FROM ATLANTA TO RALEIGH.

BY COLONEL CHARLES D. KERR,

SIXTEENTH ILLINOIS CAVALRY, U. S. VOLUNTEERS.

THE estimate here given of certain leading characters in the Atlanta campaign is purely matter of private opinion, expressed in postulate form for brevity's sake. I am aware that the estimate in some cases is not the popular one; it is simply the result of such means and opportunities for judging as I have possessed.

There were few more competent or successful division commanders in the Confederate army than J. B. Hood. Naturally quick, with keen perceptive faculties, and brave even to rashness; taught by such a master as Jackson, and in such a school as the Virginia campaign, he became, perhaps, the most brilliant and accomplished tactician in the corps of that great leader. Beyond this he never advanced, but remained a tactician merely to the end of his career. It was unfortunate both for the Army of North Virginia and the Army of Mississippi when he was raised from his legitimate position of division commander to the head of an independent army.

General Joseph E. Johnston was, I think, the ablest strategist in the Southern army south of Virginia, if not, indeed, in that army without geographical distinction. Wary, far-seeing, prudent to a degree, and cau

tious almost to the verge of timidity, he was peculiarly adapted to defensive warfare. An army in almost any predicament was safe in his hands from overwhelming disaster.

The retreat of Johnston from Dalton to Atlanta was a series of strategic moves, always to the rear, but without the loss of a gun or a wagon, or, as it seemed to us, even a cartridge-box. The consummate skill of these movements challenged the admiration of his foes, and at the same time excited their gratitude for escape from telling blows, which certainly, in more than one instance, seemed to have been overlooked by Johnston in the supreme effort to safely withdraw his army.

I shall always believe that it was a fortunate thing for the army of General Sherman that the strategy of Johnston and the tactical efficiency of Hood were not united in one commander at Cassville and New Hope Church.

Hood was lamentably wanting in strategy. Johnston was just as deficient in that prompt and vigorous aggressiveness which dares to put its fortune to the touch to win or lose it all.

Johnston was always a devotee of the breastwork. Hood despised and eschewed it altogether. Johnston affirmed that it prevented the useless sacrifice of life and supplemented deficiency in numbers. Hood contended that it impaired the morale of the men, and insidiously instilled into them the idea that they could hold their ground only by the aid of such material assistance.

There will always be difference of opinion as to the proper use of intrenchments. They are legitimate, cer

tainly, when the object is simply to hold the opposing force in check. They are oftentimes invaluable where the purpose is to hold a part of the line with a small force while the enemy is assailed by the rest of the army. But I am satisfied that the constant and systematic use of intrenchments is not the school from which the highest type of the soldier graduates.

In the situation of Johnston's army the preparing of strongly fortified works in the rear in advance of each retrograde movement was almost equivalent to a predetermination to fall back to them, which was invariably done until the army reached Atlanta and Johnston was superseded by Hood.

So critical a situation would have paralyzed a greater mind than Hood's. The night of August 25, 1864, was a dark and sultry one. My regiment was occupying a portion of the first line, close to the works of the enemy on the southwestern side of Atlanta. Shortly after dark we quietly packed the few dog-tents and equipments allowed to the soldiers at that stage of the war, and, leaving a vigorous skirmish-line to keep up appearances, silently stole away with a portion of the army on a swift march to Jonesboro', while the rest of the troops retired behind the Chattahoochie, as though in abandonment of the siege.

Hood was completely deceived. Jonesboro' was captured at the point of the bayonet, and Atlanta fell from force of circumstances which Hood failed to control. I consider this the most brilliant strategic move of the campaign. It took brains to conceive it and nerve to carry it out.

In all probability, if Johnston had remained in com

mand at Atlanta this move would not have succeeded, possibly would not have been made, but Atlanta would have fallen just the same, and probably just as quickly and with as little loss of life.

The movement around to Jonesboro' was simply adapting means to changed conditions, which is also a test of fitness to lead.

At the commencement of the campaign of 1864 the objective of Sherman was not necessarily Atlanta, but rather the army of Johnston in the field. Had that general seen fit to fall back by way of Rome to Central Alabama or Mississippi doubtless Sherman would have followed, and Atlanta would have remained, for the time at least, and perhaps altogether, like Augusta, the object of feints rather than direct investment. The capture of the city, with its manufactories and munitions of war, doubtless emphasized the sentiment which had been growing in the Northern army, that the destruction of the means of supply would as effectually end the Rebellion as the destruction of the rebel armies. In this view alone did the capture of Atlanta justify its cost. Its destruction was an immense injury to the South. Its occupation by the North, for strategic or other purposes, was entirely impracticable.

The inexorable logic of the situation justified measures which otherwise might have seemed harsh. It would have been incongruous and absurd for Sherman to have used his single line of road, already taxed to its utmost to feed his own army, in bringing supplies four hundred miles, to feed the wives and children of the men who were fighting him and his country.

There was no difference of opinion as to what should

be done with Atlanta; what to do with the army was the problem to be solved. Hood had left our front and was menacing our communications. These must be preserved at all hazards, for the present at least, and the work of their preservation is matter of history. The turning-point came when Hood abandoned the attempt to cut off our supplies, and struck out for new fields of conquest with his base of supplies at Decatur.

Nowhere in his history do the qualities of Sherman, as a military leader, shine so brightly as at this crisis. The soldier, like the poet, is born not made. Genius is always self-reliant, and, as Schiller says of Gustavus Adolphus, self-reliance in such a man is the parent of success. Military science, caution, and the advice of superiors as well as subordinates, still pointed to the army of Hood as the true objective-point. General Grant says, "On the 1st of November I suggested to Sherman the propriety of destroying Hood before he started on his campaign." Thomas wrote from Nashville, "I hope you will adopt Grant's idea of turning Wilson loose, rather than undertake the plan of a march with the whole force through Georgia to the sea." But Sherman knowing Hood as he did, and knowing Thomas also as he did, with that intuitive forecast which is born of genius, was quite content to let Hood invite his own destruction at the hands of the hero of Chickamauga, while the main army sought a new base for both supplies and operations.

The policy of all great minds is to a certain extent controlled by events, but it would be unjust to Sherman and to history to say that his great campaign of 1864-65 was the result of any fortuitous circumstances; it was