Forty-Six Years in the Army by John McAllister Schofield (e ink ebook reader .txt) 📖

good troops, and have sent back full 25,000; and having instructed General Thomas to hold defensively Nashville, Chattanooga, and Decatur, all strongly fortified and provisioned for a long siege, I will destroy all the railroads of Georgia and do as much substantial damage as is possible, reaching the sea-coast near one of the points hitherto indicated, trusting that General Thomas, with his present troops and the influx of new troops promised, will be able in a very few days to assume the offensive. Hood's cavalry may do a good deal of damage, and I have sent Wilson back with all dismounted cavalry, retaining only about 4500. This is the best I can do, and shall, therefore, when I get to Atlanta the necessary stores, move as soon as possible."

To that despatch General Grant replied, November 2:

"Your despatch of 9 A. M. yesterday is just received. I despatched you the same date, advising that Hood's army, now that it had worked so far north, be looked upon more as the objective. With the force, however, you have left with Thomas, he must be able to take care of Hood and destroy him. I do not really see that you can withdraw from where you are to follow Hood without giving up all we have gained in territory. I say, then, go as you propose."

Thus Grant gave his assent to Sherman's proposition that Nashville, Chattanooga, and Decatur be held defensively, even during a long siege if necessary, instead of the line of the Tennessee, as at first insisted on by General Grant. Yet Grant's assent was given in view of Sherman's trust that Thomas would be able in a very few days to assume the offensive.

Sherman's despatch to Thomas of the same date (November 1) instructed him as to the policy then determined on, in lieu of that which had contemplated holding the line of the Tennessee firmly, as follows:

"Despatch of last night received. The fact that Forrest is down about Johnsonville, while Hood, with his infantry, is still about Florence and Tuscumbia, gives you time for concentration. The supplies about Chattanooga are immense, and I will soon be independent of them; therefore I would not risk supplies coming in transitu from Nashville to Chattanooga. In like manner, we have large supplies in Nashville, and if they be well guarded, and Hood can't get our supplies, he can't stay in Tennessee long. General Schofield will go to you as rapidly as cars can take him. I have no doubt, after the emergency is past, and the enemy has done us considerable damage, reinforcements will pour to you more than can be provided for or taken care of. In the meantime do your best. I will leave here to-morrow for Kingston, and keep things moving toward the south; therefore hold fast all new troops coming to you, excepting such as are now at Chattanooga, to whom I will give orders."

Yet in his letter to Grant, five days later, Sherman reverts to the original plan: "On the supposition, always, that Thomas can hold the line of the Tennessee."

November 7, Sherman telegraphed Grant: ". . . On that day [November 10] or the following, if affairs should remain as now in Tennessee, I propose to begin the movement which I have hitherto fully described . . ." To which despatch General Grant replied: ". . . I see no present reason for changing your plan. . . ."

General Grant does not refer to the later despatches in his general report, July 22, 1865, quoted in his "Memoirs," but uses the following language:

"With the troops thus left at his disposal, there was little doubt that General Thomas could hold the line of the Tennessee, or, in the event Hood should force it, would be able to concentrate and beat him in battle. It was therefore readily consented to that Sherman should start for the sea-coast."

CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN GRANT AND SHERMAN

General Sherman also omits to make any reference in his "Memoirs" to the despatches respecting a possible long siege of Nashville, Chattanooga, and Decatur; but he says in a despatch of November 2 to Grant, quoted in his "Memoirs":

"If I turn back, the whole effect of my campaign will be lost. By my movements I have thrown Beauregard [Hood] well to the west, and Thomas will have ample time and sufficient troops to hold him until the reinforcements from Missouri reach him. We have now ample supplies at Chattanooga and Atlanta, and can stand a month's interruption to our communications. I do not believe the Confederate army can reach our railroad lines except by cavalry raids, and Wilson will have cavalry enough to checkmate them. I am clearly of opinion that the best results will follow my contemplated movement through Georgia."

The following language is found in a despatch dated November 11, midnight, from Sherman to Thomas, which is especially important as giving the last expression of his views of the situation, and of what Thomas would be able to do after Sherman started for the sea:

"I can hardly believe that Beauregard would attempt to work against Nashville from Corinth as a base at this stage of the war, but all information seems to point that way. If he does, you will whip him out of his boots; but I rather think you will find commotion in his camp in a day or two. Last night we burned Rome, and in two or more days will burn Atlanta; and he must discover that I am not retreating, but, on the contrary, fighting for the very heart of Georgia. . . . These [some Confederate movements about Rome and Atlanta] also seem to indicate that Beauregard expects me to retreat. . . . To-morrow I begin the movement laid down in my Special Field Orders, No. 115, and shall keep things moving thereafter. . . . By using detachments of recruits and dismounted cavalry in your fortifications, you will have Generals Schofield and Stanley and General A. J. Smith, strengthened by eight or ten new regiments and all of Wilson's cavalry. You could safely invite Beauregard across the Tennessee River and prevent his ever returning. I still believe, however, that public clamor will force him to turn and follow me, in which event you should cross at Decatur and move directly toward Selma as far as you can transport supplies. . . . You may act . . . on the certainty that I sally from Atlanta on the 16th instant with about 60,000 well provisioned, but expecting to live chiefly on the country."

The reason for this sudden and radical change of program is made perfectly clear by Sherman's despatch of November 1 and others: "The enemy is now in the full tide of execution of his grand plan to destroy my communications and defeat this army." Sherman's defiant spirit, thus aroused, brooked no delay. He would not wait for anything but his own necessary preparations. Nashville, Chattanooga, and Decatur could stand a long siege, and these alone he regarded as of strategic importance. The enemy would doubtless do "considerable damage," but afterward "reinforcements will pour to you" (Thomas). He convinced himself that Thomas had troops enough; but, "to make things sure," he might "call on the governors of Indiana and Kentucky for some militia"! In the meantime, he (Sherman) would "destroy all the railroads in Georgia and do as much substantial damage as is possible." Thus recklessly challenged by the Confederate chief, Sherman must not only accept that challenge, but do it at once. Perhaps if Jefferson Davis had known William T. Sherman as well as some of us did, he would not have uttered that challenge.

RAWLINS'S REPORTED OPPOSITION TO THE MARCH

From Grant's "Memoirs"(11) it appears that General Grant not only confirms Sherman's claim in respect to his independent authorship of the plan, but says he (General Grant) was in favor of that plan from the time it was first submitted to him, and credits his chief of staff, General Rawlins, with having been "very bitterly opposed to it," and with having appealed to the authorities at Washington to stop it.

This recollection of General Grant, after the lapse of so long a time, and when he was suffering almost beyond endurance from a fatal disease, may possibly, it seems to me, not express the views he entertained in October, 1864, quite so fully or accurately as his despatch of October 11, 1864, 11 A. M., to General Sherman, heretofore quoted.

That despatch was a literal prediction of what Hood actually did. It was dictated by a clear military foresight, whether of Grant or Rawlins. How far world-wide approval of Sherman's plans after their brilliant success may have obscured the past can only be conjectured. As distinctly stated by Grant himself soon afterward, he clearly saw that somebody ought to be criticized; but, in view of the results, he decided to let it pass.

However all this may be, even my respect for the opinions of the greatest of Union soldiers cannot alter the conclusion I have reached after many years of study and mature consideration. I can only say that the opinion ascribed to General Rawlins, as opposed to General Grant's, was in my judgment the better of the two; and that General Rawlins, though he had not the advantage of an early military education, was a man of great natural ability, and had learned much from more than three years' experience in war, after which the differences in military judgment which had existed at the beginning must have very largely, if not entirely, disappeared. General Rawlins was my immediate successor in the War Department, and would, I doubt not, have made a great reputation there if his life had been prolonged.

I believe Grant's own sound military judgment dictated his first answer to Sherman, dissenting from the proposition to begin the march to the sea before Hood's army was disposed of, or that result assured. His great confidence in the genius of his brilliant subordinate, and in Sherman's judgment that he had given Thomas ample means to take care of Hood, no matter what that bold and reckless adversary might do, dictated Grant's final assent to Sherman's project. Their correspondence shows this so clearly and fully that there would seem to be no need of my making any special reference to it. I do so only because of the statement in General Grant's "Memoirs." Very possibly General Grant may have meant, in his "Memoirs," only that he approved the general project, under the condition that sufficient force would be left "to take care of Hood and destroy him," not caring to say anything about the fulfillment or nonfulfillment of that condition.

From about October 1 till the time Sherman started on his march— six weeks—he seems to have been so intent on the execution of that project, and upon doing it with as large an army as possible, that no question of military principle or of fact could be permitted to stand in his way. He assumed and maintained throughout that the only question was whether he should continue the aggressive, or allow the enemy's movements to put him on the defensive, refusing to consider any other possible plan of aggressive operations, except for a moment in response to advice from Grant, and then brushing it aside as impracticable.—"If I could hope to overhaul Hood," etc. In like manner, he appears to have convinced himself that his arrangements for direct operations against Hood by Thomas in Tennessee were very materially more complete than they were in fact, and he so represented the matter to General Grant. It seems quite certain that Grant was laboring under a serious misapprehension in respect to Thomas's condition to cope with Hood, and no doubt Grant's subsequent impatience in respect to Thomas's action was largely due to this fact. This point deserves close consideration.

GRANT'S FINAL JUDGMENT ON IT