On the 19th of October General Rosecrans was superseded by Major General George B. Thomas, in command of the Union Army, with Grant, who was rapidly climbing to the zenith of this renown, marching to his relief as commander of the department.
A considerable commotion was caused in camp about the last of October by the news of a large body of Union soldiers making a demonstration against our left flank and rear. It seems that a body of troops had embarked on board pontoon and flat boats in Chattanooga, and during the night had floated eight miles down the river and there were joined by a similar body marching over land on the north side. This formidable array was crossed over to the south side and moved in the direction of our rear and our line of communication under cover of the hills and mountain ridges. Jenkins' and McLaw's Divisions were ordered to intercept them and drive them off. A night attack was ordered, but by some misunderstanding or disobedience of orders, this movement on the part of the Confederates miscarried, and was abandoned; not, [297] however, until General Bratton, of Jenkins' old Brigade, came up and attacked the rear guard with such vigor that the enemy was glad enough to get away, leaving their wounded and dead upon the field. No further movements were made against the army until after our removal to East Tennessee.
About the first of November orders were issued for the transfer of Longstreet to begin, and on the 5th and 6th the greater part of his army was embarked on hastily constructed trains at Tyner's Station, some five or six miles out on the E.T. & K.R.R. The horses, artillery, and wagon trains took the dirt road to Sweetwater, in the Sweetwater Valley, one of the most fertile regions in East Tennessee.
Longstreet's command consisted of Kershaw's (South Carolina), Bryan's and Wofford's (Georgia), and Humphreys' (Mississippi) Brigades, under Major General McLaws; Anderson's (Georgia), Jenkins' (South Carolina), Law's (Alabama), Robertson's (Arkansas and Texas), and Benning's (Georgia) Brigades, under Brigadier General M. Jenkins, commanding division; two batteries of artillery, under General Alexander; and four brigades of cavalry, under Major General Wheeler.
General Hood had been so desperately wounded at Chickamauga, that it was thought he could never return to the army; but he had won a glorious name, the prestige of which the war department thought of too much value to be lost, but to be used afterwards so disastrously in the campaign through Middle Tennessee. General Hood was, no doubt, an able, resolute, and indefatigable commander, although meteoric, something on the order of Charles, the "Madman of the North;" but his experience did not warrant the department in placing him in the command of an expedition to undertake the impossible—the defeat of an overwhelming army, behind breastworks, in the heart of its own country.
The movement of Longstreet to East Tennessee and Hood through Middle Tennessee was but the commencement of a series of blunders on the part of our war department that culminated eventually in the South's downfall. But it is not our province to speculate in the rosy fields of "might-have-been," but to record facts.
General Longstreet had of all arms fifteen thousand men, including [298] teamsters, guards, medical and ambulance corps. General Burnside had an army of twenty-five thousand men and one hundred pieces of artillery, and this was the army Longstreet was expected to capture or destroy.
General Grant was marching from Mississippi with a large portion of his victorious troops of the Vicksburg campaign to reinforce Rosecrans, Sherman coming down through Tennessee, and Meade was sending reinforcements from the East, all to swell the defeated ranks of Rosecrans. With the knowledge of all these facts, the department was preparing to further reduce the forces of Bragg by sending Longstreet up in East Tennessee, with soldiers badly clad, worse equipped, and with the poorest apology of camp equipage, for an active and progressive campaign.
Both governments were greatly displeased with the results of the battle of Chickamauga—the Federals at their army failing to come up to their expectations and gaining a victory, instead of a disastrous defeat; the Confederates at their commanders in not following up their success and reaping greater results. Under such circumstances, there must be some one on whom to place the blame. General Rosecrans censured General McCook and General Crittenden, commanders of the Twentieth and Twenty-first Corps, and these two able soldiers were relieved of their commands, while General Rosecrans himself was severely censured by the department in Washington, and soon afterwards relieved of his command.
The regiments of the brigade were now all short of field officers—the Seventh and Battalion with none, and the Eighth and Fifteenth in charge of Majors. However, Colonel W.G. Rice joined us on the way to East Tennessee and took command of his battalion.