When Grant reached Spotsylvania, May 8th, he found his antagonist in his front thus intrenched. He was delayed there till the 20th, during which time there was incessant fighting, because he was compelled to attack his enemy behind these improvised intrenchments. His losses, according to Phisterer, were 12,564, while the Confederates lost
the night or for battle, faced the enemy; moved forward to ground with a good outlook to the front; stacked arms, gathered logs, stumps, fence-rails, anything which would stop a bullet; piled these to their front, and, digging a ditch behind, threw the dirt forward, and made a parapet which covered their persons as perfectly as a granite wall.
A SHELL AT HEADQUARTERS.
THE GRAND STRATEGY OF THE LAST YEAR OF THE WAR, AND THE CAPTURE OF ATLANTA.
BY WILLIAM T. SHERMAN, GENERAL, U. S. A.
Commander of tlie Military Division of tile Mississippi.
of those of the Duke of Wellington contained in the twelve volumes of his published letters and correspondence.
With the month of May came the season for action, and by the 4th all his armies were in motion. The army of Butler at Port Monroe was his left, Meade’s army the center, and mine at Chattanooga his right. Butler was to move against Richmond on the south of James River, Meade straight against Lee, intrenched behind the Rapidan, and I to attack Joe Johnston and push him to and beyond Atlanta. This was as far as human foresight could penetrate. Though Meade commanded the Army of the Potomac, Grant virtually controlled it, and on the 4th of May, 1864, he crossed the Rapidan, and at noon of the 5th attacked Lee.
He knew that a certain amount of fighting, “ killing,” had to be done to accomplish his end, and also to pay the penalty of former failures. In the “ wilderness ” there was no room for grand strategy, or even minor tactics; but the fighting was desperate, the losses to the Union army being, according to Phisterer, 18,387, to the Confederate loss of 11,400 — the difference due to Lee’s intrenchments and the blind nature of the country in which the battle was fought. On the night of May 7th both parties paused, appalled by the fearful slaughter ; but Grant commanded, “ Forward by the left flank.” That was, in my judgment, the supreme moment of his life; undismayed, with a full comprehension of the importance of the work in which he was engaged, feeling as keen a sympathy for his dead and wounded as any one, and without stopping to count their numbers, he gave his orders calmly, specifically, and absolutely—“Forward to Spotsylvania.” But his watchful and skilful antagonist detected his purpose, and, having the inner or shorter line, threw his army across Grant’s path, and promptly fortified it. These field intrenchments are peculiar to America, though I am convinced they were employed by the Romans in Gaul in the days of Ciesar. Troops, halting for
ON the 4th day of March, 1864, General U. S. Grant was summoned to Washington from Nashville to receive his commission of lieutenant-general, the highest rank then known in the United States, and the same that was conferred on Washington in 1798. He reached the capital on the 7th, had an interview for the first time with Mr. Lincoln, and on the 9th received his commission at the hands of the President, who made a short address, to which Grant made a suitable reply. He was informed that it was desirable that he should come east to command all the armies of the United States, and give his personal supervision to the Army of the Potomac. On the 10th he visited General Meade at Brandy Station, and saw many of his leading officers, but he returned to Washington the next day and went on to Nashville, to which place he had summoned me, then absent on my Meridian expedition. On the 18th of March he turned over to me the command of the Western armies, and started back for Washington, I accompanying him as far as Cincinnati. Amidst constant interruptions of a business and social nature, we reached the satisfactory conclusion that, as soon as the season would permit, all the armies of the Union would assume the “bold offensive ” by “ concentric lines” on the common enemy, and would finish up the job in a single campaign if possible. The main “ objectives” were Lee’s army behind the Rapidan in Virginia, and Joseph B. Johnston’s army at Dalton, Georgia.
On reaching Washington, Grant studied with great care all the minutiae of the organization, strength, qualities, and resources of eachofthemany armies into which the Union forces had resolved themselves by reason of preceding events, and in due time with wonderful precision laid out the work which each one should undertake. His written instructions to me at Nashville were embraced in the two letters of April 4th and April 19th, 1864, both in his own handwriting, which I still possess, and which, in my judgment, are as complete as any