Some promotions to the rank of brigadier were made in the Potomac Army at this time, and Grant was notified that there were three or four other vacancies in that grade. This led him to say he would like to have them given to such men as Sherman might recommend. He added: "No one can tell so well as one immediately in command the disposition that should be made of the material on hand. Osterhaus has proved himself a good soldier, but if he is not in the field I regret his promotion." [Footnote: Id., p. 260.] As it had been Grant's former recommendation which had been the strongest ostensible ground of the promotion, this remark of his is important as pointing out the true principle in such matters. Recommendations of such a sort are always on the implied condition that the claim shall not be forfeited by subsequent conduct, and Grant said in substance that the circumstances had altered the cases and relieved him (and the administration too) of any obligation.
To complete the discussion, it must be noted that there were three brigadiers from Indiana in the Twenty-third Corps at this time, and Hovey was not only the junior of the three but had been the least actively employed in the campaign. Manson had been stricken down in the battle of Resaca whilst heroically leading his men to the capture of the rebel position, and never fully recovered from the injury. [Footnote: Ante, p. 221.] Hascall distinguished himself at every step of the campaign. Both left the service at last without any further recognition. It was common fame in the army that they were not favored by Governor O. P. Morton, the dominant political influence in their State. Hovey's further service was not in the field, but as commandant of the District of Indiana. Osterhaus returned to the Fifteenth Corps and served creditably in Sherman's remaining campaigns. Hovey's division was broken up, one brigade being added to Hascall's division and the other to mine. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxviii. pt. iv. p. 448.]
ATLANTA CAMPAIGN: MARIETTA LINES--CROSSING THE CHATTAHOOCHEE
Continuous rains in June--Allatoona made a field depot on the railway and fortified--Johnston in the Marietta lines--That from Pine Mountain to Lost Mountain abandoned--Swinging our right flank--Affair at Kolb's farm--Preparing for a general attack--Battle of Kennesaw--The tactical problem--Work of my division--Topography about Cheney's--Our advance on the 27th--Nickajack valley reached--The army moves behind us--Johnston retreats to the Chattahoochee--Twenty-third Corps at Smyrna Camp-ground--Crossing the Chattahoochee at Soap Creek--At Roswell--Johnston again retreats--Correspondence with Davis--Mission of B. H. Hill--Visit of Bragg to Johnston--Johnston's unfortunate reticence--He is relieved and Hood placed in command--Significance of the change to the Confederacy and to us.
In the month of June we had more than three weeks of pouring rains, making a quagmire of the whole country. The "dirt roads," which were the only ones, were soon destroyed by the heavy army wagons, and even the place where they had been could not be distinguished in the waste of mud and ruts which spread far and wide. Sherman found the intrenchments Johnston had left "an immense line of works," and congratulated himself that they had been turned with less loss to himself than he had inflicted on the enemy. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxviii. pt. iv. p. 408.] The first reconnoissances found that Johnston had retreated so far that, from the commander downward, we all harbored the hope that he had retreated beyond the Chattahoochee. [Footnote:Id., p. 427.] To prepare for our next step, the railway crossing of the Etowah must be completed and our depot of supplies advanced to Allatoona. The gorge there was almost as defensible on the south as on the north, and Sherman set Captain Poe, his engineer, to work laying out fortifications to cover its southern mouth and thus prepare for holding it by a small garrison as a secondary base if we should have to leave it again to make a wide turning movement. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxviii. pt. iv. p. 428.]
We were not long in learning that Johnston was not over the Chattahoochee, but had only fallen back to a shorter and more formidable line about Marietta, covering the railway where it passed through the defiles of Kennesaw Mountain, extending his left centre to the isolated knob of Pine Mountain, and thence recurving his flank by way of Gilgal (Hard-Shell Church in local nomenclature) toward Lost Mountain, which was held by his cavalry.
At the first appearance of a retreat by the Confederates beyond the Chattahoochee, Sherman's mind naturally turned to the plans of campaign which should follow his approach to Atlanta as they had been indicated by General Grant at the beginning of operations in the spring, and he inquired of Halleck whether the intended movement of the fleet under Farragut and part of the southwestern army under Canby against Mobile had been ordered. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxxviii. pt. iv. p. 418.] Halleck answered that it had been suggested to Canby, but that Grant had, just then, all he could attend to on the Chickahominy. The fierce battles in Virginia had culminated on June 3d, in the terrible struggle at Cold Harbor, where the assault had been so costly as almost to produce dismay throughout the country, and in all our armies to enforce the lesson of caution in attacking such works as the enemy was now habitually constructing. The feeling was hinted at by Sherman in his dispatch to Washington on the 5th, when he said that although he should probably have to fight Johnston at Kennesaw, he would not "run head on to his fortifications." [Footnote: Id., p. 408.]