Personal Recollections of Distinguished Generals

by William Franklin Gore Shanks

General Halleck was at the time of this occurrence before Corinth, and thither Sheridan repaired, to find himself suddenly and unexpectedly transferred from the regular to the volunteer service as colonel of the Second Michigan Cavalry, in place of Gordon Granger, who had been promoted. Halleck had, with an appreciation which he subsequently frequently displayed in organizing the United States armies, noticed Sheridan's qualities, and placed him in the branch of the service for which he was best qualified: But even Halleck did not fully appreciate the admirable qualities of his young protégé, and failed, when intrusted shortly after with the absolute organization of the armies, to advance him to the position for which the quicker appreciation of Grant afterward singled him out, after observing his conduct in one battle only.

His promotion to colonel aroused the ambition of Sheridan, who had before modestly hoped to eventually become a major. He now had opportunities to distinguish himself, and immediately went to work to improve the opportunity, determined to win rank and fame before the close of the war, which, having now changed its character, also gave promise of being long and adventurous, and full of occasions for one in his arm of the service.

His regiment was brigaded with that of Colonel W. L. Elliott, who, as the ranking officer, became brigade commander, and under his leadership Sheridan made his first campaign as a cavalryman. It was the famous raid around Corinth and upon Beauregard's communications at Boonesville, which was noted at the time as one of the first and most successful adventures of our then rapidly improving cavalry, and won for its leader a reputation for dash that the loyal press, with very questionable taste, continually compared to the daring of Stuart and Morgan in their bloodless raids against weak outposts and unguarded rear-lines. This irregular warfare of the rebel cavalry had not, up to that time, partaken of the bloody character which has since been given the cavalry encounters of the war, and Elliott and Sheridan were among the first to expose the fallibility and weakness of the boasted rebel cavalry when vigorously opposed. Elliott never accomplished any thing afterward, and it is half suspected that Sheridan did the work on the occasion which made Elliott famous.

It was but a short time after this affair that a second opportunity to distinguish himself was offered Sheridan on the same field, and, taking advantage of it, he fought his first cavalry battle.

This engagement, although of a minor character, served to illustrate his characteristics as a quick, dashing, stubborn fighter, as more brilliantly developed in Sheridan at more important engagements. The rebels were commanded by General James H. Chalmers, who attacked Sheridan's single regiment with a brigade of cavalry, evidently expecting little resistance. Sheridan was not required, by the importance of the post he commanded nor the position of the army whose front he covered, to hold his ground, and could have with propriety declined battle, and fallen back on the infantry line; but it was not in the heart of the "belligerent cadet" to decline an invitation to battle from any gentleman. He drew up his regiment in line, and received the attack in handsome style. Chalmers's first repulse taught him that he should have to proceed with his attack more systematically, and he brought up his line for a more regular and general assault. While he was thus engaged, Sheridan, with perhaps more enterprise than sound discretion, in view of the insignificance of the stake for which he contended, sent a detachment on a detour to the rear of the rebel position. These, by strenuous exertions, succeeded in effecting this purpose, and made an attack from that direction, while Sheridan, attacking from the front, succeeded in surprising the rebels and driving them from the field in confusion. Chalmers, his opponent in this engagement, subsequently won, under Bragg and Forrest, a character for belligerency similar to that now enjoyed by Sheridan, but he was not as uniformly successful, and his belligerency got him into difficulty. Bragg arrested him for his failure to carry the works at Munfordsville, Kentucky, in September, 1862, when Chalmers had assaulted them without orders. He subsequently got into like difficulties with Forrest, but his readiness to fight and general good qualities brought him safely out of his troubles. In the engagement at Boonesville his readiness to fight was evinced to Sheridan's satisfaction, while Sheridan's superior endurance and enterprise were made apparent to the rebel at the same time.

It was this success which made Sheridan a brigadier general. It has always been an unfortunate feature of our army organization that there is no provision for the promotion of the deserving in the branch of the service in which they have won distinction, and for which they have evinced high qualifications. A colonel of cavalry shows himself eminently deserving of promotion by his services in that branch, and he is promoted to be brigadier general of infantry, and not only taken from the line of the service for which he is best fitted, but, though promoted in rank, is sent to command an inferior arm of the service. By this fault of organization not only does the army lose the service of the person thus promoted out of his sphere, but often the promotion becomes the ruin of the recipient, who may be totally unfitted for this new line of duty. There are numerous examples of this. Among several of these failures, which have resulted from this cause, two of the most notable were of persons in Sheridan's own class. I have elsewhere already noticed how Terrill, who, as a captain of artillery, gained a great reputation for his successful handling of his battery at Shiloh, and who was promoted to be a brigadier general of infantry, to utterly fail and throw away his young life in his chagrin and desperation. McPherson's success outside of the engineer corps was no greater. He graduated at the head of his class, distinguished himself as an engineer, was promoted rapidly from captain to corps commander, only to find himself totally unfitted for such duty, and in time to waste, by his inadaptation to infantry and his lack of decision, the rich fruits of Sherman's successful strategic march through Snake Creek Gap upon Resaca.

Sheridan's fate was not exactly the reverse of this, for, when taken from the cavalry, for which he was eminently fitted, and made brigadier general of infantry, his success at first was not encouraging; but under the various tests which these charges have proved to be, he was more uniformly successful than any officer I remember placed in the same position. I know, indeed, of no general officer who was subjected to so many tests as Sheridan. He was alternately commanding cavalry and infantry, then both together, constantly changing from one line of operations to another, and thus being subjected to the study of new lines and new topography, besides being forced to meet and overcome the prejudices against new commanders local to every army. In fact, Sheridan may be said to have begun his career anew three several times, and his ultimate success in spite of these obstacles shows the superiority of his mettle.

Immediately on his promotion Sheridan was placed in command in Kentucky of a division of raw troops, for the organization of which he was not so well fitted as for fighting them. The command was under General Nelson. Shortly afterward Nelson was killed, and the reorganization of his army, and its incorporation with that of General Buell, placed Sheridan in command of a division of partly disciplined veteran troops. A short time subsequently the army was again reorganized by Rosecrans, and Sheridan was given a division and assigned to the corps of General A. McD. McCook. Sheridan's division suffered defeat at Stone River and Chickamauga. But amid those disasters and defeats the fighting qualities of the "little cadet" found illustrations as brilliant, but not so familiar as those of his greater victories at Cedar Creek, Five Forks.

Stone River was a battle in which the endurance of the soldiers rather than the generalship of their leaders gave us possession of a field in which the enemy retained, until his abandonment of the field, the tactical and strategic advantage. Each corps, and even each division, "fought on its own hook;" there was no generalship, no plan, no purpose on our part. The official reports tell very elaborately of a grand plan, and how, despite the reverses of the first day, it was carried out to brilliant and successful completion, but that plan was arranged after the battle was finished. There was no such plan before the battle, for, like all of Rosecrans's battles, Stone River was fought without any definite plan. Bragg was the tactician of Stone River. He assumed and held the offensive during the whole engagement, and our forces were kept continually on the defensive. It is a singular fact, that so ignorant was Rosecrans of the position of the enemy, so absolutely without a plan was he, that on the very morning of McCook's disastrous defeat he ordered General Crittenden to occupy the town which the enemy were covering in strong force, declaring that they had evacuated it. General T. J. Wood protested against the blind obedience which General Crittenden would have given to this command, and, pending the reference of the remonstrance to Rosecrans, McCook was attacked and whipped. The soldiers fought the battle on our part, not the general commanding the army; and it was Thomas, Rousseau, Sheridan, Negley, Wood, and Palmer, as leaders, who saved the day, and retrieved the disaster precipitated by McCook's incompetency, and Rosecrans's incapacity, from extreme nervousness, to direct a large column of troops. Sheridan's division was posted on the left of McCook's corps, which, being struck in flank and rear, was very quickly and unexpectedly doubled up and thrown back upon Sheridan's division, which was thus forced, while fighting a division in its front, to turn and form a defensive crotchet to the whole army, thus being compelled to expose one or the other of its flanks. It was forced back by superior numbers until its line of battle described three sides of a square, and these being broken after a terrible resistance, it was forced to retreat through a dense forest of cedars, in which artillery could not be moved, to the line formed by the reserves under General Rousseau. While the rest of the corps had been rapidly driven, Sheridan's division fought for hours desperately, losing all the brigade commanders, seventy other officers, and nearly one third of the men killed and wounded. The other divisions of McCook's corps, under Jeff. C. Davis and R. W. Johnson, were never rallied until they reached Nashville, while Sheridan's fell back upon the line of reserves and fought for two days afterward. This result was entirely owing to the personal exertions, daring, and skill of Sheridan; and his conflict formed such a brilliant episode of that badly-managed battle, and his abilities shone so prominently in contrast with the delinquencies of others, that he was at once made a major general.

In the dark cedars at Stone River he kept his men together, when almost surrounded or entirely cut off, only by being at all times along the front line of battle with them; by well-directed encouragement to the deserving, and the blackest reproaches to the delinquents; by alternate appeals and curses, and a constant display of a daring which was inspiring, and in the presence of which no man dared betray himself a coward.