On the 16th of September, he, however, returned to Vicksburg, being carried on a litter to the steamboat, and was compelled to keep his bed until the 25th of September.

At this time Rosecrans was operating in Tennessee and Northern Georgia, and had possession of Chattanooga, upon the Tennessee River, a strategical point, which is perhaps the most important between Richmond and the Mississippi, since it is the centre of the great southern railroads. His base of supplies was Nashville, and the Confederate army under Bragg was apparently attempting to move west of him, through Northern Alabama, in order to cut off his base of supplies. On the 13th of September Halleck telegraphed Grant, "All of Major General Grant's available force should be sent to Memphis, thence to Corinth and Tuscumbia, to coöperate with General Rosecrans." At this time there was telegraphic communication from Washington only as far as Cairo, and thence by boat to Memphis and Vicksburg. The messenger to whom this despatch was intrusted failed to deliver it promptly. On the 15th the order was repeated, and on the 22d, when Grant received it, he immediately forwarded the required reënforcements, and gave orders to detain all steamers then at Vicksburg, or which should arrive there, in order to afford transportation. Within fortyeight hours after the receipt of the order, the troops were on their way. On the 25th Grant wrote, "I am just out of bed, and find that I can write only with great difficulty. During the twenty days that I have been confined to one position, on my back, I have ap parently been in the most perfect health, but now that

I am up on crutches, I find myself very weak;" and on that day he notified Sherman to hold himself in readiness to go to support Rosecrans, and on the 27th the column set out. In order to divert the attention of the enemy, and prevent their interfering with Sherman's march, Grant ordered McPherson to send an expedition to Canton and Jackson.

On the 19th and 20th of September Rosecrans had been severely repulsed on the Chickamauga River, nine miles from Chattanooga, and forced to fall back upon that place, with heavy loss. Here he was nearly surrounded by the Confederate army, which was larger than his, and his only line of communication nearly cut off.

On the 10th of October Grant received orders to report at Cairo, and leaving on the same day, and arriving there on the 16th, telegraphed, "I have just arrived. My staff and headquarters are with me." He was in reply ordered to proceed to Louisville, Kentucky, taking his staff with him, for immediate operations in the field, and that there he would meet an officer of the War Department, with his orders. Starting immediately, he met at Indianapolis, on his way, the Secretary of War, Mr. Stanton, with an order he had brought from Washington, giving Grant a new command-the Military Division of the Mississippi, including ali the territory between the Alleghanies and the Mississippi, except such territory as might be occupied by Banks. The three departments of the Tennessee, the Cumberland, now under Rosecrans, and the Ohio, now under Burnside, were made subordinate to him. The advantage of some such change had been suggested by

Grant nearly a year before, and its necessity had become painfully apparent to the government. The three armies had been acting apparently without reference to each other's operations. For some time Halleck had been trying to make Rosecrans coöperate with Grant, but without success, and his last disaster had determined the government to concentrate the command of all the western forces under one head, and Grant had been selected to occupy this position. The operations in the west would now be planned for mutual support, and tend towards a single result. We shall see that eventually the government concluded that it would be best to pursue this course with the military operations of the whole country.

The Secretary brought with him also two other orders, one relieving Rosecrans, and substituting General Thomas in his place, and the other continuing Rosecrans in command. Grant was offered his choice, and preferred the one removing Rosecrans. Great anxiety was felt for the safety of the army under him. Proceeding together to Louisville, the Secretary directed Grant to assume his new position at once, and to relieve Rosecrans by telegraph. This was done, and on the 19th of October he started for Chattanooga.

16

CHAPTER XXV.

THE CONDITION AT CHATTANOOGA.
TO IMPROVE IT.

THE MEANS TAKEN - THE RESULT OF A WEEK'S WORK.

CHATTANOOGA, while it is the key of the Tennessee River, is also the junction of the railways leading from Memphis to Charleston, from Richmond to Nashville, and south to Atlanta, from whence again the numerous branches supplying the South meet. The railway lines converging here were the interior strategic lines of the Confederacy, enabling them to transport their troops with promptness and facility from one part of the theatre of the war to another, as the necessity arose, and also made their lines of transportation by which the supplies were forwarded from the rich regions of the south-west to their armies in the field. Besides these considerations, situated as this point was at the junction of several states, and at the end of the mountain range of the Alleghanies, it was the centre of the population which remained, all throughout the war, loyal to the national government. The people of East Tennessee, of West Virginia, and North Carolina, and of Northern Alabama and Georgia, had never been false to the Union. The nature of their soil had prevented slavery from becoming a profitable system of labor, and they had not therefore become corrupted by its influence. The record of the sufferings and per

secutions they endured for their devotion to the Union cause has not yet been fully written, and probably never will be. The gallows and the bullet did their work so thoroughly, that until the grave yields up its dead, we can never know how many brave hearts perished in this region of country for their loyalty to the Union. The possession of Chattanooga would secure safety for this population, and the reëstablishment of the national authority would be the realization of their daily prayers for years.

In May, 1862, after the evacuation of Corinth, Halleck had sent Buell, with more than forty thousand men, across the States of Alabama and Tennessee, to Chattanooga; but Bragg, having started for the same point, finally forced Buell to fall back towards the Ohio; and when, after months of marching and fighting, Buell was further from Chattanooga than when he started, he was relieved, and Rosecrans placed in command of this army of the Cumberland, with the same object the possession of Chattanooga as its aim.

After finally fighting the battle of Murfreesboro', in which the Union army remained in possession of the field, Rosecrans remained stationary until the 24th of June, 1863, when he moved out with about seventy thousand men. During Grant's operations at Vicksburg he had tried to have Rosecrans make at least a sufficient demonstration against Bragg to prevent him from sending reënforcements to Johnston. But though ordered to do so from the Department at Washington, he would not budge, but held a council of war, and decided that it was a maxim in war not to fight two decisive battles at the same time. When, however, he