enemy rapidly, and compelled him to burn a number of his wagons. He made a feint as if to give battle on the hills about four miles south of Franklin, but as soon as Hood's forces began to deploy for the attack, and to flank him on his left, he retired slowly to Franklin. Gen. Hood had learned from despatches captured at Spring Hill, from Thomas to Schofield, that the latter was instructed to hold that place till the position at Franklin could be made secure, indicating the intention of Thomas to hold Franklin and his strong works at Murfreesboro'. Thus Hood knew that it was all-important to attack Schofield before he could make himself strong, and that if he should escape at Franklin, he would gain his works about Nashville. The nature of the position was such as to render it inexpedient to attempt any further flank movement, and he therefore determined toattack the enemy in front, and without delay.

BATTLE OF FRANKLIN.

On the 30th November Stewart's corps was placed in position on the right, Cheatham's on the left, and the cavalry on either flank, the main body on the right under Forrest. Johnson's division of Lee's corps also became engaged on the left during the action. The line advanced at 4 P. M., with orders to drive the enemy, at the point of the bayonet, into or across the Big Harpeth River, while Gen. Forrest, if successful, was to cross the river and attack and destroy his trains and broken columns. The troops moved forward most gallantly to the attack. They carried the enemy's line of hastily-constructed works handsomely. They then advanced against his interiour line, and succeeded in carrying it also, in some places. Here the engagement was of the fiercest possible character. The Confederates came on with a desperation and disregard of death, such as had been shown on few battle-fields of the war. A Northern writer says: "More heroic valour was never exhibited by any troops than was shown here by the rebels." The devoted troops were mowed down by grape and canister. Many of them were killed entirely inside of the works. The brave men captured were taken inside the enemy's works on the edge of the town. The struggle lasted till near midnight, when the enemy abandoned his works and crossed the river, leaving his dead and wounded.

It is remarkable that in this hard-fought battle the Confederates used no artillery whatever; Gen. Hood's explanation being that he was restrained from using that terrible arm 66 on account of the women and children remaining in the town." Victory had been purchased at the price of a terrible slaughter. Hood's total loss in killed, wounded, and prisoners was 4,500. Among the killed was Maj.-Gen. P. R. Cleburne, Brig.Gens. John Adams, Strahl and Granbury; while Maj.-Gen. Brown, Brig.

Gens. Carter, Manigault, Quarles, Cockrell, and Scott were wounded, and Brig.-Gen. Gordon captured.

BATTLE OF NASHVILLE.

The next morning Gen. Hood advanced upon Nashville, where Schofield had retreated, and where Thomas lay with his main force. He laid siege to the town on the 2d December, closely investing it for a fortnight. The opinion long prevailed in the Confederacy that in this pause and the operations of siege, Hood made the cardinal mistake of his campaign; and that if he had taken another course, and struck boldly across the Cumberland, and settled himself in the enemy's communications, he would have forced Thomas to evacuate Nashville, and fall back towards Kentucky. This was the great fear of Gen. Grant. That high Federal officer, in his report of the operations of 1864, has written: "Before the battle of Nashville I grew very impatient over, as it appeared to me, the unnecessary delay. This impatience was increased upon learning that the enemy had sent a force of cavalry across the Cumberland into Kentucky. I feared Hood would cross his whole army and give us great trouble here. After urging upon Gen. Thomas the necessity of immediately assuming the offensive, I started west to superintend matters there in person. Reaching Washington city, I received Gen. Thomas's despatch announcing his attack upon the enemy, and the result as far as the battle had progressed. I was delighted. All fears and apprehensions were dispelled."

On the night of the 14th December, Thomas decided upon a plan of battle, which was to make a feint on Hood's right flank, while he massed his main force to crush in Hood's left, which rested on the Cumberland, and where the cover of the Federal gunboats might be made available. The brunt of the action did not fall until evening, when the enemy drove in the Confederate infantry outposts on the left flank. Hood, however, quickly ordered up troops from his right to stay the reversed tide of battle; and the remainder of the day was occupied by the enemy in sweeping the Confederate entrenchments with artillery fire, while here and there his infantry attempted, in vain, to find a weak spot in their lines.

Under cover of the night Hood re-formed his line, and in the morning was found in position along the Overton Hills, some two miles or so to the rear of his original line. The new position was a strong one, running along the wooded crests of closely-connecting hills; while the two keys to it were the Granny White and Franklin pikes, leading to Franklin, Columbia, Pulaski, and so down the country to the Tennessee River. Thomas' overwhelming numbers enabled him to throw heavy columns against Hood's left and centre. But every attack of the enemy was repulsed. It was

་

four o'clock in the evening, and the day was thought to be decided for the Confederates, when there occurred one of the most extraordinary incidents of the war. It is said that Gen. Hood was about to publish a victory along his line, when Finney's Florida brigade in Bates' division, which was to the left of the Confederate centre, gave way before the skirmish line of the enemy! Instantly Bates' whole division took the panic, and broke in disorder. The moment a small breach was thus made in the Confederate lines, the whole of two corps unaccountably and instantly fled from their ditches, almost without firing a gun. It was a disgraceful panic; muskets were abandoned where they rested between the logs of the breastworks; and everything that could impede flight was thrown away as the fugitives passed down the Granny White and Franklin pikes, or fled wildly from the battle-field. Such an instance of sudden, unlooked-for, wild retreat, the abandonment of a victory almost won, could only have happened in an army where thorough demoralization, the consequence of long, heavy, weary work, and of tremendous efforts without result-in short, the reaction of great endeavours where success is not decided, al ready lurked in the minds of troops, and was likely to be developed at any time by the slightest and most unimportant circumstance.

Fifty pieces of artillery and nearly all of Hood's ordnance wagons were left to the enemy. His loss in killed and wounded was disgracefully small; and it was only through want of vigour in Thomas' pursuit that Hood's shattered and demoralized army effected its retreat. Forrest's command, and Walthal, with seven picked brigades, covered the retreat. The situa tion on the Tennessee River was desperate; Hood had no pontoon train, and if he had been pressed, would have been compelled to surrender; but as it was, Thomas' great error in resting upon his victory at Nashville enabled a defeated Confederate army to construct bridges of timber over the Tennessee River, while the Federal gunboats in the stream were actually kept at bay by batteries of 32-pounders.

Hood succeeded in escaping across the Tennessee, but only with a remnant of the brilliant force he had conducted across the river a few weeks before, having lost from various causes more than ten thousand men, half of his Generals, and nearly all of his artillery. Such was the disastrous issue of the Tennessee campaign, which put out of existence, as it were, the splendid army that Johnston had given up at Atlanta, and terminated forever the whole scheme of Confederate defence west of the Alleghanies.

CHAPTER XXXVI.

CAMPAIGN OF 1864 IN THE VALLEY OF VIRGINIA.-ITS GENERAL DESIGN AS A STRATEGIO AUXILIARY TO RICHMOND.-THE NEW COMMAND OF THE ENEMY IN THE VALLEY.-GEN. SHERIDAN AND HIS FORCES.-VIEWS OF GEN. LEE ABOUT THE RELIEF OF RICHMOND.-HE DETACHES A FORCE UNDER GEN. ANDERSON TO CO-OPERATE WITH EARLY, AND STIR UP THE ENEMY ACROSS THE POTOMAC.-ANDERSON AND FITZHUGH LEE FIND EARLY FALLING BACK AND ASKING FOR REINFORCEMENTS. THE ENEMY DECLINES A BATTLE AND RETREATS TO HARPER'S FERRY.-STRENGTH AND DISPOSITION OF THE CONFEDERATE FORCES ABOUT WINCHESTER.-NEARLY A MONTH CONSUMED IN MARCHING AND COUNTERMARCHING.-GEN. LEE ORDERS THE RETURN OF GEN. ANDERSON WITH KERSHAW'S DIVISION.-BATTLE OF WINCHESTER.-GEN. GRANT ADVISES SHERIDAN TO GO IN."-EARLY'S SMALL FORCE. HOW IT CAME TO BE SCATTERED OVER TWENTY-TWO MILES.-RAMSEUR'S DIVISION SUSTAINS THE ATTACK UNTIL THE OTHER CONFEDERATE FORCES COME UP.-GORDON DRIVES THE ENEMY.-HAPPY STROKE OF A CONFEDERATE BATTERY.-THE ENEMY'S INFANTRY ROUTED.-HIS CAVALRY GET ON THE CONFEDERATE LEFT AND REAR AND CHANGE THE DAY.-RETREAT OF THE CONFEDERATES.-BATTLE OF FISHER'S HILL.—HOW GEN. EARLY'S POSITION WAS DEFECTIVE HERE.—HE IS FLANKED ON THE LEFT, AND RETREATS UP THE VALLEY.—THE ENEMY PURSUES TO STAUNTON.-SHERIDAN'S BARBAROUS ORDER TO DEVASTATE THE VALLEY.-HE BURNS TWO THOUSAND BARNS. ."-REFLECTIONS UPON THIS OUTRAGE.—BATTLE OF CEDAR CREEK.-EARLY, REINFORCED, RESUMES THE CAMPAIGN, AND DETERMINES TO MAKE A SURPRISE.-A FLANKING COLUMN OF CONFEDERATES CROSSES THE NORTH FORK OF THE SHENANDOAH.-TWO CORPS OF THE ENEMY BROKEN AND PUT TO ROUT.-THE ENEMY PURSUED THROUGH MIDDLETOWN.-HOW THE VIGOUR OF PURSUIT WAS LOST. THE FOOLISH NEWSPAPER STORY ABOUT GEN. SHERIDAN'S SUDDEN APPEARANCE ON THE FIELD.-THE CONFEDERATES DEMORALIZED BY PILLAGE.— THE ENEMY MAKES A COUNTER-CHARGE, AND SWEEPS EVERYTHING BEFORE HIM.-GEN. EARLY'S ATTEMPT TO PUT THE CENSURE OF THE DISASTER UPON HIS MEN.-HOW FAR HE WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR IT.—TRUE EXPLANATION OF THE PAUSE IN HIS VICTORY.-REMOVAL OF GEN. EARLY FROM COMMAND.—GEN. LEE'S GENEROUS LETTER TO HIM.-HOW THE NEWSPAPERS BERATED HIM.—THE CHARGE OF HABITUAL INTOXICATION.-REVIEW OF THE VALLEY CAMPAIGN.—ITS EFFECT DECISIVE UPON RICHMOND.-REMARK OF A CONFEDERATE GENERAL.SOME VIEWS OF THE MANAGEMENT AND DISPOSITION OF THE CONFEDERATE CAVALRY FORCES IN VIRGINIA.

To Hood's unbroken series of disasters there was a companion-piece in another part of the Confederacy: a small theatre of the war, but an important and a conspicuous one, associated with many heroic memories of

the Confederacy. This other chapter of misfortune was Early's campaign in the Valley of Virginia. In this campaign a Confederate General never won a victory; lost all of his artillery, and brought an army to practical annihilation. But, although like Hood's misadventure in these particulars, the campaign in the Valley is to be judged by another standard; while marked by some undoubted misconduct, it had much to excuse its impotent conclusion, and it was, in some respects, what its commander designated it—" a forlorn hope."

We have already pointed out the first object of Early's operations in the Valley as substantially the same which took Stonewall Jackson there in 1862-the diversion of a portion of the Federal forces from the great arena of combat in the lowlands. It was also important to save, as far as possible, the harvests of the Shenandoah and to protect the Gordonsville road; but the campaign was mainly a strategic auxiliary to the operations around Petersburg and Richmond.

In consequence of the threatening attitude of Early, who since he had moved across the Potomac, had been able to send a raiding party into Pennsylvania, which on the 30th July burned Chambersburg, Gen. Grant had been unable to return the Sixth and Nineteenth corps to the Army of the Potomac. On the contrary, he saw the necessity of an enlarged campaign to protect the frontiers of Maryland and Pennsylvania. What was called the Middle Department, and the Departments of West Virginia, Washington, and Susquehanna, were constituted into one under the command of Gen. Sheridan. The new commander was a man of a coarse, active nature, excessive animal spirits, and an intensely combative temperament—an antagonist not to be despised, although he had shown no distinct military genius, and was only remarkable in the war for the execu tion of single tasks indicated to him by his superiours. He had an amount of force which was all he could have asked for as a condition of success. In addition to the column of active operation under his command, consisting of the Sixth and Nineteenth corps, and the infantry and cavalry of West Virginia under Crook and Averill, there were assigned to him two divisions of cavalry from the Army of the Potomac under Torbert and Wilson. His effective infantry strength was about thirty-five thousand muskets; and his great superiority in cavalry was very advantageous to him, as the country was very open and admirably adapted to the operations of this arm.

Gen. Lee had long been persuaded that he was too weak to attack the enemy's works in his front at Petersburg. Information derived from trusty scouts and from reconnoissances pushed to the rear of the enemy's flanks, proved the impracticability of turning them. The only resource was strategy, and that obviously the renewal of the Valley campaign, to develop, if possible, a crisis in the situation about Petersburg and Richmond.