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[82] carrying out Grant's commands for the destruction of crops and mills, and on that day he reported: ‘The rebels have given up the Valley, excepting Waynesboroa, which has been occupied by them since our cavalry was there.’ The generalin-chief was now extremely anxious that Sheridan should strike the railroads east of the mountains, by which important supplies were still conveyed to Richmond. As early as the 26th of September, he said: ‘If you can possibly subsist your army at the front for a few days more, do it, and make a great effort to destroy the roads about Charlottesville, east of the Blue Ridge.’ Sheridan, however, was opposed to this movement, and replied at once: ‘The difficulty of transporting this army through the mountain passes on to the railroad at Charlottesville is such that I regard it as impracticable with my present means of transportation. . . . I think that the best policy will be to let the burning of the crops of the Valley be the end of this campaign, and let some of this army go somewhere else.’

It is not every general who, after a successful campaign, recommends his own command to be reduced and his troops distributed; but Sheridan always cared more for his cause than for his own interest or importance. He was now very much in earnest, and wrote the same day to Halleck: ‘I strongly recommend General Grant to terminate this campaign by the destruction of the crops in the Valley and the means of planting, and the transfer of the Sixth and Nineteenth corps to his army at Richmond. . . There is now no objective point but Lynchburg, and it cannot be invested on the ’

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