General John Bell Hood’s Confederate Army of Tennessee remained at Lovejoy’s Station, 20 miles south of Atlanta, where Hood hoped to retake the offensive against Major-General William T. Sherman’s Federal armies. However, he was still without his main cavalry force, which had gone north in August to unsuccessfully disrupt Sherman’s supply line. This had left Hood without adequate reconnaissance at a time when he needed it most.
Led by Major-General Joseph Wheeler, the cavalry ended their raid early this month in northern Alabama. Wheeler reported that his men had “averaged 25 miles a day (and) swam or forded 27 rivers.” They seized “1,000 horses and mules, 200 wagons, 600 prisoners, and 1,700 head of beef cattle” while they “captured, killed, or wounded three times the greatest effective strength it has ever been able to carry into action.”
However, Federal repair crews quickly fixed the railroad tracks that Wheeler’s men had wrecked, and Sherman experienced no supply problems. And Wheeler ended up in Alabama, where he could do little good for Hood’s army at Lovejoy’s Station. Also, Georgia Governor Joseph E. Brown granted furloughs to all state militia “to return to their homes and look for a time after other important interests.” This left Hood even more shorthanded.
But Hood resolved to go on the offensive regardless. On September 21, he began moving his Confederates to Palmetto, 20 miles west. This put them southwest of Atlanta, where they could easily move north and destroy Sherman’s supply and communication lines. As Hood explained his reasoning to his superiors at Richmond, “Sherman is weaker now than he will be in the future, and I as strong as I can expect to be.” But a move of this kind would leave central Georgia open to Sherman’s army.
Hood’s move was also meant to block Sherman from getting to the Federal prisoner of war camp at Andersonville in southwestern Georgia. Confederate officials had long feared that the 30,000 inmates there could be freed to reinforce Sherman’s army. Those officials did not know that the prisoners were too emaciated for service. In late September, Confederate officials began transferring the Andersonville inmates to a prison in Florida to better guard against a Federal breakout attempt.
Some Andersonville inmates had managed to escape and make it into Sherman’s lines nonetheless. According to Sherman:
“They described their sad condition: more than twenty-five thousand prisoners confined in a stockade designed for only ten thousand; debarred the privilege of gathering wood out of which to make huts; deprived of sufficient healthy food, and the little stream that ran through their prison pen poisoned and polluted by the offal from their cooking and butchering houses above… On the 22d of September I wrote to General Hood… asking his consent for me to procure from our generous friends at the North the articles of clothing and comfort which they wanted… and an officer to issue them… General Hood, on the 24th, promptly consented…”
Sherman continued scouting Hood’s movements in late September. He wrote to Chief of Staff Henry W. Halleck on the 25th: “Hood seems to be moving, as it were, to the Alabama line, leaving open the road to Macon, as also to Augusta; but his cavalry is busy on all our roads… If I were sure that Savannah would soon be in our possession, I should be tempted to march for Milledgeville and Augusta; but I must first secure what I have…”
Sherman then warned his superiors that President Jefferson Davis was in Georgia trying to raise troops to oppose him. General-in-Chief Ulysses S. Grant initially wrote Sherman on the 26th, “Jeff Davis was in Richmond on last Thursday. This I think is beyond doubt.” However, Sherman’s scouts confirmed that Davis had given a speech to Hood’s Confederates at Palmetto Station. This speech divulged Hood’s plans and gave Sherman a strategic edge. Sherman wrote to President Abraham Lincoln:
“Great efforts are being made to reenforce Hood’s army, and to break up my railroads, and I should have at once a good reserve force at Nashville. It would have a bad effect, if I were forced to send back any considerable part of my army to guard roads, so as to weaken me to an extent that I could not act offensively if the occasion calls for it.”
The day after assuring Sherman that Davis was still in Richmond, Grant wrote: “It is evident, from the tone of the Richmond press and from other sources of information, that the enemy intend making a desperate effort to drive you from where you are. I have directed all new troops from the West, and from the East too, if necessary, in case none are ready in the West, to be sent to you.”
Grant sent a second message on the same day: “I have directed all recruits and new troops from all the Western States to be sent to Nashville, to receive their further orders from you. I was mistaken about Jeff. Davis being in Richmond on Thursday last. He was then on his way to Macon.” As the month ended, Sherman detached a corps from one of his armies to go back and guard the supply line at Chattanooga. Sherman also continued monitoring Hood’s movements.
Bibliography
- Castel, Albert (Patricia L. Faust ed.), Historical Times Illustrated Encyclopedia of the Civil War. New York: Harper & Row, 1986.
- Foote, Shelby, The Civil War, A Narrative: Red River to Appomattox. New York: Vintage Civil War Library, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group (Kindle Edition), 2011.
- Grant, Ulysses S., Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant. New York: Da Capo Press, 1982 (original 1885, republication of 1952 edition).
- McFeely, William S., Grant. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1981.
- Nevin, David, Sherman’s March: Atlanta to the Sea. Alexandria, VA: Time-Life Books, 1983.
- Sherman, William T., Memoirs of General William T. Sherman, Vol. I. New York: D. Appleton and Co. (Kindle Edition), 1889.