Shattered Nation

by Jeffrey Brooks

  Lincoln sighed. “If only the Democrats would understand that, we would all be much better off. They are badly deluding the people by suggesting that the Southerners will rejoin the Union if only we tell them that they can keep their slaves. I have lived a politician’s life and I have never seen such an irresponsible action in any campaign.”

  “The people are wise enough to see through their lies,” Stanton said.

  “I hope so.”

  Stanton turned his attention to some papers in his lap, so Lincoln stopped talking and gazed out the window of the carriage as they rode northward along the docks toward Grant’s headquarters.

  To their right, all along the waterfront, dozens of enormous, three-masted vessels were being unloaded. Legions of black laborers hauled down crate after crate, which contained food, ammunition, medicine, shoes, clothing and all the other supplies required by the Federal army besieging Petersburg. The scale of the enterprise stunned Lincoln. Even during his visits to the great port cities of New York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore, he had never seen such an immense manifestation of logistical power.

  To their left, there was an immense city of tents and newly-constructed wood cabins, where untold thousands of Union servicemen toiled away in a veritable beehive of productive activity. Lincoln smelled the aroma of baking bread as they swept past the bakery which, if the stories were to be believed, turned out over a hundred thousand loaves of bread a day. He could see hospitals, sutler’s stores, warehouses, stables, and buildings housing nearly every other conceivable kind of activity.

  As their carriage followed the bank of the river and veered in an eastwardly direction, Lincoln looked to the right again, gazing out over the James River. In the distance, he could see a line of Union ironclads, arrayed like sentries across the river, guarding against any attack on City Point by the small fleet of rebel ironclads that was stationed at Richmond.

  Lincoln shook his head in wonder. As President, he commanded all of this vast effort, wielding a power greater by several orders of magnitude than any of his predecessors in office. Seeing the awesome display of the Union’s logistical might with his own eyes gave him a renewed confidence. With such power at his disposal, surely he could still turn the tide of the war and achieve victory, thus saving the Union, destroying slavery and ensuring that the United States fulfill its historical destiny.

  After a ride of about fifteen minutes, the carriage pulled up in front of an attractive manor which was called the Eppes House. It served as Grant’s headquarters. As he and Stanton were getting out, General Grant himself appeared at the front door, smoking a cigar. A dozen or so staff officers stood at attention and saluted when Lincoln approached.

  Grant stepped forward and shook his hand, not bothering to take out his cigar.

  “Welcome to City Point, Mr. President.”

  “Thank you, General Grant.” To Lincoln, the general looked like the least pretentious man he had ever seen. Judging from his muddy boots and slightly disheveled uniform, he hadn’t made the slightest effort to clean himself up before Lincoln’s visit. He found this contrast to the vanity of other generals, especially buffoons like George McClellan or Joseph Hooker, quite refreshing. Grant, Lincoln had long ago decided, was his kind of man.

  Grant gestured to the door. “Shall we?”

  After ten minutes of brief introductions and handshakes with various staff officers, the three men sat down at a cleared table where a coffee service had been prepared in advance. Grant poured the coffee himself. The conference began.

  For some time, the three men discussed the excitement caused by General Early’s raid on Washington. Lincoln was pleased to see that Grant was as angered by the incompetent Union response as he had been. The general promised a major shakeup in the command structure around the capital to make sure such an event did not happen again. As the discussions moved on, Grant gave Lincoln and Stanton some of the details of the plan to blow a hole in Lee’s trenches by means of a gigantic explosive mine. Lincoln thought the plan interesting and stated his hopes that it would succeed.

  After awhile, Lincoln brought the meeting to its main point.

  “General Grant, if we might discuss the situation in Georgia?”

  The general took a deep breath and nodded. “I’m not a man who whitewashes things. The reverse General Sherman has suffered is very serious, indeed. It threatens the successful outcome of the present campaign, not only in Georgia but throughout the country.”

  “True,” Lincoln said.

  Grant went on. “I had thought that the rebel army under Johnston had been so reduced in strength that it was incapable of offensive action. Obviously, I was wrong. Sherman, too. To be proven wrong in such a dramatic fashion came as an unpleasant shock.”

  “Yes, yes, General Grant,” Stanton said impatiently. “But I do not think it worth our time to muse over the past. Like it or not, the disaster has happened. We are here to discuss how to rectify the situation. Do you believe we should send reinforcements to Sherman?”

  “Well, it’s a difficult question,” Grant said. “After such a defeat, it only makes sense to send Sherman reinforcements to make good his losses.”

  “It’s not just that,” Stanton said. “There are political matters to take into consideration. The defeat in Georgia is the greatest disaster we have suffered at least since the Battle of Chancellorsville. The newspapers are talking of nothing else. The Democrats are having a field day. Even setting aside all military matters, pure politics demands that we avenge the defeat. That can only be done by defeating Johnston, which means we must send reinforcements to Sherman.”

  “Naturally,” said Grant. “But sending reinforcements to Sherman will necessarily curtail our operations in other theaters. To build up the strength of both Sherman’s force and my own force for the campaigns which started in May, the subsidiary theaters of war have been largely stripped of troops already.”

  “What of those forces of ours between the Mississippi and the Appalachians which are not already concentrated in Sherman’s army?” Lincoln asked.

  “General Sherman has informed me that he is already in the process of ordering many of those brigades to his assistance at once.”

  “You disagree?” Stanton asked.

  Grant shrugged. “I’m inclined to trust Sherman’s judgment. But it may weaken the forces protecting our railroads in Tennessee, and will probably not represent a decisive increase in the size of Sherman’s forces. It also may allow the Confederates to dispatch reinforcements of their own to Johnston.”

  “What about the less important theaters of war?” Lincoln asked. “The Trans-Mississippi, perhaps? Or our forces stationed along the Carolina and Florida coasts?”

  Grant shook his head. “Our forces in those theaters are now primarily garrison troops, sufficient to hold the ground we have gained but with little else to spare. If we withdraw troops from either of those theaters, we risk allowing the rebels to regain the initiative in those areas. It would become more difficult to maintain the blockade, and we might also risk the restoration of enemy communications across the Mississippi River. In any case, it would also take months to redeploy forces from those areas to Georgia.”

  “We don’t have months.”

  “I know.”

  For a moment, Lincoln had a horrifying image in his mind of George McClellan sitting down at a negotiating table with Jefferson Davis. “So,” he said, “If a sufficient number of troops are sent to Sherman in time for them to do any good, they must come from the Virginia theater?”

  “Yes, Mr. President. But that, of course, raises other problems.”

  “Such as?” Stanton said.

  Grant took a long puff on his cigar and sat back in his chair, thinking deeply. Nearly a full minute later, just as Lincoln and Stanton were beginning to become uncomfortable at the silence, Grant spoke.

  “I have Lee’s army pinned down here on the Petersburg front, but we lack the strength to break through his lines. Our plan to blast a
hole in the enemy’s defenses by detonating a mine may work, but I wouldn’t count on it. If we dispatch forces from here, we must accept that the current stalemate in Virginia will continue indefinitely.”

  Lincoln nodded soberly. It wasn’t what he wanted to hear, but at least he was convinced it was the unvarnished truth. He waved for Grant to continue.

  “As you know, we currently have significant forces chasing Early’s small army in the northern Shenandoah Valley. Maybe they’ll catch him, but I rather doubt it. I was hoping to use two corps of infantry as the main body of a new force to launch an offensive that would clear the Shenandoah Valley of rebels once and for all.”

  “That would be of great significance,” Stanton said. “Not only does rebel possession of the Valley allow them to launch raids against Washington whenever they please, but the farms of that region are critical to supplying Lee’s army at Petersburg.”

  “Indeed. But with the disaster at Peachtree Creek, I am considering whether one of the two corps I have been intending to send against Early might be of better use with Sherman in Georgia.”

  “So you’re saying that we can send reinforcements to Sherman in time to be of use, but only at the cost of allowing Early to continue to threaten us from the Shenandoah Valley?”

  “That’s about the size of it, Mr. Stanton.”

  Lincoln sat back in his chair and considered all this. With the Northern people increasingly war-weary, and even more so now that the full extent of the disaster at Peachtree Creek was sinking in, a dramatic victory was essential if the war effort was to continue. With the Democrats asserting to everyone who would listen that the war effort had failed and was only resulting in useless casualties, only a big victory would do.

  “So, General Grant,” Lincoln finally asked. “If the choice is between sending reinforcements to Sherman or launching an offensive against Early, what is your recommendation?”

  “I would recommend dispatching the Sixth Corps, a powerful infantry force of three divisions, to Sherman’s army without delay. This means we won’t be as strong in the Shenandoah Valley as I would like, but such are the fortunes of war. I would also recommend an appeal be made to the governors of the states north of the Ohio River to send as many militiamen as they can raise into Kentucky and Tennessee, to guard the rail lines. This will free up regular troops that Sherman can then bring down as reinforcements for his main force.”

  “A wise plan,” Stanton admitted. “The Sixth Corps was brought to Baltimore and Washington to protect those cities from Early’s raiders. If they set out in the next few days, our rail network would have them in Georgia within a few weeks. That would add more than ten thousand men to Sherman’s numbers, making good many of his Peachtree Creek losses.”

  “Exactly,” Grant said.

  Stanton went on. “And with the new draft coming later this month, we can hopefully muster additional regiments that can be sent to Sherman’s aid.”

  Grant tilted his head and shrugged. Clearly, he had little expectation that the coming draft would produce much in the way of new troops.

  Lincoln looked at Stanton, and then back to Grant, who nodded soberly, still puffing away at his cigar. “Very well, then,” Lincoln said. “It is decided.”

  Stanton cleared his throat. “There is another matter I wish to discuss with General Grant before we take our leave. In the wake of the defeat at Peachtree Creek, there has been some talk about whether our armies in the Western theater would be better off with a different commander.”

  Grant immediately shook his head. “I trust General Sherman as I trust no other man. I cannot think of any other officer who would be qualified for such a responsible position.”

  “I mean no offense,” Stanton said. “And I share your confidence in Sherman. But over the last week, there have been renewed rumors about the stability of his state of mind.”

  “The events of late 1861 are in his past. No, I will stand by Sherman. He is the only man I can trust in such a high position.”

  Lincoln nodded, impressed by Grant’s conviction. He and Stanton had carefully discussed how to broach this sensitive subject to Grant, knowing the close friendship between him and Sherman. The waters had been tested. For the moment, Sherman would stay where he was.

  “Mr. President, you requested the opportunity to visit with some of the enlisted men in the camps. I have prepared a cavalry escort for you and an itinerary for the rest of the day.”

  “I would like to visit some of the regiments made up of colored soldiers, if that is possible,” Lincoln said.

  “I’m sure that can be easily arranged.”

  “And visits to regiments from Pennsylvania and Indiana would also be much appreciated.” Lincoln wanted those men writing home to their fathers how much they admired their President. It might change a few votes on Election Day.

  “Of course.”

  “Thank you, General Grant.” The men rose from their chairs and shook hands. “I frankly tell you, my friend, that I take great comfort in knowing that my armies are under capable leadership.”

  Grant smiled. “Not nearly as much heart as I take in knowing that the country as a whole is under capable leadership. A situation I trust shall continue past November.”

  Lincoln shrugged. “It is up to the people. We shall see.”

  *****

  July 25, Morning

  Despite the heat and humidity, Johnston relished being outside. In the days since the battle, he had felt himself increasingly confined to his headquarters at the Niles House and had felt the need to get on his horse and out among the troops. More importantly, he wanted to see the situation on the front lines for himself. He rode across the battlefield of Peachtree Creek, accompanied by Mackall, the army standard bearer, and a small escort of cavalry.

  “Clear the road!” the officer commanding the escort shouted to a marching regiment. “General Johnston is coming through!”

  At the sound of his name, the men of the regiment burst into a cheer. They turned off to the side of the road and began waving their hats in the air.

  “What regiment is this, General Mackall?” Johnston said.

  “The 16th South Carolina, sir. Gist’s Brigade.”

  “Right,” Johnston said. He stopped his horse for a moment, stood up in the stirrups, and spoke loudly. “You men fought well at Peachtree Creek, men! I am in your debt! The country is in your debt!”

  “Three cheers for General Johnston!” one man from the ranks offered. The men lustily offered up their three cheers, and Johnston waved as he kicked his horse back into a trot.

  The battlefield remained strewn with the debris of war. Although several days had passed since the battle, not all of the dead had yet been collected for burial. The regiments of the Army of Tennessee had buried their own soldiers, but those of the enemy had been left to the birds and wild hogs. Johnston frowned. He had no hatred for the Yankees and thought that all brave and worthy men deserved a proper Christian burial. He made a mental note to stress to his staff the need to gather and bury the Union dead.

  Broken bits of discarded weapons, empty haversacks that had been cast aside, and overturned wagons with shattered wheels were also everywhere to be seen. Johnston’s quartermasters, to say nothing of the ordinary soldiers themselves, had done a thorough job collecting anything useful from the wreckage of the battlefield, but that still left a lot of refuse to be done away with only by time and nature.

  They reached Collier’s Bridge, where Cleburne and one of his brigades had fought heroically against overwhelming odds and thereby blocked the retreat of the Army of the Cumberland. The bridge had been repaired and strengthened by the engineers using some of the bridging equipment captured from the enemy and it now served as the primary conduit for the Army of Tennessee as it moved northwards in pursuit of its defeated foe.

  Without a word, Johnston and his entourage took their horses off the main road and rode along the south bank of the creek. What Johnston saw as he gazed down into the s
tream was like something out of Edgar Allen Poe’s worst nightmare. The sight of unburied Union dead on the battlefield had been disturbing enough, but Peachtree Creek looked like a grotesque human abattoir. The creek bed was simply choked with blue-clad corpses. The birds were happily feasting. The stench was overpowering. He pulled his handkerchief out and held it over his face.

  The water was considerably higher than it had been when Johnston had first surveyed the creek weeks earlier. All of the dead bodies were acting as a dam, impeding the flow of the stream and raising its height. More disturbingly, they had added a purplish color to what would have been crystal clear water.

  Johnston had been a soldier all his life. He had fought against the Seminoles in Florida three decades before. He had served with Winfield Scott in the war against Mexico in the 1840s. He had commanded armies of the Confederacy for three years. In a lifetime of war, Johnston had never seen so many corpses collected in so small a place. Despite the heat, he shuddered. Somewhere behind him, he heard a man of the cavalry escort beginning to vomit.

  He turned his horse back to the main road, followed with relief by his escort. A few minutes later, they crossed Collier’s Bridge and continued northward. The road was crowded with Confederate soldiers.

  “Look at their feet,” Mackall said, somewhat absent-mindedly.

  Johnston immediately noticed what had caught Mackall’s attention. A week earlier, perhaps half the men of the Army of Tennessee had gone barefoot because the Confederacy lacked the resources to provide them with shoes. Now, however, nearly all of them were sporting solid footwear, taken from Yankee prisoners and Yankee dead. Johnston also noted an improvement in the quality of the trousers the men were wearing, no doubt for the same reason.

  As they continued northward and approached the front lines, the number of troops grew gradually larger. A strange combination of music and scattered musketry filled the air, as well as the occasional boom of a cannon. It was the sound of heavy skirmishing rather than the sustained roar of a full-scale battle, but the men who died in such fighting were just as dead as anyone else.