USA > Tennessee > History of the Twentieth Tennessee regiment volunteer infantry, C.S.A > Part 26
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tillery, and in a few minutes the two lines of skirmishers and the two lines of battle started with a rush across the open space ; but they recoiled before they had gotten within 100 yards of the Kentuckians, and as they retreated, the Yankee artillery opened again and cut down all four of our guns, when three lines of Yankee infantry returned to the assault. Onward they came : the gallant Kentuckians were standing to their work like men; but were about to be overpowered, when Tyler's Brigade, that was lying over behind the hill, was ordered to their support ; and when Tyler reached the Kentuckian's line, the second re- pulse was complete in ten minutes. This was about 2 P. M. After this second repulse, the enemy tried to drive Lewis's and Tyler's Brigades from their positions with artillery ; and I will say that it was the most terrific artillery fire that I was under during the entire war. This storm of shot and shell lasted for three hours with scarcely a let up. I timed them several times with my watch, and they threw into these two brigades from eleven to twenty-two shots and shell per minute, but we held the position until after dark, when the command was withdrawn be- hind the hill, and next morning before daylight, I was sent on the same line with forty men to hold it, and was wounded in the leg by a Yankee sharpshooter.
On the night of the 15th, Gen. W. H. T. Walker, who had been sent by General Johnson to Calhoun, reported that the Yankees were crossing the Oostenaula near that place, and that McPherson was crossing at Lay's Ferry below ; so we were flanked out of position again.
On the night of the 15th, when Johnston's army retreated across the Oostenaula, at Resaca, the Yankees were pressing us very hard. The heavens seemed to be filled with shells, and the long lines of musketry firing by the Yankee infantry, and the pop, pop, pop, of the miles of skirmishers, was a sight that no man could describe, unless he had gone through one of the erup- tions of Mount Pelee.
In a dispatch to Washington on the 16th, Sherman reported that his loss was 3,375 wounded : he did not say how many he had killed, but there are 1,790 Yankees buried there and 170 Confederates. The Confederates were behind entrenchments.
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The heaviest loss sustained by the Confederates was that of Col. S. S. Stanton of the Twenty-eighth Tennessee Regiment, for- merly Colonel of the Twenty-fifth Tennessee Regiment. Cle- burne with his division moved in haste to Calhoun to support Walker, where the Yankees were crossing the Oostenaula. It was here that L. E. Polk's Brigade of Cleburne's Division, met the Yankees and punished them severely. On the night of the 16th, "Old Joe " retired to Adairville, and on the morning of the 17th, Hardee went into position two miles north of that place, with Cheatham and Bate in the front line, supported by Cleburne.
The Yankees made a furious assault on Cheatham, but were driven back. On the night of the 17th, we fell back to King- ston, at the Junction of the Western and Atlantic, and Rome and Atlanta R. R., and halted here a few hours, and then fell back a little further to Cassville.
Sherman's army crossed the Oostenaula on the 17th, Schofield . on the left above Resaca, McPherson at Lay's Ferry below the village, while Thomas crossed at the center on the road bridge that Johnston did not destroy. Sherman also sent Jeff. C. Davis' division down the west bank of the Oostenaula in the direction . of Rome, which he captured without a fight, with a number of · Confederate factories and hospitals.
When "Old Joe" fell back to Cassville, he formed his army in line of battle, as he thought, in the best position between Dal- ton and Atlanta, and issued his battle order ; his army was wild with enthusiasm. The position was well chosen. He held a council of war with his three corps commanders, Hardee, Polk, and Hood. Hardee was willing to risk the battle, but Polk and Hood were not, because a portion of Polk's corps could be enfil- aded with the Federal artillery ; so Johnston was persuaded to abandon this fine position and fell back across the Etowah River with Hardee protesting. On the night of the 19th, Sherman sent a despatch to Washington saying that "Johnston retires slowly, leaving nothing and hitting hard if crowded." It was here that Sherman formed his usual line with Thomas in the cen- ter, Schofield on the left, and McPherson on the right.
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On May 21, while here, Sherman reported back to Washing- ton that he had fully eighty thousand fighting men and had ordered the Seventeenth Corps with ten thousand five hundred strong to join him ; this would give him ninety thousand five hundred soldiers. Sherman here gave his army a rest for a few days. On May 23, Sherman put his army in motion again and ran upon General Johnston at Altoona Pass, but finding it too strong for him, determined to flank him out of it by going to the right in the direction of Dallas. General McPherson's army crossed the Etowah River near Kingston, and moved by way of Van Wert to the south of Dallas. Thomas took the road by Burnt Hickory, and Schofield traveled a road a little east, all con- verging on Dallas.
One of Johnston's couriers was captured near Burnt Hickory with a letter on his person, which showed the Yankees that he had detected Sherman's move on Dallas, and was already there and fortifying. General Thomas was pushing.in the direction of Dallas on the Pumpkin Vine Creek road. When in a few miles of Dallas, there was a stragetic point that he was ordered by Sherman to secure; it was where the three roads from Ac- worth, Marietta, and Dallas met, and was known as New Hope · Church.
General Johnston, who was anxious to hold this point, had sent . General Pat Cleburne there with his division of about four thou- sand men. At 4 P. M. on May 27, this one division of four thousand was attacked by four corps of Federals, not less than thirty thousand men in column. The battle lasted for one hour and a half, and resulted in the repulse of the entire Federal col- umn, with a loss of three thousand killed and wounded ; seven hundred of the killed were in forty feet of Cleburne's line. He captured 332 prisoners, and 1,200 stands of small arms. The Confederate loss was eighty-five killed and 363 wounded.
Cleburne's division was composed largely of Tennesseans. Gen. W. A. Quarles, who commanded a Tennessee brigade in this division, received the thanks of General Cleburne for coura- geous fighting of his command. Several of the Yankees charged into Quarles' rifle pits, but none ever came out.
This action came near making Cleburne a Lieutenant-General
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ADJT. JAS. W. THOMAS. See page 424.
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CAPT. B. L. RIDLEY. See page 359.
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afterwards, when Hood was promoted to the command of the Confederate Army operating in Georgia.
On the 28th, while Bate's division was on the left of the army in front of Dallas, he was ordered with his division, viz., the Kentucky Brigade, Tyler's Brigade, and Finley's Florida Brig- ade, to reconoiter the enemy in connection with Armstrong's Cavalry, but the cavalry attack was so strong that Bate's brigade commanders mistook it to be a general assault, and rushed in, and before they could be withdrawn, had lost three hundred men.
After Sherman had made his flank movement to the right some eighteen miles, for two purposes, viz., one, to flank " Old Joe" out of Altoona Pass, and the other, to get him from his line of supplies and the railroad, the two armies seemed to start east to Marietta and the railroad, side by side, throwing up earthworks like two great, mad bulls, each trying to get the advantage of the other. While Bate's division was in front of Dallas, I saw and participated in one of the most terrific skirmish fights of the war.
While this division was lying in their entrenchments one morn- ing early, with a Florida Regiment on a hill guarding our left flank, the Yankees about five-hundred strong, charged the hill and captured it. A Tennessee Regiment was ordered to retake it, which was done in the most gallant style, and then a detail of forty men from the Twentieth Tennessee Regiment was ordered to take position on the hill, after the Tennessee Regiment was withdrawn. If I remember correctly, Lieutenant Mark Sanders was the officer in charge of the forty men from the Twentieth Tennessee. He had scarcely gotten in position before the Yankees returned to the charge, and it was a fight to the finish.
Sanders was fighting between four-hundred and five-hundred men with forty; they assaulted him a number of times, and at one time the contestants fought across a rail pile about four feet through, when one Yankee attempted to scale it, and received five minnie balls and fell dead, and his comrades recoiled. He proved to be a Sergeant in the Twenty-eighth Illinois Regiment, who had just received his company's mail, but had not distributed it yet, and the boys took the letters and sent them back to Col- onel T. B. Smith.
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In about four hours, I, with a detail of forty men, was sent to relieve the gallant Sanders. We had some very warm work, but we did not put up any better fight than Sanders. Late in the evening, Colonel Smith sent word that he would send up a piece of artillery, and at the third shot we must charge the enemy, which was done, and they were driven from the hill down across a small valley that was in corn, for about one mile.
On June 26, General A. P. Stewart's Division was in line about two miles northwest of Dallas, and General Hooker with his corps had just crossed Pumpkin Vine Creek going in the direction of New Hope Church, and ran upon Stewart about two hours before sunset, in a heavy thunder and rain storm. Hooker formed two divisions into three columns, the front of these three lines equalled the front of Stewart's one line.
The Yankees opened with vigor, and by their superior force, continued to advance until they were within fifty paces of Stew- art's line. Here they were compelled to pause, stagger and fall back ; again and again they were hurled against the "Stonewall of the West," who commanded these three brigades that were fighting three times their numbers, and finally made it so hot for this great blue mass, that the Yankees named the place "Hell Hole."
In spite of the heavy fighting along the New Hope line, about Dallas, and Pickett's Mill, and the incessant rains that had been falling for sixteen days, Sherman was extending his line to his left to make connection with Schofield and Stoneman at Acworth, who had come down the railroad through Altoona Gap, all con- centrating at Big Shanty, a railroad station a few miles north of Marietta and Kennesaw mountains. It was on this line at Pine Mountain, June 14, while Generals Johnston, Polk, and Hardee were on an outpost in front of General Bate's division making observations, a Federal Battery stationed some six-hun- dred yards away, down at the foot of the mountain across a small creek, fired at this distinguished groop, and General Polk was killed. I was hotly engaged in a skirmish fight up and down the little creek at the foot of the mountain at the time, and the shot that killed General Polk, passed over my skirmish line, but we knew nothing of it until we were withdrawn.
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Sherman, on June 3, reached Acworth, and his left center under Thomas, with his left wing under Schofield and Stoneman, made connection. His flank movement to the right around by Dallas, and back to the railroad and Kennesaw Mountain, took him about thirty days and cost him several thousand men.
The losses in General Johnston's army, to meet these flank movements on this line, were in Hardee's corps, composed of the divisions of Bate, Cheatham, and Cleburn, 173 killed, 1,048 wounded, total 1,221. Hood's corps, 103 killed, 679 wounded, total 781. Polk's corps, 33 killed, 194 wounded, total 227. Cav- alry, 73 killed, 341 wounded, total 414. Grand total 2.643, to say nothing of prisoners.
The campaign had now been going on a little more than one month, and both armies had received reinforcements. Johnston had received the three divisions of French, Loring, and Canty, which brought Johnston's army up to 60,564 effective men; while Sherman was reinforced with the Seventeenth Army Corps under Blair, and several brigades had joined him that had been off guarding depots. General Sherman said that his reinforcements about equaled his losses, which gave him about the number he started with on May 6-98,000.
About the time that the Yankee Army crossed the Etowah River, Governor Joe Brown, of Georgia, called for the Georgia State troops, which embraced every man from forty-five to fifty- five years of age, and every boy from sixteen to eighteen years of age, and put them under the command of Major-General Gustavus W. Smith, an officer of skill and experience. It was this levy of Governor Brown, consisting of old men and boys, that caused the Yankees to say that the Confederacy was rob- bing "the cradle and the grave."
After the death of that gallant Christian and patriot soldier, Lieut-Gen. Leonidas Polk, on June 14, Gen. W. W. Loring took charge of his corp for a few days, but was afterwards succeeded by that Stonewall of the West, Gen. A. P. Stewart.
On June 19 the Confederate lines were formed in a semi-circle around the north and west of Marietta and Kennesaw Moun- tains, with Hood's Corps between the railroad and the mountain. Loring, who was in command of Polk's Corp, was on top of the
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mountain, and Hardee's Corps swung around south between the branches of Noe's Creek. It was here, while in our rifle pits, that the Yankees threw a shell that exploded in the ranks of the Twentieth Tennessee Regiment that caused the gallant and gen- tlemanly captain, W. G. Ewin, of Company "A," to lose his leg June 27, and the same shell killed and wounded nine out of thirteen men of Company E. The loss of this splendid officer was sad indeed for the regiment.
On the 20th General Garrard, with a division of Yankee Cav- alry, attacked General Joe Wheeler's Cavalry, and was repulsed by Wheeler, who charged him in turn and routed him. This was the biggest cavalry affair of the campaign. Wheeler on Johnston's right, and Gen. W. H. Jackson on his left, were in- dispensable. While the Confederate Army was occupying Kene- saw Mountain, it was a difficult matter to get a cannon on top of Big Kennesaw, but the men of French's division dragged up nine pieces by hand at night, and opened a furious fire on the Yankees at the foot of the mountain, which caused them so much trouble that Sherman determined to silence these nine pieces, so he concentrated against them 100 pieces, and the fire was so terriffic that it cut down the trees on the top of the moun- tain, and swept over its heights toward Marietta, but French's men held their position.
On June 23 the battle of Knobb's Farm was fought between Hooker and Hood, with no decided advantage to either. The fighting was now continuous, the artillery firing was awful, run- ning often up into the night, and the picket firing was such if a soldier showed his head above his breastworks, he was plugged at once. It was this way in both armies.
Sherman had played the game of "flank " so much that his officers and a good portion of the Confederates thought that it was not his policy to charge breastworks. Sherman issued his orders on June 26 for his army to assault Johnston's Army on the 27th. McPherson's and Thomas' Corps struck Loring's and a portion of Hardee's Corps, and were driven back, but the main and direct assault fell on Cheatham's Tennessee division and the left of Cleburne's of Hardee's corp, although the as- saulting lines that were more or less engaged were ten miles
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long. Sherman's assaulting column, at this point, was formed thus : Newton's division of the Fourth Corps, 5,000 strong ; Whittiker's Brigade of Stanly's division, 5,000 strong ; Kirly's Brigade of Stanly's division, 5,000 strong ; two brigades of Woods' division, Fourth Corps, 5,000 strong ; Kemball's Brigade, in reserve for this part of the line, 5.000 strong ; Davis' division, 6,500 strong, with Graves' Brigade in the reserve line, this made an assaulting column seven lines deep, numbering not less than 35,000 men ; while the Confederates had engaged all of Cheat- ham's division, about 4,000, and about 2,000 of Cleburne's-a total of 6,000. The lines of the two armies at this point were close together, so when the Yankees were formed and moved forward the action began at close range. The Yankees were seven lines deep and led by gallant officers ; they came forward with a rush like a great blue cloud of Egyptian flies. Their front lines began to melt from their first step, but onward they came over their dead and dying. Their front lines had now grown thin, and began to recoil; their rear line pushed on in this mad vortex of human destruction. As this great blue wave was about to reach the earthworks of this Spartan band, a Rebel yell of defiance rolled heavenward that said to the other portion of the Confederate lines that the immortal Cheatham and the tenacious Cleburne were here to do or die. Maney's Brigade held the salient, which was the deadliest point on the line. It was defended by Maney's Brigade of Tennesseans, commanded by Col. F. M. Walker, of the Nineteenth Tennessee, and nobly did they sustain the fighting reputation of the Volunteer State.
The Yankees themselves named this point "Dead Angle." The two divisions alone of Blair and Davis lost 1,580. Sherman says that he lost in this assault 3,000 men, and that Brigadier- General McCook and nearly every field officer of his brigade were killed. In front of Maney's Brigade lay dead 385 Yankees, and in front of Vaughn's 415. Gen. George H. Thomas re- ported that the loss in the centre of the Federal Army alone, for the month of June, was 5,747,, three-fourths of which occurred at "Dead Angle."
On the 29th a truce was agreed to, and the Yankees were per-
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mitted to bury their dead near the Confederate breastworks, against which some of the Federal dead were lying.
Gen. Joe Johnston said of this assault, that "it lasted for forty-five minutes, and there were more dead men in front of Cheatham and Cleburne than were in front of Jackson at the celebrated battle of New Orleans," and we must remember that it was mostly Tennesseans that did the work for General Pack- enharm and his "Red Coats " at New Orleans ; so it was mostly Tennesseans that did the work for Sherman and the "Blue Coats " at Dead Angle.
In this engagement the Yankees ran upon entrenched soldiers that were equal to Napoleon's Old Guard, or the "Red Coats" that followed Wellington out of Spain into France. Hardee's Corps lost in killed and wounded 286, and Loring's Corps, 236 ; total, 522.
Sherman had now failed in his great assault on "Old Joe's" lines in front of Marietta and Kennesaw, which lasted for twenty-six days, and was compelled to go back to his flank- ing by superior forces. This twenty-six days on this line cost Johnston 3,948 men, and Sherman nearly 10,000. Sherman, on the night of July 2, ordered McPherson from the front of Ken- nesaw, to extend his lines to the left of Schofield on to the Chat- tahoochee River, and on the morning of July 3 Johnston with- drew from Kennesaw back to a line just north of the Chattahoo- chee at Smyrna Station. On July 4 Hood's Corps was pressed by the enemy, and Cheatham's division was sent to his assistance, when one of Cheatham's most gallant brigadier-generals, A. J. Vaughn, lost his leg. He was a soldier on whom Cheatham could always rely. On July 7 Gen. A. P. Stewart was appointed Lieutenant-General, and put in command of Polk's old corps, and General Loring returned to his division.
In this appointment the names of Generals Loring, French, Cheatham, and Cleburne were all considered ; the two latter having won great distinction, one at New Hope Church, and the other at Kennesaw Mountain.
On July 7, two corps of Sherman's army crossed the Chatta- hoochee near the mouth of Soap Creek, and effected a lodgment on the south bank. Johnston withdrew across the Chattahoo-
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chee on the night of July 9, and took position in a semi-circu- lar line between Atlanta and the river, and everything was comparatively quiet until the 17th, when a large portion of the Federal Army had crossed over ; and on the evening of July 17, the Confederates that were campaigning in Georgia re- ceived their death blow. An order was received from the War Office at Richmond that our beloved commander was relieved from the command of our army of Tennessee, and Lieutenant- General John B. Hood put in command. I never witnessed as sad sights as I saw here. Great stalwart, sun-burnt soldiers by the thousands would be seen falling out of line, squatting down by a tree or in a fence corner, weeping like children. This act of the War Department threw a damper over this army from which it never recovered, for "Old Joe," as we called him, was our idol. Whatever "Old Joe" said was right ; if he said, "fall back," it was right ; if he said, "Boys, halt, and let's give them battle," it was right. If we were ragged, barefooted, and half fed, the boys would say : "Old Joe is doing the best he can," and you heard no complaint.
Hood was now in command, and the Confederate Army had withdrawn to the south bank of the Chattahoochee River, with the Yankee Army on the north bank, with the exception of Scho- field, who had crossed over near the mouth of Soap Creek. The two armies remained quiet until the 16th, when General Thomas crossed his corps over at Pace's and Power's Ferries, and en- camped on the Buck Head Road that led to Atlanta.
General McPherson crossed at Roswell's Ford further up the river, and directed his operations across the country to strike the Georgia Railroad south of Atlanta between Decatur and Stone Mountain. It was this move of McPherson's that brought on the battle of the 22nd of July.
On the 17th and 18th, the whole of Sherman's Army, except his cavalry, lined up on the old Peach Tree Creek Road. It was here that the Twentieth Tennessee Regiment was sent across Peach Tree Creek on the 16th on picket duty, and remained there until the morning of the 17th, when the Second Tennessee Regiment was sent over to relieve us, and the Twentieth Ten- nessee Regiment was withdrawn across the creek to get a little
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sleep. The Second Tennessee Regiment had not been on duty but a short while until they were assaulted by a largely superior force, and about one half of the regiment were killed, wounded, and captured. The Twentieth Tennessee Regiment was hastily aroused from sleep, thrown into line, and checked the enemy at the creek.
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After Hood was put in command of the Confederate Army on the 17th, Cheatham was placed in command of Hood's Corps. Hood's three corps cammanders were Hardee, Stewart, and Cheatham. On the 18th, as the army of the Cumberland under Thomas was crossing Peach Tree Creek, Hood thought he could catch them in detail, and ordered an attack to begin at I P. M., but on account of some delay it did not begin until 4 P. M., and was not a success, but a heavy loss. On the 21st, Thomas moved up and felt of Hood's lines on Peach Tree Creek, with Schofield to his left and McPherson still further on Scho- field's left, occupying Decatur, a little village six miles southeast of Atlanta on the Georgia State Railroad, and had torn up sev- eral miles of the road.
McPherson had in his immediate command the Fifteenth Corps under John A. Logan, Sixteenth under General Dodge, Seven- teenth under Blair, and Schofield connecting with his right at the Howard House. Hood was now forced to his great flank movement. On the night of the 21st, Hardee's and Cheatham's Corps were moved from the Peach Tree Creek line through At- lanta south out the McDonough Road about six miles, then turn- ing to the left, crossed a little stream called South River. ( It was down this road about five miles that I had a little red-headed, black-eyed sweetheart, and that night, about two o'clock, I passed her house wondering what to-morrow would bring forth.)
Hardee's orders were to attack at daylight, but we did not get in position until twelve o'clock on the 22nd. We advanced to the attack about 2 P. M. It was Hardee's and Cheatham's Corps assaulting three Federal corps behind earthworks.
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