Shattered Nation

by Jeffrey Brooks

  He shook his head. It was stupid to think about Annie, for there was virtually no chance that he would ever see her again. She might even have left Atlanta, as most citizens had already fled the city by train to either Macon or Augusta. Now that the Yankees were on the south side of the Chattahoochee and the Army of Tennessee was abandoning its position on the north side, McFadden assumed that those few who remained would also make the decision to leave. It was, after all, basic common sense.

  He stopped thinking about Annie as he heard his men continuing to discuss the retreat.

  “I don’t care whether Uncle Joe wants us to fight on the north side or the south side of this damn river,” Private Harrison was saying. “I’m ready to fight just as soon as he gives the word.”

  “Damn straight,” Montgomery said emphatically. “You ask me, Uncle Joe has lured the Yankees all the way from Dalton down to Atlanta itself as a trick. We’re about to catch them in a trap, I say.”

  “A trap?” Pearson said, incredulous. “What the hell gives you that idea?”

  “Two years ago, Uncle Joe waited until the Yankees were almost within sight of Richmond before he launched his big attack on them. Only failed because Johnston got himself wounded. That’s what I read in the papers, at any rate.”

  “And you think that’s what Johnston is doing to Sherman now?” Harrison asked. “Letting his whole army march all the way to Atlanta before we turn and attack him?”

  “Sure,” Montgomery said with a smile. “After all, if we can beat them in a fair fight on the south side of this river, they won’t be able to run away like they did after Chickamauga.”

  McFadden’s pulse quickened at the thought of that terrible but glorious battle, fought ten months before. The 7th Texas had lost half its strength during the two days of slaughter, but McFadden could not forget the feeling of unbelievable exaltation at the number of enemy soldiers he had killed. He was certain that four of them had died from the fire of his Enfield rifle and he had impaled a fifth on his bayonet. He remembered how enthralled he had been when the regiment had taken part in the great breakthrough on the Union right, tearing a huge gap in the enemy lines and putting the Yankees to flight. His joy had been raised to even greater heights when it became clear that the Battle of Chickamauga had been a tremendous Confederate victory.

  The memory of Chickamauga stirred a certain giddiness inside McFadden, as if he had consumed a large amount of good whiskey. He remembered how he had been tempted the night the battle ended to take the scalps of some dead Yankees as victory trophies, in the same way that the Comanches had taken the scalps of his father, mother and sisters. Only concern for what his fellow soldiers would have thought had snapped him out of his vengeful trance.

  As he continued walking along the pontoon bridge, something happened that McFadden did not expect. He suddenly felt confused as he found himself wondering what Annie Turnbow would have thought if she had been able to see him that night, taking such delight in killing his enemies. Imagining how his bloodlust would have appeared to her, he felt a foreign emotion rise up within him.

  For the first time in as long as he could remember, James McFadden felt shame.

  Behind him, the men of the Lone Star Rifles were laughing and chattering away amiably, making jokes about the stupidity of Braxton Bragg and the unreliability of troops from Georgia. None could see the emotional anguish that was sweeping through McFadden’s mind. That, he decided, was obviously for the best. The regiment was coming to the end of the pontoon bridge and, a few moments later, McFadden’s feet left the wooden planks and were again treading the familiar red clay soil.

  *****

  Sherman sat on his horse, cigar in his mouth, watching regiment after regiment file past him as they marched onto the pontoon bridge and across the Chattahoochee River. Every minute that passed put more Union soldiers on the same side of the river as Atlanta, the supreme goal of the campaign.

  General McPherson walked his horse up beside Sherman.

  “All going well, Cump. The entire Army of the Tennessee should be on the south bank by the end of the day.”

  “Good,” Sherman said. “Schofield’s boys are already all across, and once you get over, Thomas can start getting the Army of the Cumberland over as well. It will take a few days, and perhaps a week to build up enough supplies for an advance, but we have time.”

  “You appear to be a happy man,” McPherson said with a smile.

  “I am. But I’m also a confused one. Why didn’t Johnston make it more difficult for us to cross the river? I’m frankly surprised by how easy it was.”

  “Maybe the rebels are really whipped. Maybe they have no fight left in them.”

  “Considering the beating they gave us at Kennesaw Mountain just two weeks ago, I doubt that.”

  McPherson shrugged. “From the beginning of the campaign, Johnston has demonstrated a reluctance to engage in combat except when his troops are protected by fortifications. By now, Atlanta has to be the best fortified city on the continent, aside from Richmond and Washington. Perhaps he wants to fight us from his fortifications.”

  Sherman shook his head. “Try to withstand a siege? That would be foolish. Johnston is no fool. Whatever else he is, he is no fool.”

  “Well, all we can know for sure is that he’s pulled his forces back and is allowing us to cross the river unmolested. Cavalry reports no Confederate forces within miles of our position.”

  Sherman nodded. “I haven’t heard any cannon fire for days.”

  “I know. Odd, isn’t it?”

  For just a moment, the thought entered Sherman’s mind that Johnston actually wanted his entire force on the south side of the river, so that he might lead the Union forces into some sort of trap. He shook the disturbing thought out of his head, angry at himself. It was paranoid thinking like that which had gotten him removed from command at Louisville at the very beginning of the war, an experience he had no desire to repeat. It had led to a complete mental breakdown and his attempt at suicide. Had it not been for the intervention of Grant, he might have never gotten another command.

  “James, when your army is across, I want to move it into position on Schofield’s left. Thomas will take position on Schofield’s right when he gets across.”

  “Very well. And then?”

  “The Army of the Cumberland will advance directly south toward Atlanta, while you will maneuver to the east side of the city and cut off its railway links with Augusta, then close up toward the city itself. Schofield will serve as a link between you and Thomas.”

  “If I move my army in such a manner, my left flank will be exposed,” McPherson pointed out.

  “I know. Nothing to do about it. If Johnston plans to fight for the city, I imagine he will do so by attempting to strike your flank. It’s a risk, I know. But a pitched battle in the open against the rebels is something to be desired, not feared. If Johnston means to attack you, we shall meet him. Yes, by God, we shall meet him.”

  “And after that?”

  “Battle or not, once we have cut his rail links to the east, we shall pin him in the defenses of the city and send our cavalry to break his rail links to the west, leaving him with only a single railroad to ensure his supplies. We can then extend our trenches to threaten that final rail link, at which point I believe Johnston will evacuate the city and retreat southwards. We shall march into Atlanta with a minimum loss of life.”

  “A sound plan,” McPherson said.

  “Yes. In the meantime, unless the rebels attempt an attack, which I consider very unlikely, there is going to be a lull in operations for several days while we bring the Army of the Cumberland across the river. Make sure your men take the opportunity to rest and refit. When we move south again, I want our boys to be as ready as they can be. And when we march through the streets of Atlanta, I want them looking like proper soldiers.”

  *****

  July 9, Night

  “All aboard for Danville!” the train conductor called. As if to
give added emphasis to his words, the train’s steam whistle blew sharply a few times.

  The people who had been patiently waiting in the Richmond and Danville Railroad depot stirred themselves. A few exchanged hushed whispers and pointed at one man in particular. More than a few gave him angry glares.

  General Bragg clasped his carpetbag and rose from his seat on the bench. He was aware of the attention he was getting from the rest of the people in the depot, but he paid no mind. If the fact that he was likely the most despised man in the entire Confederacy bothered him, he gave no indication of it.

  The conductor took his ticket without meeting his eyes and Bragg stepped aboard the train. He hoped that the trunk carrying his clothing and other necessities had been loaded properly. A moment later, he found an empty seat and sat down. The two men sitting across from him, one of whom wore an officer’s uniform, immediately got up to find other seats. Letting out a deep breath, Bragg resigned himself to the fact that he would spend at least the next forty-eight hours in uncomfortable confinement aboard multiple trains.

  The President’s request that he travel to Johnston’s headquarters to personally examine the situation had come as a greater surprise than it should have. After all, the stream of telegrams and letters from Atlanta could easily be misunderstood and Davis had long since ceased trusting anything that Johnston said. A personal inspection by a person on whom the President could rely was clearly necessary.

  He thought over the route in his head. From Danville, he would go to Greensboro; from Greensboro, he would go to Columbia; from Columbia, he would go to Augusta; from Augusta, he would go to Atlanta. It was going to be a long and unpleasant trip. The Southern railroad system had been barely adequate before the war and now it verged on total collapse. Rail iron and replacement parts for locomotives had been imported from the North or from Europe before the war. With the blockade having cut off those supplies, the Confederacy had been hard pressed to manufacture their own. Occasional Yankee raids on the railroads only made the problems worse. It was a near miracle that the trains continued moving at all.

  After a delay that nearly sent Bragg forward to complain to the conductor, the engine finally began chugging and the train slowly pulled itself out of the Richmond station. Bragg opened his carpetbag and pulled out a packet of papers, laying them out on his lap. Some were copies of the official reports and telegrams which had been received from General Johnston. Others were letters written by Wheeler to Bragg, and by Hood to Davis. He would spend the journey reading through all the material and trying to filter out fact from fiction.

  If, as Johnston claimed, he had suffered light losses while inflicting heavy losses on Sherman since the campaign had opened in May, why could he not take the offensive? After all, if Johnston was telling the truth, the Confederate army had to be much stronger vis-à-vis the Union forces now then it had been at the beginning of the campaign. This question was especially relevant considering Hood’s claim that Johnston had missed several opportunities to attack.

  He thought of Johnston’s constant requests for reinforcements, which both mystified and irritated him. Johnston had to have been aware that every regiment which could possibly be spared from other theaters of war had been sent to the Army of Tennessee. More than fifteen thousand men had been stripped from Mississippi and the lower Atlantic Gulf and dispatched to Johnston, leaving those other fronts dangerously undermanned. Yet Johnston continued to assert he was too weak to take the offensive.

  Then there was the matter of the proposed cavalry raid on Sherman’s vulnerable supply line. Every piece of information that Bragg had seemed to confirm that the railroad was, indeed, quite vulnerable. But why did Johnston insist that Forrest be sent from Mississippi to do the job, rather than dispatching a force of his own cavalry? Wheeler himself was telling Bragg that he was personally eager to undertake such a mission and that it could be done without endangering the operations of the Army of Tennessee in the slightest.

  As Bragg was mulling these questions over in his mind, his attention was drawn to the conversation of two women sitting directly behind him.

  “Did you see General Bragg waiting to board this train?”

  “Bragg, you say? What an odious brute!”

  “My husband tells me that it was his fault we didn’t capture Chattanooga right after the Battle of Chickamauga.”

  “And I heard Forrest threatened to kill him one time. Perhaps if he had done so, the country wouldn’t in such sorry shape now.”

  “All will be well with Johnston in command. He’s ten times the general Bragg ever was.”

  Bragg scowled severely. He considered standing up, turning around, and berating the poor women in front of the entire car. That obviously would not be the proper behavior of a Confederate general officer and it would certainly get into the newspapers. After what had happened at George Trenholm’s party the other night, news of which had rapidly spread throughout Richmond, Bragg was determined to avoid any such publicity. Hopefully, the women would stop talking and go to sleep and he would not have to endure their sneers any longer.

  They weren’t going to sleep anytime soon, however. Indeed, their ridicule of Bragg continued for nearly twenty minutes, interspersed with praise for Johnston. He tried to focus on his papers to shut out the anonymous mockery emanating from behind him. Eventually, a gentleman who was sitting across the aisle rose and whispered quietly to the two ladies, causing them to fall into an awkward silence.

  Johnston. Everyone was always talking about Johnston. He had been one of the heroes of the First Battle of Manassas back when the war was young. His name had been on everyone’s lips. But he had never achieved any significant success in the years since that battle. He had failed to halt McClellan’s advance on Richmond before being wounded in the Battle of Seven Pines and he had failed to act aggressively enough to break Grant’s siege of Vicksburg. Why everyone continued to speak of Johnston as second only to Lee in the Confederacy’s pantheon of generals was a mystery to Bragg.

  The words of Governor Hawes from a week earlier suddenly came back to him. The political exile from Kentucky had said that the war would have already been won had Johnston been commander of the Army of Tennessee instead of Bragg. Those words had burned, because Bragg had heard them many times before.

  The previous November, a disgraced Bragg had resigned as commander of an Army of Tennessee that had been utterly shattered and demoralized following the disaster at Missionary Ridge. The following May, a rejuvenated and restored Army of Tennessee commanded by Johnston had gone forth to battle against Sherman’s hordes with a renewed enthusiasm and spirit. The difference had not been lost on the Confederate press or in the idle chatter of Richmond dinner parties.

  Bitterly, Bragg shoved his papers back into his bag, tried to get comfortable in the confines of his chair, and closed his eyes. Sleep, however, didn’t come easily.

  Chapter Four

  July 10, Afternoon

  It was an unusually hot day in New York City, but Vallandigham was in a good mood. He had expected a crowd of about fifteen hundred people, but at least twice that many packed the ground in front of the speakers’ platform. Judging by their clothes and appearance, the vast majority belonged to the working class. Many were waving signs denouncing Lincoln and Grant.

  The man currently speaking was Congressman Fernando Wood, one of the stalwarts of the Tammany Hall political machine. He had been serving as Mayor of New York City when the war had broken out. He created enormous controversy when he had called for the city to secede from the Union and set itself up as an independent city-state.

  The crowd cheered and applauded as Wood denounced Grant’s generalship in Virginia and condemned Lincoln for enlisting blacks into the army. Vallandigham didn’t catch his exact words, as he was concentrating on the text of his own speech, which he was going to give as soon Wood had finished. The crowd evidently liked it, as they were cheering wildly.

  Vallandigham thought things were going well. A
s he had expected, no one had arrested him in Ohio, even after his presence back on American soil had become public knowledge. Lincoln no doubt feared the political backlash which would have ensued had the authorities done anything to him. Free to move about the country at will, Vallandigham had embarked upon a speaking campaign, addressing a dozen “peace rallies” throughout Ohio. Now, setting his sights higher, he had traveled to the Democratic stronghold of New York City.

  He considered himself in friendly territory. Just a year earlier, New York City had exploded in three days of deadly rioting against the draft, leaving scores of people dead. The large turnout at the rally confirmed for Vallandigham that the greatest metropolis in the Union was adamantly opposed to the President and his policies.

  The cheering of the crowd rose to a crescendo as Wood came to the end of his speech. The former mayor turned and glanced at the row of chairs behind him, filled with local Democratic leaders, and met Vallandigham’s eye. He dipped his head, wordlessly asking if Vallandigham was ready. Upon receiving a nod, Wood turned and faced the crowd again.

  “And now, it is my pleasure to introduce to you fine people a true patriot. A man who has endured arrest, abuse, and even exile for his country. A man who refuses to be intimidated by the bullying brutes of Lincoln. A man who stands up for the liberties of the people! A man who loves our Constitution! Ladies and gentlemen, Clement Vallandigham!”

  He rose and walked forward, shaking Wood’s hand before advancing to the podium. The crowd roared its approval, applauding madly and waving their signs.

  Vallandigham raised his hands to call for quiet. As the applause died down, he began.

  “My friends, I am happy to be here in New York City, among so many true patriots and Democrats! As you know, my journey was a little longer than I expected.” He paused for a moment while the crowd laughed at his joke. “You may have heard about what happened to me. I had the gall and temerity to ask questions about how King Lincoln was running his war. I had the gall and temerity to ask why ten thousand good Northern men had to die under the guns of the rebels at Fredericksburg. I had the gall and temerity to ask why rich men reap the profits of the war while working men like you are sent to fight and die in it!