The Confederate Nation: 1861 to 1865 (40 page)

During the winter the Union, too, had made changes in command and organization. Lincoln had finally found a general who shared his instincts, and so the Union President made Grant commander of all his armies. Grant in turn placed his old associate Sherman in command at Chattanooga. Meade retained command of the Army of the Potomac, but Grant joined that army, pitched his tent next to Meade’s, and prepared to confront Lee. Grant accepted an essentially two-front war, in Georgia and in Virginia. He might have strained the Confederacy more had he opened still more fronts; he decided to maintain as much pressure as possible elsewhere but to concentrate upon the destruction of the South’s two field armies. He ordered simultaneous drives on Johnston in Georgia and on Lee in Virginia, both to commence during the first week of May.
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The twin assaults began first at the Rapidan. On May 4 the Army of the Potomac surged across the river and plunged into the Wilderness, an area of thick undergrowth and second-growth timber between Chancellorsville and Mine Run. Lee chose not to contest the crossing. Southern troops did challenge Grant’s exodus through the Wilderness, however, in strength. The tangled growth minimized the weight of numbers and thus favored the Confederates, who thwarted their enemies at the two major roads and at hundreds of isolated clearings. Battle raged for two days and ended with the Southern lines intact. Previously Hooker had withdrawn after a similar blood bath at Chancellorsville, and Meade had not risked battle (Mine Run). Grant, however, determined to press the issue.

Lee felt more than knew that “those people” would try to flank his right. Thus began a race to Spotsylvania Court House, where the bloody process at Wilderness repeated itself with like results. After fighting from May 8 to 21, the Army of Northern Virginia still held the crucial road junction leading south to Richmond. Again, however, the enemy sidestepped east and pressed forward.
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Meanwhile the Federals had mounted a cavalry raid on Richmond. J. E. B. Stuart’s Confederates had ridden to the rescue and intercepted the blue horsemen. But the action at Yellow Tavern cost the South Stuart, who received a mortal wound in the aftermath of the battle. Throughout Southern armies the cavalry had deteriorated, owing primarily to the decline in the quality of Confederate horseflesh. At Yellow Tavern, the loss of the flamboyant Stuart compounded the South’s problems; in the cavalry and elsewhere many talented leaders were dead, and they were more difficult to replace than cavalry mounts.
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Grant and Lee collided again at the tiny crossroads of Cold Harbor. The area had been a battlefield before, during McClellan’s peninsula campaign in 1862, and in itself Second Cold Harbor was no more decisive than First Cold Harbor. This time the Federals came head on at entrenched Confederates. Fifteen minutes on June 1 essentially decided the action; men could not live on open ground in the face of men in trenches. Again the Army of Northern Virginia stoutly barred the way to Richmond, but Lee’s army had been marching and fighting almost constantly for a month. The Confederates had inflicted 60,000 casualties upon their enemies, 2,000 per day, almost as many casualties as the total Southern strength. Still “those people” did not relent.

For a crucial few days Lee lost his opponent. Perhaps Stuart could have found Grant’s army and discerned its intentions; perhaps not. Federal cavalry blocked all attempts on the part of Lee’s horsemen to sense their enemies. Then suddenly Grant’s purpose became clear. The bulk of the Federal force was crossing the James River and heading for Petersburg. Lee was not surprised; he had feared McClellan would do the same thing in 1862. Nevertheless the situation was critical, and the Army of Northern Virginia was unprepared. Petersburg was about twenty to twenty-five miles south of Richmond; should Grant be able to capture the town, he would have the Confederate capital and Lee’s base of supply in a state of semisiege. Without Petersburg, Lee and Richmond would have only one railroad in and out of the capital, and it would be a mere matter of time before Grant’s host cut those tracks, too.

Lee moved troops as rapidly as possible to meet the threat to Petersburg. Beauregard was closest and on June 15 fortified the town with just 2,400 troops. On June 16, only 4,000 Confederates held out against 48,000 attackers. The numbers increased on both sides during the next two days. The Confederates held. Then Grant settled down to siege operations against Petersburg which would consume the armies on the Virginia front for almost the duration of the war. Lee had no choice but to accept the siege.
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In 1862, when the threat of siege was imminent, both Davis and Lee were prepared to abandon the capital in order to save the army. Now, however, the army had no hope of survival in open country; the Confederates had to have trenches to offset the superior numbers against them. The Confederates had to remain in one place in order to have logistical support; Southern supply and transportation facilities were no longer able to sustain a maneuvering field army of any size, and Richmond had become more than a political objective. The capital was crucial, not only as a center of war industry and a base of supply for the army, but also as the last hope for faltering Southern national morale. Richmond had served as a military magnet before, luring enemy armies onto killing grounds in 1861, 1862, and 1863. In 1864, though, Richmond was a military millstone around Lee’s neck. The Army of Northern Virginia and indeed the Confederacy could not live without the city. But every day the Confederates remained in their trenches, they were accept-, ing a war of attrition—and such a war they could not hope to win.
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By the time Lee and Grant settled into siege operations before Petersburg, the campaign in the west had developed a similar pattern which, unfortunately for the Confederacy, promised similar results. Sherman put his vast force in motion on May 7 and attempted to occupy Johnston’s attention in the mountain passes between Chattanooga and Dalton while slipping a flanking army into the Confederate rear at Resaca. The Army of Tennessee was dependent upon Atlanta as a base of supply and upon the Western and Atlantic (W & A) Railroad for the transport of those supplies. Thus Sherman and Johnston both knew that the Confederates would have to respond to any Federal threat to the W & A and that if the response were unsuccessful, the Army of Tennessee would quickly become impotent. This time Johnston was too clever for Sherman; when the Federals reached Resaca on May 14 they found entrenched Southern troops ready to meet them.

Sherman tried again, and again Johnston was ready, at Cassville. Then it was Johnston’s turn. The Confederate general sent Polk’s corps off into the Southwest hoping to make Sherman believe that Polk’s dust represented the entire Army of Tennessee. Johnston then entrenched his remaining corps (John Bell Hood’s and William J. Hardee’s) along the route of march down the W & A tracks. Sherman was deceived, sending Thomas and James B. McPherson after Polk’s dust and leaving John M. Schofield’s Army of the Ohio to continue the march down, the W & A and into Johnston’s trap. The Southerners had a golden opportunity to annihilate a Union army of about 17,000 men, but at the crucial juncture Hood believed the enemy was about to flank his troops and revealed his position and strength. Accordingly Sherman again concentrated his forces, and Johnston had to fall back once more.

Next Sherman abandoned the rail line and pressed his entire army westward in an effort to flank the Confederates. Once again Johnston was too quick and the armies collided at New Hope Church. The battle was inconclusive, and Sherman then fought his way back to the railroad. Finally, after days of June rains and closequarter fighting, the Federals pushed the Southerners back to Kennesaw Mountain. On June 27, Sherman repeated Grant’s mistake at Cold Harbor; he attempted to run over entrenched Confederates. The Southerners stood firm and after a bloody morning Sherman called a halt to the slaughter.
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Toward the middle of July, Sherman began again to test the Confederates with wide flanking movements. This time when Johnston withdrew he crossed the Chattahoochee River and formed his defensive line along Peachtree Creek on the outskirts of Atlanta. To reach this point the enemy had taken seventy-four days and suffered 25,000 casualties. As a withdrawal and delaying action, Johnston’s campaign was brilliant. Yet Jefferson Davis wanted more than delay and retreat from Johnston. The President hoped for an offensive, and he did not want to lose Atlanta, the last major rail link between Richmond and the gulf South. Davis, therefore, sent Bragg as his personal representative to find out what Johnston intended to do next. Sending Bragg to inspect his old army was a bad idea, and asking Johnston for his plans only rekindled the general’s suspicions of his President. The meeting between Bragg and Johnston was formally cordial but less than encouraging. Johnston was reluctant to reveal his strategy to anyone, much less to Bragg. Hence Davis decided to make a change in commanders. On July 17, Johnston received a curt telegram informing him that he was no longer in command; Johnston’s replacement was Hood.
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John Bell Hood was a fighting general; few men questioned that. Yet many, including Lee, questioned Hood’s judgment. Furthermore Hood was by this time a physical wreck. Having lost the use of both an arm and a leg, he was often in pain and had to be tied to his horse in order to ride. But Hood accepted command of the Army of Tennessee and accepted also an obvious mandate from the President for offensive action. He determined to give Davis a fight; probably he also fought to prove himself to himself and to his young love in Richmond, Sally “Buck” Preston.
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Just forty-eight hours after assuming command, Hood hurled his army into action. On July 20 the Confederates attempted to destroy Thomas’ force as it crossed Peachtree Creek. The battle was inconclusive. Next day Hood turned about and struck McPherson’s Federals as they pressed in upon Atlanta from the east. The Confederates killed McPherson, but again the battle was inconclusive. On July 28 the Southerners attacked once more, at Ezra Church, but again to no lasting effect.

After this week of furious fighting the campaign became a siege. Hood’s battered troops took up positions in Atlanta’s trenches, and Sherman’s men began moving on the railroads which led into the city. The siege continued for a month. On August 28, Hood became aware that Sherman was about to capture the Macon Railroad line. Characteristically he led his army forth to battle; he lost at Jonesboro, and on September 2 the Federals took possession of Atlanta.
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This time the President came in person to inspect his western army. Davis found Hood prepared to fight some more, and the two discussed the Confederacy’s next move. The Army of Tennessee was steadfast, but the battles for Atlanta alone had cost the army 27,500 casualties, and both Johnston’s and Hood’s campaigns had demonstrated that Sherman was just too strong. Hence Hood and Davis agreed that the Army of Tennessee should return home to Tennessee. Hood hoped to seize Sherman’s supply line at Chattanooga and, failing that, at least to draw the enemy out of Georgia and await a favorable opportunity to fight him.
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In late September, Hood led the march north, and Davis returned to his beleaguered capital. The situation there was little changed from mid-June. Lee’s army remained in its holes and hoped that the enemy would tire or commit a blunder enabling the Confederates to attack him.

Thus by the fall of 1864 the major campaigns had gone against the Confederacy. Atlanta had fallen, and the Army of Tennessee wandered back over the familiar ground of its former campaigns a much weakened force. Richmond survived and would survive longer, but the Army of Northern Virginia was no longer capable of maneuvering against the enemy except, in the end, to flee.

Significantly in 1864 while the attention of most of the world focused upon the major military themes—the campaigns for Richmond and Atlanta—the Confederate’s war developed a disturbing minor theme. The war became base and desperate, and the baseness and desperation produced a kind of counterpoint, a sad, minor theme to accompany the major chords. To be sure, the war had never been the grand parade which Southerners had expected in 1861. Even before 1864, men such as Quantrill had embraced the aspect of premeditated brutality even as President Davis bewailed atrocities committed by the North. However in 1864 the meanness mounted and threatened to become a major theme.

On March 1 two columns of Union cavalry attempted to enter Richmond. Early in the morning a large force commanded by Colonel Judson Kilpatrick threatened from the east. Then in the late afternoon a smaller body of mounted troopers commanded by Colonel Ulric Dahlgren advanced in the midst of a sleet storm from the west. On both occasions contingents of “home guards” drove off the raiders. The two thrusts at the city were designed to be simultaneous, and the Confederates rejoiced at their enemies’ lack of coordination. A short time later more home-guard units ambushed Dahlgren’s column as it attempted to reach Union lines on the peninsula. Dahlgren was killed in the first volley from the ambushers, and a small boy named William Littlepage ran from his hiding place to rifle the dead Colonel’s pockets. Littlepage was looking for a pocket watch. He found none but did take Dahlgren’s cigar case. When Littlepage opened the case, he discovered what appeared to be the draft of a speech from Dahlgren to his men.

We hope to release the prisoners from Belle Island [prison camp at Richmond] first, and having seen them fairly started, we will cross the James River into Richmond, destroying the bridges after us, and exhorting the released prisoners to destroy and burn the hateful city, and do not allow the Rebel leader, Davis, and his traitorous crew to escape.
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Richmond responded to Littlepage’s discovery with righteous indignation. Newspaper editors proposed hanging the captives from Dahlgren’s unit. Lee termed the raid a “barbarous and inhuman plot” and demanded an explanation from Meade. The Union general called the entire incident a hoax and protested that his army did not wage war on civilians.