Hood had with him about 40,000 men, or nearly that. They were as good men as any in the South, and their organization and discipline were perfect. But they were led upon a wild-goose chase by an incapable commander whose leadership gave them opportunities of heroism, indeed, but doomed them on the other hand to hopeless enterprise and wholly profitless slaughter.
Hood first met his enemy under Schofield, at Duck river, forty miles or so south of Nashville. He quickly and easily flanked the position and compelled Schofield to retreat to Franklin, eighteen miles south of Nashville. There, during the afternoon of November thirtieth, Hood delivered a tremendous assault. He carried the front line easily and rushed onward to assail the second. Again he succeeded in a struggle that extended itself far into the night.
At midnight Schofield was driven from his works and retreated to Nashville. Thither Hood followed him with that impetuosity that characterized the indiscretion of the new Confederate commander.
Then followed a long pause—Hood could not in any wise tempt Thomas into field battle and Thomas was too strongly entrenched for even Hood, with all his daring indiscretion, to attack him in his works.
It was not until the fifteenth of December that Thomas struck. When he did so it was with tremendous force and determination. He crushed Hood's entrenched left flank and forced him back to a new line of entrenchments in the rear.
On the next day Thomas renewed the attack with his entire army, and succeeded in completely destroying Hood's resisting power and driving his force into broken and disastrous retreat. Thus ended Hood's ill-judged but audacious campaign.
In the meanwhile Sherman had reached Savannah and his plan of campaign was completely successful at both its ends. The Confederacy was again split in two, and there remained in the gulf states no Confederate army capable of offering anything like effective resistance to any operations that Federal armies might have undertaken. Had he been so minded Thomas might have launched a column against Mobile or Wilmington or Charleston with the practical certainty that it would nowhere encounter an opposition which it need seriously consider.
All that now remained of Confederate strength lay in Lee's little army around Petersburg and Richmond, and in such fragments of armies as General Joseph E. Johnston was presently to gather together with the retreating garrison of Savannah and what remained of Hood's army as a nucleus.
The time was drawing near when Grant was to deliver his final blow and at last make an end of the war.