the Thirteenth Illinois Volunteers; while in the list of wounded appeared the names of Brigadier-Generals Giles A. Smith, J. M. Corse, and Matthias; Colonel Baum, Fifty-sixth Illinois; Colonel Wangeline, Twelfth Missouri Volunteers; LieutenantColonel Patridge, Thirteenth Illinois Volunteers; Major P. J. Welch, Fifty-sixth Illinois Volunteers; and Major M. Allen, Tenth Iowa Volunteers. Lieutenant-Colonel Archer, Seventeenth Iowa, was reported missing.

The army which eight days before had lain besieged, and barely subsisting behind the Missionary range, had shaken off its enemy, broken his strength and his spirit, pushed his shattered forces out of reach, and was returning to its camps holding the keys of the whole central region, and of the gates of Georgia.

CHAPTER XII.

THE RELIEF OF KNOXVILLE.-REORGANIZING.

It was General Grant's desire to continue the pursuit, but Burnside was closely beleaguered at Knoxville and Longstreet was steadily pushing his approaches. The commanderin-chief had instructed Burnside to hold on to the last. "I can hardly conceive," he wrote, "the necessity of retreating from East Tennessee. If I did it at all, it would be after losing most of the army, and then necessity would suggest the route. I will not attempt to lay out a line of retreat."

On the 3d of December, according to General Burnside's report, the supplies would be exhausted. Elliott's division of cavalry had already started for Knoxville, and Granger had been ordered thither with the Fourth Corps. Finding that the latter moved slowly and without energy, on the 28th of November, General Grant decided to send Sherman with his command, and accordingly gave him orders to take Granger's troops and his own, and go with all possible dispatch to the relief of the besieged garrison.

A large part of Sherman's command had marched from Memphis, had gone into battle immediately on arriving at Chattanooga, and had had no rest since. In the late campaign officers and men had carried no luggage or provisions. The week before, they had left their camps, on the right bank of the Tennessee, with only two days' rations, without a change of clothing, stripped for the fight, each officer and man, from the commanding general down, having but a single blanket or overcoat. They had now no provisions, save what had been gathered by the road, and were ill-supplied for such a march.

Moreover, the weather was intensely cold. But twelve thousand of their fellow-soldiers were beleaguered in a mountain town eighty-four miles distant: they needed relief, and must have it in three days. This was enough. Without a murmur, without waiting for any thing, the Army of the Tennessee directed its course upon Knoxville.

On the night of November 28th, General Howard repaired and planked the railroad bridge, and at dawn the army passed the Hiawassee, and during the day marched to Athens, a distance of fifteen miles. Granger, who was then near the mouth of the Hiawassee, was at first ordered to join the main column at Kingston; but on reaching Athens, Sherman sent him directions to meet him at Philadelphia. The small force of cavalry which was, at the time of the receipt of General Grant's orders, scouting near Benton and Columbus, overtook the column at Athens during the night.

On the 2d of December, the army moved rapidly north, towards Loudon, twenty-six miles distant. About 11 A. M., the cavalry passed to the head of the column, and was ordered to push to Loudon, and, if possible, save the pontoon bridge across the Tennessee, held by a brigade of the enemy, commanded by General Vaughn. The cavalry moved with such rapidity as to capture every picket; but Vaughn had artillery in position, covered by earthworks, and displayed a force too large to be dislodged by a cavalry dash, and darkness closed in before General Howard's infantry arrived on the ground. The enemy evacuated the place in the night, destroying the pontoons, running three locomotives and forty-eight cars into the Tennessee, and abandoning a large quantity of provisions, four guns, and other material, which General Howard took at daylight. But the bridge being gone, Sherman was forced to turn east, and trust to the bridge at Knoxville.

It was now all-important that General Burnside should have notice of Sherman's approach, and but one more day of the time remained. Accordingly, at Philadelphia, during the night of December 2d, Sherman sent an aid-de-camp forward to Colonel Long, commanding the brigade of cavalry,

ordering him to select the best material of his command, to start at once, ford the Little Tennessee, and push into Knoxville at whatever cost of life and horseflesh. The distance to be travelled was about forty miles, and the roads villanous. Before day the cavalry marched. At daylight the Fifteenth Corps was turned from Philadelphia to the Little Tennessee, at Morgantown, where the maps represented the river as very shallow; but it was found impossible to ford it, as the water was, in some places, five feet deep, and freezing cold, and the stream was two hundred and forty yards wide. A bridge was indispensable. Brigadier-General James H. Wilson, who accompanied Sherman, undertook to superintend the work, and with only such tools as axes, picks, and spades, working partly with crib-work and partly with trestles made of the houses of the late town of Morgantown, by dark of December 4th the bridge was completed, and by daylight of the 5th the Fifteenth Corps, General Blair, was over, and General Granger's corps and General Davis' division were ready to pass; but the diagonal bracings were imperfect, for want of proper spikes, and the bridge broke, causing delay.

General Blair had been ordered to march out on the Marysville road five miles, there to await notice that General Granger was on a parallel road abreast of him. At the fork of the road a messenger rode up to General Sherman, bringing a few words from General Burnside, dated December 4th, stating that Colonel Long had arrived at Knoxville with his cavalry, and all was well there; that Longstreet still lay before the place, but there were symptoms of a speedy departure.

As soon as the bridge was mended, all the troops moved forward. General Howard had marched from Loudon, had found a good ford for his wagons and horses at Davis, seven miles from Morgantown, and had made a bridge of the wagons left by Vaughn at Loudon. He marched by Unitia and Louisville. On the night of the 5th, all the heads of column communicated at Marysville, where an officer of General Burnside's staff arrived with the news that Longstreet had, the night before, retreated on the Rutledge, Rodgersville, and

Bristol roads, towards Virginia; and that General Burnside's cavalry was on his heels; and with word that the general desired to see General Sherman in person as soon as he could come to Knoxville. Ordering all the troops to halt and rest, except the two divisions of General Granger, which were directed to move forward to Little River and report to General Burnside, on the morning of December 6th Sherman rode from Marysville into Knoxville, and there met General Burnside.

Longstreet had

The siege had been already raised. hurled three brigades against the works, and met with a bloody repulse. The intelligence of Bragg's defeat, and the arrival of Colonel Long's cavalry, as the forerunners of the army known to be marching for the relief of the besieged garrison, had shown Longstreet the necessity of prompt movement, and he had taken the only line of retreat that continued practicable. General Burnside now asked for nothing but General Granger's command, and suggested to Sherman, in view of the large force he had brought from Chattanooga, that he should return with due expedition to the line of the Hiawassee, lest Bragg, re-enforced, might take advantage of his absence to assume the offensive.

In the following communication General Burnside took occasion to express his thanks for the timely relief:

"HEADQUARTERS ARMY OF THE OHIO, Knoxville, December 7, 1863.

and your

Major-General W. T. Sherman, Commanding, etc.: "GENERAL-I desire to express to you command my most hearty thanks and gratitude for your promptness in coming to our relief during the siege of Knoxville; and I am satisfied your approach served to raise the siege.

"The emergency having passed, I do not deem for the present any other portion of your command but the corps of General Granger necessary for operations in this section; and inasmuch as Genera. Grant has weakened the force immediately with him in order to relieve us, thereby rendering the