The Daily Dispatch: December 4, 1863., [Electronic resource]

The route to Atlanta.

A telegraphic report from Chattanooga is that Bragg's army is retreating in the direction of Rome and Atlanta. This may or may not be true. Atlanta is a powerful position, more powerful even than Chattanooga, and it would unquestionably be held for a considerable time against our troops by a far interior force.

Gen. Thomas would have to advance slowly upon Atlanta, for the railroad would of course be destroyed in the front, and he would be getting further and further from his base of supplies which he already obtains with much difficulty and delay. A most serious trouble is, that the rebels have great facilities for interchanging forces between Tennessee and Virginia, and even to do this without our knowledge, whilst no corresponding facilities exist on our side. But this is a trouble which is perhaps without remedy. We know not on what day three fourths of the combined armies of Bragg and Lee may strike either the Army of the Cumberland or the Army of the Potomac, and yet if any great Federal movement were made from one of our two armies in the direction of the other, the fact would probably be known at the rebel capital before it would at Washington.