USA > Indiana > History of the Seventy-fifth regiment of Indiana infantry voluteers. its organization, campaigns, and battles (1862-65.) > Part 27
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On the 21st of September, Hood's army, which, since its evacuation of Atlanta, had been lying about Lovejoy's Station, on the Macon Railroad, moved across to Palmnetto Station on the West Point Railroad. His Cavalry was sent to the vicinity of Powder Springs, west of the Chattahoochee River.
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of Indiana Infantry Volunteers.
This movement on the part of Hood apparently opened the way for Sherman at once to enter Central Georgia with his army. It was a ruse, however. Sherman's soldierly instincts enabled him to infer that Hood's real purpose of the mnove- ment was to assume the aggressive against the railroad in our
rear. The public speech made by Jeff. Davis to the Con- federate soldiers at Palmetto Station, as reported to General Sherman by one of his spies, who was present, in which Davis vaingloriously asserted that the Tennessee and Ken- tucky soldiers, then with Hood, would soon walk upon their native soil, confirmed Sherman's inference with regard to Hood's purposes.
The plan of the Confederate commander was to move his army to Sherman's rear, cut his communications, advance northward by sweeping through the States of Tennessee and Kentucky, gather recruits from these States as he progressed, and at last stand upon the banks of the Ohio River a mighty host of one hundred thousand strong! By this movement, it was expected that, to prevent the starvation of his army, Sherman would be compelled to make a retreat, which would be a repetition of that of Napoleon from Moscow, incurring more disastrous results. Sherman, however, was master of the situation, as he usually was, and scattered Hood's vision- ary project to the four winds. He hurriedly sent to the rear, by railroad, two Divisions of his army-Newton's, of the Fourth Corps, to Chattanooga, and Corse's, of the Seven- teenth Corps, to Rome. A large Confederate Cavalry force from Mississippi, under Forrest, now made an invasion into Middle Tennessee. On the 29th, General Thomas, accom- panied by the Second Division of our Corps, was also sent to Chattanooga by cars to meet this threatened danger in Ten- nessee. On discovering the next day that Hood was crossing the Chattahoochee with his entire army and advancing upon his communications in the direction of Rome, Sherman immediately issued orders for the mobilization of his entire army northward in pursuit of Hood, except the Twentieth
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Corps under Slocum, which was left in Atlanta to hold the town and the bridges spanning the Chattahoochee River.
SPECIAL FIELD ORDER NO. 68.
HEADQUARTERS MILITARY DIVISION OF THE MISSISSIPPI,
In the Field, Atlanta, Ga., October 3, 1864.
The following movements are ordered:
I. Major-General Slocum, with Twentieth Corps, will hold Atlanta and the Chattahoochee bridge, and all detachments of other troops or corps will report to him and be assigned by him to posts looking to the security of the depot.
II. All the rest of the army, provided with ten (10) days' rations, will move by the Chattahoochee bridge to Smyrna Camp-ground-the Army of the Cumberland, Major-General Stanley, on the center, looking west ; the Army of the Ohio, Brigadier-General Cox, on the right, and the Army of the Tennessee, Major-General Howard, on the left.
III. The commanding general will be near the center.
By order of General W. T. Sherman.
(Signed)
L. M. DAYTON, Aid-de-Camp.
The five Corps of Sherman's army since the opening of the campaign against Atlanta were reduced by deaths, detach- ments and discharges to 70,000 inen of all arms, and under- went various changes in commanders since the occupation of Atlanta. General D. S. Stanley of the Fourth Corps was temporarily in command of the Army of the Cumberland in place of General Thomas, who went to Tennessee to com- mand the detachments of troops against Forrest and others; General J. D. Cox was in command of the Army of the Ohio in room of General Schofield, who went to the rear; and the Fifteenth and Seventeenth Corps of the Army of the Ten- nessee under Howard, were commanded by Generals P. J. Osterhaus and T. E. G. Ransom, in room of Generals Logan and Blair, who were at home stumping their respective States for the election of Lincoln to the second term. The Confederate army, under Hood, now numbered about 40,000 infantry, artillery and cavalry, whilst Forrest's Cavalry in Tennessee consisted of 8,000 troopers.
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of Indiana Infantry Volunteers.
To intercept Hood, General Sherman ordered his two Cav- alry Divisions, under Kilpatrick and Garrard, to be sent to Sweetwater and Powder Springs; ordered Howard, with a portion of the army of the Tennessee, to make a reconnais- sance in the direction of Fairburn; commanded Cox to send a Division of the Twenty-third Corps to Flat Rock; and sent the rest of the army to take possession of the Chattahoochee River bridges. We were with this part of the armny. By the Ist of October Hood's forces had reached the railroad north of Marietta, and its destruction had already begun. Shortly afterwards they moved towards Rome and Allatoona. At the latter place, on the 5th, a Confederate Division of Stewart's Corps, under General French, was severely thrashed by Corse's Division of the Seventeenth Corps, which had been previously sent thither. Portions of Hood's army appeared at different points and times all along the railroad.
On Sunday morning, Oct. 2d, the Seventy-fifth Indiana Regiment with its Brigade and Division received marching orders, with ten days' rations, for the pursuit of Hood's army, and on the afternoon of the 3d moved out of camp near the Campbellton road, marched until 8 o'clock at night in the direction of the Chattahoochee River, and encamped near the bridge. At 6 o'clock on the morning of the next day, we resumed the pursuit. Thus we began the weary and toilsome march over the old battle grounds of the Atlanta campaign. In this northward march we frequently biv- ouacked in the old fortifications of the Confederates. Going in an opposite direction from the first, we again passed through the towns of Acworth, Cartersville, Kingston, Rome, Calhoun and Resaca. The track of desolation by the two contending armies on the former campaign was plainly perceptible in these beautiful towns. We crossed over the Chattahoochee, Coosa and Chattooga Rivers and Tay- lor's Ridge into the Chattooga Valley for the purpose of in- intercepting Hood's invasion. The Army of the Tennessee marched through Snake Creek Gap, and we-Army of the
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Cumberland-marched via Tilton across the mountain to the west. But Hood had escaped down the Valley of the Chat- tooga; his army was too far in our advance and too fleet of foot to catch. We chased his army down the valley to the vicinity of Gadsden, where we left it. On the 21st our Brigade moved across the line into Cherokee county, Ala- bama, as far as Gaylesville, encamping on a hill late in the evening, south of the town. Our pursuit of Hood's army ended here. We remained at this place for a period of eight days.
In consequence of the destruction of the railroad by Hood's army, which interrupted our communications, it was a mili- tary necessity to draw supplies from the rich and fertile lands of the neighborhood in which we were encamped. This was the beginning of the process of foraging for subsistence, of which, up to this time, the Seventy-fifth Indiana knew so little, but afterwards so much, All the foraging heretofore by our Regiment was done without orders. "Uncle Sam" had supplied us with plenty of food, excepting the time of the siege of Chattanooga, when lie could not get it to us; but now that the Confederate army had broken our "cracker line," we were compelled to get our supplies from some other source than "Uncle Sam's" Commissary. The first regu- larly detailed party for systematic foraging from the Seventy- fifth Indiana Regiment consisted of twenty men, commanded by Lieutenant Zehrung, of E Company, who were sent out with teams on the 25th from camp at Gaylesville into the rich Valley of the Chattooga, returning on the 27th with a yoke of oxen liitched to a wagon, loaded with beef, pork, sweet potatoes, four darkeys, et cetera. A detail was inade from the Brigade to build a bridge over Chattooga River and to run a grist-mill near town. A squad of thirty men from our Regiment, under Captain Elliott, of E Company, repaired the dam at the mill. This was on the 24tl1.
During our stay here the Second Division of our Corps, under General Morgan, returned; Generals Schofield and
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of Indiana Infantry Volunteers.
Mower also arrived, the former assuming his old command, that of the Army of the Ohio, and the latter was assigned to command a Division in the Seventeenth Corps.
It was also during our encampment here that General Sherman fully determined to leave the Confederate army under Hood to the care of General Thomas, whilst he him- self, witli a portion of his army, would march to the sea, and thence operate with General Grant against Richmond, Va. Accordingly, lie ordered the Fourth Corps, 15,000 strong, under Stanley, from Gaylesville, and the Twenty-third Corps, (Army of the Oliio) 12,000 strong, under Schofield, from Cedar Bluff, on the Coosa River, near Gaylesville, to Chiatta- nooga, and report to General Thomas.
In this strategic game of war, we were compelled to sus- tain the loss of our great and ideal commander-the modest, unselfish, trustful and resolute General George H. Thomas. But our loss was the country's gain. The Military Division of the Mississippi had many skillful, brave and popular lead- ers, from Sherman down; but none possessed such a universal admiration, confidence and love of the soldiers, whom he commanded, as Thomas. Above all others, he was idolized by the troops of our Corps, which he first commanded. Some of our Regiments had served under him from Mill Springs to Atlanta, and it was the supreme desire of every man in the Corps to be led by him to the end. We rejoiced greatly and felt very much complimented that "Uncle Billy " Sherman selected among others our Corps to go to the sea under his bril- liant leadership; but our hearts were made sorrowful indeed, that we could no longer be under the command of "Pap" Thomas. Sherman very well knew whom to select for tlie very responsible work of annihilation of Hood's army and other Confederates in Middle Tennessee, when he appointed Thomas to do it. Thomas had few equals and no superiors in either Union or Confederate armies.
On Saturday, 29th, at 6 o'clock a. m., we broke camp at Gaylesville, Alabama, and marched for Rome, Ga.,-a dis-
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History of the Seventy-fifth Regiment
tance of 25 miles-where we arrived at 9 o'clock on the night of the 30th, bivouacking on the banks of the Etowah. The Seventy-fifth Indiana with many other Regiments was paid off here, not having received any money from the Goverment for a period of eight months, and it was the last payment we received until our muster out, on June 8th, 1865.
At 6:30 a. in., of November 2d, we left Rome for Kings- ton, where we arrived in a drenching rain, on the afternoon of the same day. We remained encamped at Kingston for ten days. The Army with which Sherman was about to be- gin the great raid to the sea-coast was scattered from Rome to Atlanta. On the 8th, the Presidential election occurred throughout the country, resulting in the election of Abraham Lincoln over General Geo. B. McClellan for the second term. Polls were opened during the day in the Seventy-fifth Indi- ana Regiment, and all votes cast were for Lincoln and John- son. Though within a couple of years of being of age, this was the first vote cast by the writer. It was not counted, however.
On the 12th we struck tents at Kingston, and began the march for Atlanta. Passing through Cartersville, we en- camped for the night near an old furnace in the Allatoona Mountains, sixteen miles from the place of starting. On the next day the Brigade marched eighteen miles, and destroyed two miles of the Atlantic and Western Railroad between Acworth and Big Shanty, encamping at the foot of Kenesaw Mountain. It was one of the hardest day's work during our entire service. The destruction of this railroad, together with the telegraph lines, at this time and place, broke all our connections with the rear. We thereby cut loose from all communications with our friends at home, and for a period of forty days the whole Northern States breathlessly and anx- iously awaited tidings from us.
On the 14th, at daylight, we took up the line of march, halting an hour or two at Marietta, where we had done pro- vost-guard duty for a few days during the campaign of the
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of Indiana Infantry Volunteers.
previous summer. We crossed the Chattahoochee River in the afternoon, on the east bank of which we bivouacked for the night. On the morning of the next day we marched through Atlanta, and encamped a couple of miles east of the city. On the night of the 15th a terrible picture of desola- tion was presented to our view. The whole business portion of Atlanta was a roaring, seething mass of flames. Millions of dollars' worth of property went up in smoke. The destruc- tion was complete as far as making the city worthless for military purposes, which was the intention. Some of the magnificent brick business houses, in which were placed the government stores, were no barriers to the onward march of the fire, but only fuel to the resistless fury of the flames as they swept madly on in their destructiveness. We drew cloth- ing and rations on that memorable night out of some of those buildings, whilst they were enveloped in a sheet of flame.
SPECIAL FIELD ORDER NO. 120.
HEADQUARTERS MILITARY DIVISION OF THE MISSISSIPPI,
In the Field, Kingston, Ga., Nov. 9, 1864.
I. For the purpose of military organization, this army is divided into two wings, viz .:
The right wing, Major-General O. O. Howard commanding, the Fif- teenth and Seventeenth Corps.
The left wing, Major-General H. W. Slocum commanding, the Four- teenth and Twentieth Corps.
II. The habitual order of march will be, wherever practicable, by four roads, as near parallel as possible, and converging at points hereafter indi- cated in orders. The cavalry, Brigadier-General Kilpatrick commanding, will receive special orders from the Commander-in-Chief.
*
* * *
* * *
By order of Major-General W. T. Sherman.
L. M. DAYTON, Aide-de-Camp.
CHAPTER XIV.
THE MARCH TO THE SEA, AND CAPTURE OF SAVANNAH, GA.
(NOVEMBER 15TH, 1864, TO JANUARY 19TH, 1865.)
THE troops selected by Sherman for the grand march through the State of Georgia to the seaboard, as Special Field Order No. 120, recorded in the preceding chapter, shows, con- sisted of four Corps-the Fourteenth, Fifteenth, Seventeenth and Twentieth-and a Division of Cavalry. They aggregated 62,204 in infantry, artillery and cavalry. They were organ- ized into two wings-the right was commanded by Major- General O. O. Howard, and consisted of the Fifteenth and Seventeenth Corps under the command of Major-Generals P. J. Osterhaus and Frank P. Blair, in the order named. The left was in command of Major-General Henry W. Slocum, and was composed of the Fourteenth Corps, commanded by Brevet Major-General Jefferson C. Davis, and the Twentieth Corps, commanded by Brigadier-General A. S. Williams. The Fifteenth Corps had four Divisions, commanded re- spectively by Brigadier-Generals Charles R. Woods, William B. Hazen, John E. Smith and John M. Corse. The Seven- teenth Corps embraced three Divisions, in command of Major- General J. A. Mower, and Brigadier-Generals M. D. Leggett and Giles A. Smith. The Fourteenth Corps comprised three Divisions, commanded by Brigadier-Generals W. P. Carlin, James D. Morgan and Absalom Baird. The Twentieth Corps embraced three Divisions also, in command of Brigadier- Generals N. J. Jackson, John W. Geary and W. T. Ward. As heretofore stated, the Seventy-fifth Indiana Regiment was in the Second Brigade (Gleason's), Third Division (Baird's) and Fourteenth Corps (Davis'). The Cavalry Division was
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of Indiana Infantry Volunteers.
in command of Brigadier-General Judson Kilpatrick, and em- braced two Brigades under Colonels Eli H. Murry and Smith D. Atkins. All the Regiments and Batteries were thoroughly purged of non-combatants. Soldiers who were disabled through sickness and wounds had all been sent to the rear. Hence these sixty thousand men in the four Corps were all able-bodied and experienced soldiers by reason of the previous length of their service, and the hardships through which they passed in former campaigns. General Grant thus gives his opinion of the morale of Sherman's army, as equipped for the march: "Sherman's army, after all the depletions, numbered about sixty thousand effective men. All weak men had been left to hold the rear, and those remaining were not only well men, but strong and hardy, so that he had sixty thousand as good soldiers as ever trod the earth; better than any European soldiers, because they not only worked like a machine, but the machine thought." (Personal Memoirs, Vol. 2, p. 354.) Thus the citizens of Georgia had a grand opportunity of wit- nessing one of the finest armies of the world on the march, as its tide of invasion rolled onward to the sea. They also had a sufficient taste of the bitterness and iniseries of war to last them for several generations-particularly those who lived along the track of our broad belt of ruin.
General Sherman took with him, also, 2,500 wagons, each drawn by a team of six mules, 600 ambulances, each drawn by two horses, and 16 Batteries of four guns each, and to each gun, caisson and forge was attached a team of four horses. These were all equally divided with the four Corps. The wagons were chiefly loaded with ammunition.
The march to the sea was divided into three stages. The first was indicated by the following:
SPECIAL FIELD ORDER NO. 124.
HEADQUARTERS MILITARY DIVISION OF THE MISSISSIPPI,
In the Field, Atlanta, Ga., Nov. 14, 1864.
The armies will begin the movement on Milledgeville and Gordon to-mor- row, the 15th November, as follows:
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History of the Seventy-fifth Regiment
I. The right wing will move via McDonough and Monticello to Gordon.
II. The left wing (General Slocum's) will move via Covington, Social Circle and Madison to Milledgeville, destroying the railroad in a most thor- ough manner, from Yellow river to Madison.
III. The Cavalry (General Kilpatrick commanding) will move in concert with the right wing, feigning strong in the direction of Forsyth and Macon, but will cross the Ocmulgee on the pontoon bridge of General How- ard.
IV. Each column will aim to reach its destination-viz., Gordon and Milledgeville-on the seventh day's march, and each army commander will, on arrival, communicate with the other wing and the commanding Gen- eral, who will accompany the left wing.
By order of Major-General W. T. Sherman.
L. M. DAYTON, Aide-de-Camp.
On the morning of November the 15th, the famous march to the sea began. The first objective was Milledgeville, the capital of Georgia, which lay a hundred miles to the south- east. The army, marching upon divergent lines, was to reach the capital in seven days. Howard's wing, accom- panied by the Cavalry on its right flank, took up the line of march along the Macon and Western Railroad, via Jonesboro, in the direction of Macon. Slocum's wing-the Twentieth Corps in advance-followed the Georgia Railroad, via De- catur, Stone Mountain and Covington, in the direction of Madison. Our Corps did not start until the next day. Sherman himself remained in Atlanta with us, and accom- panied us as far as Milledgeville.
On the 16th at 9 o'clock a. m., together with our Division and Corps, we broke camp at Atlanta, and set our faces sea- ward, and turned our backs upon the ruined city. Our Brigade was in advance. It was a charming November morning. The Corps, marching to the music of the bands, with swinging, regular step, arms glistening in the sunlight, and colors unfurled to the balmy breezes, was as fine a picture as eyes ever saw. In his usual elegant style, General Sher- man thus describes the scene:
"About 7 a. m., of November 16th, we rode out of Atlanta
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of Indiana Infantry Volunteers.
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History of the Seventy-fifth Regiment
by the Decatur road, filled by the marching troops and wagons of the Fourteenth Corps; and reaching the hill, just outside of the old rebel works, we naturally paused to look back upon the scenes of our past battles. We stood upon the very ground whereon was fought the bloody battle of July 22d, and could see the copse of wood where McPherson fell. Be- hind us lay Atlanta, smouldering and in ruins, the black smoke rising high in air, and hanging like a pall over the ruined city. Away off in the distance, on the McDonough road, was the rear of Howard's column, the gun-barrels glis- tening in the sun, the white-topped wagons stretching away to the south; and right behind us the Fourteenth Corps, marching steadily and rapidly, with a cheery look and swing- ing pace, that made light of the thousand miles that lay be- tween us and Richmond. Some band by accident struck up the anthem of 'John Brown's soul goes marching on;' the men caught up the strain, and never before or since have I heard the chorus of 'Glory, glory, hallelujah!' done with more spirit, or in better harmony of time and place." (Memoirs, vol. 2, p. 178).
About no011, we passed through the town of Decatur, and bivouacked for the night a few miles south of Stone Moun- tain. Here John S. Shull of E Company of the Regiment died from disease, contracted after our communications from the North had been severed. He was a recruit, joining the Regiment, whilst we lay at Ringgold, just before the opening of the Atlanta campaign, and was not yet hardened to the life of a soldier. On the morning of the 17th, before taking up the line of march through the villages of Lithonia and Congers, we tenderly laid our comrade's body at the foot of Stone Mountain, whose monumental peaks, formed by the hand of nature, mark his grave. After halting and eating our dinners, our Brigade tore up a couple of miles of the Georgia Railroad to settle them. On account of its frequent recurrence, it was a work of destruction in which we became proficient, and for which we became famed.
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of Indiana Infantry Volunteers.
THE BRIGADE DESTROYING A RAIL ROAD IN GEORGIA.
The destruction of a railroad by the Regiment or Brigade was an art of itself. The troops were divided into three sec- tions of equal numbers. The first was distributed along one side of the track-each man at the end of each tie. At a given command, each soldier seized a tie, lifted it gently, until it assumed a vertical position, and at another command pushed it forward so that when it fell the ties would be on top of the rails. This process reversed the relative positions of the wooden ties and iron rails-the ties up and the rails beneath them. The first section of soldiers would now move forward upon another portion of the road and overturn it, whilst the second section would advance and occupy the place of the first section, and collect these ties and put them on piles of thirty ties each-placing the rails on the top of these piles, the centre of each rail lying on the centre of the
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