General Hardee and the Military operations around Atlanta.
By Colonel T. B. Roy, late of General Hardee's Staff.
[In presenting the following paper from the gallant soldier and accomplished gentleman who wrote it, it is, perhaps, proper to say again that the Southern Historical Society is not responsible for any sentiments uttered by writers in these pages. When there are points of controversy among Confederates we give impartially both sides, and leave the intelligent reader to judge for himself without comment from us.]The publication of General Hood's book, entitled Advance and retreat, the wide circulation which circumstances have concurred to give it, and the fact that a new generation has grown up, unfamiliar with the matters there referred to, make it essential that certain charges and imputations therein made against General William J. Hardee should be met and refuted. Some of these matters, consisting of suggestion and opinion, and of alleged verbal communications between persons, all of whom are now dead, are difficult to deal with. This difficulty is enhanced by the lapse [338] of time — over fifteen years--since the events transpired, by the death of many of the chief actors in those events, and by the loss of most of General Hardee's official records and papers, which, during active operations, were, from time to time, sent to places in the rear, which proved insecure; but, as a member of General Hardee's staff, on duty with him during all that period, and honored, then and afterwards, with his friendship and confidence, I deem it my privilege and duty to contribute what I can towards the right and the truth in these matters. In the early part of 1865, General Hood made an official report to the War Department, covering the operations at and about Atlanta, which was afterwards published in the public press of the day, and which I take to be the same as contained in the appendix to this book. This elicited from General Hardee a communication to the Department, bearing date 5th of April, 1865. This paper does not purport to be a report, in the ordinary sense of the term; and having been prepared amid the duties and activities of a campaign, and without access to sources of information afterwards open, it may be inaccurate in some matters of mere detail; but it was mainly addressed to certain specific statements contained in General Hood's report, and it is as to these statements only that I quote it. It is as follows:
He at the same time wrote as follows to the Secretary of War:
The events which ensued upon the fall of Richmond no doubt prevented further action in this matter. By reference to General Hood's report (see appendix) it will be observed that the gravamen of these charges was as follows: （1.) That on the 20th July there was delay occasioned by Hardee's shifting too far to the right; and that “Hardee failed to push he attack as ordered.” （321.) [346] （2.) That on the 22d of July “Hardee failed entirely to turn the enemy's left, as directed, took position and attacked his flanks.” （322.) （3.) That at Jonesboroa, on the 31st of August, he did not succeed in dislodging the force of the enemy there in position; and the attack, measured by the loss--fourteen hundred skilled and wounded — was not vigorous. (324.) Fifteen years later, and some seven years after General Hardee's death, these charges are reproduced, amplified and reinforced; and he is now, in effect, charged with wilful disobedience of orders on these occasions, arising from a purpose to thwart the operations of the Commanding-General, and supplemented by such unsoldierly and dishonorable means as cautioning his troops against the breastworks they were about to assault. General Hardee was a soldier by nature and by education. His career in the old army was long and in a high degree honorable. In the war between the States his military service covered the entire period of its duration. It extended through every grade — from Colonel to Lieutenant-General. It embraced every command, independent and subordinate, from a brigade to a military department. In the outset he declined the position of Adjutant-General, in favor of active service in the field, and throughout the war, from Missouri to North Carolina, as the trusted lieutenant of Albert Sidney Johnston in Kentucky--in charge of the first line of battle at Shiloh-at Perryville — in command of the victorious left wing at Murfreesboroa — in the long and deadly grapple of Sherman's and Johnston's armies from Dalton to Atlanta — at Savannah, and through the Carolinas — at Bentonville, leading a remnant of the Army of Tennessee in the last charge it ever made — always on duty; always at the post of honor and of danger; always equal to the trusts reposed in him, there is no chapter in the history of the fortunes or the misfortunes of the Western army which does not bear conspicuous witness to his honorable service. Even at Missionary Ridge, in command of the right, he not only held his own, and repulsed all assaults upon him, but charged the enemy in turn, and brought off prisoners and captured colors, as after nightfall, he withdrew, in perfect order, from the position which had covered the retreat of the army. He afterwards declined the command-in-chief of that army under circumstances which, if showing an undue diffidence of his own abilities, showed also exalted patriotism, and an absence of all selfish ambition. [347] And one of the last acts of his military career was that at Bentonville, when, at a critical moment, he in person threw a handful of cavalry against infantry, in a charge in which his only son, a boy of sixteen--true scion of a gallant stock, whose tender years had not sufficed, in his father's eyes, to withhold him from his country's service — fell mortally wounded, in the front of the battle. He withheld no duty, no service, nothing, from the cause; and his personal and soldierly qualities were attested in so many ways, and on so many fields, and are known to so many scores of thousands of the rank and file of both armies, still living, that unless such a life can be lived in vain, and unless history be a myth, these charges, with their suggestions and intendments, would refute themselves. General Hardee's report, though addressed only to these charges as then formulated, sufficiently shows their utter groundlessness in any shape; and I add such matters as may further confirm or illustrate the facts. The facts being established, any injurious opinions which may have been entertained or expressed in ignorance of, or in despite of the facts, are of consequence only to those guilty of that wrong. And, as to some of the suggestions of the text, no one, on behalf of General Hardee, need discuss or characterize such an outgrowth of unreasoning prejudice and passion, fostered, no doubt, by fifteen years of morbid brooding over the adverse criticism to which the author refers.
20th July, 1864.
General Hood, referring to the contemplated attack on the 20th July, says in his report: “Owing to the demonstrations of the enemy on the right, it became necessary to extend Cheatham a division front to the right.” （321.) Sherman also describes the dispositions and movements of his forces which occasioned that necessity (Memoirs, volume II, pages 71-73). General Hood's report shows that his instructions to Hardee and Stewart were “to close the interval” (321) created by shifting Cheatham to the right. General Stewart's report shows the same (349); General Hardee's likewise; and all agree that the interval, either because the movements of the enemy had made it necessary to shift Cheatham much more than a division length, or from some other cause, was two or three times greater than was supposed, and occasioned the delay. The object in posting a staff officer at the point designated was not, as General Hardee understood it, to limit his extension [348] to the right, but to divide the supposed interval equally between Hardee's and Stewart's corps. The attack was thus delayed in fulfiling an express order of General Hood. Major S. L. Black, now of Indian Bay, Arkansas, says of this, under date of May 31st, 1880: “I was the staff officer referred to by General Hardee, and I did go and post myself at the point indicated, and did halt the left of General Hardee's corps at that point; and also pointed out to a staff officer of General Stewart the place where our left would rest after moving half a division front to the right. When the left of General Hardee's corps began moving further to the right, at the point at which I halted it, which it did before the right of General Stewart's corps came up, I went to the officer in command of the left brigade of Hardee's corps and told him that he must halt his troops, that he had already gone beyond the point at which I had shown him his left must rest. He replied that he had just received orders to close to the right. I remained where I was until General Stewart's right came up, which was about half an hour after our left had moved off, and explained that Hardee's corps had been halted at the point agreed upon, but that it had subsequently been ordered to close to the right. I then galloped to General Hardee and reported that I had halted his left at the point designated, but that it was then moving still further to the right. He replied that his orders were to connect with General Cheatham, who was continually moving to the right. . . . . . . The interval could have been quickly closed, if it had been created by one instead of repeated moves of Cheatham's corps. One corps would move a short distance to the right, halt, face and prepare for action, when it would again become necessary to close to the right. In this matter General Cheatham was not to blame, for I suppose his orders were simply to prevent the enemy from overlapping or turning his flank. . . . . . I know that General Hardee expressed his impatience at the delay, and his annoyance at the repeated movements to the right.” The advance to the attack was in echelon of divisions from the right; but the troops of Hardee's corps which first struck the works, formidable in character and circular in shape, were repulsed and driven back with considerable loss, including the gallant General Stevens, who fell while leading his troops to the assault. This repulse was to be regretted, both in itself and for its reaction upon Stewart, who had achieved partial success further to the left. [349] But General Hood shows that the forces of Thomas on the ground were fifty thousand strong (187). General Sherman shows that Thomas had, on the 19th, crossed Peach-tree creek in line of battle, building bridges for nearly every division as deployed, and was now in position with at least two of his corps entrenched (Sherman's Memoirs, volume II, pages 72-73), and I can recall no instance in that campaign where either side succeeded in carrying and holding any extensive line of well manned works, except as accomplished by Hardee's corps on the 22d of July, two days later. Hence there was nothing in the fact of such a repulse to warrant reflection upon the troops or their commander. The situation was now as follows: Bate's division, finding no enemy in its immediate front, on account of the circular formation of the enemy's lines, had been sent forward through dense timber to find and turn his flank; Walker's division, temporarily disabled in the first assault, was shifted and ordered forward to co-operate with Bate's flanking movement; Cleburne's division, hitherto in reserve, was brought up, and with his two available divisions, Cleburne's and Maney's, Hardee prepared to renew the attack in front; and the final orders had been given to the division commanders to move to the assault, when the order, above referred to, was received from General Hood, directing that a division be withdrawn and sent to the extreme right of the army. This necessitated a countermand of the assault as it was on the point of execution, and Cleburne's division was withdrawn and dispatched as directed. Against such forces and works as were in Hardee's front it would have been folly to throw troops in detail and without concert; and before the new dispositions thus made necessary could be perfected, General Hood countermanded the movement and ordered the troops to be withdrawn to their former positions (321, 350). The same emergency which had necessitated the shifting of Cheatham's corps to the right, a few hours earlier in the day, and occasioned the delay in the first attack, had now, in the opinion of General Hood, required the withdrawal of a division from Hardee at this critical moment, and prevented the renewal of the attack. Of this, and the situation at the point to which Cleburne's division was thus sent, Captain Irving A. Buck, then Cleburne's Adjutant-General, and now residing in Baltimore, writes as follows: [350][354]
22d of July, 1864.
With respect to the plan of operations for this day General Hood says:General Hardee was directed to put his corps in motion soon after dark; to move south on the McDonough road, across Entrenchment creek at Cobb's mill, and to completely turn the left of McPherson's army and attack at daylight, or as soon thereafter as possible. He was furnished guides from Wheeler's cavalry, who were familiar with the various roads in that direction . . . ; was given clear and positive orders to detach his corps; to swing away from the main body of the army, and to march entirely around and to the rear of McPherson's left flank, even if he was forced to go to or beyond Decatur, which is only about six miles from Atlanta (177). ... Hardee had not only failed to turn McPherson's left, according to positive orders, but had thrown his men against the enemy's breastworks, thereby occasioning unnecessary loss to us (179).Singularly enough, General Hardee is accused of warning and cautioning his troops against the breastworks they were about to assault on the 20th of July, and of now needlessly hurling the same troops against breastworks on the 22d. It is not to be presumed that the liability to encounter entrenchments had weight in determining the plan of attack. Sherman's soldiers during this campaign, it may be said, marched with a musket in one hand and a spade in the other, and could construct substantial works, protected, if in a wooded country like this, by formidable abatis in a very short time. General Hood cites Federal and Confederate authorities to prove that the enemy habitually entrenched at every stage in such movements as he was now making, and could never be caught without works; and all experience had shown, what was now again confirmed, that the enemy in such movements left a network of entrenchments in his wake and on his flanks.2 In reference to the detour to and through Decatur, referred to by General Hood, General Hardee says that movement was considered and discussed; but in consideration of the night march, and the fagged condition of the troops, it was deemed impracticable to make so long a march in time to attack next day, and that “this plan was therefore abandoned, and General Hood decided to strike the enemy in flank.” [355] As the statements of Generals Hardee and Hood seem thus to conflict, they must be respectively tested by comparison with such pertinent facts as appear in the text, or are otherwise established. One such fact is that McPherson's general position, on the Decatur side of Atlanta, was well known and defined. His pressure there, as we have seen, had been such as to necessitate the shifting of Cheatham's corps, and the exigent call for Cleburne's division as early as the 20th July, and our forces had been resisting him all along that line throughout the day on the 21st. He was now entrenched along a north and south line, facing westward, with his extreme entrenched left (the left of Blair's corps) resting at a point some three miles southeast of Atlanta and some five miles southwest of Decatur. Two plans of operations seem to have been discussed--one, by a sufficient detour, to strike and turn this left flank; the other, by a movement to and through Decatur and back on the rear of the enemy, which would have brought the attacking force in rear of McPherson's centre or right flank. The distances and positions involved necessarily made these distinct and independent plans; and it would seem most extraordinary that a force should have been sent out from Atlanta in the night, and through a country so densely wooded as to be impracticable for marching off the roadways, and by such a detour, as is indicated by the order to cross “Entrenchment creek and Cobb's mill” (see map, 167), with a roving commission, either to turn and attack this flank, located as described, or to move to or beyond Decatur, and thence back on the rear of the enemy, especially when the alleged discretionary instruction, involving a difference of many hours in execution, is coupled with the definite expectation of attack at daylight or soon thereafter. And the result vindicated the wisdom of the plan adopted as compared with the Decatur plan; for, as it was, Hardee's movement by Cobb's mill, and thence northeastwardly towards Decatur to the proper point, and thence through dense woods upon McPherson's left rear, was a surprise; whereas a detour by way of Decatur, and the collision with the brigade (Sprague's) there posted, would have given the enemy timely and invaluable notice of the movement. General Wheeler says it was explained in the council held by General Hood “that the object in going so far south as Cobb's mill was to secrete the movement from the enemy.” This object would have been wholly defeated by Hardee's march to Decatur and the consequent collision with the detachment there. [356] General Hood says, in support of his version, that Decatur is “only about six miles from Atlanta” ; and he refers to it as if the road from Atlanta to Decatur was still open, and Wheeler's cavalry were still daily passing to and fro over it (178). And the map, at page 167, seems to further that idea, by locating the Federal forces north of the Decatur road. But, as is elsewhere shown in the text. the enemy had been occupying that road ever since the 18th of July. Both Schofield's and McPherson's armies had advanced to Atlanta by way of Decatur. And McPherson was now facing and entrenched along the Decatur side of Atlanta, with the Fifteenth corps extending two division lengths south of Decatur road, and the Seventeenth corps, on the left of the Fifteenth, extending south to and along the McDonough road. General Blair's letter, quoted by General Hood at page 188, shows this, and it is otherwise a well known fact. And a reference to the map at page 167, imperfect and misleading though it be, will show, at a glance, that a detour, not along but around the McDonough road, for that was occupied by Blair's corps, and across “Entrenchment creek at Cobb's Mill,” and thence to Decatur, and thence back to the rear of the enemy near Atlanta, would have involved a march, not of six, but of about eighteen miles; and such a distance, to be accomplished by a night march, with jaded troops, and within the time desired, might well have been, as General Hardee says it was, deemed impracticable. In addition to what is shown by the map, these distances by the country roads are furnished by the Mayor of Atlanta as follows:
But General Hood says Hardee's troops were fresh (174); that they had been allowed almost absolute rest the entire day of the 21st (191). In this he is also at fault. General Hardee says his troops had had little rest for thirty-six hours. We have seen above what [357] kind of “absolute rest the entire day of the 21st” Cleburne's division had enjoyed. When the troops of that division went into action on the 22d, they had been marching, working and fighting continuously for forty-eight hours. Among others, Brigadier-General Lowrey, of that division, in his official report of 22d July, says on this subject:
My men had neither sleep nor rest for two days and nights; and under the rapid marching above mentioned, and the oppressive heat, many good men fell completely exhausted, and could go no further.And as it was, though the plan finally adopted involved a shorter detour, General Blair, in the letter quoted by General Hood, at page 189, refers to the fatigue of Hardee's troops, “from their long, swift march,” and with good reason, for some of the troops which had been fighting McPherson in front of his works all day on the 21st, and which had been witwdrawn from their front at ten o'clock P. M., had made the detour by Cobb's mill, had marched thence northeastwardly towards Decatur to the proper point, and turned and advanced in line of battle through dense undergrowth for some two miles, equivalent to more than double the distance over open ground, and were now bearing down upon the rear of the same works. General Hood also says that Hardee was to march at dusk on the 21st (174-177). But the troops to take part in this movement — infantry, artillery and cavalry — were in different and distant positions on the outer lines, in some instances in direct contact with the enemy. They could not be withdrawn into Atlanta until after dark. Cleburne's situation, with respect to the enemy, was such that he could not draw out until ten o'clock P. M. Captain Williams, Govan's Adjutant-General, has furnished me the hour, entered in his diary at the time. From Atlanta the troops were to move on the same road, and in proper order of march, with sufficient intervals of time to allow the cavalry to get clear, and each successive division to draw out and get in motion before the next following took up the march. According to the order of march, Cleburne's division, which I take it brought up the rear, was to move at one o'clock A. M., although it in fact succeeded in moving half an hour earlier. Captain Buck, Cleburne's Adjutant-General, has furnished me the preliminary and final orders received by Cleburne for the movement. They are as follows: [358]
And from the animus of this book it is quite certain that if any portion of Hardee's troops had not moved until one o'clock A. M. on the 22d, when it had been practicable, and they had been ordered to move at dusk on the 21st, that matter would have been specially adverted to. General Hood says he was out on the line near Cheatham's right at dawn on the 22d, expecting momentarily to hear the initiation of the battle by Hardee, “who was supposed to be at that moment in rear of the adversary's flank” (179). The movement of Cleburne's division, as we have seen, was fixed for one o'clock A. M. General Hood, as he states, expected the action to open at dawn. It is impossible that he could have expected the troops in the intervening [359] three or three and a half hours of darkness, to make the detour of eighteen miles by way of Cobb's mill, Decatur and back to the rear of the enemy near Atlanta. And it needs but to put two and two together to demonstrate that the movement to and through Decatur, as General Hardee says it was, had been abandoned. On the other hand, General Hardee's statement of the plan of attack, as finally determined upon, is confirmed by the real condition of the troops, by the actual distances involved, by the respective positions of the opposing forces, by the time when the movement was to begin, and the hour at which General Hood says it was expected the attack could be made. It is likewise confirmed by General Hood in the text itself; for, while unaccountably confusing positions and distances, in speaking of reaching McPherson's left flank by a march “to or beyond Decatur,” he shows that it was the left flank which Hardee was to turn and strike; and that Cheatham, from the Atlanta side, was to take up the movement along that line from (his) right to left, “as soon as Hardee succeeded in forcing back or throwing into confusion the Federal left” (177). The extreme Federal left, as we have seen, and as is further shown by General Blair's letter, quoted by General Hood at page 188, and by the Federal maps of the battlefield, rested at a point some five miles southwest of Decatur; and from the point where Hardee halted and turned, to move on the rear of McPherson's left flank, every step towards Decatur would have been a step away from and not towards the rear of McPherson's left. The plan of attack, as finally adopted, was by Hardee faithfully, vigorously and successfully carried out. He swung out of Atlanta, and making the necessary detour, crossed Entrenchment creek at Cobb's mill, reached the road leading thence to Decatur, and moving out on it to the proper point, turned and advanced upon the rear of the enemy's left flank. The advance was from a position selected and determined upon as the most advantageous for that purpose, in a council held shortly after daybreak between Generals Hardee and Wheeler, at which several of the division commanders were also present, upon information of the enemy's location with respect to that position, as reported by Wheeler's scouts and confirmed by citizens whom General Wheeler brought to General Hardee for that purpose. General Wheeler recalls, as one of the incidents of this council, that a citizen who had said there was no obstacle between us and the enemy, admitted on cross-examination that a portion [360] of the ground on the right was intersected by a pond ten feet deep and a mile long, and General Walker's comment upon the man's idea of military obstacles. At this time the troops, impeded and delayed on their long march by matters mentioned hereafter, had not yet come up, and regret and annoyance were expressed by all parties at the delay. Hardee's line of battle was formed on a road leading from the Atlanta and McDonough road northeastward towards Decatur, and was in rear of the left of and at an angle of about forty-five degrees with McPherson's entrenched line; so that the left divisions should strike the left flank and rear of the Seventeenth corps, and the right divisions in turn should reach the rear of the Fifteenth corps, on the extension of McPherson's line northward. The advance in line was over a rough and broken country, intersected on the right by swamps and sloughs, and especially on the left was for some mile and a half or two miles through a wilderness of scant undergrowth so dense that it was next to impossible to preserve distance, direction or the proper angle of approach. General Hardee says of it, in a letter written next day: “I marched in line for two miles through a dense forest, where I could not see ten paces. Of course it was impossible to keep up an alignment.” And Lowry, in his official report, says he could not see a hundred yards of his own line at a time, and “that a line of battle could not be seen fifty yards.” A part of the left wing-Cleburne and Maney-struck the works which McPherson had thrown back on a line perpendicular to his main line, for the protection of his rear, and doubled up this flank, while another part turned and took the main entrenched line in reserve. These entrenchments were so constructed as to be formidable, whether attacked in front or rear. General Wheeler, who examined them that night after they had been taken, and while they were held by our troops, says of them: “I was surprised to find them so deep that they formed a good protection for the occupants from the rear.” Meanwhile the right divisions — Bate and Walker — unexpectedly encountered the Sixteenth corps, a contingency unprovided for in General Hood's plan of attack. This corps had been crowded out of position by the contraction of the line of investment, and was destined by General Sherman to the work of breaking up the railroad, but had now been ordered up from its detached service, and was on the march to Atlanta, and accidentally in the position where [361] Walker and Bate struck it. This corps was fresh, and had only to face to the left, and was in line of battle and ready for action (Sherman's Memoirs, volume II, page 74). Bate and Walker attacked this strong and fresh force with troops wearied by the long march and disordered by the rough ground over which they had just advanced in line, and where at the immediate points of contact the advance was through an open field; and though the attack was most gallantly made and renewed, the odds of forces and circumstances were too great, and they were repulsed. This accidental position of the Sixteenth corps, by preventing Bate and Walker from closing in upon McPherson's rear on the extension of his line northward, as General Blair points out, “prevented the full force of the blow from falling where it was intended to fall.” Such a contingency, however, should have been considered by General Hood in maturing his plan of action; for Wheeler had kept him fully informed that these forces were loose and detached. General Wheeler says of this: “It is most probable that he (General Hood) supposed they would be deployed to McPherson's right, to fill the gap which we knew separated McPherson and General Thomas. Upon that assumption alone could the movement of the night of the 21st have been considered advisable.” As it was, with Hardee engaged with double the force anticipated, the only hope of complete success was for General Hood, in substantial compliance with the plan of battle, to have advanced Cheatham's corps from the Atlanta side against the Fifteenth corps as soon as Hardee became hotly engaged. General Hood, as he states, was on Cheatham's right, in easy hearing of the roar of musketry. But reinforcements were actually withdrawn from the Fifteenth corps and hurried to the support of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth corps, and Hardee had been sharply checked, and was being heavily pressed by this concentration of forces upon him before Cheatham was ordered to advance (Sherman's Memoirs, volume II, page 80). General Hood fixes the hour of Cheatham's advance at three o'clock-General Sherman at four o'clock P. M. General Hood reiterates in the text that Hardee failed to turn McPherson's left as directed. It is true that the left of Hardee's line of battle, in the advance through dense woods on their flank, struck the works thrown back for a short distance at right angles from the extreme left of McPherson's line proper; but that the [362] movement, as a whole, substantially and completely turned McPherson's left, with results, only less equal from the accidental position of the Sixteenth corps, is abundantly established, among other testimony, by General Sherman's account of it, by the statement of officers of McPherson's staff, by that of General Wheeler, and by the letter which General Hood quotes from General Blair, who commanded the left corps of McPherson's army. In his Memoirs (volumel II, pages 79-80) General Sherman, erroneously supposing the attacking force to consist of Hood and a part of Hardee's corps, says of this movement and the respective positions of the forces:
His (Hood's) corps and a part of Hardee's had marched out to the road leading from McDonough to Decatur, and had turned so as to strike the left and rear of McPherson's line in air. The enemy were, therefore, enabled, under cover of the forest, to approach quite near before he was discovered; indeed his skirmish line had worked through the timber and got into the field to the rear of Giles A. Smith's division of the Seventeenth corps unseen, had captured Murray's battery of regular artillery, moving through these woods, entirely unguarded, and had got possession of several of the hospital camps. The right of the Rebel line struck Dodge's troops in motion; but fortunately this corps (Sixteenth) had only to halt, face to the left, and was in line of battle. . . . About the same time this same force had struck General Giles A. Smith's left flank, doubled it back, captured four guns in position, and the party engaged in building the very battery which was the special object of McPherson's visit to me, and almost enveloped the entire left flank. The men, however, were skilful and brave, and fought for a time with their backs to Atlanta. They gradually fell back, compressing their own lines, and gaining strength by making a junction with Leggett's division of the Seventeenth corps, well and strongly posted on a hill. One or two brigades of the Fifteenth corps, ordered by McPherson, came rapidly across the open field to the rear from the direction of the railroad, and filled up the gap from Blair's rear left to the head of Dodge's column, now facing to the general left, at right angles to the original line of battle. The enemy attacked boldly and repeatedly the whole of this flank, but met an equally fierce resistance, and on that ground a bloody battle raged from little after noon till into the night.The following are pertinent extracts from the letter of General Blair, above mentioned:
On the 22d July my corps held the extreme left of our army. We were entrenched along the McDonough road running about north and south. . . . . . One division of the Sixteenth corps, which had been ordered [363] by General McPherson to take position on my extreme left, made its appearance in rear of my position on a road known as the Clay road, and at right angles with the McDonough road, along which my corps was entrenched. Just as this division halted, about five hundred yards in rear of my line, heavy skirmishing commenced on the extreme left of my line. . . . . . . The division of the Sixteenth corps, to which I have alluded, in a very minutes became heavily engaged, and I became aware of the fact that my whole position had been turned, and that the enemy were pressing with full force upon the rear and flank of my position. General McPherson had been killed in attempting to reach my line, on a road over which we had ridden away from the line a short time before in full belief that the enemy were in retreat. I was only able to reach the line by making a detour to the right, and reached it at a point where it joined the Fifteenth corps, to find the whole of my line fighting from the reverse of my entrenchments. . . . . . . . Late in the day I drew out my forces from the line which they had occupied, and took up a new position, extending from the hill where my right had formerly rested and extending towards the position in which I have described the Sixteenth corps to have occupied in my rear. We had barely time to throw up a very tight rifle-pit before the enemy attacked us in our new position, and when night closed in the fighting still continued, and the lines were so close that it was impossible for a person looking on to tell one line from the other, except from the direction of the fire from the muzzles of the guns. On the next morning at 10 o'clock we had a truce for burying the dead. As we had given up the greater part of the ground over which the battle had been fought the day before, most of our dead were within their lines. We had suffered very severely . . . . but as we had fought behind entrenchments all the time, the Confederate loss had necessarily been much greater than ours . . . . The position taken up accidentally by the Sixteenth corps prevented the full force of the blow from falling where it was intended to fall.I have before me a map of “The battle of Atlanta,” as this action is called by Federal writers, prepared by General Hicken-looper (McPherson's Chief of Artillery) and attached to the proceedings of “The army of the Tennessee” (Federal) for 1878. This map gives the position of their forces on the 22d of July, and among other things shows that the Fifteenth corps, fronting Atlanta, extended two division lengths south of the Decatur road, and the Seventeenth corps, on the left of the Fifteenth, extended south over and beyond the McDonough road. General McPherson was killed [364] early in the action by the skirmishers of Cleburne's division as it advanced. The spot where he fell is marked on the map, and it is some half a mile directly in rear of the centre of the Seventeenth corps. And General W. E. Strong, McPherson's Inspector-General, in a paper read by him, and incorporated in the same proceedings, vouches for the correctness of this map and says (page 118):
The attack on our flank and rear was made by the whole of General Hardee's corps, comprised of Bate's, Walker's, Cleburne's and Cheatham's divisions. (The latter division was on this occasion under the command of General Maney). The divisions of Bate and Walker falling upon Dodge's column, and the divisions of Cleburne and Cheatham striking the left flank of the Seventeenth corps, and swinging around through a wide interval or gap, and reaching the extreme right of the Seventeenth corps, and occupying the breastworks constructed by Generals Leggatt and Smith in their advance on “Bald Hill,” and as far to the right of it as General Leggatt's command extended.Captain G. A. Williams, then Adjutant-General of Govan's brigade of Cleburne's division, now of New Orleans, Louisiana, in reference to a part of the movements and operations of that brigade on the 22d July, says, under date of March 14th, 1880:
Our left wing found heavy earthworks covered by an almost impassable abatis, what seemed a curtain thrown back to protect the enemy's extreme left — a precaution taken before our attack could have been known. While the Second and Fifth Arkansas regiments were engaged in the abatis, the right of the brigade, not finding such obstacles, took the works in flank and rear, and captured a considerable number of the troops defending them. They also rescued Lieutenant Saurie (Second Arkansas), who had fearlessly and almost alone made his way through the abatis, mounted the works and demanded their surrender. . . . . . We now appeared to have completely turned the enemy's left. Having dislodged him from our immediate front, General Govan reformed his line at.the captured works and moved foward, then wheeled to the feft upward through an open field, taking in rear the works confronting Atlanta, and occupying them for nearly half a mile. In this movement the right of the command was detached, having a considerable interval between it and the remainder. In this position it remained during the most of the night, which I remember as one of the most trying in my experience as a soldier. The trenches which we held were continuously swept by the small arms and artillery of the enemy on their extension to the right; and at one locality the opposing forces occupied the opposite sides of the same works, across which an uninterrupted struggle was maintained.[365] And General Wheeler says of this:
As before stated, McPherson's advanced line of entrenchments, which I faced and which I fought on the 21st, were facing west or perhaps a little southwest. The road from Cobb's mill to Decatur on which we marched, and on which General Hardee formed his line on the morning of the 22d, made an angle with these entrenchments of not more than forty-five degrees. When I left General Hardee to prepare for the attack, we knew we were in rear of General McPherson's line, at least in rear of his left. . . . At some points our line was nearly parallel to McPherson's entrenchments which faced Atlanta, and which my troops were facing and fighting the day before. And I believe the same troops which fought me on the 21st facing west or southwest were on the evening of the 22d faced about and fighting from the same works facing almost in a contrary direction.I will not attempt a description of the operations of Hardee's corps that day. Lack of space and lack of materials alike prevent. I have access to but two official reports of Confederate officers of that action, and they were brigade commanders; and I have been obliged, at the risk of doing much less than justice to Hardee's troops, to quote from Federal writers, who can speak only from their own standpoint. The detour from the positions which the troops occupied on the outer lines of Atlanta to the point where they struck the enemy, involved a march of some fourteen or fifteen miles. Portions of the command were depleted by the heavy skirmish lines left out to hold the positions thus vacated, and by the loss of many good men who fell in their tracks from exhaustion. The night march, always tedious, was additionally harassing from the fact that a considerable body of cavalry coming up in rear on the same road cut through the entire column, impeding and delaying the infantry and artillery; and from the point where the turn was made the advance in line of battle and over the ground and through the undergrowth above described, was unavoidably slow. Hardee, with four small divisions, encountered the Sixteenth and Seventeenth corps, and they were from time to time during the day reinforced from the other commands. The Seventeenth corps, as General Blair's letter shows, though turned and taken in reverse, fought all the time behind entrenchments. The day here and elsewhere, was characterized by varying fortunes — brilliant and successful charges at some points and bloody repulses at others. During the day, however, as General Blair's letter and Federal [366] maps of the battlefield show, the entire Seventeenth corps was forced from its works and position of the morning, and took up a new line at right angles to its original line of battle; and here in this new position, with compressed lines, strengthed by junction with the Sixteenth corps, and otherwise reinforced and protected by the tight rifle-pit, which he says his troops had barely time to throw up, they were again vigorously attacked, and the battle was pressed so fiercely, and so late in the night, and the opposing lines were so close, that “it was impossible for a person looking on to tell one line from the other, except from the direction of the fire from the muzzles of the guns.” If Hardee's troops failed to accomplish more, it was because it was not within the compass of human energy and endurance. As it was, they held the battlefield, to which the enemy were admitted under flag-of-truce next day to bury their dead, and counted among their captures thirteen stands of colors, a number of guns, including several entire batteries, in some instances with horses and equipments complete, arms, &c., and about two thousand prisoners. Meanwhile Wheeler, in co-operation with Hardee's operations, attacked the detached easterly forces of the enemy with results described by him as follows:
Most of my troops were dismounted — those on my right remaining on horseback. The fight was very spirited. My troops struck the extreme left; or rather, I should say, the most eastwardly troops of Sherman's army. My right encountered strong entrenchments; while my left, more fortunate, met the enemy without that protection. The resistance was very determined, but finally one point was carried, and the entire line was swept before our charge, leaving prisoners, cannon, colors, wagons and much other material in our hands.Afterwards, in obedience to instructions from General Hardee, he closed in towards Hardee's right, and was there warmly engaged until dark. With consistent injustice General Hood compliments Wheeler (of whom it may justly be said no praise could be beyond his deserts) for attacking the detached force near Decatur, by way of disparaging Hardee for not (in contravention of the real plan of operations) marching to or beyond Decatur, ignoring the fact that the whole was a concerted movement in which Wheeler was co-operating with Hardee and subject to his orders. [367] It has not been within the scope of this paper to refer to the operations of Cheatham's corps, which were directed from the Atlanta side, for the most part, as I understand it, against the entrenched position of the Fifteenth corps. How well the troops fought, and how gallantly they were led, is also manifest by the record of losses. General Hardee, in a letter written on the 24th of July, two days later, with the returns no doubt before him, states the loss in his corps alone at thirty-two hundred and ninety-nine (3,299) in killed, wounded and missing. This included Major-General W. H. T. Walker killed, and Brigadier-Generals Gist and Smith and other acting brigade commanders wounded. Cleburne's division lost about fifteen hundred officers and men out of a total of about thirty-five hundred carried into action (I get these figures from his Adjutant-General, Captain Buck); and one of his brigades in a single desperate charge lost about one-half of the entire number engaged in it (Lowry's official report). The loss in officers, especially field officers, was unparalled and irreparable. It aggregated over sixty field and acting field officers in the corps; and thirty general field and acting field officers in Cleburne's division alone. Hardee was obliged next day to break up one of his divisions. The manner in which the troops were led is thus referred to by General Strong, in the paper above mentioned (page 106), in speaking of the second attack of Walker and Bate on the Sixteenth corps:
It seemed to us that every mounted officer of the attacking column was riding at the front of or on the right or left of the first line of battle.And referring to other portions of the field later in the day, he says:
The battle from half-past 3 P. M. was desperate and bloody in the extreme, and the result was extremely doubtful till late in the day. Our lines were broken and pierced in several places, and batteries and regimental colors were lost and won again and again.And the author of the book entitled Iowa and the rebellion (pages 259-261), in describing the fighting of Iowa troops, where Cleburne's and Maney's divisions were engaged, quotes from General Giles A. Smith's official report, as follows:
Rebel commanders, with such men as would follow them [he might more justly have said with such men as they had to follow [368] them.--T. B. R.], would not unfrequently occupy one side of the works and our men the other. . . . . The flags of two opposing regiments would meet on the opposite side of the same works and would be flaunted by their respective bearers in each other's faces. Men were bayoneted across the works; and officers with their swords fought hand to hand with men with their bayonets.The same writer, in reference to the action generally, says:
The battle of Atlanta was a warfare of giants. In the impetuosity, splendid abandon and reckless disregard of danger, with which the Rebel masses rushed against our lines of fire, of iron and of cold steel, there had been no parallel during the war.This is the movement in which it is charged and reiterated by General Hood, in the face of the refutation contained between the covers of his own book, that Hardee failed to turn the enemy's flank. This is the detour, with its fierce assault upon McPherson's flank and rear, as to which — because Hardee did not move “to or beyond Decatur” to strike and turn a flank which was on his line of march five miles southwest of Decatur — it is charged that Hardee was too timid to swing away from the army. These are the soldiers to whom, on this field and in this action, General Hood attributes “lack of spirit” (191). And this is the action, with its imperishable record of heroism and devotion, attested in the blood of the flower of Hardee's corps, which is passed over in a few grudging sentences (181), to be classed with the failures due to a “timid defensive policy” (183).
28th July, 1864.
On the 28th of July Hardee's corps was still occupying the position and ground which it had conquered on the 22d. Stewart's and Lee's corps (formerly Cheatham's) were on the opposite side of Atlanta; and there occurred the engagement which is correctly classed as one of the four battles around Atlanta. General Hood refers to the operations of this day in the text (194) and in his official report (322) as defensive in character, and to the engagement which ensued as accidental, rather than preconcerted. In the text at page 194, he says:Lieutenant-General Lee was instructed to move out with his corps upon the Lick Skillet road, and to take the position most advantageous to prevent or delay the extension of the enemy's right flank. This officer promptly obeyed orders, and came unexpectedly [369] in the afternoon in contact with the Federals in the vicinity of Ezra church, where a spirited engagement ensued. The enemy was already in possession of a portion of the ground Lee desired to occupy, and the struggle grew to such dimensions that I sent Lieutenant-General Stewart to his support. The contest lasted until near sunset, without any material advantage having been gained by either opponent. Our troops failed to dislodge the enemy from their position, and the Federals, likewise, to capture the position occupied by the Confederates.Lieutenant-General Stewart, in his official report published in the appendix (page 351), gives quite a different version of the plan and character of these operations. He says:
On the 28th, the enemy, by extending to the right, had nearly gained the Lick Skillet road. Loring's and Walthall's divisions had been relieved at the trenches, and it was expected that French's would be that night. As I understood the instructions, General Lee, commanding corps, was to move out on the Lick Skillet road, attack the enemy's right flank, and drive him from that road and the one leading from it by Mount Ezra church. My own orders were to move with the divisions named to the point where our own line of works crossed the Lick Skillet road. French's division, when relieved, and one from some other corps, were to rejoin us, and at an early hour next morning we were to move out upon that road, turn to the right, pass in rear of the enemy and attack. On reaching the point designated, Lee's corps was found to be engaged and in need of assistance. Accordingly, Walthall's division was moved out (Loring's following in support), and formed on Lee's left. It attacked the enemy, strongly posted on a hill, and failing, after a desperate fight and heavy loss, to dislodge them, Loring's division was placed in position along the Lick Skillet road, and Walthall directed to withdraw his in rear of Loring's. A short time previous to this, General Loring was wounded, leaving his division under command of Brigadier-General Featherston. While his division was taking its position, I was myself disabled.The Federal accounts are to the same effect. And the Federal commander, in his official report of this engagement, claims to have captured five battle-flags, and 1,500 or 2,000 muskets; to have buried over 700 of our dead left in his hands; and estimates our loss at some six or seven thousand men (Sherman's Memoirs, volume II, pages 88-91). These claims are no doubt enormously exaggerated, and are merely cited as tending to show the character and gravity of the operations. This is the occasion, above referred to, when General Hood called Hardee from his own command on the extreme right of the army, [370] and dispatched him to take charge of two-thirds of his army, on the extreme left, at a time of apprehended disaster. In a letter to his wife (also since dead), dated July 30th, 1864, the original of which is before me, General Hardee mentions the matter in these terms:
We had a fight Thursday between parts of Stewart's and Lee's corps and the enemy. I received a note in the afternoon saying Hood wanted to see me without delay. I hurried on, and before reaching his quarters received another note, asking me to come as soon as possible. He told me that Lee and Stewart were fighting the enemy on the Lick Skillet road, and he wished me to go out there and look after matters. While I was with him news came that Stewart and Loring were wounded. I went out at once, but did not assume command. I found that Brown's, Walthall's and Clayton's divisions had been severely handled, and that Lee (Stephen D.) was acting strictly on the defensive.I myself well remember the successive couriers and the urgency manifested, and accompanied General Hardee to army headquarters and thence to the field. This, be it remembered, was eight days after Hardee's alleged failure on the 20th of July, and six days after his alleged failure on the 22d, and when the real facts were fresh in mind. And this cotemporaneous act of General Hood towers above all this cloud of calumny a monumental fact to show whether Hardee had disobeyed orders or otherwise failed of his duty on the 20th or 22d of July, and to show also on whose strong arm General Hood leaned in the hour of trial.
Jonesboroa.
The main facts as to the operations near Jonesboroa on the 31st of August and 1st of September, and the respective dates, positions, movements and forces involved, are well known. General Hardee gives a summary of them in his report (supra), and he is confirmed by General Sherman, who shows, among other things, that Howard's army had reached the position near Jonesboroa in the evening of August 30th, and that in the morning of the 31st Schofield struck the railroad at Rough-and-Ready, and Thomas' army at two points between there and Jonesboroa, and that both were ordered “to turn straight for Jonesboroa, tearing up the railroad track as they advanced” (Memoirs, volume II, pages 107-108). In the night of the 31st of August, the following dispatches, the originals of which I have, were received from General Hood at Atlanta: [371]General Hood, fifteen years later, states his plan of operations on this occasion, at page 205 of the text, as follows:
Duplicate of dispatch sent at six P. M.:
A Federal corps crossed Flint river, at about six P. M., near Jonesboroa, and made an attack on Lewis' brigade, which was gallantly repulsed. This action became the signal for battle. General Hardee was instructed to move rapidly with his corps to Jonesboroa, whither Lieutenant-General Lee with his corps was ordered to follow during the night. Hardee was to attack with the entire [372] force early in the morning of the 31st, and drive the enemy at all hazards into the river in their rear. In the event of success, Lee and his command were to be withdrawn that night back to Rough-and-Ready; Stewart's corps, together with Major-General G. W. Smith's state troops, were to form in line of battle on Lee's right near Eastpoint, and the whole force move forward the following morning, attack the enemy in flank and drive him down Flint river and the West Point railroad. In the meantime the cavalry was to hold in check the corps of the enemy stationed at the railroad bridge across the Chattahoochee near the mouth of Peach-tree creek, whilst Hardee advanced from his position near Jonesboroa or directly on Lee's left.When the text is compared with the date, tenor and effect of the dispatches quoted above, and it is remembered that they were written and sent before the result at Jonesboroa was known, the context furnishes its own commentary. Now, according to the text, the arrival of Howard's army at Jonesboroa on the 30th of August was the signal for general battle. Sherman's position was known, and his purposes and movements anticipated, and thereupon a concerted offensive movement of the entire army was begun, whereby Sherman was to be struck in flank and driven down Flint river and the West Point railroad, while the cavalry (which, by the way, except a small body with Hardee at Jonesboroa and another near Rough-and-Ready, was absent on a raid in North Georgia and Tennessee) was to hold in check the army corps of the enemy stationed at the railroad bridge over the Chattahoochee. Then, according to the dispatches, one written at 6 P. M. August 31st, and the duplicate later, Hardee was to protect Macon and communications in rear, and Lee's corps and Reynolds' brigade, and all troops which could be spared from Hardee's corps, were to be withdrawn to Atlanta to defend that place from an apprehended attack by Sherman's army; which army, with Howard's three corps already at Jonesboroa on the 30th, had, on the morning of the 31st, struck the railroad at Rough-and-Ready, and at two points between there and Jonesboroa, with orders “to turn straight for Jonesboroa,” and was now concentrated on Hardee in the vicinity of Jonesboroa. In obedience to these orders, Lee's corps was withdrawn and sent to Atlanta; and Hardee, with three divisions and a small body of cavalry, and encumbered by the ordnance and subsistence trains of the entire army, was left to confront Sherman's army. Tne new [373] dispositions thus made necessary were effected before daybreak; but the line to be occupied was so extended that Hardee was obliged to form his troops for the most part in single rank; and in the operations of next day it was only by stripping portions of the line of all troops, except a skirmish line, and moving them rapidly to points of greatest pressure, that he was able to repel the assaults of the enemy and hold the position. There was in the line vacated by Lee an angle now held by Govan's brigade of veterans. The position was weak in itself, and the unabated pressure and converging fire of the enemy's artillery on this point, left no opportunity to strengthen it; and in the afternoon, after one determined assault had been repulsed, the enemy renewed the assault, in three converging columns, and succeeded in carrying a portion of the angle, and captured General Govan, a portion of his brigade, and the eight pieces of artillery there posted. The wheels of the gun carriages had long before been cut down by the enemy's artillery fire, and Govan's men stood at their post until the dense masses of the enemy rolled over them. This made it necessary to temporarily draw back the right of Granberry's brigade and the left of Lewis' brigade, on either side of Govan's position; but Govan's brigade of Tennesseeans, which had been withdrawn from another part of the line, was brought rapidly up, and with the remnant of Govan's troops in co-operation with Granberry and Lewis, charged upon the advancing enemy, pressed him back to the salient, and held him there until the withdrawal of the troops at 11.30 P. M. The peril of Hardee's position, the stubborn courage with which the troops held it, the skill with which they were handled, and were finally withdrawn when well-nigh enveloped by the enemy, and General Sherman's chagrin that the entire corps was not captured, are matters of history. General Sherman's says of it:
Being on the spot, I checked Davis' movement, and ordered General Howard to send the two divisions of the Seventeenth corps (Blair) around by his right rear, to get below Jonesboroa, and to reach the railroad so as to cut off retreat in that direction. I also dispatched order after order to hurry forward Stanley, so as to lap around Jonesboroa on the east, hoping thus to capture the whole of Hardee's corps. I sent first Captain Andenreid (Aid-de-Camp), then Colonel Poe, of the engineers, and lastly General Thomas himself (and that is the only time during the campaign that I can recall seeing General Thomas urge his horse into a gallop). Night was approaching, and the country on the farther side of the railroad [374] was densely wooded. General Stanley had come up on the left of Davis, and was deploying, though there could not have been on his front more than a skirmish line. Had he moved straight on by the flank, or by a slight detour to his left, he would have enclosed the whole ground occupied by Hardee's corps, and that corps could not have escaped us; but night came on and Hardee did escape (Memoirs, volume II, pages 107-108).General Sherman might have spared these regrets; for Hardee had anticipated, and, as far as his means would allow, had provided against this very movement; and Stanley would have encountered in his front a force, numerically weak, it is true, but strong enough no doubt to have held him the length of time necessary. General Hood meantime was taking Hardee's situation very coolly. Referring to his march out of Atlanta at 5 P. M. the same day, he says (page 208):
Upon our uninterrupted march, information reached me that Hardee's corps was engaged with a large force of the enemy. His position upon a ridge, with an open country in rear, relieved me from special anxiety in regard to the safety of himself and command. Lieutenant-General Stewart, nevertheless, was instructed to hastened forward to his support, and General Lee to follow promptly with his corps. When these reinforcements reached the scene of action, the contest had ceased.The contest referred to was at Jonesboroa on the 1st of September, and no reinforcements reached the scene of action during or after that contest. Stewart and Lee formed a junction with Hardee afterward at Lovejoy's station, on the evening of the 2d or morning of the 3d of September. General Hood's report of this engagement is a fair illustration of his animus towards Hardee. We have seen how critical Hardee's situation was, how gallantly the troops fought, how boldly and skilfully they were handled, and how narrowly the corps escaped capture or destruction. General Hood in his official report describes and disposes of it in these words: “On the 1st of September Hardee's corps was attacked in position at Jonesboroa. The result was the loss of eight guns and some prisoners.” Two incidents occurred at Jonesboroa which illustrate the esprit de corps of Hardee's troops, which General Hood says were “the best troops in the army.” When the salient occupied by Govan was carried, Granberry, who was in single rank on the left, found his position enfiladed and turned, and began to draw back his right. Hardee, who was for the moment prevented by a screen of woods from seeing what had befallen Govan, now saw Granberry's right [375] retiring under heavy fire, and thought the troops had given way. The situation must be desperate indeed if. Granberry's Texans gave way, and Hardee at once rode into the line to rally the troops, but soon learned the true state of affairs. Granberry was hurt at the supposition that his troops would under circumstances give way and although the fire at that point was so hot that explanation and vindication might well have been postponed, he needs must have it out then and there, and said, with feeling and a just pride in his soldiers, “General, my men never fall back unless ordered back.” And they justified their commander's confidence in them a moment later, by the coolness and intrepidity with which, co-operating with troops further to the right, they retook and held the line from which they had been withdrawn. And it was next morning that the remainder of Govan's Arkansans sent a solemn delegation to Granberry's Texans to ascertain whether the latter had lost confidence in them. It is needless to add that the answer was satisfactory. Atlanta had fallen, and the campaign was ended. In his account of these operations, General Hood claims that Sherman's forces were largely more than double his own (pages 224-227). He argues that the soldiers had had “practical demonstration” that troops protected by such entrenchments as were habitually used by both sides during that campaign, were equal to.three times their number of assailants (137); and he shows that the enemy could never be caught without such works (184-190). As a matter of fact, he, with his inferior numbers, habitually attacked these superior forces protected by such entrenchments; and the logic of his premises, without attaching blame to the troops, is that there could be but one result. But he charges the result as a fault to others — to General Hardee, who, he says, disobeyed his orders, and the army, which he in effect says would not fight. Of the Army I need not here speak; as to General Hardee, he speaks for himself when, in reply to General Hood's report, arrogating nothing to himself, claiming no infallibility, and shirking no just responsibility, he says, in the simple and manly language of a soldier: “That in the operations about Atlanta, I failed to accomplish all that General Hood thinks might have been accomplished, is a matter of regret; that I committed errors, is very possible; but that I failed in any instance to carry out, in good faith, his orders, I utterly deny.” And these pages, both by what they prove and what they disprove, will have demonstrated the absence of all color of foundation in fact for any assertion to the contrary.
[376]
Hardee's transfer.
General Hood, in substance, represents — for that is the meaning and effect of the context (pages 249-254-255)--that these charges and imputations (of many of which his subsequent official report, as we have seen, gave no intimation) were brought to the attention of the President, who was invited to visit the army for the purpose of passing upon them; and that the President came, heard and rendered judgment, and that, thereupon, General Hardee, as upon a conviction, was removed from command. Perhaps a sufficient comment upon this is the fact that General Hardee was promoted to the command of the “Military Department of South Carolina, Georgia and Florida,” then constituting one of the four chief commands in the service, and which had been previously commanded by General Beauregard, who was now simultaneously assigned to a military department which included General Hood's army. And as pertinent to the conclusion and judgment which President Davis may have arrived at in the premises, I might quote his language, in a public address at Augusta, Georgia, a few days later, when Generals Beauregard and Hardee were present en route to their respective new commands. The following is an extract from his address as reported in the daily press of the city, a copy of which I have chanced to preserve:Two of these gentlemen, who crossed this floor with me, you have cheered, and you have cheered them because you respect those who have freely ventured their lives in your defence. One is Georgia's own son — the hero of many hard-fought fields — your own good and true Hardee [cheers] . . . . ; the other, Beauregard [cheers], goes to share the toils, the fortunes, the misfortunes, if it be so, of the army in Georgia.But I have the statement of President Davis, showing the occasion of his visit to the army, and the real reasons for General Hardee's assignment to a different command. It is as follows:
Caution against breastworks.
General Hood, at pages 185-186 of his work, says, that shortly after the beginning of the siege of Atlanta, fixed more definitely at page 251, as being about two weeks after the engagement of 20th and 22d July, Major-General Cleburne called at his headquarters, and in the course of conversation, the following transpired: [379]Cleburne . . .. thereupon informed me that as his division was about to move forward to the attack on the 20th, General Hardee rode along the line, and in the presence of those around him, cautioned him to be on the lookout for breastworks. I can recall no reply on my part, at the time, save, perhaps, some expression of astonishment. I could say nothing to even so worthy a subordinate. He left me to infer, however, from subsequent remarks that his division would have taken quite a different action on the 21st, had it not been for the forewarning of his corps commander. . . . .The author adds:
It is but reasonable to deduce from this unfortunate observation to Cleburne, that General Hardee gave a similar warning to other officers; at all events, those who are able to realize the baneful effects of such a remark from the commander of corps d'armee, upon the eve of conflict, know that his words were almost equivalent to an order to take no active part in the battle.And this aspersion is studiously interwoven throughout the text as a fact, and as accounting, in a large measure, for the failure of the successive operations around Atlanta. It first sees the light fifteen years after the alleged occurence, and when the lips of Hardee and Cleburne, who alone could have directly refuted it, have long since been sealed in death. It is made against Hardee, whom his worst enemy would concede to be instinct with high soldierly impulses, and is attributed to Cleburne, who, of all the thousands that served under Hardee during the war, was, perhaps, his most devoted friend. That in the Dalton and Atlanta campaign, where breastworks were so prominent a feature on both sides, they should often have been the subject of discussion or remark among officers, from the Commanding-General down, is quite likely; but nothing which might have been said on that or any subject by such a soldier as Hardee to such a soldier as Cleburne, could possibly have been misconstrued or have worked evil; and Hardee and Cleburne lived to little purpose, if any, not saturated with passion and prejudice, could for an instant believe either that Hardee was capable of riding along his lines and warning his troops against the breastworks they were about to assault, or that Cleburne was capable of making such an imputation against him. And to the veteran survivorhood of that army, who had so many opportunities of seeing Hardee on the field of battle, handling and moving troops in action, this charge, taken with its intendments, is so utterly [380] preposterous that it might well excite a smile, but for the fact that such a charge should have been made against a dead soldier under such circumstances. Fortunately the date, the occasion and the effect of the alleged warning against breastworks, are stated with such particularity that unlike many other things asserted and suggested in this book, the matter is susceptible of being reached directly. The date was the 20th of July, 1864. The occasion was as Cleburne's “division was about to move forward to the attack on the 20th,” and the effect was, as the author was left to infer “from subsequent remarks” of Cleburne, “that his division would have taken quite a different action on the 20th had it not been for the forewarning of his corps commander.” Cleburne's division was in reserve on the 20th July. On the repulse of the first assault, it was ordered up to replace other troops. The lines were reformed to renew the attack; and after the final order for the assault had been given, but before the troops were actually in motion, that division was withdrawn and dispatched to Atlanta in obedience to the order of General Hood, above referred to. Cleburne's division, therefore, made no assault or attack on that occasion, nor on that day; and it was impossible that its conduct or action could have been affected as alleged, and impossible that Cleburne could have said so. And whether its action or conduct in battle was or could have been influenced by the alleged warnings, let the record of that matchless division, two days later, on the 22d of July, also answer, where it carried successive lines of entrenchments at the point of the bayonet — where well-nigh half its numbers, including thirty of its general, field and acting field officers, fell in the path of its bloody and victorious advance, and where it was foremost among the troops whose conduct that day won from their adversaries the admission “that in the impetuosity, splendid abandon and reckless disregard of danger with which the Rebel masses rushed on against our lines . . . , there had been no parallel during the war.” But it so chances that a number of living persons, including myself, were present, and knew, and from the special circumstances are enabled to remember precisely what did transpire between Hardee and Cleburne on the 20th of July, as Cleburne's “division was about to move forward to the attack.” It was briefly as follows: That division was ordered in to replace other troops. It was [381] advanced to a position facing a wooded ridge occupied by the enemy. The order for the assault awaited the readiness of that division. As soon as it was formed, Cleburne in person rode up to General Hardee, who, with a member of his staff, was near, and immediately in rear of the line, and reported ready. General Hardee's reply was an order to advance; and Cleburne turned and rode off at once to put his troops in motion. The interview occupied but a few seconds; and the only allusion to breastworks was as involved in this order to assault the works from which other troops had just before been repulsed. And it was a moment later that the order was received from General Hood, in obedience to which that division was recalled and dispatched to Atlanta. The relations long existing and which continued to exist between Hardee and Cleburne, would of themselves suffice to show that Cleburne never made any imputation against Hardee of the character and with the intendments attributed to him. They dated from an early period of the war in Arkansas, when Cleburne was colonel of a regiment (Fifteenth Arkansas) in Hardee's original brigade. General Hardee was the first to recognize his merits, and was mainly instrumental in securing his promotion successively to the brigades and division which Hardee had himself commanded. With brief exceptions, Cleburne served under Hardee continuously up to and after that time. Their personal relations were close and intimate, and Cleburne's attachment to Hardee and his admiration for him as a soldier were well known to every one acquainted with him. And when, on the night of the 28th of September, 1864, at Palmetto, the news of Hardee's assignment to another command spread through the ranks, and officers and men thronged into his camp — a scene which no one who witnessed it can ever forget-Cleburne was most of all grieved and distressed; and among other things said, in substance, that but for his division, which was now the only tie that bound him to that army, he would apply for service in Hardee's new command, even if he had to resign his commission as Major-General and accept a position on Hardee's staff. If Cleburne had made the imputation against Hardee as alleged, or if any occasion for it had existed, in speaking and acting as he now did, he would have been the falsest of friends and greatest of hypocrites, instead of the true man and loyal friend that he was. It is, perhaps, needless to add that I have written to the living and accessible officers of Hardee's and Cleburne's staffs, and to [382] representative officers and soldiers of every command serving in Hardee's corps on the 20th of July, 1864, and I have found no one who ever heard of the alleged warnings against breastworks except in and by this book. Lack of space restricts quotations on this subject to those who from their positions at the time can speak most directly to the point. Colonel D. G. White, who from an early period in the war was a member of General Hardee's staff, and who during all that time was well acquainted with Cleburne, writes as follows:
And Major Samuel L. Black, the officer here referred to by Colonel White, in his communication of May 31st, 1880, heretofore quoted from, states the position and movements of Cleburne's division, and describes what transpired between Hardee and Cleburne on the occasion referred to, and the circumstances under which that division was recalled from the assault, in substantial identity with the statement of Colonel White. The following are extracts from a letter of Lunsford P. Yandell, M. D., of Louisville, Kentucky, written under date of June 12th, 1880:
The following is an extract from the letter of Captain Buck, Cleburne's Adjutant-General, the first of which is quoted above: [384]
The following is from Hon. Walter L. Bragg, during the war a soldier and officer in Cleburne's division and an intimate friend of Cleburne and now a leading member of the bar of this State:
