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These shots could barely reach Chattanooga, and I was told that one or more shot had struck a hospital inside the lines. All along Missionary Ridge were the tents of the rebel beleaguering force; the lines of trench from Lookout up toward the Chickamauga were plainly visible; and rebel sentinels, in a continuous chain, were walking their posts in plain view, not a thousand yards off.
An intelligent, quick-eyed, sunburned boy, without an ounce of surplus flesh on face or limbs, which had been reduced to gray-hound condition by the labors and anxieties of the months of battling between Chattanooga and Atlanta, seemed to be the accepted talker of the crowd, since all the rest looked at him, as if expecting him to answer for them.
The Rebels having greatly superior numbers, were enabled to extend their lines, so that our army was in imminent danger of being outflanked; and at one time they had nearly succeeded in cutting off our communication with Chattanooga. But General Rosencrans had anticipated this, and had made preparations to check the movement, which was successfully done, but not without great loss.
The enemy had meanwhile concentrated most of his forces at Chattanooga for the twofold purpose of holding this gateway of the Cumberland Mountains, and to assume a defensive attitude which would enable him to take advantage of such circumstances as might arise in the development of the offensive campaign he knew we must make.
On the 12th, with a full staff, I started from Kingston for Atlanta; and about noon of that day we reached Cartersville, and sat on the edge of a porch to rest, when the telegraph operator, Mr. Van Valkenburg, or Eddy, got the wire down from the poles to his lap, in which he held a small pocket instrument. Calling "Chattanooga," he received this message from General Thomas, dated
Thomas, in the meantime, was making his preparations to receive Hood. The road to Chattanooga was still well guarded with strong garrisons at Murfreesboro, Stevenson, Bridgeport and Chattanooga. Thomas had previously given up Decatur and had been reinforced by A. J. Smith's two divisions just returned from Missouri.
In person I proceeded by Sweden's Cove and Battle Creek, reaching Bridgeport on the night of November 13th. I immediately telegraphed to the commanding general my arrival, and the positions of my several divisions, and was summoned to Chattanooga. I took the first steamboat daring the night of the 14th for Belly's Ferry, and rode into Chattanooga on the 16th.
As soon as I learned that Davis was across I pushed on, but the delay had permitted the enemy to pull his rear-guard up on the mountain, and rendered nugatory all further efforts to hurt him materially, our only returns consisting in forcing him to relinquish a small amount of transportation and forage at the mouth of the pass just beyond Cowan, a station on the line of the Nashville and Chattanooga railroad.
It was General Mitchell of the Federal army who planned the advance; and it was J. J. Andrews, an active spy in the Union service, who planned a raid by means of which it was intended to burn the bridges on the road north of Marietta, cut the telegraph wires, and thus destroy for a time the lines of transportation and communication between Atlanta and Chattanooga, and make the capture of the last-named point an easy matter.
When Sherman assumed command of the Division of the Mississippi, about eighty carloads a day was the limit of the capacity of the road and the delivery at Chattanooga. It was only half of what was needed to insure rapid progress of the campaign.
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