No Better Place to Die- The Battle of Stones River

by Peter Cozzens

  With Stanley present to rejuvenate the cavalry, Rosecrans concentrated on the reorganization of the army as a whole. Its three wings were structured so as to approximate corps: the Left and Right Wing each contained three divisions of infantry and nine batteries of artillery; the Center contained four divisions and fourteen batteries, three of which were unattached as a reserve. Numbers varied. The Right Wing mustered 15,832 present in early December, the Left Wing 14,308, and the Center 29,337. A fifth division under Brigadier General Robert Mitchell, numbering 5,346, was detached for extended garrison duty in Nashville.14

  It was no accident that the Center was the largest command in the army, or that it went to Thomas. In fact, it was the price of his continued service in the department. Thomas too had been offered command of the army now entrusted to Rosecrans. As Buell hesitated in the weeks following Bragg's occupation of Chattanooga and confidence in him fell, Andrew Johnson, who made no secret of his disdain for Buell and for his “dilatory steps” at unseating the enemy, had expressed to Thomas directly his hope that the Virginian might be placed in command. Thomas answered Johnson at once, hoping to stop any groundswell on his behalf before it could begin: “I most earnestly hope I may not be placed in the position, for several reasons. One particular reason is that we have never yet had a commander of any expedition who has been allowed to work out his own policy, and it is utterly impossible for the most able General in the World to conduct a campaign with success when his hands are tied…. I can confidently assure you that Genl. Buell's dispositions will eventually free all of Tennessee and go very far to crush the rebellion entirely.”15

  But as the summer deepened it became increasingly evident Buell would meet neither Thomas's nor the War Department's expectations, and the calls for his removal grew. Finally, on 29 September, the blow fell. Washington ordered Buell to hand over command to Thomas. No sooner did Thomas catch wind of the order then he was on Buell's doorstep, declining the command. To his credit, Buell told Thomas he was willing to accede and went so far as to encourage him to take command. But Thomas was immovable. The War Department, caught off balance, suspended the order.

  Thomas's refusal to assume command in September, as laudably disinterested as were his motives, cost him advocates, so that when Buell was dumped after Perryville, there were few to speak on behalf of the Virginian. His only significant support in cabinet came from Stanton, while the secretary of the treasury, Ohioan Salmon Chase, urged Rosecrans's appointment. Thomas's earlier refusal seems to have weighed heavily with Lincoln. Then there was his Southern heritage, while Rosecrans was a Northern Catholic whose selection would be popular during upcoming gubernatorial and congressional elections with voters of the same faith who saw the conflict as a “Yankee war, originating with Puritans.” “Let the Virginian wait, we will try Rosecrans,” Lincoln said, and the matter was closed. Only the question of seniority remained, and Lincoln answered that with the stroke of a pen, changing the date of Rosecrans's commission from 21 August to 31 March.

  News of the appointment of Rosecrans shocked Thomas. Perhaps the Virginian felt that, with Buell's removal a fait accompli, there now were no obstacles to his assuming command if asked. In any case, the normally taciturn Thomas lost no time in making known his feelings. On 30 October, he protested to Halleck:

  On the 29th of last September I received an order…placing me in command of the Department of the Ohio and directing General Buell to turn over his troops to me. This order reached me just as General Buell had by most extraordinary exertions prepared his army to pursue and drive the rebels from Kentucky. Feeling convinced that great injustice would be done him if not permitted to carry out his plans, I requested that he might be retained in command. The order relieving him was suspended, but today I am officially informed that he is relieved by General Rosecrans, my junior. Although I do not claim for myself any superior ability, yet feeling conscious that no just cause exists for overslaughing me by placing me under my junior, I feel deeply mortified and aggrieved at the action taken in this matter.16

  Thomas confronted Rosecrans with his feelings as well. Although he thought Rosecrans capable and a good choice to command on his own merits, Thomas asked to be transferred out of the department. But Rosecrans knew a good soldier when he saw one. He appealed to Thomas to stay, reminding him that “you and I have been friends for many years and I shall especially need your support and advice.” Thomas agreed, but on the condition he be assigned command of the Center rather than hold the empty post of second in command of the army. Rosecrans readily agreed.

  To his credit, Rosecrans employed Thomas well. Rather than shun him as a threat to his command, Rosecrans leaned on the Virginian as his “chief counselor.” Rosecrans openly expressed a deep, almost reverential respect for Thomas. “Thomas is a man of extraordinary character,” he told his staff. “Years ago, at the Military Academy, I conceived that there were points of strong resemblance between his character and that of Washington. I was in the habit of calling him General Washington.”

  Veteran soldiers of the army shared their commanding general's opinion of Thomas, whom they affectionately called “Pap” or “Old Slow Trot,” the latter sobriquet stemming from the general's steady and sedate temper, a quality much admired by the troops. Thomas impressed even the most critical observers. “Most men diminish as you approach them, General Thomas grows upon you,” wrote W. D. Bickham. William Shanks agreed. He likened Thomas's fighting style to that of a “heavy, ponderous pugilist, whose every blow is deadly.” Colonel Beatty thought him a “gentlemanly, modest, reliable soldier.”

  Thomas was all these things. Although a Virginian by birth, his sentiments were firmly with the Union. Thomas was a good though not brilliant student at West Point, where he graduated twelfth in a class of forty-two that included Confederate brigade commander Bushrod Johnson. He owed his success in the army to patience and steadfastness. Seldom would he make a decision without “long and mature reflection.” Not surprisingly, Thomas's greatest triumphs came in defensive actions, where his imperturbability steadied officers and men under his command.

  Thomas's appearance mirrored his character. Thick-set and robust, his heaviness made him look shorter than his five feet ten inches. Grave of countenance, the sandy-haired, square-jawed Virginian seldom smiled. He appears to have taken life quite seriously, so much so that many contemporaries wondered if he had any sense of humor at all. None, however, questioned his ability.17

  The same could not be said for Rosecrans's remaining wing commanders. Major General Alexander McCook, commander of the Right Wing, was to prove singularly disappointing as a troop commander, although much was expected of him. The former West Point tactics instructor had enjoyed success early in the war, winning promotions for gallantry at Bull Run and Shiloh. But it was not his courage that was questioned; rather, many doubted his ability to handle large bodies of troops. At Perryville, his first opportunity to refute the skeptics, McCook saw his corps shattered after he deployed it prematurely. Buell left him in command, perhaps feeling that his own eroded reputation left him without the authority necessary to replace McCook.

  Not only was McCook widely regarded as incompetent, but he was unpopular as well. Although good-natured and jovial, he came across in a way that many considered undignified. John Beatty thought him a “chucklehead,” with a grin that excited “the suspicion that he is either still very green or deficient in the upper story.” A veteran of the Fifty-ninth Illinois recalled a chance meeting with the general: “While the column was passing, General McCook and staff came dashing by in magnificant style. They came, they were seen, and they were gone. Like most his rank, he prides himself on being General McCook.”

  McCook's reputation suffered equally outside the army. His political views offended Northern abolitionists, who thought him Southern and Democrat in his sympathies. A slave-catcher allegedly visited McCook's camp during the Kentucky campaign. It was said that McCook accorded him the most courteous treatment possib
le, promising to return any fugitive slaves unfortunate enough to wander into his lines.18

  Major General Thomas Crittenden of the Left Wing was no better. Like McCook, he was notorious for his profanity; in the same manner, noted Beatty, he was capable of blowing his own horn exceedingly well. A lawyer by profession, Crittenden's sole military experience prior to the war had been as an aide on the staff of Zachary Taylor during the War with Mexico. But he had other credentials. As a member of the powerful Crittenden family of Kentucky, he exercised great influence within the state. His commissioning as a brigadier general in 1861 was an acknowledgment of the state's critical role during the early days of the war.19

  Rosecrans had inherited McCook and Crittenden, and he was stuck with them. But when left to appoint subordinates as he saw fit, Rosecrans chose reasonably well. His new chief of cavalry, Brigadier General David Stanley, had commanded a division of infantry under Rosecrans at Corinth. Although his last cavalry service had been on the frontier before the war, Stanley knew enough of the mounted arm to recognize that it had been “badly neglected” in the Army of the Cumberland. “It was weak, undisciplined, and scattered around, a regiment to a division of infantry,” Stanley wrote. “To break up this foolish dispersal of cavalry, and to form brigades and eventually divisions, was my first and difficult work.” Stanley's initial attempts to pry the cavalry loose from the infantry met with resistance from division commanders, but Rosecrans intervened on his cavalry chief's behalf, and soon Stanley had two mounted brigades and a three-regiment reserve at his disposal to begin training in the fundamentals of security and reconnaissance operations.

  Stanley was a good organizer, but he had some odd ideas about how the cavalry should fight. He attributed the cavalry's previous failures not so much to their dispersal as to their dependence on carbines rather than sabres. “I insisted on the latter,” wrote Stanley. “I sent for grindstones and had all sabres sharpened, each squadron being provided with the means for this work. This soon gave confidence to our men, and the opportunity was only lacking to show their superiority over the enemy.”

  Rosecrans could forgive Stanley his eccentricities; after all, the two were much alike. Moreover, Stanley was loyal; long after the war, he continued to defend Rosecrans publicly against Grant's censure of him for failing to pursue Van Dorn after Corinth.

  Rosecrans's choice of a chief engineer officer also proved a wise one. The youthful James St. Clair Morton, a Regular Army captain with flowing blond hair, not only occupied a place on the general's staff but was given an independent command as well. Rosecrans had hit upon the novel idea of creating a brigade of combat engineers responsible for the construction of field fortifications, corduroying of roads, and building and repair of bridges. Detachments were drawn from each regiment of infantry within the army; the detachments drawn from the regiments of a single brigade were consolidated into a company of pioneers; these companies were in turn brigaded under Morton and numbered 1,938 troops present for duty in December. Some criticized Rosecrans for having appointed one so young to a post so important, but the commanding general had a reply ready: “Young men without experience are better than experienced old men. Young men will learn; old men fixed in their habits will not learn.”

  This philosophy guided Rosecrans in his choice of a chief of staff as well. To this post he appointed the eccentric but capable Lieutenant Colonel Julius Garesche, a close friend known throughout the army for his quick mind and refined manners. Like Rosecrans, the native of Cuba was a tireless worker. Unpretentious, thoroughly dedicated to his commander, Garesche was the ideal chief of staff.20

  Washington appreciated Rosecrans's efforts in reorganizing and rejuvenating the Army of the Cumberland, but they were not enough. As November drew to a close, pressure mounted for an advance before winter put an end to active campaigning. Patience with field commanders was not a virtue of the War Department. As early as 18 November, in response to Rosecrans's repeated requests for revolving rifles for his cavalry, Secretary of War Stanton warned the general that, although the arms would be provided, “something is expected from you.”

  Rosecrans parried this and similar demands for action by ascribing his inactivity to the lack of rail communications between Nashville and the North. This excuse kept Washington at bay until 26 November, when repairs were completed and rail communications reopened. From that date forward, threats replaced admonitions, culminating in Halleck's ultimatum of 4 December: “The President is very impatient at your long stay in Nashville. The favorable season for your campaign will soon be over. You give Bragg time to supply himself by plundering the very country your army should have occupied…. Twice have I been asked to designate someone else to command your army. If you remain one more week at Nashville, I cannot prevent your removal. As I wrote you when you took the command, the Government demands action, and if you cannot respond to that demand someone else will be tried.”

  “I have lost no time,” replied Rosecrans. The railroad may have been repaired, but supplies were still hazardously low. Only five days’ rations were on hand at Nashville, meaning that any advance would have to be halted after just three days to allow the army to replenish its stock. And because the cavalry remained questionable, infantry units had been scattered to protect forage trains from depredations by Confederate horsemen. “To threats of removal or the like I may be permitted to say that I am insensible,” the Ohioan concluded.

  Rosecrans was on thin ice. The War Department read the Ohioan's dispatches, then Grant's, whose only concern was “to do something before the roads get bad and the enemy can entrench and re-enforce,” and Rosecrans's reservations appeared petty.

  Halleck and Grant understood the importance of Union offensives before winter put an end to active campaigning, even if Rosecrans did not. The fortunes of the Union, at least on the diplomatic front, were at their nadir. Failure to conquer substantial amounts of Confederate territory, or at the very least recapture lost ground, raised the specter of foreign intervention on behalf of the South. Parliament would convene in January of the new year. It was widely feared in Northern circles that Confederate sympathizers within that body would compel the British government to recognize the Confederacy; should this come to pass, France gave every indication that it would follow suit.

  So now, in November, as the last of the Confederate summer offensives flickered and died, Washington prepared for a concerted drive by all the major Union armies in the field. Grant asked for and was given permission to undertake a water-borne turning movement against Jackson, Mississippi, supported by a demonstration against Grenada by General Samuel Curtis, operating out of eastern Arkansas. Grant believed that the capture of Jackson would ensure the fall of Vicksburg.

  In Virginia, Major General Ambrose Burnside, having superseded McClellan as commander of the Army of the Potomac, moved his headquarters on 16 November from Warrenton to Catlett's Station and his army toward Fredericksburg. Burnside's move forced a countermove by Lee, whose communications with Richmond were now in jeopardy. He sent Longstreet's corps at once to occupy the heights above Fredericksburg. For a time Lee sought to maintain a presence in the Shenandoah Valley, both to snap at Burnside's flank and rear and to protect the valley's abundant supplies for the Army of Northern Virginia. But Stonewall Jackson's presence there failed to deter Burnside, who continued with his designs on Fredericksburg, and Jackson was called in to meet the main threat. President Davis called four brigades from western Virginia to assist Lee, meanwhile scouring the coast for other reinforcements.

  Lee hoped to draw reinforcements from the West. As Herman Hattaway and Archer Jones have pointed out in their How the North Won:

  Lee was thus applying what had been the Confederacy's consistent policy since the fall of Fort Donelson. Faced with a major Union offensive, Lee hoped that he might secure reinforcements from the West and the South. In early September, not knowing that Bragg was advancing northward through Tennessee, Lee wrote: I hope that Bragg's army can “be ad
vantageously employed in opposing the overwhelming numbers which it seems to be the intention of the enemy now to concentrate in Virginia.” In December, faced with Burnside's advance, he applied the general principle to suppose that “should there be a lull of war,” in the South and West, “it might be advantageous to leave a sufficient covering force to conceal the movements, and draw an active force, when the exigency arrives, to the vicinity of Richmond. Provisions and forage in the meantime could be collected in Richmond. When the crisis shall have passed, these troops could be returned to their departments with reinforcements.”

  Lee's plan for inter-departmental transfers of large bodies of troops was not far-fetched; nine months later, Lee himself would send Longstreet's corps into northern Georgia to help Bragg defeat Rosecrans at Chickamauga.

  Stanton and Halleck understood the willingness of the Confederates to shift forces across departments, although they assumed Bragg would move into Mississippi against Grant, rather than into western Virginia to relieve pressure on Lee. In any event, the need for Rosecrans to keep him occupied was obvious. And, as Halleck again reminded Rosecrans in early December, even if Bragg were to stay where he was, should “the enemy be left in possession of Middle Tennessee, it will be said that they have gained on us.”21

  All these arguments and admonitions were lost on Rosecrans, who thought only in terms of his theater of operations and his needs. Grant on his right and Burnside on his left advanced; but, for the moment, Rosecrans was standing behind his fortifications at Nashville.