General Horace Porter, Campaigning with Grant

“ [289] object now in sending a staff-officer is not so much to suggest operations for you as to get your views and have plans matured by the time everything can be got ready. It will probably be the 5th of October before any of the plans herein indicated will be executed. . . .”

I started the next day on this mission, going by way of Cincinnati and Louisville; and after many tedious interruptions from the crowded state of traffic by rail south of the latter place, and being once thrown from the track, I reached Chattanooga on the afternoon of September 19. From there to Atlanta is one hundred and fifty miles. Guerrillas were active along the line of the road, numerous attempts had recently been made to wreck the trains, and they were run as far as practicable by daylight. Being anxious to reach General Sherman with all despatch, I started forward that night on a freight-train. Rumors of approaching guerrillas were numerous; but, like many other campaign reports, they were unfounded, and I arrived in Atlanta safely the next forenoon. Upon this night trip I passed over the battle-field of Chickamauga on the anniversary of the sanguinary engagement in which I had participated the year before, and all of its exciting features were vividly recalled.

Upon reaching Atlanta, I went at once to General Sherman's headquarters. My mind was naturally wrought up to a high pitch of curiosity to see the famous soldier of the West, whom I had never met. He had taken up his quarters in a comfortable brick house belonging to Judge Lyons, opposite the Court-house Square. As I approached I saw the captor of Atlanta on the porch, sitting tilted back in a large arm-chair, reading a newspaper. His coat was unbuttoned, his black felt hat slouched over his brow, and on his feet were a pair of slippers very much down at the heels. He was in the prime of life and in the perfection of physical health.