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Updated: June 14, 2025
Stoneman, who had crossed the Etowah with his division of horse at Shellman's Ford on the 22d, and covered the laying of the pontoon bridges at Milam's, went back to look after a raid by the Confederate cavalry at Cass Station, and was not able to return to his position south of the river until the evening of the 24th, when he scouted the road toward Allatoona.
On the other side of the Allatoona range, the Pumpkin-Vine Creek, also a tributary of the Etowah, flowed north and west; Dallas, the point aimed at, was a small town on the other or east side of this creek, and was the point of concentration of a great many roads that led in every direction.
For the purposes of rest, to give time for the repair of the railroads, and to replenish supplies, we lay by some few days in that quarter Schofield with Stoneman's cavalry holding the ground at Cassville Depot, Cartersville, and the Etowah Bridge; Thomas holding his ground near Cassville, and McPherson that near Kingston.
I had ridden the distance on horseback, and had noted well the topography of the country, especially that about Kenesaw, Allatoona, and the Etowah River.
Hood was assigned to the right at the church, and Polk had the interval in the centre, upon the main road they had travelled from Allatoona. The line was along the ridge dividing the headwaters of Pumpkin Vine Creek, which flows northward into the Etowah, from the sources of the Sweetwater and Powder-spring creeks which empty into the Chattahoochee at the south.
The two most important bridges on the railroad were now safe, those crossing the Chattahoochee and the Etowah; and as Forrest had failed to reach the line from Chattanooga to Nashville, Hood's plan of campaign had failed and Sherman's communications were unbroken.
He was vigorously pursued, and was overtaken at Cassville on the 19th, but during the ensuing night retreated across the Etowah. While these operations were going on, General Jefferson C. Davis's division of Thomas's army was sent to Rome, capturing it with its forts and artillery, and its valuable mills and foundries.
If he tries to get on our road, this side of the Etowah, I shall attack him; but if he goes to the Selma & Talladega road, why will it not do to leave Tennessee to the forces which Thomas has, and the reserves soon to come to Nashville, and for me to destroy Atlanta and march across Georgia to Savannah or Charleston, breaking roads and doing irreparable damage? We cannot remain on the defensive.
Fortunately "nobody was hurt on our side." The truck was soon placed on the road again; enough hands were left to repair the track, and with all the power of determined will and muscle, they pushed on to Etowah Station, some twenty miles above. Here, most fortunately, Major Cooper's old coal engine, the "Yonah" one of the first engines on the State road was standing out, fired up.
Canby and Thomas should penetrate Alabama as far as possible, to keep employed at least a part of Hood's army; or, what would accomplish the same thing, Thomas might reoccupy the railroad from Chattanooga forward to the Etowah, viz., Rome, Kingston, and Allatoona, thereby threatening Georgia. I know that the Georgia troops are disaffected.
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