The Battle of Atlanta Part 8

Stanton submitted a number of not material questions, yet possessed of some little interest. Before the meeting closed the subject of army movements on the plains came up, and Stanton said there were three columns of twenty-two thousand troops moving into the Indian country, with a view to an Indian campaign. Inquiry as to the origin and authority of such a movement elicited nothing from the War Secretary.

He said he knew nothing on the subject. He had been told there was such a movement, and Meigs had informed him it was true. Grant had been written to for information, but Grant was away and he knew not when he should have a reply. The expenses of this movement could not, he said, be less than $50,000,000. But he knew nothing about it.

Friday, August 11, 1865.

The question of the Indian war on the plains was again brought forward. No one, it appears, has any knowledge on the question. The Secretary of War is in absolute ignorance. Says he has telegraphed to General Grant, and General Grant says he has not ordered it. McCulloch wanted to know the probable expense--the numbers engaged, etc. Stanton thought McCulloch had better state how many should be engaged--said General Pope had command. Harlan said he considered Pope an improper man--was extravagant and wasteful. Thought twenty-two hundred instead of twenty-two thousand men was a better and sufficient number.

This whole thing is a discredit to the War Department.

Tuesday, August 15, 1865.

Stanton says there is to be a large reduction of the force which is moving against the Indians. That by the 1st of October the force will be about 6,000. That large supplies have gone on, but they can be divided or deflected to New Mexico and other points, so that they will not be lost.

Friday, August 18, 1865.

Senator Doolittle and Mr. Ford, who have been on a mission to the plains, visiting New Mexico, Colorado, etc., had an interview with the President and Cabinet of an hour and a half. Their statement in relation to the Indians and Indian affairs exhibits the folly and wickedness of the expedition which has been gotten up by somebody without authority or the knowledge of the Government.

Their strong protestations against an Indian war, and their statement of the means which they had taken to prevent it, came in very opportunely. Stanton said General Grant had already written to restrict operations; he had also sent to General Meigs. I have no doubt a check has been put on a very extraordinary and unaccountable proceeding, but I doubt if an active stop is yet put to war expenses.

It is no wonder that with such ignorance in the Cabinet as to the condition of the country, that the administration at Washington was so incompetent in the Civil War. No person can read Secretary Wells's diary of the daily doings at Washington of the Cabinet during President Lincoln's administration and see how little appreciation and support he got from his Cabinet. Dissensions among themselves and hardly ever agreeing on any important question, brings to view the great responsibility of the President and the fact that in all the important matters he was dependent upon his own judgment. The Cabinet knew nothing of the Indian depredations that for three months held all the lines of travel, mail, and telegraph crossing the plains to California, with every State and Territory west of the Missouri River appealing for protection, until President Lincoln wrote to General Grant to try and have something done to protect that country. General Grant instructed me to make the campaign in the winter of 1864-65, which was so successful that in forty days all the overland routes were opened, and the stage, telegraph, and mails replaced, as shown in my reports, though at the beginning of the campaign every tribe of Indians from the British Possessions to the Indian Territory was at war, with captures and murders of settlers along all the overland routes, in all the frontier States, every-day occurrences; with women and children captured and outrages committed that cannot be mentioned. And yet this Cabinet had no knowledge of the conditions, and concluded from the report of the Doolittle Peace Commission that the Indian expedition was a complete failure, notwithstanding that this commission failed to make ponce with a single tribe of Indians and failed to stop the depredations of any band of Indians; and, upon its report, declaring that the Indian expeditions were a folly and wickedness gotten up by some one without the authority or knowledge of the Government.

There never were 22,000 troops on the plains, nor one-half of that number.

The War Department may have sent that number out, but, as I have shown, they were all mustered out before they reached their work; and the cost of the campaign with a year's supplies at the posts for all the troops on the plains or engaged in the campaign was not more than $10,000,000, a very small amount compared with the trouble and cost of fighting these Indians for ten years thereafter. Secretary Harlan says that 2,200 troops were sufficient. When I took command, in January, 1865, there were not to exceed 5,000 troops guarding trains, stages, and telegraph-lines, and protecting all the routes of travel across the plains, and they had utterly failed. All travel had been stopped and no expeditions against the Indians had been made. The Indians had held the overland routes for three months in spite of these troops. It shows how little knowledge Secretary Harlan had of the condition of Indian affairs in his department. From the statements of Secretary Wells it is evident where the order came from to stop all operations on the plains and withdraw all troops by October 15th.

When Secretary Stanton states that by October 1st the troops on the plains would be reduced to 6,000, it shows how little knowledge he had of affairs in his department, for at that time there were not 6,000 troops on the plains or in my command.

It is well that no one knew the condition of affairs; that no one was aware of the ignorance of the group of statesmen at Washington who were supposed to be responsible for our nation and its preservation. They did not seem to know where to ascertain the facts. It would seem that Secretary Stanton purposely wished to place a reflection on General Grant, for he must have known that he was responsible for the Army and for all of its movements. It seems that General Grant was away at the time the dispatches of General Pope and myself were sent showing the necessity of continuing the campaign and punishing these savages. When he returned he tried to stop this Cabinet panic, but his dispatches in answer to those from Pope and myself show that he could not do it, and the fatal mistake was made of stopping the campaign just as it was accomplishing and successfully ending a year's work. It seems to have all come about through the misrepresentation of the Doolittle Peace Commission and the lack of proper information on the part of the Cabinet.

In the years 1863, 1864 and 1865 the Indians deliberately made war, believing that the Civil War had so crippled us that we could not effectively contend with them; but just as we had spent millions of dollars, sent thousands of troops into their country, and commenced fighting and capturing them, we were forced to lay down our arms almost in sight of the line of battle and beg for peace, and the Indians believed they had defeated us and that we could not conquer them, and for from three to ten years afterward we had to spend great sums, make winter campaigns, and suffer great losses of life and property, before we obtained the lasting peace which was in sight in 1865 and 1866 if we had been allowed to carry out our campaigns and plans to a legitimate end.

Upon the close of my campaigns on the plains the Legislature of the State of Iowa pa.s.sed and sent me these commendations of my services:

_Resolved_, By the Senate and House of Representatives of the State of Iowa, That the thanks of the people of this State are due and are hereby extended to Major-General Grenville M. Dodge, for his able and efficient management of Indian affairs on the plains, in protecting the Great Overland Routes, and our western borders from the depredations and incursions of hostile Indians, as also for his distinguished services as a commander in the field, and his able administration of the Department of the Missouri.

During this campaigning on the plains I had as my escort Company A, Fourteenth Pennsylvania Cavalry. They belonged to one of the Regiments that was sent from the East to take part in the Indian campaigns, and did not ask to be mustered out until after the campaign. I was greatly indebted to this company for the close attention they gave to me and the intelligence they showed during the whole trip. They had served faithfully in the Civil War, and their veteran experience there was a great benefit in the work they had to do on the plains, often in taking messages and performing other duties where only two or three of them could be detailed at a time. It has always been a great pleasure to me to have had an invitation, ever since they organized their society, to attend their reunions, but, unfortunately, I have been so far away that I could not go; and to the surviving members I with great pleasure extend my thanks for their good services to me.

[Ill.u.s.tration: BRIGADIER-GENERAL G. M. DODGE AND STAFF AT CORINTH, MISS., IN THE SPRING OF 1862

Model of fortified town on the table. Left to right--Lieutenant J. W.

Barnes, A. D. C.; Captain O. J. Dodds, D. Q. M.; Captain C. C. Carpenter, Com. of Sub.; Captain J. K. King, A. Q. M.; Lieutenant-Colonel R. S.

Barnhill, D. P. M.; Major N. B. Howard, Judge Advocate; Lieutenant J. H.

Hogan, Ordnance Officer; Major W. R. Marsh, Medical Director; Captain B.

P. Chenoweth, A. A. I. G.; Captain Henry Horn, Chief of Grand Guards.]

CAMPAIGN UP THE TENNESSEE RIVER VALLEY

GENERAL DODGE IN THE REAR OF GENERAL BRAGG'S ARMY AND COLONEL STREIGHT'S RAID SPRING OF 1863

When General Grant planned the second campaign against Vicksburg he notified me, then in command of the District of Corinth, with about eight thousand infantry and two thousand cavalry, that he intended to take my command with him; but a few days before starting he sent one of his staff officers to me stating that he had concluded to leave me with my command and some additional troops to hold that flank while he moved on Vicksburg.

This dispatch was a great disappointment to myself and my command. When the officer returned to General Grant he no doubt told him of our disappointment, as General Grant wrote me a letter stating that my command was of much more importance than a command directly under him, and said he had fears that General Bragg, who was then facing General Rosecrans in Middle Tennessee, might detach a portion of his force, cross the Tennessee River, and endeavor to make a lodgment on the Mississippi River at some point and break up his communications with the North, with a view of forcing him to abandon the campaign. He said he had left me to take care of that flank, as he knew I would stay there. I read between the lines and learned what was expected of me.

General Grant, in discussing this order of his afterwards, said that he had learned from my services under him that I was peculiarly fitted for such a command, where I had to rely on my own judgment, and that I acted promptly without waiting for orders, and that it came, he thought, from my experience before the war, when I was always in charge of engineering parties in the field and often in a hostile Indian country where I had to act promptly in any emergency. There was, at that time, quite a large force in my front and between me and General Bragg, commanded by General Earl Van Dorn, General N. B. Forrest, and General P. D. Roddey. This force was collecting supplies and storing them along the Memphis and Charleston Railroad from Bear River to Decatur, Ala. The Tennessee Valley in this territory was twenty miles wide, and full of all kinds of supplies. I wrote to General Grant about this storage of supplies for General Bragg's Army, and suggested that I move up the Tennessee Valley with my force to destroy these stores and whatever there was in the valley that Bragg's Army could utilize; but General Grant made no response then to my suggestion. In February I discovered a movement of the force in my front towards General Rosecrans's Army and notified him in the following dispatch:

CORINTH, MISS., February 10, 1863.

_Major-General Rosecrans_:

One of my scouts left Van Dorn Sunday night. He then had two regiments and one battery across the Tombigbee, at Cotton-Gin Port; was crossing slowly, and all his forces had not got to him. His men and officers said he was going to Bragg. His stock is not in good condition. He appears to be going the Pikevill and Russellville road. Streams are high, and roads bad. We captured mail from Bragg's Army yesterday. All the officers' and privates' letters express a belief that Bragg is fixing to fall back; some say to Huntsville, some to Bridgeport. You can judge how reliable such suspicions are. I have endeavored to get a gunboat up to Florence, and if one could go there it could destroy all the forces, and check Van Dorn materially. I will co-operate with it in any way to benefit the service.

G. M. DODGE,

_Brigadier-General_.

On February 16th General Van Dorn's command commenced crossing the Tennessee to join General Bragg's Army. I sent my cavalry to attack him. I wired General Rosecrans that we had attacked Van Dorn's rear guard and took some fifty prisoners from him. He had with him General Roddey, commander of some fifteen hundred men, of which we captured about two hundred. These prisoners said they were ordered to join General Bragg's Army. General Rosecrans, in answer to my dispatch, sent me this message:

MURFREESBOROUGH, February 16, 1863.

_Brigadier-General Dodge, Corinth, Miss._:

Hurlbut's request and my own coincide. Hope you will be able to cut off some of Van Dorn's command. Will give you all our news in your direction. Accept my thanks for your promptness and energy.

W. S. ROSECRANS,

_Major-General_.

Soon after this General Rosecrans conceived the idea of sending Colonel A.

D. Streight with two thousand mounted cavalry and infantry from Nashville by boat to Eastport, Miss., to go from there east to Georgia, destroying the railroads and supplies Bragg's army was depending on, and then move south and west, finally landing in Corinth, Miss. General Rosecrans proposed that I should send two brigades to Iuka in support of this movement, which General Grant acceded to, and said in making this movement for me to go on and carry out the plan I had suggested in destroying the Memphis and Charleston Railroad and the supplies gathered along it. I sent this dispatch, giving my plan of the movement:

HDQRS. DIST. OF CORINTH, DEPRT. OF THE TENNESSEE,

CORINTH, April 4, 1863.

_Henry Binmore, a.s.sistant Adjutant-General_:

CAPTAIN:--In accordance with Major-General Hurlbut's dispatch, I submit the plan of operations east of here. General Rosecrans proposes to land a force at Florence, attack and take that place, while, with a heavy body of cavalry, he penetrates Alabama north of Tennessee River, and gets into Johnson's rear. At the same time I am to strike and take Tusc.u.mbia, and, if practicable, push my cavalry to Decatur, destroy the saltpeter works, and the Tusc.u.mbia and Decatur Railroad, which they have just finished, and take all the horses and mules in that country, to prevent them from raising any large crops. To do this, I propose to move simultaneously with General Rosecrans, throw all my cavalry suddenly across Bear Creek, capture the ferries, and hold them until my infantry and artillery arrive, and then immediately force my cavalry as far toward Tusc.u.mbia as possible, and secure the crossings of Little Bear, on which creek the enemy will concentrate. To accomplish this I shall move light, taking nothing but ammunition and provisions, and march twenty miles per day, with infantry and artillery. I shall take such a force as to render certain the success of the expedition, and propose to take command in person. The movement is to be made next week, or as soon as General Rosecrans notifies me he is ready. I trust this will meet the view of the General commanding.

I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

G. M. DODGE,

_Brigadier-General Commanding_.

To ascertain what enemy I would have to meet, I sent my chief of staff, Captain George E. Spencer, a very competent officer who was a genius in getting inside of the enemy's lines, with a communication to General P. D.