I now turn with a feeling of extreme delicacy to the conduct of that other campaign from Chattanooga to Atlanta, Savannah, and Raleigh, which with liberal discretion was committed to me by General Grant in his minute instructions of April 4th and April 19th, 1864. To all military students these letters must be familiar, because they have been published again and again, and there never was and never can be raised a question of rivalry or claim between us as to the relative merits of the manner in which we played our respective parts. We were as brothers■—I the older man in years, he the higher in rank. We both believed in our heart of hearts that the success of the Union cause was not only necessary to the then generation of Americans, but to all future generations. We both professed to be gentlemen and professional soldiers, educated in the science of war by our generous Government for the very occasion which had arisen. Neither of us by nature was a combative man; but with honest hearts and a clear purpose to do what man could we embarked on that campaign, which I believe, in its strategy, in its logistics, in its grand and minor tactics, has added new luster to the old science of war. Both of us had at our front generals to whom in early life we had been taught to look up — educated and experienced soldiers like ourselves, not likely to make any mistakes, and each of whom had as strong an army as could be collected from the mass of the Southern people,—of the same blood as ourselves, brave, confident, and well-equipped; in addition to which they had the most decided ad van tage of operating in their own difficult country of mountain, forest, ravine, and river, affording admirable opportunities for defense, besides the other equally important advantage that we had to invade the country of our unqualified enemy, and expose our long lines of supply to the guerrillas of an “ exasperated people.” Again, as we advanced we had to leave guards to bridges, stations, and interme-
GENERAL WILLIAM T. SHERMAN AT ATLANTA. From a photograph.
THE “CALICO HOUSE,” GENERAL SHERMAN’S FIRST HEADQUARTERS
IN ATLANTA.
Afterward the office of his engineers; also for several months a hospital. (From a photograph.)
the 19th of October at Cedar Creek, gaining a temporary advantage during General Sheridan’s absence ; but on his opportune return his army resumed the offensive, defeated Early, captured nearly all his artillery, and drove him completely out of his field of operations, eliminating that army from the subsequent problem of the war. Sheridan’s losses were 5995 to Early’s 4200; but these losses are no just measure of the results of that victory, which made it impossible to use the valley as a Confederate base of supplies and as an easy route for raids within the Union lines. General Sheridan then committed its protection to detachments, and with his main force rejoined Grant, who still held Lee’s army inside his intrench-ments at Richmond and Petersburg.
despatched to Washington, from his army investing Petersburg, two divisions of the Sixth Corps, and also the Nineteenth Corps just arriving from New Orleans. These troops arrived at the very nick of time — met Early’s army in the suburbs of Washington, and drove it back to the Valley of Virginia.
This most skilful movement of Early demonstrated to General Grant the importance of the Valley of Virginia, not only as a base of Supplies for Lee’s army in Richmond, but as the most direct, the shortest, and the easiest route for a “ diversion” into the Union territory north of the Potomac. He therefore cast around for a suitable commander for this field of operations, and settled upon Major-General Philip H. Sheridan, whom he had brought from the West to command the cavalry corps of the Army of the Potomac.
Sheridan promptly went to his new sphere of operations [see׳ p. 283], quickly ascertained its strength and resources, and resolved to attack Early in the position which he had chosen in and about Winchester, Va. He delivered his attack across broken ground on the 19th of September, beat his antagonist in fair, open battle, sending him “w’hirling up the valley,” inflicting a loss of 5500 men to his own of 4873, and followed him up to Cedar Creek and Fisher’s Hill. Early recomposed his army and fell upon the Union army on
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9000. Nevertheless, his renewed order, “Forward by the left flank,” compelled Lee to retreat to the defenses of Richmond.
Grant’s “ Memoirs” enable us to follow him day by day across the various rivers which lay between him and Richmond, and in the bloody assaults at Cold Harbor, where his losses are reported 14,931 to 1700 by his opponent. Yet ever onward by the left flank, he crossed James River and penned Lee and his Army of Northern Virginia within the in-trenchments of Richmond and Petersburg for ten long months on the pure defensive, to remain almost passive observers of local e vents,w’hile Grant’s other armies were absolutely annihilatingthe Southern Confederacy.
While Grant was fighting desperately from the Rapidan to the James, there were two other armies within the same “zone of operations”—that “of the J ames ” under General Butler, who was expected to march up on the south and invest Petersburg and even Richmond; and that of Sigel at Winchester, who was expected to march up the Valley of Virginia, pick up his detachments from the Kanawha (Crook and Averell), and threaten Lynchburg, a place of vital importance to Lee in Richmond. Butler failed to accomplish what was expected of him; and Sigel failed at the very start, and was replaced by Hunter, who marched up the valley, made junction with Crook and Averell at Staunton, and pushed on with commendable vigor to Lynchburg, which he invested on the 16th of June.
Lee, who had by this time been driven into Richmond with a force large enough to hold his lines of intrenchments and a surplus for expeditions, detached General Jubal A. Early with the equivalent of a corps to drive Hunter away from Lynchburg. Hunter, far from his base, with inadequate supplies of food and ammunition, retreated by the Kanawha to the Ohio River, his nearest base, thereby exposing the Valley of Virginia; whereupon Early, an educated soldier, promptly resolved to take advantage of the occasion, marched rapidly down this valley northward to Winchester, crossed the Potomac to Hagerstown, and thence boldly marched on Washington, defended, at that time only by militia and armed clerks. Grant, fully alive to the danger,
GENERAL SHERMAN’S HEADQUARTERS AT THE HOWARD HOUSE, IN FRONT OF ATLANTA.
From a sketch made at the time.