Near Jonesboro, November 15, 1864.

The grand expeditionary force has commenced moving. Our regiment has the honor of leading our corps in the first day’s march. Made about 18 miles to-day, the first ten of which the two or three companies of cavalry who led us had quite lively skirmishing.

At one point the Rebels took advantage of an old line of works and made quite a stubborn resistance, but our regiment, though we were deployed and advanced as skirmishers, did not get a shot the whole day. Just as we turned off the road to bivouac the Rebels opened a piece of artillery on us, but fired only a few shots and hurt no one. Item: Saw a lovely girl today. Item: Had on the Union to-day. Item: Had my first drink of milk since the 26th of December, ’63. Item: Have an oppossum which “Rueben” is to cook for my breakfast. Heavy cannonading west of us.

Tuesday, 15th–Started early this morning for the Southern coast, somewhere, and we don’t care, so long as Sherman is leading us. The Army of the Tennessee forms the right, while the Army of the Cumberland is moving off in the direction of Milledgeville, Georgia. There are about sixty thousand men of all arms, and they are in fine spirits and well clothed for the campaign. The roads are good and the weather fine for marching. We went into bivouac for the night about twelve miles from Atlanta. The country is very thinly settled and there is nothing to forage. All is quiet at the front—none of the rebels in sight.

November 15th.–Fair and cold; ice. Quiet below; rumors of further successes in the Southwest, but not official.

Congress did nothing of interest yesterday in open session, but spent most of its time in secret session. There will probably be stringent martial law, for the strong hand of unlimited power will be required to correct abuses, repress discontent, and bring into the field the whole military strength of the Confederacy. The large majorities for Lincoln in the United States clearly indicate a purpose to make renewed efforts to accomplish our destruction.

It is now contradicted that Lincoln has called for 1,000,000 men.

Three P.M. Cloudy, and threatening snow.

An attack upon the city seems to be apprehended. All men must now have passes from Mr. Carrington, Provost Marshal, or be liable to arrest in the street. Such are the changes, indicating panic on the part of official dignitaries.

15th. Tuesday. In camp. Read some and did company business.

November 15, 1864.

Went up to Covington to-day to pay the Confederate tax. Did not find the commissioners. Mid [a slave] drove me with Beck and the buggy. Got home about three o’clock. How very different is Covington from what it used to be! And how little did they who tore down the old flag and raised the new realize the results that have ensued!

Headquarters Military Division of the West¹
Tuscumbia, November 15, 1864.

General Forrest,
……………..Commanding Cavalry, & c.:
General: It is the direction of General Beauregard that you make to these headquarters, as early as practicable, a report of the number of scouts you have employed, where operating, how employed and organized and supplied with provisions, how often they report, and whether under charge of a special officer. He desires that all independent scouts shall forthwith report to some responsible officer, and that all scouts operating in rear of front line of the army, cavalry included, shall at once report to their proper commands, as only regularly organized companies should be kept in rear of such lines to collect information and maintain order. They should be supplied with rations and forage in some legitimate way to prevent depredations on private property. The system of roving or independent scouts he regards as detrimental, and should be abandoned.
……………..Respectfully, your obedient servant,

GEORGE WM. BRENT,
Colonel and Assistant Adjutant-General.

1. War of the Rebellion: Serial 093 Page 1212 KY., SW. VA., TENN., MISS., ALA., AND N. GA. Chapter LVII.

November 14, 1864.

Troops are coming in to-day on all the roads. ‘Tis said that we will be ready to move to-morrow. So be it. The cracker line is cut now and we don’t want to lie still eating up our precious rations. I was again over the old position we occupied before Atlanta. I would like to be your guide over that ground some day. Tremendous fires in Atlanta to-day.

Monday, 14th–This morning was cool and pleasant. We started early and marched five miles, going into camp a mile south of Atlanta. We tore up the railroad tracks through Atlanta and burned all the public buildings. There was a fine large station here, and a splendid engine house, but both were burned. Very few citizens are left in Atlanta. The Fourteenth, Fifteenth, Seventeenth and Twentieth Army Corps are in bivouac in the vicinity of Atlanta. They are concentrating here for the purpose of making a grand raid down South. We are to take forty days’ rations with us, consisting of hardtack, coffee, sugar, salt and pepper, candles and soap, but we are to forage for meat as we march through the country. All is quiet.

November 14th.–Clear and cold.

Lincoln is re-elected, and has called for a million of men! This makes many of our croaking people despondent; others think it only a game of brag.

I saw the President to-day in earnest conversation with several members of Congress, standing in the street. It is not often he descends from his office to this mode of conference.

Some one of the family intimating that stains of blood were on my undershirts (second hand), I was amused to see Mrs. J. lifting them with the tongs. They have been thoroughly washed, and prove to be a first-rate article. I am proud of them, for they are truly comfortable garments.

Gen. Forrest is doing wonders in Tennessee, as the appended dispatch from Gen. Beauregard shows:

“Tuscumbia, Ala., Nov. 8th, 1804.

“Gen. S. Cooper, A. and I. General.

“Gen. Forrest reports on the 5th instant that he was then engaged fighting the enemy at Johnsonville, having already destroyed four gun boats, of eight guns each, fourteen steamers, and twenty barges, with a large quantity of quartermaster and commissary stores, on the landing and in warehouses, estimated at between seventy-five and one hundred thousand tons. Six gun-boats were then approaching, which he hoped to capture or destroy.

“G. T. Beauregard.”

14th. Monday. Lay in camp. Wrote home, to Sarah and Ella Clark.

November 13.—The “military situation” seems very much the same. Some cheering intimations from Georgia. Hood has made movements on Sherman’s flank, and Forrest upon his rear, which it is thought promise most valuable results, but nothing final has been yet accomplished, and we may be too sanguine.

General Price is still successful in Missouri.

In the Valley of Virginia an immense amount of private property has been destroyed. Sheridan, glorying in his shame, boasts of, and probably magnifies, what has been done in that way. He telegraphs to Grant that he has burned 2,000 barns. The Lord shorten his dreadful work, and have mercy upon the sufferers!

Nothing new about Richmond. A few days ago the enemy made several attempts to advance upon the Darbytown road, and were handsomely repulsed. The firing of cannon is so common a sound that it is rather remarkable when we do not hear it. [continue reading…]

White Hall, two miles west of Atlanta,
November 13, 1864.

We made 15 miles to-day very easily. Coming through Atlanta the smoke almost blinded us. I believe everything of any importance there is on fire. Understand that all the large buildings are to be burned. Tremendous smoke also rising over the site of Marietta. It is said that we will lie here two or three days. We are only one-half mile from where we did our hard fighting “before Atlanta.”

Sunday, 13th–We started early this morning for Atlanta and after marching twenty miles went into camp for the night. A detachment of the Twentieth Army Corps is stationed at the railroad bridge crossing the Chattahoochee river. They will soon destroy the bridge, and also the track clear to Atlanta. All is quiet in the front. We burned everything in our camp yesterday that we did not need, and it seems that everything in sight is being burned. Every man seems to think he has a free hand to touch the match. The nice little town of Marietta which we left behind this morning will doubtless be burned before the last of Sherman’s army leaves the place.

13th. Sunday. Reconnoissance by all cavalry to Cedar Creek. No enemy. Very cold.

Saturday, 12th–Our corps marched out on the railroad between Marietta and Big Shanty and tore it up, burning all the ties and bending the irons. The iron rails were thrown into the fires and then twisted up. The last train went North about noon, and no more mail will be sent out from this part of the army for forty days. The telegraph lines between Atlanta and the North were cut soon after the last train left. The railroad from Dalton south, wherever Sherman’s army goes, is to be destroyed and all stations and public buildings burned.

November 12, 1864.

The Rubicon is passed, the die is cast, and all that sort of thing. We to-day severed our own cracker line. At 11 a.m. ours and the 17th Corps were let loose on the railroad, the men worked with a will and before dark the 12 miles of track between here and Marietta were destroyed. The ties were piled and burned and the rails, after being heated red hot in the middle were looped around trees or telegraph poles. Old destruction himself could not have done the work better. The way the Rebels destroyed our road on their raid was not even a fair parody on our style. The 20th Corps is at it between Atlanta and the river, and the 14th and 23d north of Marietta. We have orders to-night to move at 7 a.m.

November 12th. After an all night’s ride, arrived at Baltimore this morning. Marched through Pratt Street to the B. & O. station, Camden Street. Up to this time nothing special occurred to make mention of. All are anxious to reach camp. Leave Baltimore tonight.

November 12th.–Bright and pleasant.

The rumor is revived that Mr. Seddon will resign. If he really does resign, I shall regard it as a bad sign. He must despair of the Republic; but, then, his successor may be a man of greater energy and knowledge of war.

We are destitute of news, with an awful silence between the armies. We believe this cannot last long, and we know Grant has a great superiority of numbers. And he knows our weakness; for the government will persist in keeping “at the front” local defense troops, smarting under a sense of wrong, some of whom are continually deserting.

The money-changers and speculators, who have lavished their bribes, are all in their places, preying upon the helpless women and children; while the clerks–the permanence of whose tenure of office was guaranteed by the Constitution–are still kept in the trenches, and their families, many of them refugees, are suffering in destitution. But Mr. Seddon says they volunteered. This is not candid. They were told by Mr. Memminger and others that, unless they volunteered, the President had decided their dismissal –when conscription into the army followed, of course!

12th. Saturday. Gen. Rosser attacked 1st Conn. on reconnoissance. 2nd Ohio charged to help them. Both driven back after several charges, in some confusion. Brigade out and drove rebs back–at Shells–hand-to-hand encounter–charge after charge. Col. Hull killed. Drove rebs over the creek, four miles. Rebel brigade came in rear and picked up many stragglers. 2nd Ohio lost 20. Had my horse wounded. Early’s whole army at Middletown.

November 12, 1864.

Warped and put in dresses for the loom. Oh, this blockade gives us work to do for all hands!

Nov 12—Arrange to get Capt. Moore’s body up the Valley. Quarter-master gave me a wagon, team and driver. The Colonel of my Regiment detailed a man to assist me. Army was retreating. We pushed on to the grave. It was now dark and snowing. There were two graves! The good man living near by told us one of them was Capt. M’s. He knew not which. We dug down till we found a Captain’s uniform. We recognized the dead and hastily put body in wagon. A few miles up the pike we got a box I had bought for a coffin. A few miles on we get tan-bark and pack around body Journey all night. Our army camps at Fisher’s Hill. I write to Rev. McGill at Staunton and ask him to look after Capt. M’s. body and if he can not send it to N. C. to bury and mark the spot. He did the latter. A few weeks later the body was sent on and rests near old Sparta, Pitt County, N. C.

Nov. 2—Preaching every night in Lutheran and Methodist Churches. At 11 a. m. a few penitents at prayer meeting.

Nov. 3—I preach in Lutheran Church at night. Rain.

Nov. 4—Wind and rain Regiment goes on picket. I get a furlough of 30 days from 17th instant to visit my family and attend my Annual Conference. I attend preaching in Lutheran Church and sup with Mr. Tidler, a hatter. Mrs. Rutter, Miss Littell and others are kind and attentive.

Nov. 5—Cold wind. Snows a little. Division moves camp. I visit my Regiment on picket and preach in Lutheran Church at night.

Sunday, Nov. 6—I preach to Johnston’s Brigade. Visit Hines in Hoke’s Brigade. Pray with Col. Winston’s Brigade. Attend M. E. Church. Rev. Landstreet preached.

Nov. 7—Meet Chaplains. Go to new camp.

Nov. 8—Good meeting at night. Nineteen conscripts come to our Regiment.

Nov. 9—Prepare seats for our worship.

Nov. 10—Whole army moves and camps near Woodstock. So we will never use our seats! God grant we may all find seats in heaven.

Nov. 11—Pass Middletown.

Friday, 11th–All is quiet in camp. We have company drill twice a day now for the purpose of drilling our conscripts. We received orders that the last mail would leave for the North tomorrow morning and that all who wanted to write farewell letters home would have to attend to it before that time. The rebel cavalry, about three thousand strong, made a raid on our forces at Atlanta, but were repulsed with heavy loss, for what little they gained.

November 11th.–Clear and pleasant. All quiet. No doubt, from the indications, Lincoln has been re-elected.

Now preparations must be made for the further “conflict of opposing forces.” All our physical power must be exerted, else all is lost.

Mr. Sparrow, Louisiana, chairman of the Committee on Military Affairs, introduced a measure, yesterday, in the Senate, which, if consummated, might put all our able-bodied men in the field. It would equalize prices of the necessaries of life, and produce a panic among the speculators. I append it. But, probably, the press will have to be suppressed, “as a war measure,” too, to pass it:

“A bill to extend the assessment of prices for the army to all citizens of the Confederate States:

“Whereas, the depreciation of our currency is, in a great measure, produced [continue reading…]