Protecting the rear for the march to the sea
The armed guard indicates that the pick-and-shovel detail is made up of delinquent soldiers serving petty sentences.
It seems strange that the throwing up of entrenchments about a city should form an essential part of marching, but so it was in the case of the greatest march of the
Civil War, which covered a total distance of a thousand miles in less than six months.
Sherman did not dare to leave
Atlanta with his 62,000 veterans until his rear was properly fortified against the attacks of
Hood.
The upper photograph shows some of
Sherman's men digging the inner line of entrenchments at
Decatur, Alabama, a task in vivid contrast to the comfortable quarters of the officers at the
Decatur Hotel shown in the cut below.
Their military appearance suffers somewhat from their occupation, but digging was often more important than fighting, for the soldier.
Having despatched
Thomas to
Nashville, and having left strongly entrenched garrisons at
Allatoona and
Resaca, as well as at
Decatur,
Sherman launched his army from
Atlanta, November 15, 1864.
He cherished the hope that
Hood would attack one of the fortified places he had left behind, and that is precisely what occurred.
Hood and
Beauregard believed that
Sherman's army was doomed, and turned toward
Tennessee.
Sherman believed that his march would be the culminating blow to the
Confederacy.
The lower photograph shows the pontoon-bridge built by
Sherman at
Decatur at the time his army marched swiftly to the relief of
Chattanooga.
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A typical army scene—1864 |
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Officers' quarters at Decatur hotel, 1864 |
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