Bragg remained strangely quiet. If he had won the brilliant victory claimed in his dispatches, why did he fail to improve it; to hurl his force upon the shattered columns of the Union army, capture Chattanooga, and again hold the key of East Tennessee? Two days after the battle, a war-council of the Confederate chieftains. agreed that there should be a grand movement toward Knoxville. The generals under Bragg were making preparations accordingly, when he announced another plan and sat down three weeks before the tripple lines of Chattanooga. Rosecrans worked with energy, strengthening defences, and accumulating supplies. On the 23d of September the 11th and 12th Corps of the Army of the Potomac advanced. Hooker was sent to his relief increasing the fighting force and multiplying the number to be fed. In the meantime Major-General Grant was placed in command; Thomas superseded Rosecrans who took leave of his army on the 19th of October. On the 18th Grant issued the following: “HEAD-QUARTERS MILITARY DIVISION OF THE MISSISSIPPI, "[ General Orders, No. 1.] } "In compliance with General Orders, No. 337, of date Washington, D. C., October 16, 1863, the undersigned hereby assumes command of the Military Division of the Mississippi, embracing the Departments of the Ohio, of the Cumberland, and of the Tennessee. "The Head-quarters of the Military Division of the Mississippi will be in the field, where all reports and returns required by army regulations and existing orders will be made. "U. S. GRANT, Major-General." He telegraphed Thomas to hold Chattanooga if he starved, and the grim veteran answered that he would and he did, with starvation perilously near. General W. T. Sherman was placed in command of the Department of the Tennessee. During the summer General Burnside planned an attack upon Knoxville. In August he began his advance, and moved with such caution and celerity as to throw the rebel forces into a panic and thus entered the town, September 1st, amid the joyful tears, and jubilant shoutings of the Union citizens. The rebel garrison at Cumberland Gap, 2000 strong, surrendered on the 9th of September and Burnside thus occupied the East Tennessee Railroad as far as Morristown. A Before he had been strong force moved toward Chattanooga, and a junction with Rosecrans was expected, when that General was ordered in his defenses, and it was evident that his own position was fraught with peril for Bragg detached Longstreet to besiege him, and thus it was confidentially expected by the rebels that from Chattanooga and Knoxville, our brave men would be driven back to the Ohio. It was a dark day. Grant's appointment restored heart and hope. placed in command he ordered Sherman to send from Big Black a division to the aid of Rosecrans. The order reached Sherman on the 22d of September. At four P. M. Osterhaus was on the war path towards Vicksburg twenty miles away, and the next day with his division was steaming toward Memphis. On the 23d Sherman was ordered to follow with his entire command. Four days later he was on the river but the ascent was tedious. Fuel was gone, and his soldiers were compelled to procure rails and haul wood from the interior to keep the engine in motion. He reached Memphis early in October. Here he received orders from Halleck to go to Athens, Alabama, repairing the railway as he marched and to secure his own supplies. He began and worked details day and night, until he found it necessary to move upon the highways and clear his way, which he did. Blair drove the enemy from the front and entered Tuscumbia October 27th. On the 25th Sherman received the order placing him in command of the Department of the Tennessee, and from Iuka issued an order placing the brave Mc Pherson in command with full authority at Vicksburg, and the heroic Hurlbut in West Tennessee. On the 27th a messenger from Grant, who had floated down the Tennessee over the Muscle Shoals, came to Sherman's head-quarters with this sententious order. "Drop all work on the railroad east of Bear Creek. Put your command toward Bridgeport till you meet orders." The order of march was reversed, and headed for Eastport, the only practicable crossing of the Tennessee. On gunboats and a coal-barge he commenced the crossing, expedited, by the arrival on the 31st, of a ferry-boat. Onward, through thickening difficulties, that indomitable will pressed his brave men. On the night of the 13th he reached Bridgeport and reported by telegraph to Grant, was summoned by him to his head-quarters; took boat, and on the morning of November 15th was at Chattanooga, his men coming forward. Others were active. When Grant arrived at Chattanooga, matters were gloomy enough. General Thomas had studied the situation and these able chieftains saw where advantage could be gained. Hooker, who held the right at Bridgeport, was ordered to cross the Tennessee and assail the rebel left flank. A force under General Hazen crossed at Brown's. Ferry, below, where pontoons had been laid by General W. F. Smith, and commenced the ascent of Lookout Mountain. By this movement the rebel retreat was cut off, and his forces compelled to march up the valley toward Trenton, Georgia, about twenty miles, before joining Bragg's main army. Hooker crossed at Bridgeport and the forces united at Brown's Ferry. In a drizzly, foggy atmosphere the march was made. The rugged sides. frowned defiance, but in spite a storm of leaden hail, upward and still upward pressed the resistless column, until it passed into and above the low clouds. Below, our leaders, Grant and Thomas watched and waited the result, but at length the clouds rifted and it was seen that Hooker was carrying the rebel works, and that in his victory, so gloriously won, the first success of the campaign was achieved. Communication was opened with Chattanooga, and the river cleared between Thomas and the Nashville railroad. Steamers brought up supplies and full rations succeeded scanty food. Burnside was holding Knoxville, and had a succession of sharp contests with the enemy under Longstreet, aided by some of the ablest of the Confederate generals, and by falling back, and again renewing the contest with desperation, drew Longstreet away from Bragg and held him pounding fruitlessly at the defenses of Knoxville, as Grant desired him. Meanwhile preparations proceeded to repay Chickamauga. Sherman's army came to the Tennessee, by Fayetteville to Bridgeport. He was to cross, effect a lodgment on the end of Missionary Ridge, and with a part of his force act against Lookout Mountain, near Trenton. Ewing's division was to make the demonstration upon Lookout, but was to be ready to march rapidly on Chattanooga. Sherman rowed in a small open boat from Kelly's to Bridgeport, and put his force in motion, and at Hooker's head-quarters on the 20th, received Grant's orders for an attack the next day. But only General John E. Smith's division, the 3d, was in position; the 1st, under Osterhaus, and the 2d, under Morgan L. Smith, were slowly, and footsore, coming over a wretched road from Shell-Mound to Chattanooga, and Ewing's, the 4th, had not left Trenton. Morgan L. Smith's crossed the bridge at Brown's Ferry on the 21st, Ewing reached it the same day, but it was so broken he could not complete his crossing until the 23d. Again it broke, and Osterhaus was not over, but Sherman proposed to go into action with the three divisions with him, supported by Jeff. C. Davis' division of the 14th Army Corps, leaving Osterhaus to co-operate with Hooker against Lookout. Pontoon boats were silently carried, under the shelter of hills and woods, to the North Chickamauga, manned, and at midnight silently floated below the mouth, our men capturing the pickets along the banks, and taking a position on the left bank of the Tennessee, sending the boats across for reinforcements. M. L. Smith's division was rapidly ferried over, and by daybreak of the 24th the two divisions of Morgan L. and John E. Smith, numbering 8,000 men, were across the Tennessee, and had thrown up a line of rifle-pits to protect the crossing. A substantial pontoon bridge was laid, and soon three divisions were on the left bank, and Jeff. C. Davis declared his command ready to take Missionary Ridge. Grant now had his forces well in hand. Above was Sherman with his Western boys, below Hooker with his battle-tested veterans, and Thomas, eager to avenge Chickamauga was in front of Chattanooga. Bragg had requested Grant to remove all non-combatants, as he was about to bombard Chattanooga. He was astounded on the morning of the 25th to find Sherman's army on his right. Hooker made his successful demonstration on Lookout Mountain, and the army had shouted his victory. On the 23d an unusual movement was observed in the rebel camps, and orders were given for a division of the Fourth Corps to make a reconnoissance in the direction of Orchard Knob. Wood's division was selected, to be supported by Sheridan's. Forming his men on the slope, outside of the fortifications, Wood advanced rapidly, made his reconnoissance a storming party, carried the Knob and the adjacent works at the point of the bayonet, and made the interior line of rebel works untenable. So rapid and sweeping was the advance, that only about two-hundred were killed and wounded. An important position was gained and the 28th Alabama, with its colors, captured. General Wood was ordered to hold the position. The night of the 23d was a busy one. Before the dawn of the 24th, the intrenchments were reversed, strengthened and made impregnable. Bragg, awaking from his dream of easy victory, was startled to find Sherman on his right, Hooker on his left, and before him the "Rock of Chickamauga. But he still had faith in the impregnable sides and inaccessible hights of Missionary Ridge. Between Sherman and the hill was a deep valley, how deep he did not know, but the steep hill beyond was covered with trees, and across the top a breast-work of logs and earth, thick with rebel soldiers. The narrow path leading to it was enfiladed by two guns. Behind, a still higher hill bristled with guns, placed to throw a plunging fire on the first, if taken. Colonel Bowman says: "The brigades of Colonel Cocherill of Ewing's division, Colonel Alexander of John E. Smith's and General Lightburn of Morgan L. Smith's were to hold their hill as the key point; General Corse, with as much of his brigade of Ewing's division as could operate along the narrow ridge was to attack from the right center; General Lightburn was to dispatch a regiment from his division to co-operate with General Corse, and General Morgan L. Smith was to move along the eastern base of Missionary Ridge, connecting with General Corse and Colonel Loomis of Ewing's division, in like manner to move along the west base, supported by Mathias and Baum's brigades of John E. Smith's division in reserve." The sun arose red and lurid, and Corse ordered the advance. The Fortieth Illinois, with two Ohio regiments moved down into the valley and steadily up the hill-side held by the foe. It moved onward within eighty yards of the entrenchment, where Corse found a crest on which he halted, called his reserve and asked reinforcements, which His crowded ground was swept by musketry and artillery, and the approach to the entrenchment was through a sea of fire, and for an hour, the battle for that crest was fearful. Fortune was vary came. |