Bierce's Civil War and other reminiscences

I don't know what anyone else's background is here on Historum or how they might be affected by Bierce's war stories, but in my case they have taken an emotional toll. I was a Marine in Korea for the last two battle seasons, and despite my ill-advised attempts to get to the front never experienced actual battle, I did live the life. I experienced the marching, waiting, walking post not knowing whether we would be attacked.

A month before I got to K-8, a North Korean up to no good had been killed outside our compound. The Sergeant of the Guard was a WWII veteran who kept sentries on the alert by sneaking up on the sleepy ones, grabbing them and putting a knife to their throats and whispering, "what if I was a Gook?" [I know that is an offensive word now, but that was the word we had back then.] I developed my own methods for walking post so that would never happen to me. I would move from shadow to shadow and at each one stop and search the surroundings.

We had just one pair of thermal boots for walking post, so the one who walked around the rice paddy at the northern end of our compound got the boots. I took the boots when I could get them and didn't mind being out there. We also had just one Thompson submachine gun; which the northern post got that as well. Much about being in Korea is hazy after all these years, but not that particular post. I could still walk it in a drenching rain when the water topped the paddy's raised enclosures.

Another post I remember included a grove of trees and bushes. To the west of this grove was a little clearing and beyond that was the officer's club. We were contemptuous of the officers because they had to be there for only six months while we had to stay for thirteen. One night the OD (Officer of the Day) came out of the Officer's Club to inspect the posts. As he came toward me with eyes still not adjusted to the night, I called out, "halt, who goes there."

The officer staggered to a stop and said "Officer of the Day." I then demanded, "what's the password," and he couldn't remember it. As he tried, I cranked a round into my M1. He put his hands up in alarm. "wait, wait, I really am. Look at my bars. I have other identification."

I backed into the deeper darkness of the grove without saying anything and watched as he tried and failed to see me. Eventually he staggered back to the Officer's Club.

When the truce was signed I was at K-30, Cheju Island. There was a huge Prisoner of War camp located there and, while this doesn't seem reasonable to me now, we were told that the prisoners were simply released and told to make there way back to the North. Some chose not to and instead hid out on Cheju Mountain. We were told that some soldiers from the nearby Army base went up Cheju hunting for deer and never returned.

Once when we were on full alert I strapped a couple of bandoleers around my chest, put a few grenades in my field jacket and with my M1 climbed one of the Prison Towers. The towers were intended to keep track of the then-empty prison grounds, but they worked as well for looking out toward Cheju Mountain. Nothing happened. We were not attacked, but I was up there well armed on a beautiful day, and it was very good.

H. L. Mencken admired the literary figures who fought through their war, Ambrose Bierce, W. DeForest, and Sidney Lanier. He called Mark Twain, William Dean Howells and Henry James, on the other hand, "draft-dodgers." That sort of thinking still exists, but many hold the idea that they "oppose war" and therefore won't fight or support one. Duty to family, state, country is forgotten and replaced by something else which Mencken would have dismissed as cowardice. One fights or runs, there is no other choice.

I still feel that way, but after I got back to the states and ended up my tour at Camp Pendleton as a Rifle Coach, eventually "senior Rifle Coach" which I was very proud of, I decide that since we weren't going back to war with Korea and since Truman and Eisenhower weren't inclined to go to war with China, I would get out of the Marines and go to college.

 
But I often wished I'd stayed in. After college I went to work in Aerospace and remained an engineer for 39 years. Toward the end I worked with another former Marine, this one had worked his way up through the ranks and retired as a Captain. He speculated with me about what my career might have been like if I'd stayed in. I got out in 1955 and it wasn't until about 1962 that "observers" and "advisers" were being sent to Vietnam. I was a Buck Sergeant and the one promise I received when being urged to "ship over" was that of a promotion to Staff Sergeant. My friend said that would have been a good thing. Rank was harder to make in the period between 1955 and 1962.

Ambrose Bierce was a misanthrope. Some times I think I'm one as well, but is it a dislike of all mankind or a contempt for half-hearted soldiers who can't remember the password, skulkers, and draft-dodgers -- especially when they preach their draft-dodgerness and skulking as though it were a higher-form of being, one to be sought by everyone not wishing to be considered a "war-monger."

A Bivouac of the Dead

Ambrose Bierce later visited much of the ground on which he fought. In "A Bivouac of the Dead" he finds a spot where his regiment fought its way up a hill only to find that it was indefensible; so his commander called it a "reconnaissance in force" and they went back down. But there were casualties and many of them, at the time of Bierce's visit, still laid buried near where they fell but the spot seemed to have been used for other dead as well:

"In these forgotten graves rest the Confederate dead -- between eighty and one hundred, as nearly as can be made out. Some fell in the 'battle;' the majority died of disease. Two, only two, have apparently been disinterred for reburial at their homes. So neglected and obscure is this campo santo that only he upon whose farm it is -- the aged postmaster of Travelers' Repose -- appears to know about it. Men living within a mile have never heard of it. Yet other men must be still living who assisted to lay these Southern soldiers where they are, and could identify some of their graves. Is there a man, North or South, who would begrudge the expense of giving to these fallen brothers the tribute of green graves? One would rather not think so. True, there are several hundreds of such places still discoverable in the track of the great war. All the stronger is the dumb demand -- the silent plea of these fallen brothers to what is 'likest God within the soul.'

"they were honest and courageous foemen, having little in common with the political madmen who persuaded them to their doom and the literary bearers of false witness in the aftertime. They did not live through the period of honorable strife into the period of vilification -- did not pass from the iron age to the brazen -- from the era of the sword to the member of the Southern Historical Society. Their valor was not the fury of the non-combatant; they have no voice in the thunder of the civilians and the shouting. Not by them are impaired the dignity and infinite pathos of the Lost Cause. Give them, these blameless gentlemen, their rightful part in all the pomp that fills the circuit of the summer hills."

What I saw at Shiloh

Have we not all imagined (or was it just me?) what it would have been like being an ordinary soldier in some big battle like Shiloh. Here are a few paragraphs from what it was like for Ambrose Bierce:

"The night was now black-dark; as is usual after a battle, it had begun to rain. Still we moved; we were being put into position by somebody. Inch by inch we crept along, treading on one another's heels by way of keeping together. Commands were passed along the line in whispers; more commonly none were given. When the men had passed so closely together that they could advance no farther they stood stock-still, sheltering the locks of their rifles with their ponchos. In this position many fell asleep. When those in front suddenly stepped away those in the rear, roused by the tramping, hastened after with such zeal that the line was soon choked again. Evidently the head of the division was being piloted at a snail's pace by some one who did not feel sure of his ground. Very often we struck our feet against the dead; more frequently against those who still had spirit enough to resent it with a moan. These were lifted carefully to one side and abandoned. some had sense enough to ask in their weak way for water. Absurd! Their clothes were soaked, their hair dank; their white faces, dimly discernible, were clammy and cold. Besides, none of us had any water. There was plenty coming, though, for before midnight a thunderstorm broke upon us with great violence. the rain, which had for hours been a dull drizzle, fell with a copiousness that stifled us; we moved in running water up to our ankles. Happily, we were in a forest of great trees heavily 'decorated' with Spanish moss, or with an enemy standing to his guns the disclosures of the lightning might have been inconvenient. As it was, the incessant blaze enabled us to consult our watches and encouraged us by displaying our numbers; our black, sinuous line, creeping like a giant serpent beneath the trees, was apparently interminable. I am almost ashamed to say how sweet I found the companionship of those coarse men.

"So the long night wore away, and as the glimmer of morning crept in through the forest we found ourselves in a more open country. But where? Not a sign of battle was here. The trees were neither splintered nor scarred, the underbrush was unmown, the ground had no footprints but our own. It was as if we had broken into glades sacred to eternal silence. I should not have been surprised to see sleek leopards come fawning about our feet, and milk-white deer confront us with human eyes.

"A few inaudible commands from an invisible leader had placed us in order of battle. But where was the enemy? Where, too, were the riddled regiments that we had come to save? Had our other divisions arrived during the night and passed the river to assist us? or were we to oppose our paltry five thousand breasts to an army flushed with victory? What protected our right? Who lay upon our left? Was there really anything in our front?

"There came, borne to us on the raw morning air, the long weird note of a bugle. It was directly before us. It rose with a low clear, deliberate warble, and seemed to float in the gray sky like the note of a lark. The bugle calls of the Federal and the Confederate armies were the same: it was the 'assembly'! As it died away I observed that the atmosphere had suffered a change; despite the equilibrium established by the storm, it was electric. Wings were growing on blistered feet. Bruised muscles and jolted bones, shoulders pounded by the cruel knapsack, eyelids leaden from lack of sleep -- all were pervaded by the subtle fluid, all were unconscious of their clay. The men thrust forward their heads, expanded their eyes and clenched their teeth. They breathed hard, as if throttled by tugging at the leash. If you had laid your hand in the beard or hair of one of these men it would have crackled and shot sparks."

Ambrose Bierce in the Civil War

In another thread there was a question about whether the "Founding Fathers" were Christian. I argued that the Founding "generation" was predominately Christian and that the "Fathers probably were as well."

An argument I didn't use but thought about was that Civil War soldiers "seemed" predominately Christian, and if they were that surely weakens the hopes of those who assert that the Founding Fathers were predominately unbelievers. For the colonists to be believers and their Revolutionary War descendants to be unbelievers only to have their Civil War descendents be believers again, defies common sense (IMHO).

I don't know where the statement "there are no atheists in foxholes" originated, but if you were a Union soldier, for example, under General Hazen and about to be asked to charge Confederate emplacements at Pickett's Mill, you might embrace whatever beliefs you held. And if you are a lukewarm Christian you might for the rest of the day increase the temperature.

My impression of Ambrose Bierce had been that he was probably a non-believer, and yet he enlisted and re-enlisted to fight in the Civil War. He was in a great number of battles and had great contempt for skulkers and cowards. I have been reading his Ambrose Bierce's Civil War and think now I may have been wrong about him: The following is the last paragraph from "A Little of Chickamauga":

"To those of us who have survived the attacks of both Bragg and Time, and who keep in memory the dear dead comrades whom we left upon that fateful field, the place means much. May it mean something less to the younger men whose tents are now pitched where, with bended heads and clasped hands, God's great angels stood invisible among the heroes in blue and the heroes in gray, sleeping their last sleep in the woods of Chickamauga."

The Protestant Work Ethic in the U.S. & the West

In 1513 Luther nailed his 95 theses on the Wittenberg Door (1513). In Luther's day they fought wars for religious principles. In fact they wore each other out, economically and in most other ways and gave up fighting each other (Catholic against Protestant) and subscribing to the "Peace of Westphalia" in 1648.

In a way, the Peace of Westphalia was a victory for the Protestants because it in effect established that religion was not something that we in the West are willing to die for anymore. Every man after that could indeed be "his own priest" without having to worry about some Church authority taking his head. The Founding Fathers were probably all alive in 1648 and while they didn't invoke the Peace of Westphalia they adhered to its principles. They would not fight over religious principles. The principles they were willing to fight for were "Enlightenment Principles."

However, as sociologists such as Max Weber, Karl Durkheim and Karl Marx argue, in effect, "enlightenment principles" are Christian principles cleansed of God. Thus, we Christians and non-Christians alike agree that we should take care of the poor; provide for the elderly, care for widows and orphans; forgive those who sin against us (at least in terms of our laws), etc. Karl Marx and Lenin, Trotsky, and Stalin after him made a good living promising to provide the material blessings promised by Christianity more efficiently than they had been by the Church (whether Catholic or Protestant). An excellent modern statement of that concept is provided by Marcel Gauchet's The Disenchantment of the World, A Political History of Religion.

Thus, we can see that the war to establish Liberal (more or less) Democracy in America (1776) occurred not so long (in historical terms) after the Peace of Westphalia (1648) and not so much prior to the war over "Economic Management of the people") (1917).

Most Sociologists today would probably agree that the U.S. is the most Christian of all Western nations and would probably attribute that fact to our Founding generations (not necessarily "fathers") being more intensely religious than those remaining behind in Europe. It is a truism that the West became an economic powerhouse because of its "Protestant Work Ethic." (a term first coined by by Max Weber.) Puritan Protestants especially believed that God would economically bless those who did their duty, and for farmers and others that meant working as hard as they were able to.

Obviously the Protestant Work Ethic isn't as popular as it once was. In France for example workers aren't willing to give up entitlements or tax themselves to pay for them. We see some of that in the U.S. as well but the "Protestant Work Ethic" is perhaps more alive in the U.S. than it is in Europe, (probably) accounting for America's slightly better economy.

But back in the years leading up to 1776 no one was worrying about Social Security, public supported hospitals and other such entitlements. They worried about such enlightenment principles as "freedom," "democracy," and "equality." It needs to be understood, as Marcel Gauchet tells us, that "Enlightenment Principles" are not antithetical to Christian Principles, they are merely principles that have been excised from Christian dogma.

Take "equality" for example. You won't find the words "all men are created equal" in the Bible, but the New Testament is shot through with that principle, e.g., in the heaven the first shall become last and the last first. Powerful religious leaders such as the Pharisees were despised by Jesus and his disciples not because of their political positions but because they thought themselves better than "lesser" people. Thank God, a Pharisee prayed, that I am not like that beggar over there. And perhaps most tellingly, is the beatitude "Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth."

In the twentieth century, the Fascists denounced Enlightenment Principles by declaring that they were better than others. The Communists gave lip-service to them by declaring themselves the "meek," i.e., "workers," but they never gave up the idea that the "workers" needed a "vanguard," i.e., a group of superior people to rule over the workers.

In the West, on the other hand, Enlightenment principles are still held sacred. No Western politician would dream of standing up before the people he wanted to vote for him (or her) and saying, "you should vote for me because I am more competent than you are" even though he might think that. Instead he will present any modest & meek attributes he can dig up from his past and present them for public approval.

So is the matter of which of our Forefathers was Christian a non-issue? In the Max Weber and Marcel Gauchet sense it is. Even if we ask whether the Forefathers were members of the mainline churches extant in the days before 1776 we are on shaky ground. Were these Forefathers members of those churches, such as Presbyterian and Episcopalian sincere believers or were they members in order to show that they were no better than those they wanted to vote for them?

In days prior to the Civil War (1861-1865) there were a lot of mixed marriages. Catholics and Protestants married amicably in the West at least, but there wasn't much softening of sincere Christian belief. The father of Christian Liberalism (Liberal here meaning "less than orthodox") in Europe is generally considered to be Frederick Schleiermacher (1768-1834). Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834) brought the ideas "higher Criticism" to England; so who would have brought them to America prior to the Revolution?

Various Americans such as Thomas Jefferson were very well read for the time; so there may have been a "climate of opinion" in Europe that was giving rise to "higher criticism" that Jefferson was aware of and even influenced by, but it doesn't seem reasonable to assume that those ideas were widespread in America prior to the Revolution. Could there have been something equivalent taking place in America: our own "higher criticism"? I doubt it.

Sherman, Thomas & the Snake Creek Gap controversy

I looked at Albert Castel's book on Atlanta and he pretty much agrees with McMurry (McMurry's Doctoral Dissertation was given in 1967 so "presumably" he advanced this theory before Castel). Castel is fairer than McMurry however because in an appendix he outlining an opposing view, that of B. H. Liddell Hart.

In the advocate-ridden world of Civil War commentary, admirers of General George Thomas, who first proposed the Snake Creek Gap maneuver, argue that if only Thomas had been in charge in place of Sherman the war could have been ended much earlier. Thomas proposed that he send his army (composed on April 30th of 72,938 officers and men, per McMurry) through the Snake Creek Gap to pounce on the undefended rear of Johnston's army. He (or some of his people) had done some reconnaissance and saw that the gap itself was lightly defended and if he could get his army through it he was confident he could defeat if not rout Johnston's entire army.

Sherman chose instead to send McPherson's smaller, 24,000 man army through the gap. Hart thinks Sherman made the right decision. "To swing Thomas out [and send him toward Snake Creek Gap] and pull in McPherson, who was already 'out' [in the direction of the trail to Snake Creek Gap] would mean a crossing of routes and a probably entanglement of lines of supply. And in this spy-ridden country the sudden disappearance of Thomas's army which had been so long facing the Confederates, would be likely to put them on their guard. The one objection to Sherman's decision was that it employed but a quarter of his force in the rear attack, and left an excessively large force to contain Johnston in front. At the same time, however, this covered Sherman's own base, which was within unpleasantly close reach of the enemy, and the loss of which would ruin not only his plan but his army. Moreover, the turning movement had to be made by an uncertainly known route, and with a still greater uncertainty as to whether Snake Creek Gap would be blocked. Sherman would look foolish if two-thirds of his force found itself locked out in front to this narrow defile, with Johnston free to strike swiftly at the remaining third and at Sherman's precious base.

"Thus, in sum, the one valid criticism seems to be that Sherman might have augmented McPherson's army from Thomas's. But Grant had previously discovered Thomas's sensitiveness and for Sherman, newly appointed and previously junior to Thomas, to have broken up an army of such jealous esprit de corps would hardly have been the way to eradicate jealousies and to ensure harmonious co-operation. Nor is there any serious reason to believe that McPherson's army was inadequate in strength to the task of closing Johnston's line of retreat."

Later on Hart writes about Johnston that "It seems curious that he should have concentrated so solidly and placed no part of his force to guard his rear near Snake Creek Gap. But apart from the lack of accurate maps of this tangled wilderness, Snake Creek Gap was so narrow and the mountain approaches to it so winding and difficult, that the Confederates did not seriously believe that Sherman would attempt such a maneuver."

Both McMurry and Castel, and in a slightly more ambivalent fashion Ecelbarger blame Sherman for "ordering" McPherson to stop once he got his army through the gap and wait for further orders. They all admit that Sherman chewed McPherson out for not destroying the railroad at Rasaca, but unjustly so, they tell us. Hart, however looked at the actual orders and they present a different view:

"These instructions, as contained in a letter of May 5, are so explicit that one can only marvel at the subterfuges to which in post-war controversy disgruntled partisans of Thomas were driven in their efforts to blame Sherman not merely for giving McPherson the task in preference to Thomas, but for McPherson's failure to execute it. 'I want you to move . . . to the head of Middle Chickamauga, then to Villanow: then to Snake Gap, secure it and make a bold attack on the enemy's flank or his railroad at any point between Tilton and Resaca. I hope the enemy will fight at Dalton, in which case he can have no force there that can interfere with you. But, should his policy be to fall back along his railroad you will hit him in flank. Do not fail in that event to make the most of the opportunity by the most vigorous attack possible, as it may save us what we have most reason to apprehend -- a slow pursuit, in which he gains strength as we lose it.' Sherman had clearly grasped the truth that to roll the enemy back along their communications means that their resistance will be solidified and expended by accretions like a snowball. 'In the event of hearing the sound of heavy battle about Dalton, the greater necessity for your rapid movement on the railroad. If once broken to an extent that would take them days to repair, you can withdraw to Snake Gap. . . .'

What actually happened when McPherson exited Snake Creek Gap does not seem to be in dispute. Here is Hart again: 'Thus when, early in the morning of the 9th, McPherson's corps, 24,000 strong, debouched into the valley about 4 miles due west of Resaca, there were only Cantey's brigade and a fraction of Reynold's, not much more than 2,000 men to stop it. After driving back a cavalry detachment, belatedly sent down from Dalton to watch this flank, McPherson came within sight of the frail line of Confederate entrenchments covering Resaca, and halted his army, taking up defensive dispositions with four divisions while he sent the fifth forward. This skirmished forward cautiously, and at 12.30 P.M. McPherson wrote a dispatch to Sherman saying that it was probably 'within 2 miles of Resaca,' and adding 'I propose to cut the railroad, if possible, and then fall back and take [up] a strong position near the gorge. . . .' The tone suggests that he was thinking more of the final clause of Sherman's order than of the earlier clauses about making 'a bold attack.'"

Castel accuses Sherman of destroying or hiding or ignoring some letters from McPherson describing his very reasonable (according to Castel) reasons for not attacking as Sherman ordered. Hart quotes from (presumably) those letters:

"At half past ten that night he [McPherson] sent a further and fuller report -- 'General Dodge's command moved up and skirmished with the enemy at Resaca this afternoon. While that was going on one company of mounted infantry ['actually eighteen men' Hart tells us] . . . succeeded in reaching the railroad near Tilton station, but were forced to leave without damaging the track. They tore down a small portion of telegraph wire. . . . After skirmishing till after dark . . . I decided to withdraw the command and take up a position for the night' -- at the mouth at Snake Creek Gap. He then explained that his decision was due, first to the fact that there were several roads down whcih Confederate reinforcements from dalton might arrive on his flank if he stayed out; second, that Dodge's division was 'out of provisions.' 'I shall have to rest my men tomorrow forenoon, at least, to enable them to draw provisions.' Lastly, he expressed regret that he had been unable to break the railroad owing to lack of cavalry, telling Sherman that Garrard's cavalry division had only reached Lafayette and that Garrard wished to wait there for his forage train."

"Sherman was never more bitterly disappointed in his life, and in acknowledging the message prefaced his fresh instructions by the remark, 'I regret beyond measure you did not break the railroad . . . but I suppose it was impossible.'"

Comment: The critics of Sherman defy the cliche "you can't argue with success," for that is exactly what they do. Sherman's taking of Atlanta saved Lincoln's presidency and may have saved the Union. Sherman did that with his three armies, but his critics with a great deal of venom argue that Thomas could have done it quicker and better.

As a long-time hiker I can't get my mind around the idea of old "Slow-Trot" Thomas sneaking his 72,938 through Snake Creek Gap and surprising Johnston. Most hiking trails I have been on require a party to hike single-file. How many miles I wonder would 72,938 men take up marching single file? I suppose that wouldn't have been all bad. If Johnston had noticed that Thomas army had gone missing from the front and decided to beef up his defenses at Snake Creek Gap and then decided to attack Sherman's depleted front, the latter part of Thomas' single-file army would still be close enough to Sherman to turn around and come to his his aid.

Sherman's failures during the Battle of Atlanta

McMurry in his Atlanta 1864, Last Chance for the Confederacy is hard on all of the top commanders. He was harder on Joe Johnston than I had read before. As to Hood (about whom McMurry wrote a separate biography) he was no harder than others I've read, and in a left-handed way Hood comes out a bit better. Hood did a lot of maneuvering against Sherman at Atlanta and guessed right more often than Sherman did. His failure (according to McMurry) was in overestimating what his lieutenants and troops could do.

McMurry's treatment of Sherman was harsher:

Page 182: "The Atlanta campaign itself showcased several of Sherman's weaknesses as a director of field operations. His chief shortcoming was his failure to see that the situation in North Georgia that spring and summer required him to act more as a field commander and less as a person responsible for a grand, overall war plan. His errors were ones of omission rather than of commission, matters of what he did not do that he could reasonably have been expected to do and almost certainly could have accomplished. He simply failed to realize that no single method of warfare is always best in every situation. He did not grasp the reality that sometimes armies must pursue routes to victory other than that dictated by their commanders' pet theories or personal preference. Specifically, armies sometimes have a great opportunity to win an old-fashioned, smashing military triumph on the battlefield that would be important enough to justify the risk it would involve and the casualties it would entail.

"During the Atlanta campaign two opportunities to win such a great battlefield victory presented themselves to Sherman. On both occasions, he was aware of his opportunity, and on both he chose not even to try seriously to take advantage of the situation. At Snake Creek Gap he had one of the war's few real chances to trap an enemy army in the open field and destroy it. Sherman elected instead to make only a limited effort with a relatively weak force. Again, on September 1 at Jonesboro, he had a second such opportunity. He stood then with six powerful infantry corps in the midst of weakened, widely separated parts of the Rebel army. Beyond question, he had that day had it in his power to destroy much or all of the opposing force. Had he chosen to pursue aggressively either of those opportunities, he almost certainly would have broken Secessionist power in the West for all time and hastened the end of the wary by many months.

"Arguably, Sherman had similar opportunities on at least four other occasions in North Georgia in 1864. . . ."

"In all those cases, we can legitimately criticize Sherman for what he failed to do. Because he did not seize any of the opportunities Johnston and Hood gave him, he left the Rebel army intact to march north in the fall after it had evacuated Atlanta. Destruction of Confederate military power in the West did not take place in North Georgia in the spring and summer of 1864. It occurred in Middle Tennessee in late November and December that year at the hands of troops commanded by John M. Schofield and George H. Thomas.

"To be sure, Sherman's handling of operations in Georgia in the spring and summer of 1864 was not inept. Two of his maneuvers, in fact, rate high among the war's operations and showed considerable skill. Seizure of Snake Creek Gap at the very beginning of the campaign was one of the strategic masterpieces of the war and made ultimate Rebel success in Georgia that year very unlikely. The crossing of the Chattahoochee two months later was a well-conceived and well-conducted operation. In both those maneuvers Sherman completely fooled Joseph E. Johnston, struck where he was not expected, and by so doing compelled the Rebels to evacuate very strong positions on which they had expended much time and labor.

"In summary, Sherman proved capable enough to achieve success for the Union cause. In the long run, that was what counted -- except, of course, to the men killed or maimed in the subsequent operations that would have been unnecessary had the war ended nine or ten months sooner than it did."

Comment: To my unskilled eye, it seems inconsistent of McMurry to on the one hand berate Sherman for not taking sufficient adavantage of his victory at Snake Gap and on the other telling us that "Seizure of Snake Creek Gap at the very beginning of the campaign was one of the strategic masterpieces of the war and made ultimate Rebel success in Georgia that year very unlikely."

Also, McMurry states that Sherman can be legitimately criticized for failing to take actions that he could have and should have taken. I have seen other historians make such judgments and wonder how they know that generals like Sherman "could have and should have known." McMurry in places chides Sherman for "guessing" wrong about what Johnston intends, but he provides no references describing what would have enabled Sherman to guess right.

Also, McMurry's main criticism of Sherman, i.e. that he could have destroyed or badly crippled the entire army of Tennessee if he had used a bit more foresight and competences in two places. How does McMurry "know" what Sherman could have known? He provides no references to answer that question. Sherman on p. 412 of Sherman's Memoirs wrote, "The movement by us through Snake-Creek Gap was a total surprise to him. My army about doubled his size, but he had all the advantages of natural positions, of artificial forts and roads, and of concentrated action. We were compelled to grope our way through forests, across mountains, with a large army, necessarily more of less dispersed. Of course, I was disappointed not to have crippled his army more at that particular stage of the game; but, as it resulted, these rapid successes gave us the initiative, and the usual impulse of a conquering army.

"Johnston having retreated in the night of May 15th, immediate pursuit was begun. A division of infantry (Jeff. C. Davis's) was at once dispatched down the valley toward Rome, to support Gerrard's cavalry, and the whole army was ordered pursue, McPherson by Lay's Ferry, on the right, Thomas directly by the railroad, and Schofield by the left, by the old road that crossed the Oostenaula above Echota or Newton. . . ."

Since McMurry provided no reference to show what Sherman should have known that he didn't or should have done that he didn't. Pursuing an army that hasn't been routed didn't in the Civil War result in the destruction of that army as far as I have read. Retiring in order was an art form. A military unit, either cavalry or one or two brigades would skirmish with the pursuing army and bring its forward units to a halt while they deployed. After additional forces came to the front, the delaying forces would move after the "retiring army" and set up at the next good spot to delay the pursuing army once again.

Maybe I'm missing something here, and of course I have read but the one account of the Battle of Atlanta, but McMurry hasn't convinced me that Sherman failed at Atlanta.