the work of destruction. The occupancy of these roads by the patriot army would send starvation into the streets of Atlanta, and seal its doom.

The rebels made one last desperate endeavor to prevent this movement, which, being successfully accomplished, would drive them fugitives from Atlanta. General Sherman had marched more than a hundred miles over the hills and through the beautiful valleys of Northern Georgia. He had, day after day, in uninterrupted victory, driven the whole rebel army before him. And now the capture of the "Gate City," with its arsenals, its magazines, its manufactories, its vast amount of military stores, would open to him an unobstructed path, through the very heart of the State, to the sea. He had fought his way through dense forests, and mountain gorges, and rocky crags. He was now to enter upon a level country, where no serious impediment could block his path. The rebels understood this perfectly, and stiffened their sinews for a last despairing effort.

When General Howard arrived within half a mile of Jonesboro', about noon of the 31st of July, the rebels plunged upon him, inspired by all the energies of fury and despair. General Logan received the first onset. He was just the man for the place and the hour. General Kilpatrick had gained an important eminence, from which his guns dealt destruction to the foe. In accumulated masses the surging rebels rolled up the hill. In a moment there was a portentous silence, until the serried host were within a few feet of the guns. Then came flash and roar, peal upon peal, volley after volley. The range was perfect. There was no need for deliberation or aim. The gunners worked with superhuman rapidity; shells, grape, canister, swept through the ranks of the foe like hail. Fifteen minutes passed. A puff of wind swept away the billowy smoke. The column had vanished. The ground was red with blood, and covered with the mangled, ghastly victims of war-some still in death, many writhing in mortal agonies.

It was with the rebels a case of life or death. Defeat now was remediless ruin. A second column was forced up the hill. A second burst of war's terrific tempest swept them to destruction. And thus the battle raged till night. Hardee, the rebel leader at that point, seemed utterly reckless of the lives of his men. The wretched victims of the rebellionthe "poor whites," who, by the most merciless conscription, had been forced into the war-were driven to certain slaughter with the most fanatic disregard of life. The Union troops were safe behind a parapet of logs. The rebel dead were piled up before this parapet, in some places four deep. The next morning the battle was renewed. Nearly the whole of General Thomas's Division was now at hand, to aid the Army of the Tennessee. After standing on the defensive for a few hours and bloodily repelling several charges, the patriots, in their turn, commenced making assaults. General Davis, with Major Edith, made one of the most gallant of these charges. Rebel and patriot struggled hand to hand over the barricade. The starspangled banner and treason's flag intertwined their folds. The Eighth Illinois, under Colonel Anderson, performed illustrious deeds. After a fight of four hours the whole rebel line was carried, and their battery of twenty-four guns was captured. The vanquished foe retreated in confu

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sion. The gloom of the night, the dark, pathless forest, and the rugged nature of the ground prevented pursuit.

Scouts probably conveyed to Hood, in Atlanta, the disastrous intelligence. About two o'clock in the morning heavy explosions were heard in the city, about twenty miles distant. Hood was blowing up his maga zines, in preparation for flight. The next morning, July 2d, General Slocum, who was watching the movements of the rebels at Atlanta, discovered their retreat. They were escaping by roads which led eastward towards Augusta. He immediately entered the city in triumph. The black population received him as their deliverer. No tongue can tell the enthusiasm of their greeting. There were a few Union inhabitants in the place, "faithful found among the faithless." For their persistent patriotism they had suffered untold outrages. With tears which could not be restrained, and prayers of thanksgiving inarticulate through emotion, they welcomed the return of the National flag.

General Sherman, with a brilliant cavalcade, soon entered the city. The Stars and Stripes were unfurled from every spire, and over every rampart. Along the wires the joyful telegram was flashed to Washington: "Atlanta is ours, and fairly won."

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

FROM ATLANTA TO SAVANNAH

(October, November, and December, 1864.)

EXPULSION OF THE INHABITANTS FROM ATLANTA.-CORRESPONDENCE WITH REBEL AUTHORITIES.ATTEMPT UPON OUR LINES OF COMMUNICATION.—ALLATOONA PASS.-RETREAT OF THE FOE DESTRUCTION OF ATLANTA.-THE LINE OF MARCH. ANECDOTES AND INCIDENTS.-CAPTURE OF MILLEDGEVILLE-MACON AND AUGUSTA THREATENED.-SERVICES OF GENERAL KILPATRICK. THE CONTRABAND.-ARRIVAL AT SAVANNAH.-STORMING FORT MCALLISTER.— THE TRIUMPHANT ISSUE.

As soon as General Sherman had entered Atlanta, his first care was for the weary veterans who had so patiently and heroically borne the toilsome march from Chattanooga. While General Kilpatrick, with his tireless riders, scoured the country to guard against surprise, our soldiers were encamped within and around the captured town. Rapidly a city rose, of fifty thousand inhabitants, in whose lowly dwellings, constructed mainly of the timber of deserted houses, the bravest and noblest of human hearts throbbed. General Sherman, conscious that his grand enterprise was not finished, only auspiciously commenced, was devoting his apparently exhaustless energies of mind and body in preparation for his onward march. It was necessary for the furtherance of his plans that Atlanta, for a time, should be converted into exclusively a military post, where there should be no spies to watch his movements, and no idle mouths to consume the food which must be brought over his long lines of transportation. He therefore issued an order that all non-combatants should leave the place, allowing those whose sympathies were with rebellion to seek the protection of the rebel army; while those whose hearts were patriotic were to be transferred to the Union lines. The torch was also applied to all those public buildings which, upon the evacuation of Atlanta by the patriot troops, the rebels could again occupy for their traitorous purposes.

A wail of anguish now rose from the unfortunate inhabitants. They had endured the peril and suffering of the siege. Now came expulsion from their homes. "War is nothing," flippantly exclaimed Toombs of Georgia. "War," exclaimed the people of Atlanta, in tones of heartpiercing anguish, "is the most dreadful of all earthly calamities." The rebel General Hood, assuming that it was General Sherman's duty to retain thousands in his camp who would act as spies, and eat the food of his soldiers, sent a remonstrance, in the name of God and humanity, against the expulsion of the inhabitants, as "an inprecedented and studied act of cruelty." General Sherman, in a reply as impetuous and resistless as the sweep of his columns, reminded Hood of the invariable course of the

rebels in regard to the Union families found within their lines. "If we must be enemies," he wrote, "let us be men, and fight it out as we propose to-day, and not deal in such hypocritical appeals to God and humanity." He claimed it to be more humane to remove the weak and helpless from the military post, than to leave them exposed to the ever-recurring attacks of hostile armies.*

The mayor and city council of Atlanta communicated Hood's remonstrance to General Sherman, accompanied by a very earnest but respectful remonstrance of their own. To them General Sherman replied in a letter under date of September 12, containing the following strongly expressed sentiments:

"GENTLEMEN :—I have your letter of the 11th, in the nature of a petition to revoke my order removing all the inhabitants from Atlanta. I have read it carefully, and give full credit to your statements of the distress which will be occasioned by it, and yet shall not revoke my order, simply because my orders are not designed to meet the humanities of the case, but to prepare for the future struggle in which millions, yea, hundreds of millions of people outside of Atlanta, have a deep interest.

"We must have peace, not only in Atlanta, but in all America. To secure this, we must stop the war that now desolates our once favored country. To stop the war, we must defeat the rebel armies that are arrayed against the laws and Constitution which all men must respect and obey. To defeat these armies, we must be prepared to meet them in their recesses, provided with the arms and instruments which enable us to accomplish our purpose.

"The use of Atlanta for warlike purposes is inconsistent with its char acter as a home for families. War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it; and those who brought war on our country deserve all the curses and maledictions a people can pour out. I know that I had no hand in making this war, and I know that I will make more sacrifices than any of you, to to-day, to secure peace. But you cannot have peace and a division of our country. If the United States submit to a division now, it will not stop, but will go on till we meet the fate of Mexico, which is eternal war.

"You might as well appeal against the thunder-storm as against the terrible hardships of war. They are inevitable, and the only way the people of Atlanta can hope once more to live in peace and quiet at home, is

The following sentence from his reply shows that General Sherman is as able with the pen as with the sword:

"In the name of common sense-I ask you not to appeal to a just God in such a sacrilegious manner-you, who in the midst of peace and prosperity, have plunged a nation into war-dark and cruel war; who dared and badgered us to battle; insulted our flag; seized our arsenals and forts, that were left in the honorable custody of a peaceful ordnance sergeant; seized and made prisoners of war of the very garrisons sent to protect your people from negroes and Indians, long before any overt act was committed by the (to you) hateful Lincoln Government; tried to force Kentucky and Missouri into rebellion in despite of themselves; falsified the vote of Louisi ana; turned loose your privateers to plunder unarmed ships; expelled Union families by the thousands; burned their homes, and declared, by acts of your Congress, the confiscation of all debts due to Northern men for goods had and received! Talk this to the marines, but not to me, who have seen these things, and who will this day make as great sacrifice for the peace and honor of the South, as the best Southerner among you."

to stop this war, which can alone be done by admitting that it began in error and is perpetuated in pride. We don't want your negroes, or your horses, or your houses, or your land, or any thing you have.

But we

do want, and we will have, a just obedience to the laws of the United States."

Sorrowfully the people prepared for the abandonment of their homes. A ten days' truce was agreed upon, to facilitate this painful operation. General Sherman furnished transportation for all families, giving them their choice whether they would go north to Chattanooga, where the Union flag would protect them, or south to Rough and Ready, where the flag of rebellion was unfurled. All were treated with tenderness, and every thing was done which humanity could dictate, to mitigate the severity of their inevitable but sad lot. Seven hundred and five adults and eight hundred and sixty children were sent south. Each family was allowed to take baggage to the amount of sixteen hundred and fifty-one pounds. The rebels invariably acknowledged the patience, courtesy, and kindness with which this movement was executed by the patriot commanders.

Jeff.

As soon as the truce was terminated, which was prolonged to thirteen days, Hood again made a movement, hoping to drive the patriots out of 1 Atlanta. It was then the 22d of September. Hood had rendezvoused his army at Macon, about one hundred miles southeast of Atlanta. Davis hastened there to inspire the troops by his presence and with his words of cheer. On Sunday, the 25th, he addressed them in a glowing speech, in which he assured them that their march should soon be northward, and that their feet should "press the soil of Tennessee," where he promised them brilliant conquests and abundant plunder. Hood, having been so signally chastised in every attempt to meet General Sherman in the field, now attempted to accomplish by strategy that which he had in vain essayed by force of arms. On the 2d of October, with the main portion of the rebel army, he recrossed the Chattahoochie, and, marching north towards Marietta, threatened all the posts on our long line of railroad communication between Atlanta and Chattanooga.

As soon as General Sherman was informed of this movement, he sent General Thomas to Chattanooga, to watch the rebel General Forrest, who, with a formidable force of cavalry, was marching in that direction. At the same time General Corse was sent to strengthen the garrison at Rome. On the 3d, nearly the whole Union army was in motion back again, to protect our menaced line of communication. Atlanta, now truly and only a military post, strongly fortified, was left under the protection of General Slocum, with a small band of troops.

It was soon evident that Hood, with an army of thirty thousand men, was aiming to seize the Allatoona Pass, about half-way between Marietta and Kingston. The importance of this pass was well known to both armies. General Sherman promptly signalled to his line of garrisons to accumulate as much force at the pass as possible, and to hold it at every hazard. On the night of the 4th of October, General Corse left Rome with part of one brigade, and reached Allatoona at daybreak the next