20. Moving in several columns, flanked by cavalry, sweeping a belt of territory sixty miles wide, avoiding the fortified positions of the enemy, living on the country through which he passed, and meeting with but little opposition, he entered Milledgeville on the 20th; and on the 12th of December the whole army was within a few miles of Savannah. On the 13th Fort McAllister, which commands the approaches to Savannah by sea, was taken by storm, and communication was opened with the Union fleet lying off the harbor. The Confederate General Hardee, who held Savannah with about 15,000 men, abandoned the city on the 20th, and on the next day it was occupied by the Federal forces. On the 22nd Sherman wrote to President Lincoln: "I beg to present to you, as a Christmas gift, the city of Savannah, with 150 heavy guns and plenty of ammunition, and also about 25,000 bales of cotton."

21. While Sherman was marching through Georgia, Hood, left too far in the rear to overtake him, being now joined by Forrest, turned northward against the forces of Thomas, which were scattered over Southern Tennessee. Thomas slowly fell back, concentrating his command, and bringing up his reenforcements. On the 30th of November Hood had a severe engagement with Schofield at Franklin.* Schofield then fell back toward Nashville,* and joined Thomas. Hood continuing to advance, Thomas fell upon him on the 15th of December, and in a battle lasting two days, defeated and drove him from the field in the utmost confusion. In this and the preceding battle, and during the pursuit which followed, Hood lost 18,000 men in killed, wounded, and prisoners, and 50 cannon.

22. It was a part of General Grant's plan, while Meade and Sherman were moving against the two main armies of the Confederacy, to press the siege of Charleston, to attack Mobile both by sea and land, and to capture, if possible, the forts which commanded the entrance to Wilmington Harbor, on the coast of North Carolina. The siege of Charleston had been continued; and although the Confederate flag still waved over the ruins of Sumter and the forts which controlled the harbor, Gillmore's batteries had been pushed forward, so that their fire laid waste all the lower part of the city.

23. On the 5th of August Admiral Farragut, with fourteen gunboats and three monitors, forced the passage into Mobile

*See map, p. 399.

426

THE GREAT REBELLION: 1864.

Bay, leading between Forts Morgan and Gaines, which poured in a heavy fire on the advancing fleet. In passing, the monitor Tecumseh struck a torpedo and went down, with her commander, Captain Craven, and nearly all on board. A Confederate fleet of three gunboats, and the formidable iron-clad ram Tennessee, joined the forts in the attack on Farragut's vessels; but the Tennessee and one of the gunboats, after a short encounter, surrendered; one gunboat escaped to Mobile, and one took refuge under the guns of Fort Morgan. Fort Gaines was taken on the 8th, and Fort Powell was evacuated. Fort Morgan surrendered on the 23rd, after a terrific bombardment. Mobile, though strongly fortified, could now be taken by the aid of a coöperating land force.

24. On the 13th of December an expedition, under General Butler and Admiral Porter, sailed from Fortress Monroe, for an attack upon Forts Fisher and Caswell, commanding the approaches to Wilmington. On the 25th a landing was effected above Fort Fisher; but after a brief reconnoisance, General Butler, deeming the fort too strong to be taken, ordered a re-embarkation, and the return of the land forces. General Grant was dissatis

Batteries

Port Casi

Fort Fisher fied with the result, and soon after General Butler was relieved of his command.

15 WILMINGTON, N. C., 1864.

25. During the months of October and November considerable alarm was occasioned at the North by the attempt of Confederate emissaries in Canada to carry out measures for burning and pillaging Northern cities. On the 19th of October a band of marauders robbed the bank of St. Albans, Vermont, killed and wounded several of the citizens, and then made their escape into Canada. Another party se:zed and burned two steamers on Lake Erie; and on the night of the 25th of November an attempt was made to burn the city of New York, by fires kindled in several of the large hotels.

One of the perpetrators of this crime was afterwards caught and hanged.

26. In June of this year the war-steamer Alabama, Captain Semmes, the most noted of the English-built Confederate privateers, was sunk off Cherbourg Harbor, France, after a short contest, by the steamer Kearsarge, Captain Winslow. For nearly two years the Alabama had roamed the seas, during which time she had captured sixty-six American ves sels, most of which, with their cargoes, she had burned. For these and other losses which we had suffered from British-built and British-manned ships, purchased in British ports, for the known purpose of preying upon American commerce, we claimed indemnification from the British Government. It is one of the subjects respecting the rights of neutrals, which the close of the war has left open for future adjudication.

27. At the Presidential election of 1864, only two parties were in the field-the Republican and the Democratic. The former declared that the rebellion ought to be suppressed without compromise; that slavery, now virtually dead by the President's proclamation and by the results of the war, ought to be abolished by constitutional amendment. The latter party charged the President and administration with unconstitutional assumptions of power, with being animated by intolerance and fanaticism-demanded that immediate efforts be made for a cessation of hostilities, with a view to a peaceful settlement of difficulties; and declared that "the aim and object of the Democratic party is to preserve the Federal Union and the rights of the States unimpaired."

28. The policy of the Republican party was clearly defined, as demanding a re-establishment of the Union without slavery; that of the Democratic party looked either to a peaceful separation, or to a re-establishment with slavery, and the "rights of the States unimpaired," as at the beginning of the war. President Lincoln was the candidate of the Republican party for a second term; General McClellan was the nominee of the Democratic party. The former was elected, with Andrew Johnson, of Tennessee, as Vice-President, by 212 electoral votes, out of a total of 233.

CHAPTER VI.

EVENTS OF 1865.

1. The winter season caused no suspension of military operations in the Federal armies. It was the policy of Grant to keep the overwhelming forces at his command constantly in motion; "to hammer continuously at the armed forces <f the enemy and his resources, until there should be nothing left to him but submission."

2. During the autumn and winter Grant vigorously pushed forward the siege of Petersburg, gradually working his way southward around the city, and sending out numerous cavalry expeditions to destroy railroads and canals, and cut off the

enemy's supplies. Early in January he sent General Terry to make another attempt to capture Fort Fisher. Under cover of the fleet of Admiral Porter, General Terry landed on the 13th, and on the 15th the fort was assaulted, and after the most desperate fighting was captured, with its entire garrison and armament. Fort Caswell was then abandoned, the control of the mouth of Cape Fear River was secured, and on the 22nd of February the Federal forces took possession of Wilmington.

3. In the meantime General Sherman, after a short rest at Savannah, put his whole army in motion northward on the 1st of February. Marching some distance from the sea-coast, and destroying the railroads on which Charleston depended for supplies, that city, which had withstood a siege and bombardment from its seaward side of more than a year and a half, was thus rendered untenable, and on the 18th of February it surrendered to the besieging army of General Gillmore. The Confederates destroyed all their iron-clad vessels in the harbor, but left behind them 450 cannon. General Hardee escaped with the force which he had taken with him from Savannah, and succeeded in joining Johnston, who, with Bragg and Beauregard, had collected a large army in the two Carolinas, to withstand Sherman's northward march.

4. As Sherman marched in several columns, threatening different points, and with his cavalry destroying railroads in all directions, the enemy were prevented from concentrating their forces. On the 17th of February Columbia, the capital of South Carolina, fell into his hands, with but little resistance. Both at Charleston and Columbia the enemy, in retreating, set fire to immense stores of cotton; and hundreds of buildings in both cities were destroyed in the conflagration. On the 11th of March Sherman entered Fayetteville, and, by way of Cape Fear River, opened communication with the Federal forces at Wilmington. On the 18th his advance was checked by the army of Johnston at Bentonville; but on the 20th Sherman attacked with his whole army, drove the enemy back, and on the next day entered Goldsborough, where he was joined by the armies of Schofield and Terry, the former by way of Newbern, and the latter from Wilmington. Sherman's army was now more than a match for all the forces which Johnston could throw in his way.

5. While Sherman was thus forcing Johnston's army back