the proposed advance into Tennessee. He believed that the Federal forces in Tennessee were not weaker, but if anything stronger, than at Missionary Ridge; that defeat beyond the Tennessee would probably prove ruinous to us, resulting in the loss of his army, the occupation of Georgia by the enemy, the "piercing of the Confederacy in its vitals," and the loss of all the southwestern territory. He proposed, therefore, to stand on the defensive until strengthened, "to watch, prepare, and strike" as soon as possible. As soon as reënforced, he declared his purpose to advance to Ringgold, attack there, and, if successful, as he expected to be, to strike at Cleveland, cut the railroad, control the river, and thus isolate East Tennessee, and, as a consequence, force his antagonist to give battle on this side of the Tennessee River. Simultaneously with, and in aid of, this movement, General Johnston proposed that a large cavalry force should be sent to Middle Tennessee, in the rear of the enemy. These operations, he thought, would result in forcing the Federal army to evacuate the Tennessee Valley, and make an advance into the heart of the State safely practicable.
The irreparable loss of time in making any forward movement as desired having sufficed for the combinations which rendered an advance across the Tennessee River no longer practicable, I took prompt measures to enable General Johnston to carry out immediately his own proposition to strike first at Ringgold and then at Cleveland, proposing that General Buckner should threaten Knoxville, General Forrest advance into or threaten Middle Tennessee, and General Roddy hold the enemy in northern Alabama, and thus prevent his concentration in our front. This movement, although it held out no such promise as did the plan of advance before the enemy had had time to make his combinations, might have been attended with good results had it been promptly executed. But no such movement was made or even attempted. General Johnston's belief that General Grant would be ready to assume the offensive before he could be prepared to do so, proved too well founded, while his purpose, if the Federal army did not attack, that we should prepare and take the initiative ourselves, was never carried out.[105]
On the morning of May 2, 1864, General Johnston discovered that the enemy, under the command of General Sherman, was advancing against him, and two days subsequently it was reported that he had reached Ringgold (about fifteen miles north of Dalton) in considerable force.
At this date the official returns show that the effective strength of the Army of Tennessee, counting the troops actually in position at Dalton and those in the immediate rear of that place, was about fifty thousand. When to these is added General Polk's command (then en route), and the advance of which joined him at Resaca, the effective strength of General Johnston's army was not less than 68,620 men of all arms, excluding from the estimate the thousands of men employed on extra duty, amounting, as General Hood states, to ten thousand when he assumed command of the army.
Army at Dalton, May 1, 1864, according to General Johnston's estimates[106] . . . . . . . . . . . . 37,652 infantry. 2,812 artillery. 2,392 cavalry. Mercer's brigade, joined May 2d . . . . . . . . . 2,000 infantry. Thirty-seventh Mississippi Regiment, en route 400 " Dibrell's and Harrison's brigades in rear, recruiting their horses . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2,336 cavalry. Martin's division at Cartersville . . . . . . . . 1,700 " ------ 49,292 Polk's command . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19,330 ------ Total effective . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68,620
To enable General Johnston to repulse the hostile advance and assume the offensive, no effort was spared on the part of the Government. Almost all the available military strength of the south and west, in men and supplies, was pressed forward and placed at his disposal. The supplies of the commissary, quartermaster, and ordnance departments of his army were represented as ample and suitably located. The troops, encouraged by the large accessions of strength which they saw arriving daily, and which they knew were marching rapidly to their support, were eager to advance, and confident in their power to achieve victory and recover the territory which they had lost. Their position was such as to warrant the confident expectation of successful resistance at least. Long mountain-ranges, penetrated by few and difficult roads and paths, and deep and wide rivers, seemed to render our position one from which we could not be dislodged or turned, while that of the enemy, dependent for his supplies upon a single line of railroad from Nashville to the point where he was operating, was manifestly perilous. The whole country shared the hope which the Government entertained, that a decisive victory would soon be won in the mountains of Georgia, which would free the south and west from invasion, would open to our occupation and the support of our armies the productive territory of Tennessee and Kentucky, and so recruit our army in the West as to render it impracticable for the enemy to accumulate additional forces in Virginia.
On May 6th the Confederate forces were in position in and near Dalton, which point General Johnston believed that General Sherman would attack with his whole force. This belief seems to have been held by General Johnston until the evening of May 12th, when, having previously learned the proximity of the advance of Lieutenant-General Polk's command, and that the rest of his troops were hurrying forward to reënforce him, but discovering that the main body of Sherman's army was moving round his left flank, via Snake-Creek Gap to Resaca, under cover of Rocky-Face Mountain, he withdrew his troops from Dalton and fell back on Resaca, situated on the Western and Atlantic Railroad, eighteen miles south of Dalton on a peninsula formed by the junction of the Oostenaula and Conasauga Rivers. The Confederate position at this place was strengthened by continuous rifle-pits and strong field-works, by which it was protected on the flanks on the above-named rivers, and a line of retreat across the Oostenaula secured. Information, on May 15th, that the right of the Federal army was crossing the Oostenaula near Calhoun (four miles south of Resaca), thus threatening his line of communications, induced General Johnston to fall back from Resaca toward Adairsville, thirteen miles south on the railroad. General Johnston, in accounting for his abandonment of his strong position at Dalton, and of his subsequent position at Resaca, states that he was dislodged from the first position--that in front of Dalton--by General Sherman's movement to his right through Snake-Creek Gap, threatening our line of communication at Resaca; and from the position taken at Resaca to meet that movement, by a similar one on the part of the Federal General toward Calhoun--the second being covered by the river, as the first had been by the mountains.
After abandoning Resaca, General Johnston hoped to find a good position near Calhoun; but, finding none, he fell back to a position about a mile north of Adairsville, where the valley of the Oothcaloga was supposed from the map to be so narrow that his army, formed in line of battle across it, could hold the heights on both flanks. On reaching this point, however, it was found that the valley was so much broader than was supposed, that the army, in line of battle, could not obtain the anticipated advantage of ground. Hence a further retreat to Cassville was ordered, seventeen miles farther south, and a few miles to the east of the railroad. Here, supposing that the Federal army would divide, one column following the railroad through Kingston and the other the direct road to the Etowah Railroad Bridge through Cassville, General Johnston hoped that the opportunity would be offered him to engage and defeat one of the enemy's columns before it could receive aid from the other, and, as the distance between them would be greatest at Kingston, he determined to attack at this point. The coming battle was announced in orders to each regiment of the army.
The battle, for causes which were the subject of dispute, did not take place as General Johnston had originally announced, and, instead of his attacking the divided columns of the enemy, the united Federal army was preparing to attack him. Here our army occupied a position which General Johnston describes as "the best that he saw during the war," but owing, as he represents, to an expressed want of confidence on the part of lieutenant-Generals Hood and Polk in their ability to resist the enemy, the army was again (May 19, 1864) ordered to retreat beyond the Etowah.
General Hood, in his official report, and in a book written by him since the war, takes a very different view of the position in rear of Cassville, and states that he and General Polk explained that their corps were on ground commanded and enfiladed by the batteries of the enemy, therefore wholly unsuited for defense, and, unless it was proposed to attack, that the position should be abandoned. General Shoup, a scientific and gallant soldier, confirms this opinion of the defects of the position, as does Captain Morris, chief-engineer of the Army of Mississippi, and others then on duty there.[107]
The next stand of our army was at Alatoona, in the Etowah Mountains, and south of the river of that name; but the reported extension of the Federal army toward Dallas, threatening Marietta, was deemed to necessitate the evacuation of that strong position. The country between Dallas and Marietta, eighteen miles wide, and lying in a due westerly direction from the latter place, constitutes a natural fortress of exceptional strength. Densely wooded, traversed by ranges of steep hills, seamed at intervals by ravines both deep and rugged, with very few roads, and those ill constructed and almost impassable to wheels, it is difficult to imagine a country better adapted for defense, where the advantages of numerical superiority in an invading army were more thoroughly neutralized, or where, necessarily ignorant of the topography, it was compelled to advance with greater caution.
The engagements at New Hope Church, June 27th and 28th, though severe and marked by many acts of gallantry, did not result in any advantage to our army. Falling back slowly as the enemy advanced to Acworth (June 8th), General Johnston made his next stand in that mountainous country that lies between Acworth and Marietta, remarkable for the three clearly defined eminences: Kenesaw Mountain, to the west of the railroad, and overlooking Marietta; Lost Mountain, half-way between Kenesaw and Dallas, and west of Marietta; and Pine Mountain, about half a mile farther to the north, forming, as it were, the apex of a triangle, of which Kenesaw and Lost Mountains form the base. These heights are connected by ranges of lower heights, intersected by numerous ravines, and thickly wooded. The right of our army rested on the railroad, the line extending four or five miles in a westerly direction, protected by strong earthworks, with abatis on every avenue of approach. While the enemy, feeling his way slowly, was skirmishing on the right of our position, our army, our country, and mankind at large, sustained an irreparable loss on June 13th in the death of that noble Christian and soldier, Lieutenant-General Polk. Having accompanied Generals Johnston and Hardee to the Confederate outpost on Pine Mountain, in order to acquaint himself more thoroughly with the nature of the ground in front of the position held by his corps, he was killed by a shot from a Federal battery six or seven hundred yards distant, which struck him in the chest, passing from left to right. Since the calamitous fall of General Albert Sidney Johnston at Shiloh and of General T. J. Jackson at Chancellorsville, the country sustained no heavier blow than in the death of General Polk.
On June 18th, heavy rains having swollen Nose's Creek on the left of our position so that it became impassable, the Federal army, under cover of this stream, extended its lines several miles beyond Johnston's left flank toward the Chattahoochee, causing a further retrograde movement by a portion of his force. For several days brisk fighting occurred at various points of our line.
The cavalry attack on Wheeler's force on the 20th, the attack upon Hardee's position on the 24th, and the general assault upon the Confederate position on the 27th were firmly met and handsomely repulsed. On the 4th of July, it having been reported by General G. W. Smith, in command of about a thousand militia, and occupying the extreme left of our army, that the enemy's "cavalry was pressing him in such force that he would be compelled to abandon the ground he had been holding and retire before morning to General Shoup's line of redoubts," [108] constructed on the high ground near the Chattahoochee and covering the approaches to the railroad-bridge and Turner's Ferry, General Johnston deemed it necessary to abandon his position at Kenesaw on July 5th and fall back to the line constructed by General Shoup, as the enemy's position covered one of the main roads to Atlanta, and was nearer to that city than the main body of General Johnston's force. On the 9th, Sherman having crossed the Chattahoochee with two corps on the day previous, the Confederate army crossed that river and established itself two miles in its rear.
Thus, from Dalton to Resaca, from Resaca to Adairsville, from Adairsville to Alatoona (involving by the evacuation of Kingston the loss of Rome, with its valuable mills, foundries, and large quantities of military stores), from Alatoona to Kenesaw, from Kenesaw to the Chattahoochee, and then to Atlanta; retreat followed retreat, during seventy-four days of anxious hope and bitter disappointment, until at last the Army of Tennessee fell back within the fortifications of Atlanta. The Federal army soon occupied the arc of a circle extending from the railroad between Atlanta and the Chattahoochee River to some miles south of the Georgia Railroad (from Atlanta to Augusta) in a direction north and northeast of Atlanta. We had suffered a disastrous loss of territory.
Whether the superior numerical strength of the enemy, by enabling him to extend his force beyond the flank of ours, did thereby necessitate the abandonment of every position taken by our army, and whether the enemy, declining to assault any of our intrenched camps, would have ventured to leave it in rear, upon his only line of communication and supply, or whether we might have obtained more advantageous results by a vigorous and determined effort to attack him in detail during some of his many flank movements--are questions upon which there has been a decided conflict of opinion, and upon which it would be for me now neither useful nor pleasant to enter. When it became known that the Army of Tennessee had been successfully driven from one strong position to another, until finally it had reached the earthworks constructed for the exterior defense of Atlanta, the popular disappointment was extreme. The possible fall of the "Gate City," with its important railroad communication, vast stores, factories for the manufacture of all sorts of military supplies, rolling-mill and foundries, was now contemplated for the first time at its full value, and produced intense anxiety far and wide. From many quarters, including such as had most urged his assignment, came delegations, petitions, and letters, urging me to remove General Johnston from the command of the army, and assign that important trust to some officer who would resolutely hold and defend Atlanta. While sharing in the keen sense of disappointment at the failure of the campaign which pervaded the whole country, I was perhaps more apprehensive than others of the disasters likely to result from it, because I was in a position to estimate more accurately their probable extent. On the railroads threatened with destruction, the armies then fighting the main battles of the war in Virginia had for some time to a great degree depended for indispensable supplies, yet I did not respond to the wishes of those who came in hottest haste for the removal of General Johnston; for here again, more fully than many others, I realized how serious it was to change commanders in the presence of the enemy. This clamor for his removal commenced immediately after it became known that the army had fallen back from Dalton, and it gathered volume with each remove toward Atlanta. Still I resisted the steadily increasing pressure which was brought to bear to induce me to revoke his assignment, and only issued the order relieving him from command when I became satisfied that his declared purpose to occupy the works at Atlanta with militia levies and withdraw his army into the open country for freer operations, would inevitably result in the loss of that important point, and where the retreat would cease could not be foretold. If the Army of Tennessee was found to be unable to hold positions of great strength like those at Dalton, Resaca, Etowah, Kenesaw, and on the Chattahoochee, I could not reasonably hope that it would be more successful in the plains below Atlanta, where it would find neither natural nor artificial advantages of position. As soon as the Secretary of War showed me the answer which he had just received in reply to his telegram to General Johnston, requesting positive information as to the General's plans and purposes, I gave my permission to issue the order relieving General Johnston and directing him to turn over to General Hood the command of the Army of Tennessee. I was so fully aware of the danger of changing commanders of an army while actively engaged with the enemy, that I only overcame the objection in view of an emergency, and in the hope that the impending danger of the loss of Atlanta might be averted.
The following extracts are made from a letter of the Hon. Benjamin H. Hill, of Georgia, written at Atlanta, October 12, 1878, and handed to me by the friend to whom it was addressed:
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"On Wednesday or Thursday, I think the 28th or 29th of June, 1864, a messenger came to my house, sent, as he said, by General Johnston, Senator Wigfall, of Texas, and Governor Brown, of Georgia.
"The purpose of his mission, as he explained, was to persuade me to write a letter to President Davis urging him to order either Morgan or Forrest with five thousand men into Sherman's rear, etc. . . .
"The result of this interview was a determination on my part to go at once to see General Johnston, and place myself at his service. I reached his headquarters near Marietta, on the line of the Kenesaw, on Friday morning, which was the last day of June or the first day of July. We had a full and free interview, and I placed myself unreservedly at his disposal.
"He explained at length that he could not attack General Sherman's army in their intrenchments, nor could he prevent Sherman from ditching round his (Johnston's) flank and compelling his retreat.
"The only method of arresting Sherman's advance was to send a force into his rear, cut off his supplies, and thus compel Sherman either to give battle on his (Johnston's) terms or retreat. In either case, he thought, he could defeat Sherman, and probably destroy his army.
"I said to him, 'As you do not propose to attack General Sherman in his intrenchments, could you not spare a sufficient number of your present army, under Wheeler or some other, to accomplish this work?'
"He said he could not--that he needed all the force he had in front.
"He then said that General Morgan was at Arlington, Virginia, with five thousand cavalry, and, if the President would so order, this force could be sent into Sherman's rear at once.
"He also said that Stephen D. Lee had sixteen thousand men under him in Mississippi, including the troops under Forrest and Roddy, and that, if Morgan could not be sent, five thousand of those under Forrest could do the work. Either Morgan or Forrest, with five thousand men, could compel Sherman to fight at a disadvantage or retreat, and there was no reason why either should not be sent if the President should give the order. He explained that he (General Johnston) had had a consultation with Senator Wigfall and Governor Brown, the result of which was the messenger to me to secure my coöperation to influence President Davis to make the order. I repelled the idea that any influence with the President was needed, and stated that, if the facts were as General Johnston reported them, the reënforcement would be sent on his request.
"But the situation was so critical, involving, as I believed and explained at length to General Johnston, the fate of the Confederacy, that I said I would go in person to Richmond and lay all the facts before the President, and I did not doubt he would act promptly.
"I then said to General Johnston: 'How long can you hold Sherman north of the Chattahoochee River? This is important, because I must go to Richmond, and Morgan must go from Virginia or Forrest from Mississippi, and this will take some time, and all must be done before Sherman drives you to Atlanta.' General Johnston did not answer this question with directness, but gave me data which authorized me to conclude that he could hold Sherman north of the Chattahoochee River at least fifty-four days, and perhaps sixty days. I made this calculation with General Johnston's data in his presence, and told him the result, and he assented to it. When this result was stated, General Hood, who was present, said, 'Mr. Hill, when we leave our present line, we will, in my judgment, cross the Chattahoochee River very rapidly.' 'Why, what makes you think that?' said General Johnston, with some interest. 'Because,' answered General Hood, 'this line of the Kenesaw is the strongest line we can get in this country. If we surrender this to Sherman, he can reconnoiter from its summit the whole country between here and Atlanta, and there is no such line of defense in the distance.'
"'I differ with your conclusion,' said General Johnston. 'I admit this is a strong line of defense, but I have two more strong lines between this and the river, from which I can hold Sherman a long time.'
"I was delayed en route somewhat, and reached Richmond on Sunday morning week, which I think was the 9th day of July. I went to the hotel, and in a few moments was at the Executive mansion.
"This interview with Mr. Davis I can never forget.
"I laid before him carefully, and in detail, all the facts elicited in the conversation with General Johnston, and explained fully the purpose of my mission. When I had gone through, the President took up the facts, one by one, and fully explained the situation. I remember very distinctly many of the facts, for the manner as well as matter stated by Mr. Davis was impressive. 'Long ago,' said the President, 'I ordered Morgan to make this movement upon Sherman's rear, and suggested that his best plan was to go directly from Abingdon through East Tennessee. But Morgan insisted that, if he were permitted to go through Kentucky and around Nashville, he could greatly recruit his horses and his men by volunteers. I yielded, and allowed him to have his own way. He undertook it, but was defeated, and has retreated back, and is now at Abingdon with only eighteen hundred men, very much demoralized, and badly provided with horses.' He next read a dispatch from General Stephen D. Lee, to the effect that A. J, Smith had left Memphis with fifteen thousand men, intended either as a reënforcement for Sherman or for an attack on Mobile; that, to meet this force, he (Lee) had only seven thousand men, including the commands of Forrest and Roddy. He would like to have reënforcements, but anyhow, with or without reënforcements, 'he should meet Smith, and whip him, too.' 'Ah! there is a man for you,' said Mr. Davis. And he did meet Smith with his inferior force, and whipped him, too. He next read a dispatch from a commander at Mobile (who, I think, was General Maury), to the effect that Canby was marching from New Orleans with twenty thousand men, and A. J. Smith from Memphis with fifteen thousand, intending to make a combined attack on Mobile. To meet this force of thirty-five thousand men he had four thousand, and Lee, with Forrest and Roddy, seven thousand, making eleven thousand in all. He asked for reënforcements.
"After going fully through this matter, and showing how utterly General Johnston was at fault, as to the numbers of troops in the different commands, the President said, 'How long did you understand General Johnston to say he could hold Sherman north of the Chattahoochee River?' From fifty-four to sixty days I said, and repeated the facts on that subject as above stated. Thereupon the President read me a dispatch from General Johnston, announcing that he had crossed or was crossing the Chattahoochee River."
* * * * *
"The next day (Monday), Mr. Seddon, the Secretary of War, called to see me. He asked me to reduce my interview with General Johnston to writing, for the use of the Cabinet, and I did so, and gave it to him. Mr. Seddon said he was anxious for General Johnston's removal, and he was especially anxious because, he said, he was one of those who was responsible for his appointment. He had urged his appointment very earnestly, but it was a great mistake, and he desired to do all he could, even at this late day, to atone for it. The President, he said, was averse to the removal. He made the appointment against his own convictions, but thought it a very hazardous thing to remove him now, and he would not do it, if he could have any assurance that General Johnston would not surrender Atlanta without a battle.
"Other members of the Cabinet, I know, had views similar to those expressed by Mr. Seddon. The question, or rather the situation, was referred to General Lee, but he declined to give any positive advice, and expressed regret that so grave a movement as the removal of General Johnston, under the circumstances existing, should be found to be necessary." [109]
* * * * *
"During all the time, a telegraphic correspondence was kept up with General Johnston--the object being to ascertain if he would make a determined fight to save Atlanta. His answers were thought to be evasive. Finally, the question was put to General Johnston categorically to this effect: 'Will you surrender Atlanta without a fight?' To this the answer was regarded as not only evasive, but as indicating the contemplated contingency of surrendering Atlanta, on the ground that the Governor of the State had not furnished, as expected, sufficient State troops to man the city while the army was giving battle outside. 'This evasive answer to a positive inquiry,' said one of the Cabinet to me, 'brought the President over. He yielded very reluctantly.' I was informed of the result at once, and was also informed that Mr. Davis was the last man in the Cabinet to agree to the order of removal.". . .
General Hood assumed command on the 18th of July. In his report of the operations of the army while under his command, he states that the effective strength of his force on that day was forty-eight thousand seven hundred and fifty men of all arms.
Feeling that the only chance of holding Atlanta consisted in assuming the offensive by forcing the enemy to accept battle, General Hood determined, on the 20th of July, to attack the corps of Generals Thomas and Schofield, who were in the act of crossing Peachtree Creek, hoping to defeat Thomas before he could fortify himself, then to fall on Schofield, and finally to attack McPherson's corps, which had reached Decatur, on the Georgia Railroad, driving the enemy back to the creek and into the narrow space included between that stream and the Chattahoochee River. Owing to an unfortunate misapprehension of the order of battle and the consequent delay in making the attack, the movement failed. On the 21st, finding that McPherson's corps was threatening his communications, General Hood resolved to attack him at or near Decatur, in front and on flank, turn his left, and then, following up the movement from the right to the left with his whole army, force the enemy down Peachtree Creek. This engagement was the hottest of the campaign, but it failed to accomplish any other favorable result than to check General McPherson's movement upon the communications of our army, while it cost heavily in the loss of many officers and men, foremost among whom was that preux chevalier and accomplished soldier, Major-General W. H. T. Walker, of Georgia.
Beyond expeditions by the enemy, for the most part by cavalry, to destroy the lines of railroad by which supplies and reënforcements could reach Atlanta, and successful efforts on our part to frustrate their movements, resulting in the defeat and capture of General Stoneman and his command near Macon, the utter destruction of the enemy's cavalry force engaged by General Wheeler at Newnan, and the defeat of Sherman's design to unite his cavalry at the Macon and Western Railroad, and effectually destroy that essential avenue for the conveyance of stores and ammunition for our army, no movement of special importance took place between July 22d and August 26th, at which latter date it was discovered that Sherman had abandoned his works upon our right, and, leaving a considerable force to hold his intrenched position at the railroad-bridge over the Chattahoochee, was marching his main body to the south and southwest of Atlanta, to use it, as he himself has expressed it, "against the communications of Atlanta, instead of against its intrenchments." On the 30th, it being known that he was moving on Jonesboro, the county town of Clayton County, about twenty miles south of Atlanta, General Hood sent two corps under General Hardee to confront him at that point, in the hope that he could drive him across Flint River, oblige him to abandon his works on the left, and then be able to attack him successfully in flank. The attack at Jonesboro was unsuccessful. General Hardee was obliged, on September 1st, to fall back to Lovejoy's, seven miles south of Jonesboro, on the Macon and Western Railroad. Thus, the main body of the Federal army was between Hardee and Atlanta, and the immediate evacuation of that city became a necessity. There was an additional and cogent reason for that movement. Owing to the obstinately cruel policy which the United States Government had pursued for some time, of refusing on any terms to exchange prisoners of war, upward of thirty thousand prisoners were at Andersonville in southwestern Georgia at this time. To guard against the release and arming of these prisoners, General Hood thought it necessary to place our army between them and the enemy, and abandon the project, which he thought feasible, of moving on Sherman's communications and destroying his depots of supplies at Marietta.
Upon abandoning Atlanta, Hood marched his army in a westerly direction, and formed a junction with the two corps which had been operating at Jonesboro and Lovejoy's under General Hardee.
General Sherman, desisting from any further aggressive movement in the field, returned to Atlanta, which had been formally surrendered by the Mayor on September 2d, with the promise, as reported, on the part of the Federal commander, that non-combatants and private property should be respected. Shortly after his arrival, the commanding General of the Federal forces, forgetful of this promise, and on the pretense that the exigencies of the service required that the place should be used exclusively for military purposes, issued an order directing all civilians living in Atlanta, male and female, to leave the city within five days from the date of the order (September 5th). Since Alva's atrocious cruelties to the noncombatant population of the Low Countries in the sixteenth century, the history of war records no instance of such barbarous cruelty as that which this order designed to perpetrate. It involved the immediate expulsion from their homes and only means of subsistence of thousands of unoffending women and children, whose husbands and fathers were either in the army, in Northern prisons, or had died in battle. In vain did the Mayor and corporate authorities of Atlanta appeal to Sherman to revoke or modify this inhuman order, representing in piteous language "the woe, the horror, and the suffering, not to be described by words," [110] which its execution would inflict on helpless women and infant children. His only reply was:
"I give full credit to your statements of the distress that will be occasioned by it, and yet shall not revoke my order, because my orders are not designed to meet the humanities of the case."
At the time appointed, the women and children were expelled from their houses, and, before they were passed within our lines, complaint was generally made that the Federal officers and men who were sent to guard them had robbed them of the few articles of value they had been permitted to take from their homes. The cowardly dishonesty of its executioners was in perfect harmony with the temper and spirit of the order.
During the month of September the Federal army in and around Atlanta made no movement beyond strengthening its defenses and collecting within it large quantities of military supplies. General Hood, meantime, held his troops in the vicinity of Jonesboro. His reports to the War Department represented the morale of his army as "greatly impaired by the recurrence of retreat," decreasing in numbers day by day, and the surrounding country devoid of natural strength or any advantageous position upon which he could retire. With a view to judge better the situation, and then determine after personal inspection the course which should seem best to pursue, I visited General Hood's headquarters at Palmetto. The crisis was grave. It was not to be expected that General Sherman would remain long inactive. The rapidity with which he was collecting recruits and supplies at Atlanta indicated that he contemplated a movement farther south, making Atlanta a secondary base. To rescue Georgia, save the Gulf States, and retain possession of the lines of communication upon which we depended for the supplies of our armies in the field, an effort to arrest the further progress of the enemy was necessary; and to this end the railroads in his rear must be effectually torn up, the great railroad-bridge over the Tennessee River at Bridgeport destroyed, and the communication between Atlanta, Chattanooga, and Nashville completely cut off. Could this be accomplished, all the fruits of Sherman's successful campaign in Georgia would be blighted, his capture of Atlanta would become a barren victory, and he would probably be compelled to make a retreat toward Tennessee, at every mile of which he might be harassed by our army. Or, should he, relying on Atlanta as a base, push forward through Georgia to the Atlantic coast, our army, having cut his communications north of Atlanta, could fall upon his rear, and, with the advantages of a better knowledge of the country, of the surrounding devoted population, of the auxiliary force to be expected under the circumstances, and our superiority in cavalry, it was not unreasonable to hope that retributive justice might overtake the ruthless invader.
My first object was to fill up the depleted ranks of the army, to bring the absentees and deserters back to the ranks, and induce the Governor and State officials to coöperate heartily and earnestly with the Confederate Government in all measures that might be found necessary to give the proposed movement a reasonable prospect of success.
The avowed objection of the Governor of Georgia to the acts of Congress providing for raising troops by conscription, and his persistent opposition to the authority of the Confederate Executive to appoint the generals and staff officers of the volunteer organizations received from the States to form the provisional army of the Confederacy, caused him frequently to obstruct the Government officials in the discharge of their duty, to withhold the assistance which he might be justly expected to render, and, in the contemplation of his own views of the duties and obligations of the Executive and legislative departments of the General Government, to lose sight of those important objects, the attainment of which an exalted patriotism might have told him depended on the coöperation of the State and Confederate governments. The inordinate exemption from military service as State officials of men between the ages of eighteen and forty-live (it was estimated that the number of exempts in November, 1864 amounted to fifteen thousand) was an abuse which I endeavored in vain to correct. Were the majority of the men thus exempted, and who remained at home "that the army might be fed," really engaged in that important service, the end might be said to justify the means; but, for any less exigent demand, patriotism and humane consideration for the brave men at the front required that the number of these exempts should be reduced to the minimum, if, indeed, the number of those unfit for military duty was not sufficient to perform this service. After a thorough inspection of the Army of Tennessee at Palmetto, after conference with several prominent Georgians, and notably with that pure patriot and distinguished statesman and soldier. General Howell Cobb, whose brain and heart and means and energies were all at the service of his country, I proceeded to Augusta during the first week of October, in order, with Generals Hardee and Cobb and other officers of prominence, to meet and confer with General Beauregard, whom I had just assigned to the command of the Military Division of the West, and to impart to him my views as to the exigencies of the occasion, and how I thought that they might be most advantageously met.
Before this time General Hood had already crossed the Chattahoochee with his entire force, moving against the enemy's line of communication. General Forrest, with a strong force of cavalry, had been ordered to Tennessee to strike the railroad from Nashville to Chattanooga. During my visit to Hood's army, I learned that the morale of it had been partially restored, many absentees had returned to duty, and the waning hope of the people was beginning to revive.
The plan of operations which I had discussed with General Hood while at his headquarters was fully explained to General Beauregard at Augusta, and by him cordially approved. It comprised the occupation of a strong position on the enemy's line of communication by the railroad between Atlanta and Chattanooga, the capture of his depots of supplies and the small garrisons left to guard them. If this, as was probable, should cause Sherman to move to attack as in position, in that case, if the tone of the troops justified it, a battle should be joined; otherwise, he should retreat toward Gadsden, where supplies would be collected, and, should Sherman follow him so far, then there, on the dividing line of the States of Georgia and Alabama, the largest practicable number of militia and home-guards of both States would be assembled as an auxiliary force, and there a final stand should be made for a decisive battle. If victorious, as under the circumstances it was hoped we should be, the enemy could not retreat through the wasted country behind him, and must surrender or disperse. If Sherman should not pursue our retiring army to Gadsden, but return to Atlanta to march toward the seacoast, he was to be pursued, and, by our superiority in cavalry, to be prevented from foraging on the country, which, according to our information as to his supplies on hand at Atlanta, and as to his inadequate means of transportation, would be indispensable for the support of his troops. Should Sherman, contrary to that information, have supplies and transportation sufficient to enable him to march across the country, and he should start toward the seacoast, the militia, the local troops, and others who could be employed, should obstruct the roads and fords in his front by felling trees, and, by burning bridges and other available means, delay his progress until his provisions should be consumed and absolute want should deplete if not disintegrate his army. It was supposed that Augusta, on account of our principal powder-manufactory and some important workshops being located there, would be the first objective point of Sherman, should he march toward the east. General Hood's calculation was that, taking a route north of Sherman, where he would have smaller streams to cross, he could reach Augusta as soon as Sherman.
General Cobb, the local commander in Georgia, in addition to obstructing roads, etc., was, in the last supposed contingency, to assemble at Augusta the invalid soldiers, the militia, and others to defend the place. General George W. Rains, an accomplished soldier and military engineer, was instructed to enlarge and strengthen the defenses of the place, and General G. R. Rains, the author of the system of defense by sub-terra shells, was, on the coming of the enemy, to apply his invention to the threatened approaches of the town. There was another contemplated contingency, viz., that Sherman, emboldened by his recent successes, would move against Hood with such overweening confidence as might offer to the latter the opportunity to strike in detail.
After the full conversation with General Beauregard above noticed, General Hardee was called in and asked to give his opinion on the plan, which I regarded as entitled to great consideration, not only because of his high capacity as a soldier, but also because of his long connection with the Army of Tennessee, and minute knowledge of the country in which it was proposed to operate. He had previously been made fully aware of the plans and purposes discussed between General Hood and myself, and stated to General Beauregard substantially that, while he could not say the plan would succeed, he was confident it was the best which we could adopt, and that, if it failed, none other with our means would succeed. General Beauregard left for General Hood's headquarters, as I supposed, to aid in the execution of the proposed plan, to the success of which the larger command with which he was invested, it was hoped, would contribute.
General Hood moved as was expected upon the enemy's line of communication, and his successes at Big Shanty and Acworth, in capturing those stations and thoroughly destroying the railroad between them, and his partial success at Allatoona, caused Sherman, leaving one corps to garrison Atlanta, to move out with his main body to restore his communications. Hood further succeeded in destroying the railroad from Resaca to Tunnel Hill, capturing the enemy's posts at Tilton, Dalton, and Mill-Creek Gap; but, not deeming his army in condition to risk a general engagement, withdrew his forces in a southwesterly direction toward Gadsden, which place he reached October 20th, finding there supplies adequate for the wants of his troops. Sherman had turned back toward Atlanta, and Hood, instead of hanging on his rear, not allowing him to repair the damage to the railroad, and otherwise harassing him in his march as much as possible, after conference with General Beauregard, decided to continue his march into Tennessee.[111] His reasons for this change of plan are elaborately and forcibly presented in his book, "Advance and Retreat," published since the war, and in which he emphatically contradicts the attempt which has been made to represent that campaign into Tennessee as one projected by me. The correspondence of General Sherman, published in the same work, shows that Hood was not far wrong in the supposition that Sherman would follow the movement made on his line of communication; the only error being that he could thus draw him beyond the limits of Georgia. After my return to Richmond, a telegram from General Beauregard informed me of the change of programme. My objection to that movement remained, and, though it was too late to regain the space and time which had been lost, I replied promptly on November 30, 1864, as follows:
"General BEAUREGARD, care of Colonel W. M. Browne, Augusta, Georgia.
"Yours of 24th received. It is probable that the enemy, if short of supplies, may move directly for the coast. When that is made manifest, you will be able to concentrate your forces upon the one object, and I hope, if you can not defeat his attempt, that you may reduce his army to such condition as to be inefficient for further operations.
"Until Hood reaches the country proper of the enemy, he can scarcely change the plans for Sherman's or Grant's campaigns. They would, I think, regard the occupation of Tennessee and Kentucky as of minor importance.
"JEFFERSON DAVIS."
To the arguments offered to show that our army could not, after it had reached the Tennessee River, have effectually pursued Sherman in his march through southern Georgia, it is only needful to reply that the physical difficulties set forth would not have existed, had our army commenced the pursuit from Gadsden.
To make the movement into Tennessee a success, even so far as to recover that country, it was necessary that it should be executed so promptly as to anticipate the concentration of the enemy's forces, but unforeseen and unavoidable delays occurred, which gave full time for preparation. After having overcome many vexatious detentions, Hood on the 20th of November completed his crossing of the Tennessee River at Gunter's Landing, and moved forward into Tennessee on the route to Nashville, whither Sherman had sent General Thomas for the protection of his depots and communications against an apprehended attack by cavalry under General Forrest.
Most unwilling to criticise the conduct of that very gallant and faithful soldier who, battle-scarred and mutilated, survived the war, and whose recent death our country has so much deplored, I must say after the event, as I did before it, that I consider this movement into Tennessee ill-advised.
Thomas having been sufficiently reënforced in Tennessee to enable him to hold Hood in check, and Sherman relieved from the necessity of defending himself against an active army, and of protecting a long line of railroad communication with a fortified base in his rear, resolved upon his march to the sea, abandoning Atlanta, after having first utterly destroyed that city by fire. Not a single house was spared, not even a church. Similar acts of vandalism marked the progress of the Federal army at Rome, Kingston, Acworth, Marietta, and every town or village along its route, thus carrying out General Sherman's order "to enforce a devastation more or less relentless" along the line of his march, where he only encountered helpless women and children. The arson of the dwelling-houses of non-combatants and the robbery of their property, extending even to the trinkets worn by women, made the devastation as relentless as savage instincts could suggest.
On November 16th Sherman left his intrenchments around Atlanta, and, dividing his army into two bodies, each from twenty-five to thirty thousand strong, the one followed the Georgia Railroad in the direction of Augusta, and the other took the line of the Macon and Western Railroad to Jonesboro. Avoiding Macon and Augusta, they passed through central Georgia, taking Milledgeville on the way, marching in compact column, and advancing with extreme caution, although only opposed by detachments of Wheeler's cavalry and a few hastily formed regiments of raw militia. Partial efforts were made to obstruct and destroy the roads in the front and on the flanks of the invading army, and patriotic appeals by prominent citizens were made to the people, to remove all provisions from its path, but no formidable opposition was made, except at the railroad-bridge over the Oconee, where Wheeler, with a portion of his command and a few militia, held the enemy in check for two or three days. With his small force, General Wheeler daringly and persistently harassed, and, when practicable, delayed the enemy's advance, attacking and defeating exposed detachments, deterring his foragers from venturing far from the main body, defending all cities and towns along the railroad lines, and affording protection to depots of supplies, arsenals, and other important Government works. The report of his operations from November 14th to December 20th displays a dash, activity, vigilance, and consummate skill, which justly entitle him to a prominent place on the roll of great cavalry leaders. By his indomitable energy, operating on all sides of Sherman's columns, he was enabled to keep the Government and commanders of our troops advised of the enemy's movements, and, by preventing foraging parties from leaving the main body, he saved from spoliation all but a narrow tract of country, and from the torch millions worth of property which would otherwise have been certainly consumed.
It soon became manifest that Savannah was General Sherman's objective point. That city was occupied by General W. J. Hardee with about eighteen thousand men, a considerable portion of which was composed of militia, local troops, reserves, and hastily organized regiments and battalions made up of convalescents from the hospitals and artisans from the Government shops. On the 10th of December the enemy's columns reached the immediate vicinity of Savannah, and on the 12th they occupied a semicircular line extending from the Savannah River to the Savannah and Gulf Railroad. The defenses of the city were strong, the earthworks and other fortifications were flanked by inundated rice-swamps extending across the peninsula formed by the Savannah and Ogeechee Rivers, and the causeways leading through them were well fortified by works mounting heavy guns. With a sufficient force to occupy his long lines of defense, General Hardee could have sustained a protracted siege. The city was amply supplied, and its lines of communication were still open. Although Sherman had reached Savannah, he had not yet opened communication with the Federal fleet. Fort McAllister, situated on the right bank of the Ogeechee, about six miles from Ossabaw Sound, was a serious obstacle in his way, as it was a work of considerable strength, mounting twenty-one heavy guns, a deep and wide ditch extending along its front, with every avenue of approach swept by the guns mounted upon its bastions. The fort was held by a garrison of two hundred and fifty men under the command of experienced officers. The work was attacked on the evening of the 13th, and carried by assault after a short and feeble resistance. In consequence of the loss of this fort, Sherman speedily opened communication with the fleet, and became perfectly secure against any future want of supplies. This also enabled him to obtain heavy ordnance for use against the city. He proceeded immediately to take measures to invest Savannah, and in a few days had succeeded in doing so on every side of the city except that fronting the river. While Hardee's troops had not yielded a single position or lost a foot of ground, with the exception of Fort McAllister, when, on December 20th, he discovered that Sherman had put heavy siege-guns in position near enough to bombard the city, and that the enemy was threatening Union Causeway, which extends across the large swamps that lie between Savannah and Charleston, and offered the only practicable line of retreat, he determined to evacuate the place rather than expose the city and its inhabitants to bombardment. He also thought holding it had ceased to be of any special importance, and that his troops could do more valuable service in the field. Accordingly, on the night of December 20th, having destroyed the navy-yard, the ironclads, and other Government property, and razed the fortifications below the city, he withdrew his army and reached Hardeeville on the evening of the 22d, without hindrance or molestation on the part of the enemy.
Having heretofore stated my objections to the plan of sending Hood's army into Tennessee after the fall of Atlanta, I will now follow it in that campaign, relying for the facts on the official report of General Hood of the 15th of February, 1865. The fidelity and gallantry of that officer and the well-known magnanimity of his character are a sufficient guarantee of the impartiality of his narration.
He reported the arrival of his army at Gadsden on the 20th of October, 1864, where he was joined by General P. G. T. Beauregard, commanding the military department. He writes that, after withdrawing from Atlanta, his hope had been that Sherman in following might offer an opportunity to strike him in detail, but in this he was disappointed. Hood reported that the morale of his army, though improved, was not such as, in the opinion of his corps commanders, would justify a general engagement while the enemy remained united. At Gadsden he found a thorough supply of shoes and other stores, but, after a full and free conference with General Beauregard at Tuscumbia, he decided to cross the Tennessee and move against Thomas, who with his corps had been detached by Sherman and sent into Middle Tennessee. General Beauregard had sent orders to General Forrest to move with his cavalry into Tennessee; the main body of Hood's cavalry had been sent to follow Sherman. As the orders to Forrest were accidentally delayed, and Hood had not cavalry enough to protect his trains, he was compelled to wait for the coming of Forrest, and, to hasten the meeting, moved down the river as far as Florence, where he arrived on the 31st of October. This unfortunate delay gave the enemy time to repair the railroad to Chattanooga, and accumulate supplies at Atlanta for a march thence toward the Atlantic coast. Forrest's cavalry joined on the 21st of November, and the movement began. The enemy's forces at that time were concentrated at Pulaski and at Lawrenceburg. Hood endeavored to place his army between these forces and Nashville, but our cavalry, having driven off the enemy at Lawrenceburg, gave notice of our advance, and on the 23d he evacuated Pulaski and moved rapidly by the turnpike and railroad to Columbia. On the evening of the 27th of November our army took position in front of the works at that place. During the night the town was evacuated, and a strong position was taken on the opposite side of the river, about a mile and a half distant. On the evening of the 28th General Forrest crossed Duck River a few miles above Columbia, and in the morning of the 29th Stewart's and Cheatham's corps followed the cavalry, leaving Lieutenant-General Stephen D. Lee's corps confronting the enemy at Columbia. The cavalry and the two infantry corps moved in light marching order, the object being, by advancing rapidly on roads parallel to the Columbia and Franklin turnpike at or near Spring Hill, to cut off that portion of the foe at Columbia. The movement having been discovered after Hood's forces had got well on the flank of the enemy, he began to retreat along the turnpike toward Spring Hill. About noon of that day the cavalry attacked his trains, but found them too strongly guarded to be captured. The retreat was rapidly conducted along the turnpike, with flankers thrown out to protect the main column. Near Spring Hill Major-General Cheatham, being in the advance, commenced to come in contact with the retreating column about two miles from Spring Hill. He was ordered to attack vigorously, and get possession of the turnpike. This was so feebly executed that he failed to attain the object, and the enemy passed on toward Spring Hill. Though the golden opportunity had passed with daylight, Hood did not abandon the hope of effecting by a night movement the end he sought. Accordingly, Lieutenant-General Stewart was furnished with a guide, and ordered to move his corps beyond Cheatham's, and place it across the road beyond Spring Hill. In the dark and confusion, he did not succeed in getting the position desired. About midnight, ascertaining that the enemy was moving in disorder, with artillery, wagons, and troops intermixed, Hood sent instructions to General Cheatham to advance a heavy line of skirmishers, still further to impede the retreat. This was not accomplished. The enemy continued to move along the road in hurry and confusion nearly all the night. Thus was lost a great opportunity for striking him for which we had labored so long--the greatest this campaign had offered, and one of the greatest during the war. Lieutenant-General S. D. Lee, left in front of the enemy at Columbia, was instructed to press him the moment he abandoned his position at that point. He did not abandon his works until dark, showing that his trains obstructed the road for fifteen miles during the day and a great part of the night. At daylight Hood pursued the enemy so rapidly as to compel him to burn a number of his wagons. On the hills about four miles south of Franklin, he made demonstration as if to give battle, but, when our forces deployed for the attack, he retired to Franklin.
From dispatches captured at Spring Hill, Hood learned that Schofield was instructed by Thomas to hold that position until Franklin could be made secure, and thus knew that it was important to attack Schofield promptly, and concluded that, if he should escape at Franklin, he would gain the fortifications about Nashville. Hood reports that "the nature of the position was such as to render it inexpedient to attempt any other flank movement, and I therefore determined to attack him in front and without delay."
As this was one of the bloodiest battles of the war, and its results materially affected the future, before entering on an account of it, I pause for some general reflections. It is not quite easy to determine what my gallant friend Hood meant by the expression, "the nature of the position." It may have referred to the probability that the enemy, if he attempted a flank movement, would retreat rapidly, as he had done from Columbia, and it is now known that a part of his troops and a large part of his train had already been sent across the Harpeth River. Thomas's dispatch indicated a purpose to hold Franklin; and its relation to Murfreesboro, where a garrison was maintained, would seem to render this a probable part of a plan to maintain communication with Chattanooga. Franklin had to us, as a mere military question, no other value than that the road to Nashville led through it. Whether it would have been possible to turn the position so promptly as to strike the enemy's line of retreat is a question which no doubt General Hood considered and decided in the negative, otherwise he would surely have preferred to attack the enemy on the march rather than in his intrenchments, especially as these were so near to the town that Hood was restrained from using his artillery on account of the women and children resident in it. The position itself was favorable for defense; the Harpeth River by a short bend flows on two sides of the town, and the works in front had the center so boldly salient, their flanks resting on the river, as to inclose the town in something like a square, two sides being river and two sides intrenchment. The exterior line of defense had been recently and hastily constructed; the interior line was much stronger. Behind the town there were two bridges, one on the main road leading through it, and the other a pontoon-bridge a short distance above it. Hood had served with distinction under Lee and Jackson, and his tactics were of that school. If he had, by an impetuous attack, crushed Schofield's army, without too great a loss to his own, and Forrest could have executed his orders to capture the trains when Schofield's army was crushed, we should never have heard complaint because Hood attacked at Franklin, and these were the hopes with which he made his assault.
On the 30th of November he formed his line of battle. At 4 P.M. he gave the order to advance; his troops moved gallantly forward, carried the first line, and advanced against the interior works; here the engagement was close and fierce; the combatants occupied the opposite sides of the intrenchments, our men carrying them in some places, many being killed entirely inside the enemy's works. Some of the Tennesseeans, after years of absence, saw again their homes, and strove with desperation to expel the invader from them; the contest continued till near midnight, when the enemy abandoned his works and crossed the river, leaving his dead and wounded behind him, We had won a victory, but it was purchased at fearful cost. General Hood, in his letter of December 11, 1864, written near Nashville, reported his entire loss at about four thousand five hundred, and among them was Major-General Cleburne, Brigadier-Generals Gist, John Adams, Strahl, and Granberry, all well known to fame, and whose loss we could ill afford to bear. Around Cleburne thickly lay the gallant men who, in his desperate assault, followed him with the implicit confidence that in another army was given to Stonewall Jackson; and in the one case, as in the other, a vacancy was created which could never be filled. Hood reported that the number of dead left on the field by the enemy indicated that his loss was equal to or near our own; that those of our men who were captured were inside the enemy's works.
The next morning at daylight, the wounded being cared for and the dead buried, Hood moved forward toward Nashville, about eighteen miles distant, and Forrest with his cavalry closely pursued the enemy. On the 2d of December our army took position in front of Nashville about two miles from the city, Lieutenant-General Lee's corps in the center resting on the Franklin turnpike, Cheatham's on the right, Stewart's on the left, and the cavalry on each flank. Hood then commenced to construct detached works to cover the flanks, should offensive movements be attempted against our flank and rear. The enemy still held Murfreesboro with a garrison of about six thousand, strongly fortified; he also had small forces at Chattanooga and Knoxville. It was supposed that he would soon have to take the offensive to relieve his garrisons at those points, or cause them to be evacuated, in which latter case Hood hoped to capture the forces at Murfreesboro, and thus open communication with Georgia and Virginia; and he thought, if attacked in position, that he could defeat Thomas, gain possession of Nashville with its abundant supplies, and thus get the control of Tennessee. The people of the country, in the mean time, were able and willing to furnish our army with supplies, and we had captured rolling-stock to put the railroad to Pulaski in successful operation.
Hood sent Major-General Forrest with the greater part of his cavalry and a division of infantry against Murfreesboro. The infantry did not fulfill expectation, and it was withdrawn. Mercer's and Palmer's brigades of infantry were sent to replace the division. Nothing of importance occurred until the morning of the 15th, and the enemy, having been reënforced by about fifteen thousand men from the trans-Mississippi, attacked simultaneously both flanks of our line. On our right he was repulsed with heavy loss; but on our left, toward evening, he earned some of the partially completed redoubts. During the night of the 15th our line was shortened and strengthened, the left being thrown back and dispositions made to meet any renewed attack. The corps of Major-General Cheatham was transferred from our right to the left. Early on the 16th of December the enemy made a general attack on our lines, accompanied by a heavy fire of artillery. All his assaults were repulsed with heavy loss until 3.30 P.M., when a portion of our line to the left of the center suddenly gave way. Up to this time no battle ever progressed more favorably-- the troops in excellent spirits, waving their colors and bidding defiance to the enemy; but the position he then gained being such as to enfilade us, caused our entire line to give way in a few moments and our troops to retreat in the direction of Franklin, most of them in great confusion. Confidence in the ability to hold the line had caused the artillery-horses to be sent to the rear for safety, and the abandonment of the position was so unexpected and sudden that it was not possible to bring forward the horses to remove the guns which had been placed in position, and fifty-four of them were consequently lost. Our loss in killed and wounded was small. At Brentwood, about four miles from the field of battle, the troops were partially rallied, and Lieutenant-General S. D, Lee took command of the rear-guard and encamped for the night. On leaving the field, Hood sent one of his staff-officers to inform General Forrest of our defeat, and to direct him to rejoin the army with as little delay as possible, but heavy rains had so swollen the creeks that he was unable to effect the junction with his main force until it reached Columbia. During the 17th the enemy's cavalry pressed boldly on the retreating column, the open character of the country being favorable to cavalry operations. Lieutenant-General Lee, commanding the covering force, was severely wounded, but not until after he and the corps he commanded had rendered such service as to receive the special commendation of the General commanding the army.
Hood reports that when he left the field before Nashville he had hoped to be able to remain in Tennessee, on the line of Duck River; but, after arriving at Colombia, he became convinced that the condition of the army made it necessary to recross the Tennessee without delay. On the 21st he resumed his march for Pulaski, leaving Major-General Walthall, with five infantry brigades, and General Forrest, with the main body of his cavalry, at Columbia, to cover the movements of the army. The retreat continued, and on the 25th, 26th, and 27th, the army, including the rear-guard, crossed the Tennessee River at Bainbridge. The enemy had followed the rear-guard with all his cavalry and three corps of infantry to Pulaski, and thence the cavalry continued the pursuit to the Tennessee River. After crossing the river, the army moved by easy marches to Tupelo, Mississippi. General Hood reported his losses in the Tennessee campaign to have been about ten thousand men, including prisoners, and that when he arrived at Tupelo he had 18,500 infantry and artillery, and 2,306 cavalry. I again quote from General Hood's report:
"Here, finding so much dissatisfaction throughout the country, as, in my judgment, greatly to impair, if not destroy, my usefulness, and counteract my exertions, and with no desire but to serve my country, I asked to be relieved, with the hope that another might be assigned to the command who might do more than I could hope to accomplish. Accordingly, I was so relieved on the 23d of January, by authority of the President."
Though, as General Hood states in his book, page 273, I was "averse to his going into Tennessee," he might well assume that I "was not, as General Beauregard and himself, acquainted with the true condition of the army" when they decided on the Tennessee campaign. Of the manner in which he conducted it, Isham G. Harris, the Governor of Tennessee, a man of whose judgment, integrity, and manhood I had the highest opinion, wrote to me, on the 25th of December, 1864:
". . . I have been with General Hood from the beginning of this campaign, and beg to say, disastrous as it has ended, I am not able to see anything that General Hood has done that he should not, or neglected any thing that he should, have done, . . . and regret to say that, if all had performed their parts as well as he, the results would have been very different."
To this I will only add that General Hood was relieved at his reiterated request, made from such creditable motives as are expressed in the extract above, taken from his official report, and that it was in no wise due to a want of confidence in him on my part.
[Footnote 105: It was during this time, i. e.. in March and April, 1864, that Forrest made his extraordinary expedition from north Mississippi across Tennessee to Paducah, Kentucky, and continued his operations against depots of supplies, lines of communication, and troops moving to reënforce Sherman--having, on June 11th, a severe action in Tishemingo with a force estimated at eight or nine thousand, supposed to be on their way to join Sherman. The energy, strategy, and high purposes of Forrest, during all this period, certainly entitle him to higher military rank than that of a partisan, and enroll him in the list of great cavalry commanders. Some of his other expeditions are elsewhere mentioned in these pages.]
[Footnote 106: "Narrative," p. 302.]
[Footnote 107: "Advance and Retreat," by J. B. Hood, pp. 98-116.]
[Footnote 108: Johnston's "Narrative," p. 346.]
[Footnote 109: Mr. Seddon, ex-Secretary of War, in a letter written to me on the 10th of February, 1879, states, in regard to his interview with General Lee, that it was held after the determination had been made "to remove General Johnston from his command at Atlanta," and says of the purpose of the interview with General Lee: "It was designed merely to secure General Lee's estimate of qualifications in the selection of a successor for the command."]
[Footnote 110: Mayor Calhoun's Petition to General Sherman, September 11, 1864.]
[Footnote 111: "Advance and Retreat," by General J. B. Hood; letter of General Beauregard to President Davis, p. 278, et seq.]
Chapter XLIX
Exchange of Prisoners.--Signification of the Word "loyal."--Who is the Sovereign?--Words of President Lincoln.--The Issue for which we fought.--Position of the United States Government.--Letters of Marque granted by us.--Officers and Crew First Prisoners of the Enemy.--Convicted as "Pirates."--My Letter to President Lincoln.-- How received.--Act of Congress relating to Prisoners.--Exchanges, how made.-Answer of General Grant.--Request of United States Congress.--Result.--Commissioners sent.--Agreement.--Disputed Points.--Exchange arranged.--Order to pillage issued.--General Pope's Order.--Proceedings.--Letter of General Lee relative to Barbarities.--Answer of General Halleck.--Case of Mumford.--Effect of Threatened Retaliation.--Mission of Vice-President Stephens.--A Failure.--Excess of Prisoners.--Paroled Men.--Proposition made by us.--No Answer.--Another Arrangement.--Stopped by General Grant.-- His words, "Put the Matter offensively."--Exchange of Slaves.-- Proposition of Lee to Grant.--Reply of Grant.--Further Reply.--His Dispatch to General Butler.--Another Proposition made by us.--No Answer.--Proposition relative to Sick and Wounded.--Some exchanged.--The Worst Cases asked for to be photographed.-- Proposition as to Medicines.--No Answer.--A Final Effort.-- Deputation of Prisoners sent to Washington.--A Failure.-- Correspondence between Ould and Butler.--Order of Grant.--Report of Butler.--Responsibility of Grant for Andersonville.--Barbarities of the United States Government.--Treatment of our Men in Northern Prisons.--Deaths on Each Side.
Perhaps there was no question in the treatment of which the true character and intentions of the Government of the United States was so clearly exposed as in the exchange of prisoners. That we should dare to resort to arms for the preservation of our rights, and "to secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity," was regarded by our enemies as most improbable. Their aspirations for dominion and sovereignty, through the Government of the Union, had become so deep-seated and apparently real as to cause that Government, at its first step, to assume the haughtiness and imperiousness of an absolute sovereign. "I appeal to all loyal citizens to favor, facilitate, and aid this effort," said President Lincoln, in the first proclamation, calling for seventy-five thousand men. The term "loyal" has no signification except as applied to the sovereign of an empire or kingdom. In a republic the people are the sovereign, and the term "loyal" or its opposite can have no signification except in relation to the true sovereign. To say, therefore, that the agent of the sovereign people, the representative of the system they have organized to conduct their common affairs, composed the real sovereign, and that loyalty or disloyalty is of signification in relation to this sovereign alone, is not only a perversion of language, but an error, that leads straight to the subversion of all popular government and the establishment of the monarchical or consolidated form. The Government of the United States is now the sovereign here, says President Lincoln in this proclamation, and loyalty consists in the maintenance of that sovereignty against all its foes. The sovereignty of the people and of the several and distinct States, in his mind, was only a weakness and enthusiasm of the fathers. The States and the people thereof had become consolidated into a national Union. "I appeal," says President Lincoln, "to all loyal citizens to favor, facilitate, and aid this effort to maintain the honor, the integrity, and the existence of our national Union."
The Confederate States refused thus "to favor, facilitate, and aid this effort to maintain the honor, the integrity, and the existence of a national Union." They not only refused to aid, but they took up arms to defeat the consummation of such a monstrous usurpation of popular rights and popular sovereignty. It was evident that, if no efforts for a rescue were made, the time would soon come when the rights of all the States might be denied, and the hope of mankind in constitutional freedom be for ever lost. This was the usurpation. This lay at the foundation of the war. Every subsequent act of the Government was another step in the same direction, all tending palpably to supremacy for the Government of the United States, the subjugation of the States, and the submission of the people.
This was the adversary with whom we had to struggle, and this was the issue for which we fought. That we dared to draw our swords to vindicate the rights and the sovereignty of the people, that we dared to resist and deny all sovereignty as inherently existing in the Government of the United States, was adjudged an infamous crime, and we were denounced as "rebels." It was asserted that those of us "who were captured should be hung as rebels taken in the act." Crushing the corner-stone of the Union, the independence of the States, the Federal Government assumed toward us a position of haughty arrogance, refused to recognize us otherwise than as insurrectionists and "rebels," who resisted and denied its usurped sovereignty, and who were entitled to no amelioration from the punishment of death, except such as might proceed only from the promptings of mercy.
On April 17, 1861, I issued a proclamation in which I offered to grant letters of marque and reprisal to seamen. On April 19th President Lincoln issued a counter-proclamation, declaring that, "if any person, under the pretended authority of said States, or under any other pretense, shall molest a vessel of the United States, or the persons or cargo on board of her, such person shall be held amenable to the laws of the United States for the prevention and punishment of piracy," which was death.
Some small vessels obtained these letters of marque and were captured. Their officers and crew constituted the first prisoners that fell into the hands of the enemy. They were immediately imprisoned, and held for trial as pirates. The trial came on later in the year. A report of it states that "the views of all the judges seemed to center upon the one point, that these men were taken in arms against the Government of the United States, and that, inasmuch as the laws of that Government did not recognize the authority under which the men acted, there was no course but to condemn them."
As soon as the treatment of these prisoners was known in Richmond, before their trial and as early as July 6, 1861, I sent by a special messenger a communication to President Lincoln, in substance as follows:
"Haying learned that the schooner Savannah, a private armed vessel in the service and sailing under a commission issued by the authority of the Confederate States of America, had been captured by one of the vessels forming the blockading squadron off Charleston Harbor, I directed a proposition to be made to the commanding officer of the squadron for an exchange of officers and crew of the Savannah for prisoners of war held by this Government, 'according to number and rank.' To this proposition, made on the 19th ultimo, Captain Mercer, the officer in command of the blockading squadron, made answer, on the same day, that 'the prisoners' (referred to) 'are not on board any of the vessels under my command.'
"It now appears, by statements made without contradiction in newspapers published in New York, that the prisoners above mentioned were conveyed to that city, and have been treated not as prisoners of war, but as criminals; that they have been put in irons, confined in jail, brought before courts of justice on charges of piracy and treason; and it is even rumored that they have been convicted of the offenses charged, for no other reason than that they bore arms in defense of the rights of this Government and under the authority of its commission.
"I could not, without grave discourtesy, have made the newspaper statements above referred to the subject of this communication, if the threat of treating as pirates the citizens of this Confederacy, armed for its service on the high-seas, had not been contained in your proclamation of the 19th of April last. That proclamation, however, seems to afford a sufficient justification for considering these published statements as not devoid of probability.
"It is the desire of this Government so to conduct the war now existing as to mitigate its horrors as far as may be possible, and, with this intent, its treatment of the prisoners captured by its forces has been marked by the greatest humanity and leniency consistent with public obligation. Some have been permitted to return home on parole, others to remain at large, under similar conditions, within this Confederacy, and all have been furnished with rations for their subsistence, such as are allowed to our own troops. It is only since the news has been received of the treatment of the prisoners taken on the Savannah, that I have been compelled to withdraw these indulgences, and to hold the prisoners taken by us in strict confinement.
"A just regard to humanity and to the honor of this Government now requires me to state explicitly that, painful as will be the necessity, this Government will deal out to the prisoners held by it the same treatment and the same fate as shall be experienced by those captured on the Savannah; and, if driven to the terrible necessity of retaliation by your execution of any of the officers or crew of the Savannah, that retaliation will be extended so far as shall be requisite to secure the abandonment of a practice unknown to the warfare of civilized man, and so barbarous as to disgrace the nation which shall be guilty of inaugurating it.
"With this view, and because it may not have reached you, I now renew the proposition made to the commander of the blockading squadron, to exchange for the prisoners taken on the Savannah an equal number of those now held by us according to rank."
This communication was taken by Colonel Thomas Taylor, who was permitted to visit Washington, but was refused an audience with President Lincoln. He was obliged to content himself with a verbal reply from General Winfield Scott that the communication had been delivered to President Lincoln, and that he would reply in writing as soon as possible. No answer ever came. We were compelled to select by lot from among the prisoners in our hands a number to whom we proposed to mete out the same fate which might await the crew of the Savannah. These measures of retaliation arrested the cruel and illegal purposes of the enemy.
Meantime, as early as May 21, 1861, the Confederate Congress passed an act which provided that--
"All prisoners of war taken, whether on land or sea, during the pending hostilities with the United States, shall be transferred by the captors from time to time, and as often as convenient, to the Department of War; and it shall be the duty of the Secretary of War, with the approval of the President, to issue such instructions to the quartermaster-general and his subordinates as shall provide for the safe custody and sustenance of prisoners of war, and the rations furnished prisoners of war shall be the same in quantity and quality as those furnished to enlisted men in the army of the Confederacy."
This law of Congress was embodied in the orders issued from the War Department and from the headquarters in the field, and no order was ever issued in conflict with its humane provisions.
Nevertheless, the Government of the United States, forgetful of the conduct of Great Britain toward her revolted colonies, apparently refused all consideration of the question of exchange of prisoners, as if impressed with the idea that it would derogate from the dignity of its position to accept any interchange of courtesy. An exchange was therefore occasionally made by the various commanders of troops under flags of truce, while the Federal Government made the paltry pretense of not knowing it. We released numbers at different points on parole, and the matter was compromised in various ways. Fifty-seven wounded soldiers were unconditionally released at Richmond and sent home. In response, twenty of our soldiers, mostly North Carolinians, were released from Bedloe's Island, New York, and sent to Fortress Monroe, to be discharged on condition of taking the oath, so called, of loyalty to the United States Government. Thirty-seven confined in the military prison at Washington were released on taking the oath. On September 3d an exchange was made between General Pillow and Colonel Wallace, of the United States Army. Whereupon General Polk proposed an exchange to General Grant, who replied, on October 14th:
"I can, of my own accordance, make none. I recognize no 'Southern Confederacy' myself, but will communicate with higher authorities for their views."
An exchange was made on October 23d between General McClernand and General Polk. Subsequently, on November 8th, General Grant offered to surrender to General Polk certain wounded men and invalids unconditionally. To this proposition General Polk replied:
"My own feelings would prompt me to waive again the unimportant affectation of declining to recognize these States as belligerents in the interest of humanity; but my Government requires all prisoners to be placed at the disposal of the Secretary Of War."
On November 1st General Fremont made an agreement with General Price, in Missouri, by which certain persons named were authorized to negotiate for the exchange of any persons who might be taken prisoners of war, upon a plan previously arranged. General Hunter, who succeeded General Fremont, on November 7th, repudiated this agreement. A proposition made in the Confederate Congress to return the prisoners captured by us at first Manassas, without any formality whatever, would doubtless have prevailed but for the difficulty in reference to the crew of the Savannah.
But this determination of the United States Government, not to meet us on the equal footing consistent with the modern usages of war and exchange prisoners, thus far prevented any general arrangement for that object. In consequence, however, of the clamors of the Northern people for the restoration of their friends, both Houses of Congress united in a request to President Lincoln to take immediate steps for a general exchange. Instead of complying with this request, two respectable commissioners were, however, appointed to visit the prisoners we held, relieve their necessities, and provide for their comfort at the expense of the United States. It is impossible to conceive any reason for such conduct, unless it was to exasperate and "fire up the Northern heart," as it was expressed, and thus cause the people to make greater efforts for our devastation. This action on the part of the Government was at a later day known by the expression "waving the bloody shirt."
The commissioners arrived at Norfolk, Virginia, but were not allowed to proceed any farther. A readiness on our part to negotiate for a general exchange was manifested, and agreed to by them. This was subsequently approved at Washington. Shortly afterward, on February 14, 1862, an arrangement was made between General Howell Cobb on our part and General Wool, the commander at Fortress Monroe, by the terms of which the prisoners of war in the hands of each Government were to be exchanged man for man, the officers being assimilated as to rank; our privateersmen were to be exchanged on the footing of prisoners of war; any surplus remaining on either side was to be released; and during the continuance of hostilities prisoners taken on either side should be paroled. The exchange proceeded, and about three hundred in excess had been delivered, when it was discovered that not one of our privateersmen had been released, and that our men taken prisoners at Fort Donelson, instead of being paroled, had been sent into the interior. Some of the hostages we held for our privateersmen had gone forward, but the remainder were retained. Being informed of this state of affairs, I recommended to Congress that all of our men who had been paroled by the United States Government should be released from the obligations of their parole so as to bear arms in our defense, in consequence of this breach of good faith on the part of that Government. It was subsequently said, on behalf of the United States Government, that the detention of our privateersmen had been intended to be only temporary, to make it certain that the hostages were coming forward.
It is further stated that the only unadjusted point between Generals Cobb and Wool was, that the latter was unwilling that each party should agree to pay the expenses of transporting their prisoners to the frontier, and this he promised to refer to his Government. At a second interview, on March 1, 1862, General Wool informed General Cobb that his Government would not consent to pay these expenses, and thereupon General Cobb promptly receded from his demand, and agreed to the terms proposed by the other side. But General Wool, who had said at the beginning of the negotiation, "I am clothed with full power for the purpose of arranging for the exchange of prisoners," was now under the necessity of stating that "his Government had changed his instructions." And thus the negotiations were abruptly broken off, and the matter left where it was before.[112] After these negotiations had begun, the capture of Forts Henry and Donelson had given to the United States a considerable preponderance in the number of prisoners held by them, and they at once returned to their original purpose of an equal treatment.
A suspension of exchange for some months ensued. Finally, a storm of indignation beginning to arise among the Northern people at the conduct of their Government, it was forced to yield its absurd pretensions, and, on July 22, 1862, a cartel for the exchange of prisoners was executed, based on the cartel of 1812 between the United States and Great Britain. In accordance with these terms an exchange commenced, and by the middle of August most of the officers of rank on either side, who had been for any long period in captivity, were released.
On the same day on which the cartel was signed, an order was issued by the Secretary of War, in Washington, under instructions from President Lincoln, empowering the military commanders in Virginia and elsewhere "to seize and use any property, real or personal, which may be necessary or convenient for their several commands for supplies or for other military purposes," and "to keep accounts sufficiently accurate and in detail to show quantities and amounts and from whom it shall come, as a basis upon which compensation can be made in proper cases." This was simply a system of plunder, for no compensation would be made to any person unless he could prove his fidelity to the Government of the United States.
On the next day, Major-General Pope, in command of the United States forces near Washington,[113] issued a general order directing the murder of our peaceful inhabitants as spies, if found quietly tilling the farms in his rear, even outside of his lines; and one of his brigadier-generals seized upon innocent and peaceful inhabitants to be held as hostages, to the end that they might be murdered in cold blood if any of his soldiers were killed by some unknown persons, whom he designated as "bushwhackers." Under this state of facts, I issued a general order, recognizing General Pope and his commissioned officers to be in the position which they had chosen for themselves-- that of robbers and murderers, and not that of public enemies, entitled, if captured, to be considered as prisoners of war. Some of the military authorities of the United States seemed to suppose that better success would attend a savage war, in which no quarter was to be given and no age or sex to be spared, than had hitherto been secured by such hostilities as were alone recognized to be lawful by civilized men. We renounced our right of retaliation on the innocent, and continued to treat the soldiers of General Pope's army as prisoners of war, confining our repressive measures to the punishment only of commissioned officers as were willing participants in such crimes. General Pope was soon afterward removed from command.
In August a letter involving similar principles was addressed by General R. E. Lee to the commanding General at Washington, General Halleck, making inquiries as to the truth of the case of William B. Mumford, reported to have been murdered at New Orleans by Major-General Benjamin F. Butler, and of Colonel John Owens, reported to have been murdered in Missouri by order of Major-General Pope. I had also been credibly informed that numerous other officers of the army of the United States within the Confederacy had been guilty of felonies and capital offenses, which are punishable by all laws human and divine. Inquiries were made by letter relative to a few of the best-authenticated cases. It was announced that Major-General Hunter had armed slaves for the murder of their masters, and had thus done all in his power to inaugurate a servile war, which is worse than that of the savage, inasmuch as it super-adds other horrors to the indiscriminate slaughter of all ages, sexes, and conditions.
In a letter, dated Port Royal, South Carolina, June 23, 1862, General Hunter said:
"It is my hope to have organized by the end of next fall, and to be able to present to the Government, from forty-eight to fifty thousand of these hardy and devoted soldiers."
Brigadier-General Phelps was reported to have initiated at New Orleans the example set by General Hunter in South Carolina. Brigadier-General G. N. Fitch was stated in the public journals to have murdered in cold blood two peaceful citizens, because one of his men, when invading our country, was killed by some unknown person while defending his home. General Lee was further directed by me to say that, if a reply was not received in fifteen days, it would be assumed that the alleged facts were true, and were sanctioned by the Government of the United States, and on that Government would rest the responsibility of retaliatory measures. The reply of the commanding General (Halleck) at Washington was in these words:
"As these papers are couched in language insulting to the Government of the United States, I most respectfully decline to receive them."
On August 20, 1862, I issued an order threatening retaliation for the lives of peaceable citizens reported to have been executed by Brigadier-General Fitch. That report was afterward ascertained to be untrue. On the next day I issued another order, which, after reciting the principal facts, directed that Major-General Hunter and Brigadier-General Phelps should be no longer held and treated as public enemies of the Confederate States, but as outlaws; and that in the event of the capture of either of them, or that of any other commissioned officer employed in drilling, organizing, or instructing slaves, with a view to their armed service in this war, he should not be regarded as a prisoner of war, but held in close confinement for execution as a felon, at such time and place as may be ordered.
In the case of William B. Mumford, a letter was received from General Halleck, dated August 7, 1862, stating sufficient causes for a failure to make an earlier reply to the letter of July 6th; asserting that "no authentic information had been received in relation to the execution of Mumford, but measures will be immediately taken to ascertain the facts of the alleged execution," and promising that General Lee should be duly informed thereof. Subsequently, on November 25, 1862, our agent for the exchange of prisoners, Mr. Robert Ould, under my instructions, addressed the agent of the United States, informing him that the explanation promised on August 7th had not been received; and that, if no answer was sent within fifteen days, it would be considered that an answer was declined. On December 3d our agent, Mr. Ould, was apprised by the agent of the United States that his letter had been forwarded to the Secretary of War at Washington, and no answer was returned, which was regarded as a tacit admission of the charge. Besides, I had received evidence fully establishing the fact that the said Mumford, a citizen of the Confederacy, was actually and publicly executed in cold blood by hanging after the occupation of New Orleans by the forces under General Benjamin F. Butler, when said Mumford was an unresisting and non-combatant captive, and for no offenses even alleged to have been committed by him subsequent to the date of the occupation of the city. It appeared that the silence of the Government of the United States and its maintenance of Butler in high office, under its authority, afforded evidence too conclusive that it sanctioned his conduct, and was determined that he should remain unpunished for these crimes. I therefore pronounced and declared the said Butler a felon, deserving capital punishment, and ordered that he be no longer considered and treated as a public enemy of the Confederate States, but as an outlaw and common enemy of mankind; and that, in the event of his capture, the officer in command should cause him to be immediately executed by hanging.
These measures of retaliation were in conformity with the usages of war, and were adapted to check and punish the cruelties of our adversary.
At length, so many difficulties were raised and so many complaints made in the execution of the cartel, that, for the sake of the unfortunate prisoners, I resolved to seek an adjustment through the authorities at Washington. For this purpose Vice-President Stephens offered his services as a commissioner. The following papers will show the proposition we were prepared to make, and illustrate the disposition with which our humane designs were regarded by the enemy:
"RICHMOND, July 2, 1863.
"Hon. ALEXANDER H. STEPHENS, Richmond, Virginia.
"SIR: Having accepted your patriotic offer to proceed as a military commissioner under flag of truce to Washington, you will receive herewith your letter of authority to the Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States. The letter is signed by me, as Commander-in-Chief of the Confederate land and naval forces.
"You will perceive from the terms of the letter that it is so worded as to avoid any political difficulties in its reception. Intended exclusively as one of those communications between belligerents which public law recognizes as necessary and proper between hostile forces, care has been taken to give no pretext for refusing to receive it on the ground that it would involve a tacit recognition of the independence of the Confederacy. Your mission is simply one of humanity, and has no political aspect.
"If objection is made to receiving your letter on the ground that it is not addressed to Abraham Lincoln as President, instead of Commander-in-Chief, etc., then you will present the duplicate letter which is addressed to him as President and signed by me as President. To this latter, objection may be made on the ground that I am not recognized to be President of the Confederacy. In this event you will decline any further attempt to confer on the subject of your mission, as such conference is admissible only on the footing of perfect equality.
"My recent interviews with you have put you so fully in possession of my views, that it is scarcely necessary to give you any detailed instructions, even were I at this moment well enough to attempt it. My whole purpose is in one word to place this war on the footing of such as are waged by civilized people in modern times, and to divest it of the savage character which has been impressed on it by our enemies, in spite of all our efforts and protests. War is full enough of unavoidable horrors under all its aspects, to justify and even to demand of any Christian rulers who may be unhappily engaged in carrying it on, to seek to restrict its calamities and to divest it of all unnecessary severities. You will endeavor to establish the cartel for the exchange of prisoners on such a basis as to avoid the constant difficulties and complaints which arise, and to prevent for the future what we deem the unfair conduct of our enemies in evading the delivery of the prisoners who fall into their hands; in retarding it by sending them on circuitous routes, and by detaining them sometimes for months in camps and prisons; and in persisting in taking captives non-combatants.
"Your attention is also called to the unheard-of conduct of Federal officers in driving from their homes entire communities of women and children, as well as of men, whom they find in districts occupied by their troops, for no other reason than because these unfortunates are faithful to the allegiance due to their States, and refuse to take an oath of fidelity to their enemies.
"The putting to death of unarmed prisoners has been a ground of just complaint in more than one instance; and the recent execution of officers of our army in Kentucky, for the sole cause that they were engaged in recruiting service in a State which is claimed as still one of the United States, but is also claimed by us as one of the Confederate States, must be repressed by retaliation if not unconditionally abandoned, because it would justify the like execution in every other State of the Confederacy; and the practice is barbarous, uselessly cruel, and can only lead to the slaughter of prisoners on both sides--a result too horrible to be contemplated without making every effort to avoid it.
"On these and all kindred subjects you will consider your authority full and ample to make such arrangements as will temper the present cruel character of the contest, and full confidence is placed in your judgment, patriotism, and discretion that, while carrying out the objects of your mission, you will take care that the equal rights of the Confederacy be always preserved."
"HEADQUARTERS, RICHMOND, July 2, 1863.
"SIR: As Commander-in-Chief of the land and naval forces now waging war against the United States, I have the honor to address this communication to you, as Commander-in-Chief of their land and naval forces.
"Numerous difficulties and disputes have arisen in relation to the execution of the cartel of exchange heretofore agreed on by the belligerents, and the commissioners for the exchange of prisoners have been unable to adjust their differences. Their action on the subject of these differences is delayed and embarrassed by the necessity of referring each subject as it arises to superior authority for decision. I believe that I have just grounds of complaint against the officers and forces under your command for breach of the terms of the cartel, and, being myself ready to execute it at all times in good faith, I am not justified in doubting the existence of the same disposition on your part.
"In addition to this matter, I have to complain of the conduct of your officers and troops in many parts of the country, who violate all the rules of war, by carrying on hostilities, not only against armed foes, but against non-combatants, aged men, women, and children; while others not only seize such property as is required for the use of your forces, but destroy all private property within their reach, even agricultural implements; and openly avow the purpose of seeking to subdue the population of the districts where they are operating, by the starvation that must result from the destruction of standing crops and agricultural tools.
"Still, again, others of your officers in different districts have recently taken the lives of prisoners who fell into their power, and justify their act by asserting a right to treat as spies the military officers and enlisted men under my command, who may penetrate for hostile purposes into States claimed by me to be engaged in the warfare now waged against the United States, and claimed by the latter as having refused to engage in such warfare.
"I have heretofore, on different occasions, been forced to make complaint of these outrages, and to ask from you that you should either avow or disclaim having authorized them, and have failed to obtain such answer as the usages of civilized warfare require to be given in such cases.
"These usages justify, and indeed require, redress by retaliation, as the proper means of repressing such cruelties as are not permitted in warfare between Christian peoples. I have, notwithstanding, refrained from the exercise of such retaliation, because of its obvious tendency to lead to a war of indiscriminate massacre on both sides, which would be a spectacle so shocking to humanity and so disgraceful to the age in which we live and the religion we profess, that I can not contemplate it without a feeling of horror that I am disinclined to doubt you would share.
"With the view, then, of making one last solemn attempt to avert such calamities, and to attest my earnest desire to prevent them, if it be possible, I have selected the bearer of this letter, the Hon. Alexander H. Stephens, as a military commissioner to proceed to your headquarters under flag of truce, there to confer and agree on the subjects above mentioned; and I do hereby authorise the said Alexander H. Stephens to arrange and settle all differences and disputes which may have arisen or may arise in the execution of the cartel for exchange of prisoners of war, heretofore agreed on between our respective land and naval forces; also to agree to any just modification that may be found necessary to prevent further misunderstandings as to the terms of said cartel; and finally to enter into such arrangement or understanding about the mode of carrying on hostilities between the belligerents as shall confine the severities of the war within such limits as are rightfully imposed, not only by modern civilization, but by our common Christianity. I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant,
"JEFFERSON DAVIS,
"Commander-in-Chief of the land and naval forces of the Confederate States.
"To ABRAHAM LINCOLN,
"Commander-in-Chief of the land and naval fores of the United States."
On July 3, 1863, Mr. Stephens proceeded down the James River under a flag of truce, and when near Newport News his further progress was arrested by the orders of the Admiral of the enemy's fleet. The object of his mission, with a request for permission to go to Washington, was made known to that officer, who, by telegraph, communicated with the Government at Washington. The reply of that Government was:
"The request is inadmissible. The customary agents and channels are adequate for all needful military communications and conference between the United States forces and the insurgents."
This was all the notice ever taken of our humane propositions. We were stigmatized as insurgents, and the door was shut in our faces. Does not this demonstrate an intent to subjugate our States?
From the correspondence of our exchange commissioner, Judge Ould, it appears that, from the date of the cartel on July 22, 1862, until the summer of 1863, we had an excess of prisoners. During the interval deliveries were made as fast as the enemy furnished transportation. Indeed, upon more than one occasion they were urged to send increased means of transportation. It was never alleged that we failed or neglected to make prompt deliveries of prisoners who were not held under charges when they had the excess. On the other hand, the cartel was openly and notoriously violated by the Washington authorities. Officers and men were kept in confinement, sometimes in irons or doomed to cells, without charge or trial. Many officers were kept in confinement even after the notices published by the enemy had declared them to be exchanged.
In the summer of 1863 the authorities at Washington insisted upon exchanges limited to such as were held in confinement on either side. This was resisted as in violation of the cartel. Such a construction not only kept in confinement the excess on either side, but ignored all paroles which were held by the Confederate Government. These were very many, being the paroles of officers and men who had been released on capture. The authorities at Washington at that time held few or no paroles. They had all, or nearly all, been surrendered. We gave prisoners as an equivalent for them. As long as we had the excess of prisoners, matters went on smoothly enough; but, as soon as the posture of affairs in that respect was changed, the cartel could no longer be observed. So long as the United States Government held the paroles of Confederate officers and men, they were respected and made the basis of exchange; but when equivalents were obtained for them, and no more were in hand, they would not recognize the paroles which were held by us. In consequence of the position thus assumed by the Government of the United States, the requirement of the cartel that all prisoners should be delivered within ten days was practically nullified. The deliveries which were afterward made were the results of special agreements.
The wish of the Confederate Government, which it was hoped had been accomplished by the cartel, was the prompt release of all prisoners on both sides, either by exchange or parole. When, in 1864, the cartel was so disregarded by the enemy as to indicate that prisoners would be held long in confinement, Andersonville, in Georgia, was selected for the location of a principal prison. The site was chosen because of its supposed security from raids, together with its salubrity, the abundance of water and timber, and the productive farming country around it. General Howell Cobb, then commanding in Georgia, employed a large number of negro laborers in the construction of a stockade and temporary shelter for the number of prisoners it was expected would be assembled there. The number, however, rapidly increased, and, by the middle of May, gangrene and scurvy made their appearance. General John H. Winder, who had been stationed in Richmond in charge of the police and local guards, as well as the general control of prisoners, went to Andersonville in June, and found disease prevailing to such an extent that, to abate the pestilence, he immediately advised the removal of prisoners to other points. As soon as arrangements could be made, he was instructed to disperse them to Millen and elsewhere, as in his judgment might be best for their health, comfort and safety. In July he made arrangements to procure vegetables, recommended details of men to cultivate gardens, and that hospital accommodations should be constructed outside of the prison; all of which recommendations were approved, and as far as practicable executed. In September General Winder, with the main body of the prisoners, removed first to Millen, Georgia, and then to Florence, South Carolina.
Major Wirz thereafter remained in command at Andersonville, and the testimony of Chief-Surgeon Stevenson, of the hospital at Andersonville, bears testimony to the success with which Wirz improved the post, and the good effect produced upon the health of the prisoners. This unfortunate man--who, under the severe temptation to which he was exposed before his execution, exhibited honor and fidelity strongly in contrast with his tempters and persecutors--it now appears, was the victim of men whom, in his kindness, he paroled to take care of their sick comrades, and who, after having violated their parole, appeared to testify against him.
In like manner has calumny pursued the memory of General John H. Winder, a man too brave to be cruel to anything within his power, too well bred and well born to be influenced by low and sordid motives. I have referred only to a few of the facts illustrative of his kindness to the prisoners after he went to Georgia, and they were in keeping with his conduct toward the prisoners at Richmond. This latter fact, together with his sterling integrity and soldierly character, had caused his selection for the chief control of Confederate prisons.
The Adjutant-General, Samuel Cooper, a man as pure in heart as he was sound in judgment, was the classmate of Winder; their lives had been passed in the array in frequent intercourse; and General Cooper, in a letter of July 9, 1871, wrote that "General Winder, who had the control of the Northern prisoners, was an honest, upright, and humane gentleman, and as such I had known him for many years. He had the reputation, in the Confederacy, of treating the prisoners confided to his general supervision with great kindness and consideration."
In January, 1864, and even earlier, it became manifest that, in consequence of the complication in relation to exchanges, the large mass of prisoners on both sides would remain in captivity for many long and weary months, if not for the duration of the war. In order to alleviate the hardships of confinement on both sides, our commissioner, on January 24, 1863, addressed a communication to General E. A. Hitchcock, United States commissioner of exchange, in which he proposed that all prisoners on each side should be attended by a proper number of their own surgeons, who, under rules to be established, should be permitted to take charge of their health and comfort.
It was also proposed that these surgeons should act as commissaries, with power to receive and distribute such contributions of money, food, clothing, and medicines as might be forwarded for the relief of the prisoners. It was further proposed that these surgeons should be selected by their own Government, and that they should have full liberty at any and all times, through the agents of exchange, to make reports, not only of their own acts, but of any matters relating to the welfare of the prisoners.
To this communication no reply of any kind was ever made.
Again, Commissioner Ould, in a communication published in August, 1868, further says:
"About the last of March, 1864, I had several conferences with General B. F. Butler, then agent of exchange at Fortress Monroe, in relation to the difficulties attending the exchange of prisoners, and we reached what we both thought a tolerably satisfactory basis. The day that I left there General Grant arrived. General Butler says he communicated to him the state of the negotiations, and 'most emphatic verbal directions were received from the Lieutenant-General not to take any step by which another able-bodied man should be exchanged until further orders from him'; and that on April 30, 1864, he received a telegram from General Grant 'to receive all the sick and wounded the Confederate authorities may send you, but send no more in exchange.' Unless my recollection fails me, General Butler also, in an address to his constituents, substantially declared that he was directed, in his management of the question of exchange with the Confederate authorities, to put the matter offensively, for the purpose of preventing an exchange."
The signification of the word "offensively," in the preceding line, relates to the exchange of negro soldiers. The Government of the United States contended that the slaves in their ranks were such no longer; that it was bound to accord to them, when made prisoners, the same protection that it gave all other soldiers. We asserted the slaves to be property, under the Constitution of the United States and that of the Confederate States, and that property recaptured from the enemy in war reverts to its owner, if he can be found, or it may be disposed of by its captor.
On October 1st, when the number of prisoners was large on either side. General Lee addressed a note to General Grant, saying:
"With a view of alleviating the sufferings of our soldiers, I have the honor to propose an exchange of the prisoners of war belonging to the armies operating in Virginia, man for man, or upon the basis established by the cartel."
On the next day General Grant replied:
"I could not of a right accept your proposition further than to exchange those prisoners captured within the last three days, and who have not yet been delivered to the commanding General of prisoners. Among those lost by the armies operating against Richmond were a number of colored troops. Before further negotiations are had upon the subject, I would ask if you propose delivering these men the same as white soldiers."
On the next day General Lee said, in rejoinder:
"In my proposition of the 1st inst., to exchange the prisoners of war belonging to the armies operating in Virginia, I intended to include all captured soldiers of the United States, of whatever nation and color, under my control. Deserters from our service and negroes belonging to our citizens are not considered subjects of exchange, and were not included in my proposition. If there are any such among those stated by you to have been captured around Richmond, they can not be returned."
On October 20th General Grant finally answered, saying;
"I shall always regret the necessity of retaliating for wrong done our soldiers, but regard it my duty to protect all persons received into the army of the United States, regardless of color or nationality; when acknowledged soldiers of the Government are captured, they must be treated as prisoners of war, or such treatment as they receive inflicted upon an equal number of prisoners held by us."
This was "putting the matter offensively, for the purpose of preventing an exchange," as recommended by General Grant for the adoption of General Butler.
But let us return to the progress of negotiations. In a dispatch from General Grant to General Butler, dated City Point, August 18, 1864, the former says:
"On the subject of exchange, however, I differ from General Hitchcock. It is hard on our men held in Southern prisons not to exchange them, but it is humanity to those left in the ranks to fight our battles. Every man released on parole, or otherwise, becomes an active soldier against us at once, either directly or indirectly. If we commence a system of exchange, which liberates all prisoners taken, we will have to fight on until the whole South is exterminated. If we hold those caught, they amount to no more than dead men. At this particular time to release all rebel prisoners North would insure Sherman's defeat, and would compromise our safety here."
We now proposed to the Government of the United States to exchange the prisoners respectively held, officer for officer and man for man. We had previously declined this proposal, and insisted on the terms of the cartel, which required the delivery of the excess on either side on parole. At the same time we sent a statement of the mortality prevailing among the prisoners at Andersonville.
As no answer had been received relative to this proposal, a communication was sent, on August 22, 1864, to Major-General E. A. Hitchcock, United States commissioner of exchange, containing the same proposal which had been before delivered to the assistant commissioner, and a request was made for its acceptance.
No answer was received to either of these letters, and on August 31st the assistant commissioner stated that he had no communication on the subject from the United States Government, and that he was not authorized to make an answer.
This offer, which would have released every soldier of the United States confined in our prisons, was not even noticed. Indeed, the United States Government had, at that time, a large excess of prisoners, and the effect of the proposal, if carried out, would have been to release all the prisoners belonging to it, while a large number of ours would have remained in prison awaiting the chances of the capture of their equivalents.
Thus, having ascertained that exchanges could not be made, either on the basis of the cartel, or officer for officer and man for man, we offered to the United States Government their sick and wounded without requiring any equivalents. On these terms, we agreed to deliver from ten to fifteen thousand at the mouth of the Savannah River; and we further added that, if the number for which transportation might be sent could not be readily made up from sick and wounded, the difference should be supplied with well men. Although the offer was made in the summer, the transportation did not arrive until November. And as the sick and wounded were at points distant from Georgia, and could not be brought to Savannah within a reasonable time, five thousand well men were substituted. In return, some three thousand sick and wounded were delivered to us at the same place. The original rolls showed that some thirty-five hundred had started from Northern prisons, and that death had reduced the number during the passage to about three thousand.
On two occasions we were specially asked to send the very sick and desperately wounded prisoners, and a particular request was made for men who were so seriously sick that it was doubtful whether they would survive a removal a few miles down James River. Accordingly, some of the worst cases, contrary to the judgment of our surgeons, but in compliance with the piteous appeals of the sick prisoners, were sent away, and after being delivered they were taken to Annapolis, Maryland, and there photographed as specimen prisoners. The photographs at Annapolis were terrible indeed, but the misery they portrayed was surpassed by some of those we received in exchange at Savannah. Why was there this delay between the summer and November in sending vessels for the transportation of sick and wounded, for whom no equivalents were asked? Were Federal prisoners left to suffer, and afterward photographed "to aid in firing the popular heart of the North"?
In the summer of 1864, in consequence of certain information communicated to our commissioner, Mr. Ould, by the Surgeon-General of the Confederate States, as to the deficiency of medicines. Mr. Ould offered to make purchases of medicines from the United States authorities, to be used exclusively for the relief of the Union prisoners. He offered to pay gold, cotton, or tobacco for them, and even two or three prices if required. At the same time he gave assurances that the medicines would be used exclusively for the treatment of Union prisoners; and moreover agreed, on behalf of the Confederate States, if it were insisted on, that such medicines might be brought into the Confederate lines by the United States surgeons, and dispensed by them. Incredible as it may appear, it is, nevertheless, strictly true that no reply was ever received to this offer.
One final effort was now made to obtain an exchange. This consisted in my sending a delegation from the prisoners at Andersonville to plead their cause before the authorities at Washington. It was of no avail. President Lincoln refused to see them. They were made to understand that the interests of the Government of the United States required that they should return to prison and remain there. They carried back the sad tidings that their Government held out no hope of their release.
"We have a letter from the wife of the chairman of that delegation (now dead) in which she says that her husband always said that he was more contemptuously treated by Secretary of War Stanton than he ever was at Andersonville." [114]
Another prisoner, Henry M. Brennan, writes:
"I was at Andersonville when the delegation of prisoners spoken of by Jefferson Davis left there to plead our cause with the authorities at Washington; and nobody can tell, unless it be a shipwrecked and famished mariner, who sees a vessel approaching and then passing on without rendering the required aid, what fond hopes were raised, and how hope sickened into despair, waiting for the answer that never came. In my opinion, and that of a good many others, a good part of the responsibility for the horrors of Andersonville rests with General U. S. Grant, who refused to make a fair exchange of prisoners."
The following extracts are from the official report of Major-General Butler to "the Committee on the Conduct of the War," which was appointed by a joint resolution of Congress, during the war:
"Mr. Ould left on the 31st of March, 1864, with the understanding that I would get authority and information from my Government, by which all disputed points could be adjusted, and would then confer with him further, either meeting him at City Point or elsewhere for that purpose. In the mean time exchanges of sick and wounded, and special exchanges, should go on.
"General Grant visited Fortress Monroe on April 1st, being the first time I had ever met him. To him the state of the negotiations as to exchange[115] was verbally communicated; and most emphatic directions were received from the Lieutenant-General not to take any step by which another able-bodied man should be exchanged, until further orders from him."
General Butler next gives the following from General Mulford, United States assistant agent of exchange, addressed to him:
"GENERAL: The Confederate authorities will exchange prisoners on the basis heretofore proposed by our Government--that is, man for man. This proposition was proposed formally to me after I saw you."
General Butler's report continues as follows:
"Accident prevented my meeting the rebel commissioner, so that nothing was done; but after conversation with General Grant, in reply to the proposition of Mr. Ould to exchange all prisoners of war on either side held, man for man, officer for officer, I wrote an argument showing our right to our colored soldiers. This argument set forth our claims in the most offensive form possible, consistently with ordinary courtesy of language, for the purpose of carrying out the wishes of the Lieutenant-General that no prisoners of war should be exchanged. This paper was published so as to bring a public pressure by the owners of slaves upon the rebel Government, in order to forbid their exchange."
The report continues:
"In case the Confederate authorities took the same view as General Grant, believing that an exchange 'would defeat Sherman and imperil the safety of the Armies of the Potomac and the James,' and therefore should yield to the argument, and formally notify me that their former slaves captured in our uniform would be exchanged as other soldiers were, and that they were ready to return us all our prisoners at Andersonville and elsewhere in exchange for theirs, then I had determined, with the consent of the Lieutenant-General, as a last resort to prevent exchange, to demand that the outlawry against me should formally be reversed and apologized for, before I would further negotiate the exchange of prisoners. But the argument was enough, and the Confederates never offered to me afterward to exchange the colored soldiers who had been slaves, held in prison by them."
Further on in the report General Butler gives the history of some naval exchanges, in the course of which colored prisoners were delivered, and concludes his observations on that head as follows:
"It will be observed that the rebels had exchanged all the naval colored prisoners, so that the negro question no longer impeded the exchange of prisoners; in fact, if we had demanded the exchange of all, man for man, officer for officer, they would have done it."
The conclusion of the report is as follows:
"I have felt it my duty to give an account with this particular carefulness of my participation in the business of exchange of prisoners, the orders under which I acted, and the negotiations attempted, which comprises a faithful narration of all that was done, so that all may become a matter of history. The great importance of the questions; the fearful responsibility for the many thousands of lives which, by the refusal to exchange, were sacrificed by the most cruel forms of death, from cold, starvation, and pestilence of the prison-pens of Raleigh and Andersonville, being more than all the British soldiers killed in the wars of Napoleon; the anxiety of fathers, brothers, sisters, mothers, wives, to know the exigency which caused this terrible, and perhaps, as it may have seemed to them, useless and unnecessary, destruction of those dear to them, by horrible deaths, each and all have compelled me to this exposition, so that it may be seen that those lives were spent as a part of the system of attack upon the rebellion, devised by the wisdom of the General-in-Chief of the armies, to destroy it by depletion, depending upon our superior numbers to win the victory at last. The loyal mourners will doubtless derive solace from this fact, and appreciate all the more highly the genius which conceived the plan, and the success won at so great a cost."
Sufficient facts have been presented to satisfy every intelligent and candid mind of our entire readiness to surrender, for exchange, all the prisoners in our possession, whenever the Government of the United States would honestly meet us for that purpose. At any hour perfect arrangements could have been made with us for the restoration to it of all its soldiers held as prisoners by us, if its authorities at Washington had consented so to do. On them rests the criminality for the sufferings of these prisoners.
Further, the Government of the United States, in order to effect our subjugation, devastated our fields, destroyed our crops, broke up our railroads, and thus interrupted our means of transportation, and reduced our people, our armies, and consequently their soldiers, who were our prisoners, all alike, to the most straitened condition for food. Our medicines for the sick were exhausted, and, contrary to the usage of civilized nations, they were made, by our enemy, contraband of war. After causing these and other distressing events--of which Atlanta, where the women and children were driven into the fields and their houses burned, and Columbia, with its smoking and plundered ruins, were prominent examples--after every effort to excite our slaves to servile war--this Government of the United States turned to the Northern people, and, charging us with atrocious cruelties to their sons, who were our prisoners, appealed to them again and again to recruit the armies and take vengeance upon us by our abject subjugation or entire extermination. It was the last effort of the usurper to save himself.
But there is another scene to be added to these cruelties. During all this time, Northern prisons were full of our brave and heroic soldiers, of whom there were about sixty thousand. The privations which they suffered, the cruelties inspired by the malignant spirit of the Government, which were inflicted upon them, surpass any records of modern history: yet we have had no occasion to seek out a Wirz for public trial before an illegal court, that we might conceal behind him our own neglect and cruel sacrifice of them. That we might clothe our brave men in the prisons of the United States Government, I made an application for permission to send cotton to Liverpool, and therewith purchase the supplies which were necessary. The request was granted, but only on condition that the cotton should be sent to New York and the supplies bought there. This was done by our agent, General Beale. The suffering of our men in Northern prisons caused the application; that it was granted, refutes the statement that our men were comfortably maintained.
Finally, to the bold allegations of ill-treatment of prisoners on our side, and humane treatment and adequate supplies on that of our opponents, it is only necessary to offer two facts: First, the report of the Secretary of War, E. M. Stanton, made on July 19, 1866, shows that, of all the prisoners in our hands during the war, only 22,576 died; while, of the prisoners in our opponents' hands, 26,246 died. Second, the official report of Surgeon-General Barnes, an officer of the United States Government, states that, in round numbers, the number of Confederate States prisoners in their hands amounted to 220,000, the number of United States prisoners in our hands amounted to 270,000. Thus, out of the 270,000 in our hands, 22,000 died; while of the 220,000 of our soldiers in their hands, 26,000 died. Thus, more than twelve per cent. of the prisoners in our opponents' hands died, and less than nine per cent. of the prisoners in our hands died.
When, in this connection, it is remembered how much our resources were reduced, that our supply of medicines required in summer diseases was exhausted, and that Northern men when first residing at the South must undergo acclimation, and that these conditions in the Northern States were the reverse in each particular--the fact that greater mortality existed in Northern than in Southern prisons can only be accounted for by the kinder treatment received in the latter. To present the case in a sentence--we did the best we could for those whom the fortune of war had placed at our mercy; and the enemy, in the midst of plenty, inflicted cruel, wanton deprivation on our soldiers who fell within his power.
In regard to the failure in the exchange of prisoners, General B. F. Butler has irrefutably fixed the responsibility on the Government at Washington and on General Grant. The obstacles thus thrown in the way were not only persistently interposed, but artfully designed to be insurmountable.
On the other hand, the Confederate Government, through Colonel Ould, its commissioner of exchanges, sought by all practicable means to execute the obligations of the cartel, and otherwise to relieve the suffering of prisoners kept in confinement; through a delegation of the Federal prisoners at Andersonville, it sought to attract the notice of their Government to their sufferings; and, finally, confiding in the chivalry characteristic of soldiers, sought, through General Lee, to make an arrangement with General Grant for the exchange of all the prisoners held in their respective commands, and as many more as General Grant could add in response to all held by the Confederate Government.[116]
[Footnote 112: "Southern Historical Society Papers," March, 1876.]
[Footnote 113: See chapter xxxiv.]
[Footnote 114: Editor of Southern Historical Society Papers.]
[Footnote 115: "The negotiations as to exchange, to which General Butler refers, were the points of agreement between General Butler and myself, under which exchanges of all white and free black soldiers, man for man and officer for officer, were to go on, leaving the question as to slaves to be disposed of by subsequent arrangement."-- (Letter of Mr. Ould, June, 1879.)]
[Footnote 116: For full and exact information, compiled from official records and other documents, the reader is referred to "Treatment of Prisoners," by J. William Jones, D. D., and to "The Southern Side: or Andersonville Prison, compiled from Official Documents" by R. Randolph Stevenson, M. D.]
Chapter L
Subjugation the Object of the Government of the United States.--The only Terms of Peace offered to us.--Rejection of all Proposals.-- Efforts of the Enemy.--Appearance of Jacques and Gilmore at Richmond.--Proposals.--Answer.--Commissioners sent to Canada.-- The Object.--Proceedings.--Note of President Lincoln.--Permission to visit Richmond granted to Francis P. Blair.--Statement of my Interview with him.--My Letter to him.--Response of President Lincoln.--Three Persons sent by me to an Informal Conference.-- Their Report.--Remarks of Judge Campbell.--Oath of President Lincoln.--The Provision of the Constitution and his Proclamation compared.--Reserved Powers spoken of in the Constitution.--What are they, and where do they exist?--Terms of Surrender offered to our Soldiers.
That it was the purpose of the Government of the United States to subjugate the Southern States and the Southern people, under the pretext of a restoration of the Union, is established by the terms and conditions offered to us in all the conferences relative to a settlement of differences. All were comprehended in one word, and that was subjugation. If the purpose had been an honorable and fraternal restoration of the Union as was avowed, methods for the adjustment of difficulties would have been presented and discussed; propositions for reconciliation with concessions and modifications for grievances would have been kindly offered and treated; and a way would have been opened for a mutual and friendly intercourse. How unlike this were all the propositions offered to us, will be seen in the proceedings which took place in the conferences, and in the terms of surrender offered to our soldiers. It should be remembered that mankind compose one uniform order of beings, and thus the language of arbitrary power has the same signification in all ages. When Major Pitcairn marched the British soldiers upon the common, at Lexington, in Massachusetts, on April 19, 1775, and, drawing his sword, rushed upon the little line of Continentals, exclaiming: "Disperse, ye rebels! throw down your arms and disperse!" he expressed the same conditions which were offered to us in all our negotiations with the President of the United States and his generals. Does any one doubt that Major Pitcairn meant subjugation, or that Great Britain meant subjugation? Let them as dispassionately construe the Government of the United States in its declarations to us.
Several efforts were made by us to communicate with the authorities at Washington without success. Commissioners were sent before hostilities were begun, and the Government of the United States refused to receive them, or hear what they had to say. A second time I sent a military officer with a communication addressed by myself to President Lincoln. The letter was received by General Scott, who did not permit the officer to see Mr. Lincoln, but promised that an answer would be sent. No answer was ever received. The third time a gentleman was sent whose position, character, and reputation were such as to insure his reception, if the enemy had not been determined to receive no proposals whatever from our Government. Vice-President Stephens made a patriotic tender of his services, in the hope of being able to promote the cause of humanity; and, although little belief was entertained of his success, I cheerfully yielded to his suggestions, that the experiment should be tried. The enemy refused to let him pass through their lines or to hold any conference with him. He was stopped before he reached Fortress Monroe.
If we would break up our Government, dissolve the Confederacy, disband our armies, emancipate our slaves, take an oath of allegiance, binding ourselves to obedience to it and to disloyalty to our own States, the Government of the United States proposed to pardon us, and not to deprive us of anything more than the property already robbed from us, and such slaves as still remained. In order to render the proposals so insulting as to secure their rejection, the President of the United States joined to them a promise to support with his army one tenth of the people of any State who would attempt to set up a government over the other nine tenths; thus seeking to sow discord among the people of the several States, and to excite them to civil war in furtherance of his ends.
The next movement relating to the accommodation of differences occurred in July, 1864, and consisted in the appearance at Richmond of Colonel James F. Jacques, of the Seventy-eighth Illinois Infantry, and James R. Gilmore, of Massachusetts, soliciting an interview with me. They stated that they had no official character or authority, "but were fully possessed of the views of the United States Government, relative to an adjustment of the differences existing between the North and the South," and did not doubt that a free interchange of views would open the way to official negotiations, etc. They had crossed our lines through a letter of General Grant to Colonel Ould, commissioner for the exchange of prisoners. The Secretary of State, Mr. Benjamin, to whom they were conducted, accompanied them to my office. Colonel Jacques expressed the ardent desire he felt, in common with the men of their army, for a restoration of peace, using such emphatic terms as that the men would go home in double-quick time if they could only see peace restored. Mr. Gilmore addressed me, and in a few minutes conveyed the information that the two gentlemen had come to Richmond impressed with the idea that the Confederate Government would accept a peace on the basis of a reconstruction of the Union, the abolition of slavery, and the grant of an amnesty to the people of the States as repentant criminals. In order to accomplish the abolition of slavery, it was proposed that there should be a general vote of all the people of both federations, in mass, and the majority of the vote thus taken was to determine that as well as all other disputed questions. These were stated to be Mr. Lincoln's views. The impudence of the remarks could only be extenuated because of the ignorance displayed and the profuse avowal of the kindest motives and intentions.
I answered that, as these proposals had been prefaced by the remark that the people of the North were a majority, and that a majority ought to govern, the offer was, in effect, a proposal that the Confederate States should surrender at discretion, admit that they had been wrong from the beginning of the contest, submit to the mercy of their enemies, and avow themselves to be in need of pardon for their crimes; that extermination was preferable to dishonor. I stated that, if they were themselves so unacquainted with the form of their own government as to make such propositions, Mr. Lincoln ought to have known, then giving them his views, that it was out of the power of the Confederate Government to act on the subject of the domestic institutions of the several States, each State having exclusive jurisdiction on that point, still less to commit the decision of such a question to the vote of a foreign people. Having no disposition to discuss questions of state with such persons, especially as they bore no credentials, I terminated the interview, and they withdrew with Mr. Benjamin.
The opening of the spring campaign of 1864 was deemed a favorable conjuncture for the employment of the resources of diplomacy. To approach the Government of the United States directly would have been in vain. Repeated efforts had already demonstrated its inflexible purpose--not to negotiate with the Confederate authorities. Political developments at the North, however, favored the adoption of some action that might influence popular sentiment in the hostile section. The aspect of the peace party was quite encouraging, and it seemed that the real issue to be decided in the Presidential election of that year, was the continuance or cessation of the war. A commission of three persons, eminent in position and intelligence, was accordingly appointed to visit Canada, with a view to negotiation with such persons in the North as might be relied upon to aid the attainment of peace. The commission was designed to facilitate such preliminary conditions as might lead to formal negotiations between the two Governments, and they were expected to make judicious use of any political opportunity that might be presented.
The commissioners--Messrs. Clay, of Alabama; Holcombe, of Virginia; and Thompson, of Mississippi--established themselves at Niagara Falls in July, and on the 12th commenced a correspondence with Horace Greeley, of New York. Through him they sought a safe-conduct to Washington. Mr. Lincoln at first appeared to favor an interview, but finally refused on the ground that the commissioners were not authorized to treat for peace. His final announcement to them was the following:
"EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, D. C, July 18, 1864.
"To whom it may concern:
"Any proposition which embraces the restoration of peace, the integrity of the whole union, and the abandonment of slavery, and which comes by and with an authority that can control the armies now at war against the United States, will be received and considered by the Executive Government of the United States, and will be met by liberal terms on other substantial and collateral points, and the bearer or bearers thereof shall have safe conduct both ways.
"ABRAHAM LINCOLN."
This movement, like all others which had preceded it, was a failure.
On December 30, 1864, I received a request from Mr. Francis P. Blair, a distinguished citizen of Montgomery County, Maryland, for permission to visit Richmond for certain personal objects, which was conceded to him. On January 12, 1865, he visited me, and the following statement of our interview was immediately afterward prepared:
"RICHMOND, VIRGINIA, January 12, 1865.
"_Memorandum of a confidential conversation held this day with F. P. BLAIR, of Montgomery County, Maryland._
"Mr. Blair stated that, not receiving an answer to his application for permission to visit Richmond, which had been sent from the headquarters of General Grant's army, he returned to Washington and there received the reply which had been made to his application, but by some means had been withheld from him and been forwarded after having been opened; that he had originally obtained permission to visit Richmond from Mr. Lincoln, after stating to him that he (Mr. Blair) had for many years held friendly relations with myself. Mr. Lincoln stopped him, though he afterward gave him permission to visit me. He stated, in explanation of his position, that he, being a man of Southern blood, felt very desirous to see the war between the States terminated, and hoped by an interview with me to be able to effect something to that end; that, after receiving the pass which had been sent to him by my direction, he sought before returning to have a conversation with Mr. Lincoln; had two appointments for that purpose, but on each occasion was disappointed, and, from the circumstances, concluded that Mr. Lincoln avoided the interview, and therefore came not only without credentials but without such instructions from Mr. Lincoln as enabled him to speak for him. His views, therefore, were to be regarded merely as his own, and said they were perhaps merely the dreams of an old man, etc. He said, despairing of being able to see me, he had determined to write to me, and had the rough draft of a letter which he had prepared, and asked permission to read it. Soon after commencing to do so, he said (pleasantly) that he found his style was marked by his old pursuit, and that the paper appeared too much like an editorial. He omitted, therefore, portions of it, reading what he considered the main points of his proposition. He had recognized the difference of our positions as not entitling him to a response from me to the arguments and suggestions which he desired to offer. I therefore allowed him to read without comment on my part. When he had finished, I inquired as to his main proposition, the cessation of hostilities and the union of the military forces for the common purpose of maintaining the 'Monroe doctrine'--how that object was to be reached. He said that both the political parties of the United States asserted the Monroe doctrine as a cardinal point of their creed; that there was a general desire to apply it to the case of Mexico. For that purpose a secret treaty might be made, etc. I called his attention to my past efforts for negotiation, and my inability to see--unless Mr. Lincoln's course in that regard should be changed--how we were to take the first step. He expressed the belief that Mr. Lincoln would now receive commissioners, but subsequently said he could not give any assurance on that point, and proposed to return to Washington to explain his project to Mr. Lincoln, and notify me, if his hope proved well founded, that Mr. Lincoln would now agree to a conference for the purpose of entering into negotiations. He affirmed that Mr. Lincoln did not sympathize with the radical men who desired the devastation and subjugation of the Southern States, but that he was unable to control the extreme party, which now had great power in the Congress, and would at the next session have still more; referred to the existence of two parties in the Cabinet, to the reluctant nomination of Mr. Chase to be Chief-Justice, etc. For himself, he avowed an earnest desire to stop the further effusion of blood, as one every drop of whose blood was Southern. He expressed the hope that the pride, the power, and the honor of the Southern States should suffer no shock; looked to the extension of Southern territory even to the Isthmus of Darien, and hoped, if his views found favor, that his wishes would be realized; reiterated the idea of State sovereignty, with illustrations, and accepted the reference I made to explanation given in the 'Globe,' when he edited it, of the proclamation of General Jackson.
"When his attention was called to the brutal atrocities of their armies, especially the fiendish cruelty shown to helpless women and children, as the cause of a deep-seated hostility on the part of our people, and an insurmountable obstacle to an early restoration of fraternal relations, he admitted the necessity for providing a new channel for the bitter waters, and another bond than that of former memories and interests. This was supposed to be contained in the proposed common effort to maintain the 'Monroe doctrine' on the American Continent. It was evident that he counted on the disintegration of the Confederate States if the war continued, and that in any event he regarded the institution of slavery as doomed to extinction. I thought any remark by me on the first proposition would lead to intimations in connection with public men which I preferred not more distinctly to hear than as manifested in his general remarks; on the latter point, for the reason stated, the inequality of his responsibility and mine, I preferred to have no discussion. The only difficulty which he spoke of as insurmountable was that of existing engagements between European powers and the Confederate States. This point, when referred to a second time as the dreaded obstacle to a secret treaty which would terminate the war, was met by me with a statement that we had now no such complication, were free to act as to us should seem best, and desired to keep state policy and institutions free from foreign control. Throughout the conference Mr. Blair appeared to be animated by a sincere desire to promote a pacific solution of the existing difficulty, but claimed no other power than that of serving as a medium of communication between those who had thus far had no intercourse, and were therefore without the co-intelligence which might secure an adjustment of their controversy. To his hopeful anticipation in regard to the restoration of fraternal relations between the sections, by the means indicated, I replied that a cessation of hostilities was the first step toward the substitution of reason for passion, of sense of justice for a desire to injure, and that, if the people were subsequently engaged together to maintain a principle recognized by both, if together they should bear sacrifices, share dangers, and gather common renown, that new memories would take the place of those now planted by the events of this war, and might, in the course of time, restore the feelings which preexisted. But it was for us to deal with the problems before us, and leave to posterity questions which they might solve, though we could not; that, in the struggle for independence by our colonial fathers, had failure instead of success attended their effort, Great Britain, instead of a commerce which has largely contributed to her prosperity, would have had the heavy expense of numerous garrisons, to hold in subjection a people who deserved to be free and had resolved not to be subject. Our conference ended with no other result than an agreement that he would learn whether Mr. Lincoln would adopt his (Mr. Blair's) project, and send or receive commissioners to negotiate for a peaceful solution of the questions at issue; that he would report to him my readiness to enter upon negotiations, and that I knew of no insurmountable obstacle to such a treaty of peace as would secure greater advantage to both parties than any result which arms could achieve.
"January 14, 1865.
"The foregoing memorandum of conversation was this day read to Mr. Blair, and altered in so far as he desired, in any respect, to change the expressions employed.
"JEFFERSON DAVIS."
The following letter was given by me to Mr. Blair:
"RICHMOND, VIRGINIA, January 12, 1865.
"F. P. BLAIR, Esq.
"SIR: I have deemed it proper and probably desirable to you to give you in this form the substance of remarks made by me to be repeated by you to President Lincoln, etc., etc.
"I have no disposition to find obstacles in forms, and am willing now, as heretofore, to enter into negotiations for the restoration of peace, am ready to send a commission whenever I have reason to suppose it will be received, or to receive a commission if the United States Government shall choose to send one. That, notwithstanding the rejection of our former offers, I would, if you could promise that a commissioner, minister, or other agent would be received, appoint one immediately, and renew the effort to enter into conference with a view to secure peace to the two countries.
"Yours, etc., JEFFERSON DAVIS."
"WASHINGTON, January 18, 1865.
"F. P. BLAIR, Esq.
"SIR: You having shown me Mr. Davis's letter to you of the 12th instant, you may say to him that I have constantly been, am now, and shall continue ready to receive any agent whom he or any other influential person now resisting the national authority may informally send to me with the view of securing peace to the people of our one common country.
"Yours, etc., A. LINCOLN."
When Mr. Blair returned and gave me this letter of Mr. Lincoln of January 18th, it being a response to my note to Mr. Blair of the 12th, he said it had been a fortunate thing that I gave him that note, as it had created greater confidence in Mr. Lincoln regarding his efforts at Richmond. Further reflection, he said, had modified the views he formerly presented to me, and that he wanted to have my attention for a different mode of procedure.
He had, as he told Mr. Lincoln, held friendly relations with me for many years; they began as far back as when I was a schoolboy at Lexington, Kentucky, and he a resident of that place. In later years we had belonged to the same political party, and our views had generally coincided. There was much, therefore, to facilitate our conference. He then unfolded to me the embarrassment of Mr. Lincoln on account of the extreme men in Congress and elsewhere, who wished to drive him into harsher measures than he was inclined to adopt; whence it would not be feasible for him to enter into any arrangement with us by the use of political agencies; that, if anything beneficial could be effected, it must be done without the intervention of the politicians. He, therefore, suggested that Generals Lee and Grant might enter into an arrangement by which hostilities would be suspended, and a way paved for the restoration of peace. I responded that I would willingly intrust to General Lee such negotiation as was indicated.
The conference then ended, and, to report to Mr. Lincoln the result of his visit, Mr. Blair returned to Washington. He subsequently informed me that the idea of a military convention was not favorably received at Washington, so it only remained for me to act upon the letter of Mr. Lincoln.
I determined to send, as commissioners or agents for the informal conference, Messrs. Alexander H. Stephens, R. M. T. Hunter, and John A. Campbell.
A letter of commission or certificate of appointment for each was prepared by the Secretary of State in the following form:
"In compliance with the letter of Mr. Lincoln, of which the foregoing is a copy, you are hereby requested to proceed to Washington City for conference with him upon the subject to which it relates," etc.
This draft of a commission was, upon perusal, modified by me so as to read as follows:
"RICHMOND, January 28, 1865.
"In conformity with the letter of Mr. Lincoln, of which the foregoing is a copy, you are requested to proceed to Washington City for an informal conference with him upon the issues involved in the existing war, and for the purpose of securing peace to the two countries."
Some objections were made to this commission by the United States officials, because it authorized the commissioners to confer for the purpose "of securing peace to the two countries"; whereas the letter of Mr. Lincoln, which was their passport, spoke of "securing peace to the people of our one common country." But these objections were finally waived.
The letter of Mr. Lincoln expressing a willingness to receive any agent I might send to Washington City, a commission was appointed to go there; but it was not allowed to proceed farther than Hampton Roads, where Mr. Lincoln, accompanied by Mr. Seward, met the commissioners. Seward craftily proposed that the conference should be confidential, and the commissioners regarded this so binding on them as to prevent them from including in their report the discussion which occurred. This enabled Mr. Seward to give his own version of it in a dispatch to the United States Minister to the French Government, which was calculated to create distrust of, if not hostility to, the Confederacy on the part of the power in Europe most effectively favoring our recognition.
Why Mr. Lincoln changed his purpose, and, instead of receiving the commissioners at Washington, met them at Hampton Roads, I can not, of course, explain. Several causes may be conjecturally assigned. The commissioners were well known in Washington, had there held high positions, and, so far as there was any peace party there, might have been expected to have influence with its members; but a more important inquiry is: If Mr. Lincoln previously had determined to hear no proposition for negotiation, and to accept nothing less than an unconditional surrender, why did he propose to receive informally our agent? If there was nothing to discuss, the agent would have been without functions.
I think the views of Mr. Lincoln had changed after he wrote the letter to Mr. Blair of June 18th, and that the change was mainly produced by the report which he made of what he saw and heard at Richmond on the night he staid there. Mr. Blair had many acquaintances among the members of the Confederate Congress; and all those of the class who, of old, fled to the cave of Adullam, "gathered themselves unto him."
Mr. Hunter, in a published article on the peace commission, referring to Mr. Blair's visit to Richmond, says: "He saw many old friends and party associates. Here his representations were not without effect upon his old confederates, who for so long had been in the habit of taking counsel with him on public affairs." He then goes on to describe Mr. Blair as revealing dangers of such overwhelming disaster as turned the thoughts of many Confederates toward peace more seriously than ever before. That Mr. Blair saw and noted this serious inclining of many to thoughts of peace, scarcely admits of a doubt; and, if he believed the Congress to be infected by a cabal undermining the Executive in his efforts successfully to prosecute the war, Mr. Lincoln may be naturally supposed thence to have reached the conclusion that he should accept nothing but an unconditional surrender, and that he should not allow a commission from the Confederacy to visit the United States capital.
The report of the commissioners, dated February 5, 1865, was as follows:
"To the President of the Confederate States:
"SIR: Under your letter of appointment of the 28th ult. We proceeded to seek 'an informal conference' with Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, upon the subject mentioned in the letter. The conference was granted and took place on the 30th ult., on board of a steamer anchored in Hampton Roads, where we met President Lincoln and the Hon. Mr. Seward, Secretary of State of the United States. It continued for several hours, and was both full and explicit. We learned from them that the message of President Lincoln to the Congress of the United States, in December last, explains clearly and distinctly his sentiments as to the terms, conditions, and method of proceeding by which peace can be secured to the people, and we were not informed that they would be modified or altered to obtain that end. We understood from him that no terms or proposals of any treaty, or agreement looking to an ultimate settlement, would be entertained or made by him with the authorities of the Confederate States, because that would be a recognition of their existence as a separate power, which under no circumstances would be done; and, for a like reason, that no such terms would be entertained by him for the States separately; that no extended truce or armistice (as at present advised) would be granted or allowed without a satisfactory assurance in advance of the complete restoration of the authority of the Constitution and laws of the United States over all places within the States of the Confederacy; that whatever consequences may follow from the reestablishment of that authority must be accepted; but that individuals subject to pains and penalties under the laws of the United States might rely upon a very liberal use of the power confided to him to remit those pains and penalties if peace be restored.
"During the conference, the proposed amendment to the Constitution of the United States adopted by Congress on the 31st ultimo was brought to our notice.
"This amendment provides that neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except for crime, should exist within the United States, or any place within their jurisdiction, and that Congress should have power to enforce this amendment by appropriate legislation. Very respectfully, etc.,
"ALEXANDER H. STEPHENS,
"R. M. T. HUNTER,
"JOHN A. CAMPBELL."
Thus closed the conference, and all negotiations with the Government of the United States for the establishment of peace. Says Judge Campbell, in his memoranda:
"In conclusion, Mr. Hunter summed up what seemed to be the result of the interview: that there could be no arrangements by treaty between the Confederate States and the United States, or any agreements between them; that there was nothing left for them but unconditional submission."
By reference to the message of President Lincoln of December 6, 1864, which is mentioned in the report, it appears that the terms of peace therein stated were as follows:
"In presenting the abandonment of armed resistance to the national authority on the part of the insurgents, as the only indispensable condition to ending the war on the part of the Government, I retract nothing heretofore said as to slavery. I repeat the declaration made a year ago, that 'while I remain in my present position I shall not attempt to retract or modify the emancipation proclamation, nor shall I return to slavery any person who is free by the terms of that proclamation, or by any act of Congress.'
"If the people should, by whatever mode or means, make it an executive duty to reënslave such persons, another, and not I, must be their instrument to perform it."
On the 4th of March, 1861, President Lincoln appeared on the western portico of the Capitol at Washington, and in the presence of a great multitude of witnesses took the following oath:
"I do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will, to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States."
The first section of the fourth article of the Constitution of the United States is in these words:
"No person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due."
The intelligent reader will observe that the words of this section, "in consequence of any law or regulation therein," embrace a President's emancipation proclamation, as well as any other regulation therein. Thus the Constitution itself nullified Mr. Lincoln's proclamation, and made it of no force whatever. Yet he assumed and maintained, with all the military force he could command, that it set every slave free. Which is the higher authority, Mr. Lincoln and his emancipation proclamation or the Constitution? If the former, then what are constitutions worth for the protection of rights?
Again he says:
"Nor shall I return to slavery any person who is free by the terms of that proclamation or by an act of Congress."
But the Constitution says he shall return them--
"but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service is due."
Who shall decide? Which is sovereign, Mr. Lincoln and his proclamation or the Constitution? The Constitution says:
"This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof, shall be the supreme law of the land."
Was it thus obeyed by Mr. Lincoln as the supreme law of the land? It was not obeyed, but set aside, subverted, overturned by him. But he said in his oath:
"I do solemnly swear that I will, to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States."
Did he do it? Is such treatment of the Constitution the manner to preserve, protect, and defend it? Of what value, then, are paper constitutions and oaths binding officers to their preservation, if there is not intelligence enough in the people to discern the violations, and virtue enough to resist the violators?
Again the report says:
"We understood from him that no terms or proposals of any treaty or agreement looking to an ultimate settlement would be entertained or made by him with the authorities of the Confederate States, because that would be a recognition of their existence as a separate power, which under no circumstances would be done; and, for a like reason, that no such terms would be entertained by him for the States separately."
Now the Constitution of the United States says, in Article X:
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
Within the purview of this article of the Constitution the States are independent, distinct, and sovereign bodies--that is, in their reserved powers they are as sovereign, separate, and supreme as the Government of the United States in its delegated powers. One of these reserved powers is the right of the people to alter or abolish any form of government, and to institute a new one such as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness; that power is neither "delegated to the United States by the Constitution nor prohibited by it to the States." On the contrary, it is guaranteed to the States by the Constitution itself in these words:
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
Mark the words, "are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." No one will venture to say that a sovereign State, by the mere act of accession to the Constitution, delegated the power of secession. The assertion would be of no validity if it were made; for the question is one of fact as to the powers delegated or not delegated to the United States by the Constitution. It is absurd to ask if the power of secession in a State is delegated to the United States by the Constitution, or prohibited by it to the States. No trace of the delegation or prohibition of this power is to be found in the Constitution. It is, therefore, as the Constitution says, "reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
The Convention of the State of New York, which ratified the Constitution of the United States on July 26, 1788, in its resolution of ratification said:
"We do declare and make known . . . that the powers of Government may be reassumed by the people, whensoever it shall become necessary to their happiness; that every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by the said Constitution clearly delegated to the Congress of the United States, or to the departments of the Government thereof, remains to the people of the several States, or to their respective State governments, to whom they may have granted the same. . . . Under these impressions, and declaring that the rights aforesaid can not be abridged or violated," etc., etc., "we, the said delegates, in the name and in behalf of the people of the State of New York, do, by these presents, assent to and ratify the said Constitution."
With this and other conditions stated in the resolution of ratification, it was accepted and approved by the other States, and New York became a member of the Union. The resolution of Rhode Island asserts the same reservation in regard to the reassumption of powers.
It is unnecessary to examine here whether this reserved power exists in the States respectively or in the people; for, when the Confederate States seceded, it was done by the people, acting through, or in conjunction with, the State, and by that power which is expressly reserved to them in the Constitution of the United States. When Mr. Lincoln, therefore, issued his proclamation calling for seventy-five thousand men to subjugate certain "combinations too powerful to be suppressed by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings," he not only thereby denied the validity of the Constitution, but sought to resist, by military force, the exercise of a power clearly reserved in the Constitution, and reaffirmed in its tenth amendment, to the States respectively or to the people for their exercise. But, in order to justify his flagrant disregard of the Constitution, he contrived the fiction of "combinations," and upon this basis commenced the bloody war of subjugation with all its consequences. Thus, any recognition of the Confederate States, or of either of them, in his negotiations, would have exposed the groundlessness of his fiction. But the Constitution required him to recognize each of them, for they had simply exercised a power which it expressly reserved for their exercise. Thus it is seen who violated the Constitution, and upon whom rests the responsibility of the war.
It has been stated above that the conditions offered to our soldiers whenever they proposed to capitulate, were only those of subjugation. When General Buckner, on February 16, 1862, asked of General Grant to appoint commissioners to agree upon terms of capitulation, he replied:
"No terms, except unconditional and immediate surrender, can be accepted."
When General Lee asked the same question, on April 9, 1865, General Grant replied:
"The terms upon which peace can be had are well understood. By the South laying down their arms, they will hasten that most desirable event, save thousands of human lives and hundreds of millions of property not yet destroyed."
When General Sherman made an agreement with General Johnston for formal disbandment of the army of the latter, it was at once disapproved by the Government of the United States, and Sherman therefore wrote to Johnston:
"I demand the surrender of your army on the same terms as were given to General Lee at Appomattox, on April 9th, purely and simply."
It remains to be stated that the Government which spurned all these proposals for peace, and gave no terms but unconditional and immediate surrender, was instituted and organized for the purposes and objects expressed in the following extract, and for no others:
"We, the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."
[Footnote 117: General Hampton's letter to General Sherman, February 27, 1865.]
[Footnote 118: "The Story of the Great March, from the Diary of a Staff Officer." By Brevet Major George Ward Nichols, Aide-de-Camp to General Sherman. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1865, pp. 112, et seq.]
Chapter LI
General Sherman leaves Savannah.--His March impeded.--Difficulty In collecting Troops to oppose him.--The Line of the Salkehatchie.-- Route of the Enemy's Advance.--Evacuation of Columbia.--Its Surrender by the Mayor.--Burning the City.--Sherman responsible.-- Evacuation of Charleston.--The Confederate Forces in North Carolina.--General Johnston's Estimate.--General Johnston assigned to the Command.--The Enemy's Advance from Columbia to Fayetteville, North Carolina.--"Foraging Parties."--Sherman's Threat and Hampton's Reply.--Description of Federal "Treasure-Seekers" by Sherman's Aide-de-Camp.--Failure of Johnston's Projected Attack at Fayetteville.--Affair at Kinston.--Cavalry Exploits.--General Johnston withdraws to Smithfield.--Encounter at Averysboro.-- Battles of Bentonville.--Union of Sherman's and Schofield's Forces.--Johnston's Retreat to Raleigh.
After the evacuation of Savannah by General Hardee, it soon became known that General Sherman was making preparations to march northward through the Carolinas with the supposed purpose of uniting his forces with those of General Grant before Richmond. General Hardee, having left detachments at proper points to defend the approaches to Charleston and Augusta, Georgia, withdrew the rest of his command to the first-named city. General Wheeler's cavalry held all the roads northward, and, by felling trees and burning bridges, obstructed considerably the enemy's advance, which in the early part of January was still further impeded by the heavy rains which had swollen the rivers and creeks far beyond their usual width and depth.
The seriously impaired condition of our railroad communications in Georgia and Alabama, the effect of the winter rains on the already poor and ill-constructed country roads, the difficulty in collecting and transporting supplies, to impeded the concentration of our available forces, that Generals Beauregard and Hardee--the former at Columbia, South Carolina, and the latter at Charleston--could only retard, not prevent, the onward march of the enemy. At the outset of his movement the Salkehatchie River presented a very strong line of defense. Its swollen condition at that time, and the wide, deeply inundated swamps on both sides, rendered it almost impossible to force or outflank the position if adequately defended. It might have been better if we had then abandoned the attempt to hold cities of no strategic importance, and concentrated their garrisons at this point, where the chances of successful resistance were greater than at any subsequent period of the campaign. For, even if our expectation had been disappointed, and had the superior numerical force of the enemy compelled us to withdraw from this line, the choice of several good positions was open to us, any one of which, by moving upon converging lines, we could reach sooner than was possible to Sherman, whose passage of the river must have been much encumbered and delayed by his trains. Of these defensive positions, Branchville and Orangeburg may be regarded as eligible: had Sherman headed his columns toward Charleston, our forces would have been in position to attack him in front and on the flank. Had his objective point been Augusta, he would have had our army in his rear; and had, as proved to be the case, Columbia been the place at which he aimed, our army would have been able to reach there sooner than he could.
General Sherman left Savannah January 22, 1865, and reached Pocotaligo on the 24th. On February 3d he crossed the Salkehatchie with slight resistance at River's and Beaufort bridges, and thence pushed forward to the South Carolina Railroad at Midway, Bamberg, and Graham's. After thoroughly destroying the railroad between these places, which occupied three or four days, he advanced slowly along the line of the railroad, threatening Branchville, the junction of the railroads from Augusta to Columbia and Charleston. For a short time it was doubtful whether he proposed to attack Augusta, Georgia, where it was well known we had our principal powder-mill, many important factories and shops, and large stores of army supplies; but on the 11th it was found that he was moving north to Orangeburg, on the road from Branchville to Columbia, the latter city being the objective point of his march. Early on the morning of the 16th the head of his columns reached the Congaree opposite Columbia. The bridge over that stream had been burned by our retreating troops, but a pontoon bridge, built by the enemy under cover of strong detachments who had crossed higher up at Saluda Factory, enabled the main body to pass the river and enter the city on the morning of the 17th, the Confederate troops having previously evacuated it. On the same day the Mayor formally surrendered the city to Colonel Stone, commanding a brigade of the Fifteenth Corps, and claimed for its citizens the protection which the laws of civilized war always accord to non-combatants. In infamous disregard not only of the established rules of war, but of the common dictates of humanity, the defenseless city was burned to the ground, after the dwelling-houses had been robbed of everything of value, and their helpless inmates subjected to outrage and insult of a character too base to be described.
Hypocrisy is the tribute which vice pays to virtue; therefore General Sherman has endeavored to escape the reproaches for the burning of Columbia by attributing it to General Hampton's order to burn the cotton in the city, that it might not fall into the hands of the enemy. General Hampton has proved circumstantially that General Sherman's statement is untrue, and, though in any controversy to which General Hampton may be a party, no corroborative evidence is necessary to substantiate his assertion of a fact coming within his personal observation, hundreds of unimpeachable witnesses have testified that the burning of Columbia was the deliberate act of the Federal soldiery, and that it was certainly permitted, if not ordered, by the commanding General. The following letter of General Hampton will to those who know him be conclusive:
"WILD WOODS, MISSISSIPPI, April 21, 1866.
"To Hon. REVERDY JOHNSON, United States Senate.
"SIR: A few days ago I saw in the published proceedings of Congress that a petition from Benjamin Kawles, of Columbia, South Carolina, asking for compensation for the destruction of his house by tho Federal army, in February, 1865, had been presented to the Senate, accompanied by a letter from Major-General Sherman. In this letter General Sherman uses the following language: 'The citizens of Columbia set fire to thousands of bales of cotton rolled out into the streets, and which were burning before we entered Columbia; I, myself, was in the city as early as nine o'clock, and I saw these fires, and knew that efforts were made to extinguish them, but a high and strong wind prevented. I gave no orders for the burning of your city, but, on the contrary, the conflagration resulted from the great imprudence of cutting the cotton bales, whereby the contents were spread to the wind, so that it became an impossibility to arrest the fire. I saw in your Columbia newspaper the printed order of General Wade Hampton, that on the approach of the Yankee army all the cotton should thus be burned, and, from what I saw myself, I have no hesitation in saying that he was the cause of the destruction of your city.'
"This charge, made against me by General Sherman, having been brought before the Senate of the United States, I am naturally most solicitous to vindicate myself before the same tribunal. But my State has no representative in that body. Those who should be her constitutional representatives there are debarred the right of entrance into those halls. There are none who have the right to speak for the South; none to participate in the legislation which governs her; none to impose the taxes she is called upon to pay, and none to vindicate her sons from misrepresentation, injustice, or slander. Under these circumstances, I appeal to you, in the confident hope you will use every effort to see that justice is done in this matter.
"I deny, emphatically, that any cotton was fired in Columbia by my order. I deny that the citizens 'set fire to thousands of bales rolled out into the streets.' I deny that any cotton was on fire when the Federal troops entered the city. I most respectfully ask of Congress to appoint a committee, charged with the duty of ascertaining and reporting all the facts connected with the destruction of Columbia, and thus fixing upon the proper author of that enormous crime the infamy he richly deserves. I am willing to submit the case to any honest tribunal. Before any such I pledge myself to prove that I gave a positive order, by direction of General Beauregard, that no cotton should be fired; that not one bale was on fire when General Sherman's troops took possession of the city; that he promised protection to the city, and that, in spite of his solemn promise, he burned the city to the ground, deliberately, systematically, and atrociously. I, therefore, most earnestly request that Congress may take prompt and efficient measures to investigate this matter fully. Not only is this due to themselves and to the reputation of the United States army, but also to justice and to truth. Trusting that you will pardon me for troubling you, I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant,
"WADE HAMPTON."
Were this the only instance of such barbarity perpetrated by General Sherman's army, his effort to escape the responsibility might be more successful, because more plausible; but when the eulogists of his exploits note exultingly that "wide-spreading columns of smoke rose wherever the army went," when it is incontrovertibly true that the line of his march could be traced by the burning dwelling-houses and by the wail of women and children pitilessly left to die from starvation and exposure in the depth of winter, his plea of "not guilty" in the case of the city of Columbia can not free him from the reprobation which outraged humanity must attach to an act of cruelty which only finds a parallel in the barbarous excesses of Wallenstein's army in the Thirty Years' War, and which, even at that period of the world's civilization, sullied the fame of that otherwise great soldier.
In consequence of General Sherman's movements, it was considered advisable to evacuate Charleston (February 17th), that General Hardee's command might become available for service in the field; and thus that noble city and its fortresses, which the combined military and naval forces of the United States, during an eighteen months' siege, had failed to reduce, and which will stand for ever as imperishable monuments of the skill and fortitude of their defenders, were, on February 21st, without resistance, occupied by the Federal forces under General Q. A. Gillmore.
Fort Sumter, though it now presented the appearance of a ruin, was really better proof against bombardment than when first subjected to fire. The upper tier of masonry, from severe battering, had fallen on the outer wall, and shot and shell served only to solidify and add harder material to the mass. Over its rampart the Confederate flag defiantly floated until the city of Charleston was evacuated.
Every effort that our circumstances permitted was immediately and thenceforward made to collect troops for the defense of North Carolina. General Hood's army, the troops under command of General D. H. Hill at Augusta, General Hardee's force, a few thousand men under General Bragg, and the cavalry commands of Generals Hampton and Wheeler, constituted our entire available strength to oppose Sherman's advance. These were collected as rapidly as our broken communications and the difficulty of gathering and transporting supplies would permit.
After the fall of Columbia, General Beauregard, commanding the military department, retreated toward North Carolina. The Army of Tennessee (Hood's) was moving from the west to make a junction with the troops retiring from South Carolina. The two forces, if united with Hardee's command, then moving in the same direction, would, it was hoped, be able to make effective resistance to Sherman's advance. In any event it was needful that they should be kept in such relation to Lee's army as to make a junction with it practicable. In this state of affairs I was informed that General Beauregard, after his troops had entered North Carolina, had decided to march to the eastern part of that State. This would leave the road to Charlotte open to Sherman's pursuing column, which, interposing, would prevent the troops coming from the west from joining Beauregard, enable him to destroy our force in detail by the joint action of his own army and that of Schofield, commanding the district of Wilmington. The anxiety created by this condition of affairs caused me, after full correspondence with General Lee, to suggest to him to give his views to General Beauregard, and I sent to General Beauregard's headquarters the chief-engineer, General J. F. Gilmer, he being possessed fully of my opinions and wishes. General Beauregard modified his proposed movements so as to keep his forces on the left of the enemy's line of march until the troops coming from Hood's army could make a junction. These were the veteran commands of Stevenson, Cheatham, and Stewart. Lieutenant-General S. D. Lee, though he had not entirely recovered from a wound received in the Tennessee campaign, was at Augusta, Georgia, collecting the fragments of Hood's army to follow the troops previously mentioned. They had not moved together, and the first-named division had reached Beauregard's army in South Carolina.
Though it contained an implied compliment, General Lee was not a little disturbed by occasional applications made to have troops detached from his army to reënforce others. The last instance had been a call from General Beauregard for reënforcements from the Army of Virginia. He had always been attentive, and ready as far as he could, to meet the wants of other commands of our army, but at this time those who knew his condition could not suppose he had any men to spare; yet the fact of thinking so was a compliment to his success in resisting the large army which was assailing his small one. There had always been entire co-intelligence and accord between General Lee and myself, but the Congress about this time thought his power would be increased by giving him the nominal dignity of general-in-chief, under which he resumed, as far as he could, the general charge of armies from which, at his urgent solicitation, I had relieved him after he took command, in the field, of the Army of Northern Virginia.
A few days subsequent to the events in North Carolina to which reference has been made, General Lee proposed to me that General J. E. Johnston should be put in command of the troops in North Carolina. He still had the confidence in that officer which I had once felt, but which his campaigns in Mississippi and Georgia had impaired. With the understanding that General Lee was himself to supervise and control the operations, I assented to the assignment. General Johnston, on the 23d of February, at Charlotte, North Carolina, relieved General Beauregard and assumed command. General Lee's first instructions to General Johnston were to "concentrate all available forces and drive back Sherman." The first part of the instructions was well executed; the last part of it was more desirable than practicable, though the brief recital made herein of the events of the campaign claimed the credit due to a vigorous effort.
General Johnston's force, according to his estimate, when he took command, amounted to about sixteen thousand infantry and artillery, and four thousand cavalry; if to this be added the portion of the Army of Tennessee, about twenty-five hundred men, under command of General Stephen D, Lee, which afterward joined the army at Smithfield, North Carolina, and that of General Bragg's command at Goldsboro, which amounted to about eight thousand, the aggregate would be about thirty thousand five hundred men of all arms.
After leaving Columbia, the course of the Federal army through Winnsboro, across the Catawba at Rocky Mount, Hanging Rock, and Peay's Ferry, and in the direction of Cheraw on the Great Pedee, indicated that it would attempt to cross the Cape Fear River at Fayetteville, North Carolina--a town sixty miles south of Raleigh, and of special importance, as containing an arsenal, several Government shops, and a large portion of the machinery which had been removed from Harper's Ferry--and effect a junction at that point with General Schofield's command, then known to be at Wilmington. Up to this time, while no encounter of any magnitude had taken place, the enemy's progress had been much impeded by the Confederate cavalry, and the robbery of private citizens by gangs of armed banditti, called "foraging parties," was in a large measure prevented. The right of an army to forage as it advances through an enemy's country is not questioned. But the right to forage, to collect food for men and horses, does not mean the right to rob household furniture, plate, trinkets, and every conceivable species of private property, and to burn whatever could not be carried away, together with the dwellings. General Sherman complained that some of these "foragers," who were caught in the commission of the above-named offenses, and had added thereto the greater crime of assaulting women, had been summarily dealt with by some of those whose wives and daughters they had outraged, and whose homes they had made desolate; and he informed General Hampton that in retaliation he had ordered a number of Confederate prisoners of war to be put to death. To arrest this brutality General Hampton promptly informed him that, "for every soldier of mine murdered by you, I shall have executed at once two of yours, giving in all cases preference to any officers who may be in our hands," and adding, with a view to check the inhuman system of burning the houses of those citizens whom they had robbed, that he had ordered his men "to shoot down all of your men who are caught burning houses." [117] This notice and the knowledge that General Hampton would keep his word, produced, it is believed, a very salutary effect, and thereafter the fear of punishment wrought a reform which the dictates of honor and humanity had been powerless to effect.
The historian of Sherman's "Great March," in his illustrated narrative of that expedition, describes both with pen and pencil the manner in which "with untiring zeal the soldiers hunted for concealed treasures. . . . Wherever the army halted," he writes, "almost every inch of ground in the vicinity of the dwellings was poked by ramrods, pierced with sabers, or upturned with spades," searching for "valuable personal effects, plate, jewelry, and other rich goods, as well as articles of food, such as hams, sugar, flour, etc. . . . It was comical," adds the chronicler, "to see a group of these red-bearded, barefooted, ragged veterans punching the unoffending earth in an apparently idiotic but certainly most energetic way. If they 'struck a vein,' a spade was instantly put into requisition, and the coveted wealth was speedily unearthed. Nothing escaped the observation of these sharp-witted soldiers. A woman standing upon the porch of a house, apparently watching their proceedings, instantly became an object of suspicion, and she was watched until some movement betrayed a place of concealment. The fresh earth recently thrown up, a bed of flowers just set out, the slightest indication of a change in appearance or position, all attracted the gaze of these military agriculturists. It was all fair spoil of war, and the search made one of the excitements of the march." [118] The author of the work from which the foregoing is an extract was an aide-de-camp on the staff of General Sherman. The playful manner in which he describes these habitual acts of plunder of "plate, jewelry and other rich goods" from private and undefended dwellings shows that not only was such conduct not forbidden by the military authorities, but that it was permitted and applauded, that it was practiced "wherever the army halted" under the eye of the staff-officers of the General commanding, and was looked upon as one of the pleasurable "excitements of the march." Indeed, so agreeable was the impression made by these scenes of robbery of women's "rich goods" that he has adorned his narrative with a full-page illustration, exhibiting a plantation home surrounded by soldiers engaged, as this staff-officer humorously terms it, in "treasure-seeking," while the lady of the house--its only apparent occupant--stands upon the veranda, with hands uplifted, beseeching them not to steal the watch and chain which they are taking out of a vessel which they have just dug up. That the foreign mercenaries, of which the Federal army was largely composed, should have been guilty of such disgraceful conduct, when free from the observation of their officers, is conceivable; but it is difficult to imagine that, in the nineteenth century, such acts as are described above could be committed habitually, in view of the officer of highest rank in the army of a civilized country, and not merely pass unpunished or unrebuked, but be recorded with conspicuous approval in the pages of a military history.
The advance of the enemy's columns across the Catawba, Lynch's Creek, and the Pedee, at Cheraw, though retarded as much as possible by the vigilant skill of our cavalry under Generals Hampton, Butler, and Wheeler, was steady and continuous. General Johnston's hope that, from the enemy's order of moving by wings, sometimes a day's march from each other, he could find an opportunity to strike one of their columns in the passage of the Cape Fear River, when the other was not in supporting distance, was unhappily disappointed.
On March 6th, near Kinston, General Bragg with a reënforcement of less than two thousand men attacked and routed three divisions of the enemy under Major-General Cox, capturing fifteen hundred prisoners and three field-pieces, and inflicting heavy loss in killed and wounded. This success, though inspiring, was on too small a scale to produce important results. During the march from the Catawba to the Cape Fear several brilliant cavalry affairs took place, in which our troops displayed their wonted energy and dash. Among these the most conspicuous were General Butler's at Mount Elon, where he defeated a detachment sent to tear up the railroad at Florence; General Wheeler's attack and repulse of the left flank of the enemy at Hornesboro, March 4th; a similar exploit by the same officer at Rockingham on the 7th; the attack and defeat by General Hampton of a detachment on the 8th; the surprise and capture of General Kilpatrick's camp by General Hampton on the morning of the 10th, driving the enemy into an adjoining swamp, and taking possession of his artillery and wagon-train, and the complete rout of a large Federal party by General Hampton with an inferior force at Fayetteville on the 11th.
As it was doubtful whether General Sherman's advance from Fayetteville would be directed to Goldsboro or Raleigh, General Johnston took position with a portion of his command at Smithfield, which is nearly equidistant from each of those places, leaving General Hardee to follow the road from Fayetteville to Raleigh, which for several miles is also the direct road from Fayetteville to Smithfield, and posted one division of his cavalry on the Raleigh road, and another on that to Goldsboro. On the 16th of March General Hardee was attacked by two corps of the enemy, a few miles south of Averysboro, a place nearly half-way between Fayetteville and Raleigh. Falling back a few hundred yards to a stronger position, he easily repelled the repeated attacks of these two corps during the day, and, learning in the evening that the enemy's corps were moving to turn his left, he withdrew in the night toward Smithfield.
Early in the morning of the 18th General Johnston obtained definite information that General Sherman was marching on Goldsboro, the right wing of his army being about a day's march distant from the left. General Johnston took immediate steps to attack the head of the left wing on the morning of the 19th, and ordered the troops at Smithfield and General Hardee's command to march at once to Bentonville and take position between that village and the road on which the enemy was advancing. An error as to the relative distance which our troops and those of the enemy would have to move, exaggerating the distance between the roads on which the enemy was advancing and diminishing the distance that our troops would have to march, caused the failure to concentrate our troops in time to attack the enemy's left wing while in column; but, when General Hardee's troops reached Bentonville in the morning, the attack was commenced. The battle lasted through the greater part of the day, resulting in the enemy's being driven from two lines of intrenchments, and his taking shelter in a dense wood, where it was impracticable for our troops to preserve their line of battle or to employ the combined strength of the three arms. On the 20th the two wings of the Federal army, numbering, as estimated by General Johnston, upward of seventy thousand, came together and repeatedly attacked a division of our force (Hoke's) which occupied an intrenched position parallel to the road to Averysboro; but every attack was handsomely repulsed. On the next day (21st) an attempt by the enemy to reach Bentonville in the rear of our center, and thus cut off our only route of retreat, was gallantly defeated by an impetuous and skillful attack, led by Generals Hardee and Hampton, on the front and both flanks of the enemy's column, by which he was compelled to retreat as rapidly as he had advanced. In this attack. General Hardee's only son, a noble boy, charging gallantly with the Eighth Texas Cavalry, fell mortally wounded. On the night of the 21st our troops were withdrawn across Mill Creek, and in the evening of the 22d bivouacked near Smithfield. On the 23d the forces of General Sherman and those of General Schofield were united at Goldsboro, where they remained inactive for upward of two weeks.
On the 9th of April the Confederate forces took up the line of march to Raleigh, and reached that city early in the afternoon of the same day closely followed by the Federal army.