CHAPTER XXV. THE ATLANTA CAMPAIGN. AT the West, the first important movements in 1864 were for the purpose of securing the Mississippi River, possession of which had been won by the victories of Farragut at New Orleans and Grant at Vicksburg, and setting free the large garrisons that were required to hold the important places on its banks. On the 3d of February General William T. Sherman set out from Vicksburg with a force of somewhat more than twenty thousand men, in two columns commanded respectively by Generals McPherson and Hurlbut. Their destination was Meridian, over one hundred miles east of Vicksburg, where the Mobile and Ohio Railroad is crossed by that from Jackson to Selma. The march was made in eleven days, without notable incident, except that General Sherman narrowly escaped capture at Decatur. He had stopped for the night at a log house, Hurlbut's column had passed on to encamp four miles beyond the town, and McPherson's had not yet come up. A few straggling wagons of Hurlbut's train were attacked at the cross-roads by a detachment of Confederate cavalry, and Sherman ran out of the house to see wagons and horsemen mingled in a cloud of dust, with pistol bullets flying in every 414 THE MERIDIAN EXPEDITION. [1864. direction. With the few orderlies and clerks that belonged to head-quarters, he was preparing to barricade a corn-crib where they could defend themselves, when an infantry regiment was brought back from Hurlburt's corps and quickly cleared the ground. General Grant had an equally narrow escape from capture just before he set out on his Virginia campaign. A special train that was taking him to the front reached Warrenton Junction just after a detachment of Confederate cavalry, still in sight, had crossed the track at that point. per General Leonidas Polk, who was in command at Meridian, marched out at the approach of Sherman's columns, and retreated into Alabama haps deceived by the report Sherman had caused to be spread that the destination of the expedition was Mobile. The National troops entered the town on the 14th, and at once began a thorough destruction of the arsenal and storehouses, the machine-shops, the station, and especially the railroads. Miles of the track were torn up, the ties burned, and the rails heated and then bent and twisted, or wound around trees. These were popularly called "Jeff Davis's neckties," and "Sherman's hair-pins." Wherever the columns passed, they destroyed the mills and factories and stations, leaving untouched only the dwelling-houses. Sherman was determined to disable those railroads so completely that the Confederates could not use them again, and in this he succeeded, as he did in everything he undertook personally. But another enterprise, intended to be carried out at the same 1864.] THE SHREVEPORT EXPEDITION. 415 time, was not so fortunate. He sent General W. Sooy Smith with a cavalry force to destroy Forrest's Confederate cavalry, which was very audacious in its frequent raids, and liable at any time. to dash upon the National railroad communication in middle Tennessee. Smith had about seven thousand men, and was to leave Memphis on the 1st of February and go straight to Meridian, Sherman telling him he would be sure to encounter Forrest on the way, and how he must manage the fight. But Smith did not leave Memphis till the 11th, and, instead of defeating Forrest, allowed Forrest to defeat him and drive him back to Memphis; so that Sherman waited at Meridian till the 20th, and then returned with his expedition to Vicksburg, followed by thousands of negroes of all ages, who could not and would not be turned back, but pressed close upon the army, in their firm belief that its mission was their deliverance. While the gap that had been made in the Confederacy by the seizure of the Mississippi was thus widened by destruction of railroads east of that river, General Banks, in command at New Orleans, attempted to perform a somewhat similar service west of it. With about fifteen thousand men he set out in March for Shreveport, at the head of steam navigation on Red River, to be joined at Alexandria by ten thousand men under General A. J. Smith (loaned for the occasion by Sherman from the force at Vicksburg) and by Commodore David D. Porter with a fleet of gunboats and transports. Smith and Porter arrived promptly at 416 BATTLE OF SABINE CROSS-ROADS. [1864. the rendezvous, captured Fort DeRussey below Alexandria, and waited for Banks. After his arrival, the army moved by roads parallel with the river, and the gunboats kept even pace with them, though with great difficulty because of low water. Small bodies of Confederate troops appeared frequently, but were easily brushed aside by the army, while the fire from the gunboats destroyed a great many who were foolhardy enough to attack them with musketry and field guns. So used had the troops become to this proceeding that common precautions were relaxed, and the army jogged along strung out for twenty miles on a single road, with a small cavalry force in the advance, then the wagon-trains, and then the infantry. As they approached Sabine Cross Roads, April 8, they were confronted by a strong Confederate force commanded by General Richard Taylor, and suddenly there was a battle, though neither commander intended it. Taylor, before camping for the night, had sent out troops merely to drive back the advance guard of the expedition. But the men on both sides became excited, and the Nationals fought persistently for an hour and a half to save their trains, while Banks tried to bring forward his infantry, but in vain, because his wagons blocked the road. At the end of that time the line suddenly gave way, and the cavalry and teamsters rushed back in a disorderly mass, followed closely by the victorious enemy. Banks's personal efforts to rally them were useless, and he was borne away by the tide. Three miles in the rear the Nine 1864.] BATTLE OF PLEASANT HILL. 417 teenth corps was drawn up in line, and here the rout was stayed. The Confederates attacked this line, but could not break it, and at nightfall retired. Banks had lost over three thousand men, nineteen guns, and a large amount of stores. He fell back a short distance, to Pleasant Hill, where the Sixteenth and Seventeenth corps came up, and next day he had nearly his whole force in line. Here the Confederates, after spending most of the day in skirmishing and in gathering up the plunder, made a determined assault late in the afternoon, but were repelled, and, being attacked in return, lost many men and several guns, some of those captured the day before being recaptured. But Banks, instead of following up his victory, fell back to the river at Grand Ecore, partly for the reason. that he had been ordered to return Smith's borrowed troops. Then a new difficulty arose. The water in the river had fallen so that the fleet, taken up over the rapids with difficulty, could not pass down again. The boats appeared to be in imminent danger of capture, and it was seriously proposed to abandon and destroy them. But a genius came to the front in the person of Lieutenant-Colonel Joseph Bailey, who said he could build dams across the river, and raise the water enough to float the fleet. He was laughed at by the regulation army engineers, but got permission to try the experiment, and set to work with three thousand men, cutting down trees, hauling stone, and building cribs. In eight days the work was done, the water had risen |