Confederate wizards of the saddle /

by Bennett H. Young

General Rosecrans took with him out of Nashville forty-seven thousand men. He had seventy-five hundred at Nashville, thirty-five hundred at Gallatin and four thousand at Bowling Green, Kentucky, and Clarksville, Tennessee. General Bragg, all counted, had thirty-eight thousand men to resist the Federal advance.

Between Murfreesboro and Nashville there was a macadam road. Along this, Rosecrans advanced, and it took him four days to get close enough to Murfreesboro to justify an attack on the part of the Confederates. The outlook to the Federals was flattering. On the afternoon of the 30th, General Palmer, who was commanding the Union vanguard, telegraphed that he was “in sight of Murfreesboro and the enemy was running.” On the next day, he discovered that this was a great mistake, and when he felt the impact of the Confederates on the 31st, he realized that if “the men in gray were running,” they had suddenly changed their mind and their ways. The four days consumed by Rosecrans in making this twenty miles were full of intense activities. Generals Wheeler and Wharton of the Confederate cavalry were the potent factors in delaying and embarrassing the Federal movements.

No one in the Confederate service knew better than General Wheeler how to obstruct an advancing foe. On the 26th, 27th, 28th and 29th, he harassed and assailed the Federals at every opportunity and made them hesitant and extremely cautious.

At midnight, on the 29th of December, General Wheeler was ordered by General Bragg to ride around the Federal Army. It was only a thirty-five mile dash, but it had much of excitement, danger and difficulty. On the morning of the 30th, Wheeler reported that he had captured a brigade train and fifty prisoners. At Lavergne, a few hours later, he took seven hundred prisoners and destroyed an immense train. This carried with it a loss to the Federals in supplies and munitions of many hundreds of thousands of dollars. Nearby, at Rock Springs, he caught another train. At Nolensville he captured still another and three hundred prisoners, and then without any disturbance from his foes, he proceeded to take his place on the left wing of the Confederate Army. In these brief hours he had swung the circle and deeply impressed on his opponents that they might expect trouble at every step of their way.

At dawn of the day following, General McCown opened the Battle of Murfreesboro. General Wheeler, with his cavalry, joined in the attack on the Federals and aided in driving them two miles. General Wharton, with the other portion of the Southern cavalry, was ordered also to ride to the rear of the enemy. He captured hundreds of prisoners, and as if defying all rules of safety, he turned the head of his column due north, in the direction of Nashville. He destroyed many wagons and made numerous prisoners. A large majority of those he safely delivered within the Confederate lines. The Federals had good guns; Wharton, inferior ones. He immediately provided his two thousand riders with the improved arms which had been taken from the Federals, and then returned to the rear of the enemy, passing entirely around the Federal forces. These successes inspired every man in Bragg’s army with courage and hope. The example of these bold horsemen was contagious, and the infantry were anxious to try their luck with the invading columns.

Not satisfied with these adventures, on the 1st day of January, General Wheeler with his own and Wharton’s cavalry, decided to return to the rear of the Federal Army, where there was such rich reward for his labors. Revisiting Lavergne, he attacked the garrison, burned many wagons and captured a number of infantry and a splendid piece of artillery. Fate was so propitious in all these expeditions and the field for destruction so wide, the same night he again went to Rosecrans’ rear, capturing a large number of wagons and horses and prisoners, and by two o’clock the next morning was on the left flank of the army. At nine o’clock on the night of the 1st, he made his last expedition to the Federal rear, and, as before, found his foes easily demoralized and ready to flee or surrender when vigorously and promptly assailed. On the 4th of January, after these adventurous and successful operations, he emerged from his Federal surroundings to find that General Bragg had fallen back. No cavalry in any great battle of the war played a more distinguished part than Wheeler’s and Wharton’s men at Murfreesboro. Their audacity was only equalled by their success, and it is difficult to comprehend how even the greatest of leaders, with only twenty-nine hundred horsemen, could make such havoc with foes, or move with such ease, celerity and with freedom from disaster, in the rear of an opposing army, when rarely was he at any time more than ten miles from the tents of its commanders. A few hundreds of Federal cavalry properly led and disposed, with such numbers of infantry close by, ought not only to have obstructed Generals Wheeler and Wharton in their marches, but should have forced or driven them discomfited within their own lines. In the battle the Federal losses in killed and wounded was eight thousand, seven hundred and seventy-eight and three thousand six hundred and seventy-three captured, making a total of twelve thousand four hundred and fifty-one. Rosecrans also lost twenty-eight pieces of artillery. Bragg, with thirty-eight thousand men, had a loss of ten thousand, two hundred and sixty-six, of which nine thousand were killed and wounded, and about twelve hundred of them were left in the hospitals at Murfreesboro, which later were taken possession of by the Federal Army.

A third of the forces in this battle were from Tennessee. They fought desperately on their native soil, contesting for their homes and firesides, and they suffered a terrific decimation. Cheatham’s division, composed entirely of Tennesseeans, had thirty-six per cent wounded or killed. Cleburne’s division suffered a like mortality, and Johnson’s and Palmer’s Tennessee brigades sustained a loss of twenty-nine and a half per cent.

In order to prevent reinforcements at Clarksville, Nashville and Bowling Green from coming to the assistance of Rosecrans, General John H. Morgan was directed by General Bragg on the 22d of December, 1862, to make a raid along the Louisville and Nashville railroad into Kentucky, and, as far as possible, destroy it, so as to break the Federal communications.

Alexandria, in Wilson County, Tennessee, was forty miles east of Nashville. The Federals did not spread out very far from Nashville in this direction, and there was a neutral zone in and around Lebanon, the county seat of Wilson County, to which the Federals and Confederates each now and then came. It was necessary to protect this line in order to prevent danger to Knoxville. It was still in the nominal possession of the Confederacy. South and west of Nashville, Wheeler, Wharton and Forrest were campaigning. Forrest’s December raid into West Tennessee had not only demonstrated that he was one of the most ferocious fighters in the Confederate service, but also the tremendous power of cavalry when skillfully handled. He had largely recruited his skeleton regiments, and when he came out, although he had seen hard service, he numbered several hundred more men than when he was ordered, against his judgment, by General Bragg to make the raid, in the face of most inclement weather and with an ill-equipped force. His personal pride had been subordinated to his patriotism, and he was ready to give and do his best for the work now before Bragg.

Morgan was now to be given a chance to try his hand in Kentucky. For some months there had been no material interruption of the Louisville and Nashville railroad, and Rosecrans was using it and the Cumberland River to supply his army at Nashville. General Bragg was perfectly familiar with the preparations that Rosecrans was making for the advance of his army southward, and he knew that a decisive battle could not be long delayed.