The Holston bridge at Strawberry Plains was completed on March 11th, and our forces were at once put in motion for Morristown, where we once more encamped on the 12th. Nothing new had been learned of the enemy; but there was nothing to learn, for Longstreet quietly occupied the line of Bays Mountain, and, like ourselves, was busy getting his troops clothed and shod, while he discussed with the Richmond authorities various plans of campaign. The cavalry ordered back to Johnston was making its way along the base of the mountains, and occasional news of their advance was exaggerated into stories of all Longstreet's army being in motion. Schofield very wisely thought the best way to know what his enemy was doing was to be as near him as practicable without assaulting his strong positions with an inferior force, and therefore ordered the fresh advance as soon as the railway could be made to transport supplies.
On the 14th Grant was again at Nashville, and took immediate steps to send the Ninth Corps to Burnside at Annapolis, [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. p. 67.] in accordance with an arrangement which was settled at the Washington conferences. Schofield was directed to have no delay in getting the Ninth Corps off, and he issued his formal orders to that effect on the 16th. [Footnote:Id., p. 82.] This reduced the forces in East Tennessee to a very small number, but a bold front was preserved and active reconnoitering kept up. On the 18th Stoneman's infantry was placed at Mossy Creek, between New Market and Morristown, and Wood with two brigades of his division was ordered to Rutledge about half-way to Cumberland Gap. The other brigade was placed at Strawberry Plains to protect the stores accumulated there. The cavalry which remained to Schofield was divided, part reporting to Stoneman and part to Wood, and the country was carefully watched from the Nolachucky on the east to Cumberland Gap on the northwest. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. pp. 88, 89.] I was personally directed to keep headquarters in the field, with power to act, in emergencies and in matters of detail, in Schofield's name, while the general returned to the department headquarters at Knoxville, where he made to Sherman, as his now superior, a full report of the situation, with suggestions as to the future work of the army of the Ohio. [Footnote: Id., p. 96.] It was now settled that a new campaign, both East and West, should open in April, if possible, and everything else was to be made subservient to preparation for it. Steps were taken to bring back the furloughed veterans, to remount the cavalry in Kentucky and bring it forward, and to secure such additional infantry as should enable Schofield to take the field with three strong divisions of foot, and at least two of horse, besides leaving about ten thousand men in Kentucky and five thousand in East Tennessee.
The question what should be the work of the Army of the Ohio had naturally interested us who belonged to it, and while Grant was in Washington I prepared and submitted to General Schofield a sketch of a plan of campaign. It was based on the assumption that the Army of the Potomac would not operate by its left along the lowlands of Virginia, as McClellan had done, but would follow the railway through Culpepper and Orange Court House to Richmond. This route was in a high and healthy country, the streams would be crossed where they were comparatively insignificant, and the natural obstacles to an advance seemed much less formidable than upon the coast line. True, the army would have to depend upon the railway for its supplies, but so must Sherman in the West, and the Virginia line was only a fraction of his in length. It had the advantage of covering the Shenandoah valley as it advanced, and saving the large detachment which had to be devoted to that region and to the protection of Washington. But besides this (and this was the feature directly affecting us in East Tennessee), it opened for the Army of the Ohio a rôle of usefulness which seemed to me very important.
If Schofield were to take the field in Georgia, he could carry to Sherman, at most, some twelve or fourteen thousand infantry and six or eight of cavalry. The proper protection of Kentucky and East Tennessee required just about the same number of troops. His active column in the decisive campaign would therefore be only half of the forces in his department. Whenever it should be apparent that Georgia was our field of operations, Longstreet's twenty thousand men would be set free to join Lee in Virginia (as actually happened), or could be used in any other theatre of operations, whilst our garrisons could not be greatly reduced because small raids of mounted men could harry the wide expanse of country behind us unless all the important points were fully guarded. This also was demonstrated by our actual experience, and was a plain deduction from facts and principles. To drive Longstreet into Virginia and destroy the railroad so that he could not return was, therefore, to force the enemy to do the thing most advantageous to himself; that is, to concentrate his forces at the East in entire security that he would not be troubled by any advance on our part into southwestern Virginia.
If, on the other hand, we could move eastward along the railroad, we could bring our supplies to our camps as we advanced. Sherman's army behind us would make our base at Chattanooga safe; the great mountain barrier on the right would so cover our flank that scarce any force need be left in Tennessee, but all could be put in the aggressive column: the troops in Kentucky could be brought forward as we progressed, for our movement would cover that district; finally, on reaching the New River valley we could be joined by the forces in West Virginia. The advance, therefore, instead of being with a dwindling column would be with a growing one, and when the Army of the Potomac should approach the valley of the James, we should be ready with about forty thousand to come into line as the right wing of that army. Approaching Richmond from the north and west, the south side railroad would be at once in our grasp, and that to Petersburg within easy reach.
The objection to such a plan which would first occur to a critic, would be that convergent movements from so distant bases are proverbially uncertain; but this objection is greatly weakened by a study of the topography of the country. The Holston valley is so isolated that, approached by the railway line with a good base behind the column, it is strongly defensible, and if the advance is so timed as not to pass the New River before the Army of the Potomac should be swinging in toward Richmond from the northwest, Lee's army would be too fully occupied to make a detachment strong enough to oppose us, and the line by which he would operate against us would be threatened by the army of our friends. There would also be a safe line of retreat always open for us, in case of check. [Footnote: Napoleon was a master of strategy who fully appreciated the objections to exterior lines, but in the campaign of Wagram in 1809 he ordered Marmont to lead a column from Italy to Vienna by a route having strong resemblances to that which I have sketched. He regarded the character of the route itself, protected as it was by mountain ranges, and giving the assurance of a line of retreat, as making an exception to ordinary cases and overcoming the objections which would have been conclusive against attempting it in an open country.] Another interesting feature in this plan is that if railway communication between Sherman and the Potomac Army had been opened in the summer of 1864, it would have been an interior line of immense importance, not improbably modifying essentially the final campaign of the war.
General Schofield thought well enough of my sketch to adopt it as a suggestion to General Grant, which he submitted as soon as the latter returned from the East. The General-in-Chief had, however, already made arrangements which committed him to operating by the left of the Potomac Army. He had sent General W. F. Smith to Fortress Monroe for the purpose of taking the field at the head of the movable part of Butler's Army of the James, and Burnside's command at Annapolis was at that time expected to make another line of operations from the seacoast in North Carolina. There was also a disposition to leave in Sherman's hands all the departments which constituted the Military Division of the Mississippi, and allow him to concentrate the movable forces of all in his operations against Johnston. Grant therefore adhered to his original purpose of destroying enough of the railroad near the Watauga River to make a serious obstruction to hostile movements against East Tennessee from the east, and turn everything that could be spared into the advance upon Atlanta. Another thing which had weight with him was the fact that Schofield's confirmation as major-general was still delayed and opposed in the Senate, and he intended, if it were finally defeated, to consolidate the Department of the Ohio with that of the Cumberland under General Thomas. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. p. 11.]
On the 29th of March General Sherman visited Schofield at Knoxville, and a full understanding was reached regarding the place the Army of the Ohio was to take in the great campaign of the spring. All the troops in the department were to constitute the Twenty-third Corps, and Schofield was to command the moving column in the field as well as the department. To avoid the inconvenience of having a double head to this column, Stoneman was to be transferred to the command of the cavalry in place of Sturgis, and Schofield was to be assigned to the formal command of the corps. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. pp. 221, 268, 312.] Sturgis was then to be sent to Memphis to take command of the column there organizing for the purpose of operating against Forrest.
As to operations in the upper valley of the Holston, it was determined to occupy Bull's Gap at an early day, and to keep up such an apparent purpose of advancing as should detain Longstreet in East Tennessee as long as possible. If he retreated he was to be followed, so as to induce him to burn the railway bridges, and thus to avoid disclosing our own purpose of leaving that portion of the valley which we should plainly proclaim if we ourselves should destroy the railway. Everything was to be ready for movement, and at the last moment, if the enemy had not already done it, we were to burn railway bridges and tear up the track for a considerable distance. Then the divisions which were to take the field in Georgia were to march rapidly to Cleveland, and come in on the left of Sherman's grand army as he advanced from Chattanooga.
As the plan of campaign thus took definite shape, it gave the occasion also for a settlement of my personal problem of permanent assignment to duty. It had become evident that there was no room for transfer to another command, and the active part marked out for the Twenty-third Corps removed the only ground for wishing it. No better soldiers could be found than those which made up our divisions, and my acquaintance with General Schofield had ripened into a confidence which made me entirely content to follow him as my commander. He warmly invited me to continue permanently in the position of chief of staff, but gave me the alternate choice of one of the divisions of the active column. My preference for responsible command in the field decided me to take a division, and by his further permission I chose the third, in which were a considerable number of officers who had served with me in other campaigns. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxii. pt. iii. p. 245.] I would not be understood, however, to depreciate the position of chief of staff of such a department and army. Properly filled, few positions in active service could be pleasanter or more useful. I had tested this during the six weeks preceding, and had found the associations and the duty every way most agreeable. The general was always prompt to assume his proper responsibility and to order the movements or the administrative acts which are peculiarly the province of the commander; but he gave me the task of arranging the subordinate details, and the authority to direct them in his name. To distribute the parts each corps or division was to perform; to co-ordinate all the arrangements so that they should move harmoniously; to bring to a common centre all the information, external and internal, which affected the conduct and efficiency of the whole; to supervise the matters of organization, of equipment, and of supply; to consult with the medical director as to hospital work and the sanitary condition of the army, and to be guarantor that the common end is vigorously and intelligently pursued by every part of the army,--all this, as scarcely needs telling, makes a chief of staff the right arm of the commander, and his most trusted adviser and confidant. He makes his commander feel free to give his own thought to the larger problems of a campaign, with confidence that the whole machinery of the army will work smoothly toward the object which he has in view. I did not then, nor do I now, underestimate the importance of the duty which an industrious staff officer may thus perform, and I had found it made personally pleasant by the even temper and appreciative justice of General Schofield's rule. I had, however, formed so strong a predilection for the immediate and active conduct of troops in the field, that this determined me to choose the division command. In the new organization of the corps I should, in this, report directly to the general, and should be next in rank to him (in the infantry) by virtue of seniority, so that in his absence, or when two divisions were temporarily detached from the army, I should exercise a superior command. These were advantages which every experienced soldier estimates highly, and I was to enjoy them, until good fortune and the steady friendship of my superiors gave me, a second time, and this time in permanent form, the corps command with the rank belonging to it. There was no mistake, therefore, in my choice of duty; and considering the part Sherman's whole army was to play in the remaining campaigns of the war, it was a matter of personal good fortune also that the Army of the Ohio became an integral part of the great western organization, and marched southward, not eastward.