The Day Dixie Died: The Battle of Atlanta

by Gary Ecelbarger

  Grant’s plans called for all of the movements to commence in the first week of May, and Lincoln wholeheartedly approved it. The president understood that while all fronts were important, the two most vital ones were the Georgia theater and, of course, the operation against General Lee and his elusive army. That the president considered the other elements as less crucial appears to have initiated a problem with Grant’s operation. Lincoln was responsible for selecting the commanders of those theaters. Here, the president’s performance was mediocre and had a foreboding history just a few months before. A fifth front began its operation in the winter of 1863–1864. The objective was to move up the Red River from Louisiana into Texas, combine with a southward moving Union force in Arkansas and, after they cleared the region in short order, the combined force was expected to head southeastward all the way to Mobile Bay on the Gulf Coast of Alabama. Against Grant’s wishes, Lincoln chose Major General Nathaniel P. Banks to head that operation. Banks was a political general with a scant record of military success at Port Hudson in 1863, a victory that failed to neutralize his stunning defeat in the Shenandoah Valley in the spring of 1862. Yet, Lincoln insisted upon Banks, and the general delivered another failure by abandoning the Red River operation, which terminated the thrust to Mobile.

  Lincoln’s choice for the Yorktown Peninsula army, appropriately called the Army of the James, was Major General Benjamin “the Beast” Butler, another controversial political general with little military ability. Unlike Banks, Butler’s operation began very smoothly and nearly reached Richmond before the summer. A skilled Confederate defense, however, not only halted him, it kept him stagnant throughout the summer, leading to the oft-repeated statement “The Beast is bottled up on the James.” Lincoln’s third horrible choice, both in foresight and hindsight, was Major General Franz Siegel to head the army in the Shenandoah. The fact that the Confederate Shenandoah army under Jubal Early reached the gates of Washington in July is evidence of how poor that choice turned out to be. All three of those hand-picked commanders were failures that led to fiascos. They signaled a huge threat to the success of Grant’s grand plan.

  To no one’s real surprise, Grant was forced to fight for every mile of Virginia terrain against Robert E. Lee in an operation known as the Overland campaign. From May through July, he successfully pushed Lee’s army back from the Rapidan River to the trenches of Petersburg where both sides dug in for a siege. Grant’s siege of Vicksburg the previous year lasted six weeks with the capture of the entire army there on the Fourth of July. Nevertheless, Lee was the best general in the South with a much bigger army; by the middle of July 1864 the duration of the Petersburg siege already exceeded Vicksburg’s with no end in sight. Still, that was not a military failure because Lee was trapped and unless he could break out or receive reinforcements, Grant could lock him in so tightly that he could starve Lee’s army out. “I begin to see it: you will succeed,” Lincoln declared as Grant started the siege, but what the president understood the voters could not.3

  Public perception throughout the North saw that in an entirely different light, a light that failed to reveal the overall progress but only exposed the most unseemly and appalling aspect of a military campaign—the casualties. Grant had successfully ground Lee down, inflicting nearly 35,000 casualties upon him, but he did so while losing 65,000 killed, wounded, and missing men. The enormity of those losses was shocking; adding in the losses in all theaters from May through mid-July revealed that Lincoln’s armies lost over 100,000 soldiers (including captured) in just ten weeks—an average of 1,500 soldiers every single day! As Americans stared stunned at the lengthy lists that marred their hometown papers, they collectively asked, “What do we have to show for this sacrifice?”

  To achieve victory, Lincoln needed to provide more soldiers to offset those atrocious losses and to buttress the armies in the field. On July 18, he issued a proclamation calling for 500,000 more volunteers, boldly adding that a draft would begin in September to guarantee the number of recruits should the requisite number of volunteers fall short. The proclamation was met with disdain and derision. Adam Gurowski told his diary:

  July 18.—A new call for 500,000 men. Lincoln ought to make his whereas as follows:

  Whereas, my makeshift and of all foresight bereaved policy—

  Whereas, the advice of a Seward, of a Blair, and of similar etc’s—

  Whereas, my Generals, such as McClellan, Halleck, and many other pets appointed or held in command for political reasons, have occasioned a wanton slaughter of men; therefore

  I, Abraham Lincoln, the official Juggernaut, call for more victims to fill the gaps made by the mental deficiency of certain among my commanders as well as by the rebel bullets.4

  Gurowski was a Radical Republican; his cynical entry underscored how many felt about the history of Lincoln’s mistakes in prosecuting a war that most of them supported, and many of them still did, but no one seemed to approve the current state of affairs in the summer of 1864. That was a dire time for Lincoln; he was up for reelection, that time under a new ticket. War-supporting Democrats joined political forces with Republicans to form the National Union Party for that election. At their national convention held at Baltimore in June, Lincoln was nominated for reelection on the first ballot. The ticket was complete with the choice of Governor Andrew Johnson, a Tennessee War Democrat, as his running mate. That convention met and chose Lincoln in June, but Republican dissention grew so quickly that it began to boil over in the middle of July. Horace Greeley, the influential editor of the New York Tribune, was the most prominent former Lincoln supporter to bolt the ranks by seeking another candidate “to save us from utter overthrow” and preserve the Union. “Mr. Lincoln is already beaten,” insisted Greeley that summer. “He cannot be elected.”5

  Lincoln floundered in attempting to put together a peace commission to meet with Confederate emissaries at Niagara Falls. He also allowed two loyal citizens to meet with President Jefferson Davis in Richmond. In both instances Lincoln clung to his ideals, insisting that the war should end in the field and negotiations could compromise on differences between North and South, but the two Union causes must stay in place: The rebellious Southern states must return to the United States of America without their “peculiar institution.” Lincoln insisted there must be no Confederacy and slavery must end throughout the land. Negotiations broke down on both fronts over that, so the war would continue.6

  But for how long? Lincoln was coming closer and closer to the realization that he would lose the November 8 election (in a month he would be certain of it). He lamented that the public was not realistic about the time required to succeed in a campaign, complaining to an aide, “they expect too much at once.” Lincoln had been guilty of the same expectations two years before, but by then he was reconciled to allow Grant’s campaign to wind down in 1865. “As God is my judge,” Lincoln declared in the summer of 1864, “I shall be satisfied if we are over with the fight in Virginia within a year. I hope we shall be ‘happily disappointed,’ as the saying is, but I am afraid not—I am afraid not.”7

  News from the Shenandoah Valley bode ill that Lincoln would be “happily disappointed” at an end to the war in Virginia before the election. On July 20, the Union forces in the Shenandoah Valley were beaten again by Jubal Early’s army. Butler remained bottled up on the James River, and Grant’s siege of Lee at Petersburg had produced no discernable gains. That left one general as the only glimmer of hope for Lincoln: Major General William T. Sherman and his Atlanta campaign. Like Grant, Sherman had made significant progress against the Confederate army that was defending northern Georgia against his advance. In two months Sherman had advanced almost 100 miles into Georgia, sparring and maneuvering at the cost of 20,000 Union casualties during that time. Those losses were significant, but were less than a third of what Grant and Meade had suffered during their simultaneous campaign against Lee.

  Sherman oftentimes appeared as the antithesis of General Grant. Sherman was
taller, thinner, and redheaded. He knew the South, had lived in the South, and was very accustomed to Southern customs. He tolerated the institution of slavery but was absolutely intolerant of secession. Sherman was very excitable and rather emotional; the stress of the Civil War (and his chain-smoking) made him appear more than ten years older than his forty-four years of life. His friends called him “Cump” (a shortened version of his middle name, Tecumseh) and the rank and file under him called him “Uncle Billy.” He accepted both and basked in the adoration of peers and subordinates, but hated newspaper reporters with a passion and worked hard to expel them throughout his military district.

  MAJOR GENERAL WILLIAM TECUMSEH SHERMAN, U.S.A.

  Taken at Atlanta within three months of the battle, this image captures the head of the Military Division of the Mississippi on horseback. Sherman commanded three Union armies numbering nearly 100,000 soldiers in July of 1864. (Courtesy of the Library of Congress)

  Sherman earned the command of the army group for his dedicated service and steady ascent over two years of successful campaigns west of the Appalachians. His Civil War career, however, prior to 1864 had been far less stellar. Sherman proved to be a less-than-spectacular battlefield tactician as a division commander, a corps commander, and an army commander, but his tactical flaws were not appreciated at the time, while his seniority and friendship with General Grant secured a series of field promotions. He rose to a position where he excelled when he took over the Military Division of the Mississippi in March of 1864. Sherman was a master of maneuver and logistics, working wonders with a single-track railroad between Chattanooga, Tennessee, and Marietta, Georgia, to feed and supply a military population equivalent to the ninth largest city in the country. Those skills placed all three of his armies south of the Chattahoochie River and within 6 miles of Atlanta on the morning of July 20, 1864.

  Sherman succeeded at maneuvering three distinct armies through the rough terrain of northern Georgia, partially perhaps because he thought of them as one. Indeed, he referred to his command in the singular “my whole army.” His enemy, both rank and file, respected his swiftness. Earlier in July, the opposing pickets exchanged some friendly banter across the Chattahoochie:

  “Hello, Yank, who is your Commanding General?”

  “Sherman. Who is yours?”

  “Well, I believe Sherman is ours too. Whenever he moves, we move too.”

  Less than two weeks after that verbal exchange, Sherman moved both armies southward by crossing that river and pushing the Confederates into Atlanta as he proceeded to surround it. “I think I shall succeed,” Sherman wrote his wife, “at all events you Know I never turn back.” Although the line referred to his July 9 prediction of crossing the Chattahoochie, Sherman could easily have offered the same line verbatim in describing his intention for Atlanta.8

  Lincoln grew particularly hopeful during July’s third week about the potential end of the campaign, anticipating that Sherman’s grand offensive would result in the Confederates abandoning Atlanta without a fight or a siege. By July 20, however, that hope diminished when he learned that the Confederate army remained to defend it. Given his belief that no dramatic improvements would occur in the other theaters, Atlanta was the key to the future course of the Civil War. It was all linked to his reelection. If General Sherman could seize that vital business center, rail hub, and symbol of the South, it would overturn a great deal of the dour news that had permeated the North regarding the conduct of the war. That could be the first solid success of Grant’s four-pronged grand strategy. The newly acquired manpower obtained through volunteers and drafted recruits would buttress the armies in the other theaters and produce visible results as well, but that would likely only occur after November 8. Atlanta had to be conquered well before that to boost Lincoln’s chances for reelection and guarantee the prosecution of the war to its end—the submission of the Confederate armies in the field. Lincoln feared that his loss to a Peace Democrat (they would choose their nominee at the end of August) would end the war on completely different terms. It would be a negotiated peace in which the Southern states would either form their own nation or would come back into the Union with slavery preserved.

  Lincoln’s hopes were pinned to Atlanta, a city that owed its existence to the very factor that made it a prized military objective: railroads. When the Western & Atlantic (W&A) Railroad was completed with its terminus at the sleepy little town of Marthasville in 1845, no one could predict how that Georgia hamlet would thrive from its new lifeline. Nine years and three more railroads later, the renamed city of Atlanta then competed with the largest urban areas of the South. By 1860 its population approached 10,000 souls with blacks comprising about 1 out of 5 of the residents. The city flourished from the four crossing ribbons of iron, transporting textiles and foodstuffs from all over the country to and from markets in the North, South, East, and West. In addition to the wealth they accumulated by trading and by railroad employment, Atlanta residents reaped the harvest of living at the center of regional markets whose products were hauled to the iron crossroads.9

  Naturally, Atlanta was a valuable depot for the Southern states during the Civil War, rolling out troops and supplies throughout the entire Confederacy. Grant’s instructions to Sherman early in April to “get into the country as far as you can, inflicting all the damage you can against their war resources” made Atlanta the objective point of the campaign without even having to name it. That Sherman received those instructions in Chattanooga and embarked on a campaign one month later that carried three Union armies through northern Georgia along the line of the W&A Railroad made Atlanta a prized possession at the terminus of that lifeline. With Grant stymied well south of Richmond, the focus fell upon Atlanta, where opposing lines of battle stood within 6 miles of the city. In July of 1864 it had become the symbol for both the life of the Confederacy and the preservation of the Union. Richmond was the capital of the Confederacy, but Atlanta was the heart of the South.10

  THE CAR SHED IN DOWNTOWN ATLANTA 1864.

  The great 300-foot depot on the Georgia Railroad highlights the importance of the city as the junction of four rail lines and how prized it was as the objective of Sherman’s summer campaign. (Courtesy of the Library of Congress)

  On July 20, the Atlanta Daily Appeal, a newspaper one day from extinction, printed a prediction—one that would be carried by newspapers throughout the North, including the urban centers of Philadelphia and New York:

  The greatest battle of the war will probably be fought in the immediate vicinity of Atlanta. Its result determines that of the pending Northern Presidential election. If we are victorious the Peace party will triumph; Lincoln’s Administration is a failure, and peace and Southern independence are the immediate results. While we are not disposed to underestimate the importance of holding Atlanta as a strategic position, yet the fate of the city itself is a question of minor import when compared with other necessary national results.

  Everything—life, liberty, property and the independence of the South, the security of our homes, wives, mothers and children all depend upon the courage and heroism of the men whose toils may now be terminated by a brilliant victory. Never before were such incentives to valor placed before an army whose courage requires no stimulant, whose gallantry has never been questioned.11

  In the middle of July readers of the plea in the Appeal both in the North and the South could come to a consensus on one point: Atlanta was the key. James Russell Lowell, a renowned poet and editor of the era, identified it as “the real campaign” for Lincoln’s election. A big battle appeared inevitable at Atlanta; its result would determine the fate of a nation.12

  1

  CLOSING THE VISE

  A brass-laden brigade band blared forth a spirited rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner” as the blue-clad soldiers of the Army of the Tennessee marched westward toward Atlanta, the objective point of an arduous and angst-filled campaign. The army had begun that trek in Chattanooga seventy-five days
and 100 miles earlier. Since then they had crossed three rivers; fought three battles and skirmishes nearly every day between them; all the while enduring hardships from both anticipated and unexpected sources. Six days earlier, 15 men in one division were killed or wounded by a single lightning strike during a violent storm blanketing the Chattahoochie River valley, a freakish bolt that did not discriminate between foot soldiers, artillery men, or mule drivers. Thousands more fell dead or wounded from Confederate lead, iron, and steel over the two months prior to that deadly storm. But on Wednesday morning, July 20, 1864, Atlanta and ultimate victory stood just 6 miles away from the surviving Union soldiers.1

  The army was not surprised to be so close to its campaign destination. Named for a major river—as were most Union armies in the field—the Army of the Tennessee, in the haughty words of one of its members, expected “nothing but victory” at the completion of its campaign. The soldier trumpeted that boast the previous autumn, a prediction borne out by ultimate success in the field. It was a statement that proved true in every major campaign in which the army participated before that: at Fort Donelson, Shiloh, and Corinth in 1862; and at Vicksburg and Chattanooga in 1863. This was the army previously commanded by the two most important generals in the Union: Ulysses S. Grant and William Tecumseh Sherman. With only a smattering of setbacks on battlefields and two and a half years of continuous victories in military campaigns—including the surrender of Confederate armies at Fort Donelson, Tennessee, and Vicksburg, Mississippi—the collective opinion of soldiers within the Army of the Tennessee was that the capture of Atlanta was inevitable. They expected nothing less, for they laid claim to be the most successful army on the continent.2