John Harrison Wilson, The life of Charles Henry Dana

During the cavalry campaign through Alabama and Georgia, in March and April, 1865, I was necessarily cut off from all communication with the North. No letters reached me from any quarter, and the only news I received came through the Confederates or the “intelligent contraband.” I knew that the spring campaign would begin “all along the line” as soon as the weather would permit, but I had no word from the time I left the Tennessee River till I arrived at Macon, Georgia, as to what had actually taken place in Virginia and the Carolinas; and after the armistice it took several days to re-establish telegraphs, and several weeks to open railroad communication and the postal service with the North. It was not till that was done that it became possible to learn the particulars of the great events that had taken place.

After the defeat and dispersion of Hood's army, the conviction became wide-spread that the Confederacy was doomed to an early collapse. Sherman had met with no resistance in his march to Savannah. While the moral effect of dividing the Confederacy in two again was very great, it is true that Sherman's divergent or eccentric movement made it practicable for Johnston to join Lee before Showman's army could possibly form a junction with Grant's. This was a strategic mistake, which might have turned the scale for good against the National forces had the Confederate authorities been able to keep their people in the ranks. But desertion, quite as much as fighting, had done its work. The Southern soldiers were certainly tired of the war, for, in spite of the conscription, the woods were full of them. True, the leaders yet showed an undaunted front, but it seemed to be rather for the purpose of securing terms than with any well-founded hope of gaining a substantial victory. They made a brave stand at Bentonville, and another at Averysborough, but the odds against them were overwhelming. With all they