720 



PUBLIC DOCUMENTS. 



and South, until the military power of the rebellion 

 was entirely broken. 



I therefore determined, first, to use the greatest 

 number of troops practicable against the armed 

 force of the enemy ; preventing him from using the 

 same force at different seasons against first one and 

 then another of our armies, and the possibility of 

 repose for refitting and producing necessary supplies 

 for carrying on resistance. Second, to hammer con- 

 tinuously against the armed force of the enemy and 

 his resources, until by mere attrition, if in no other 

 way, there should be nothing left to him but an 

 equal submission with the loyal section of our com- 

 mon country to the Constitution and laws of the 

 land. 



These views have been kept constantly in mind, 

 and orders given and campaigns made to carry them 

 out. Whether they might have been better in con- 

 ception and execution is for the people, who mourn 

 the loss of friends fallen, and who have to pay the 



Eecuniary cost, to say. All I can s_ay is, that what I 

 ave done has been done conscientiously, to the best 

 of my ability, and in what I conceived to be for the 

 best interests of the whole country. 



At the date when this report begins the situation 

 of the contending forces was about as follows : The 

 Mississippi River was strongly garrisoned by Federal 

 troops from St. Louis, Missouri, to its mouth. The 

 line of the Arkansas was also held, thus giving us 

 armed possession of all west of the Mississippi, north 

 of that stream. A few points in southern Louisiana, 

 not remote from the river, were held by us, together 

 with a small garrison at and near the mouth of the 

 Rio Grande. All the balance of the vast territory 

 of Arkansas, Louisiana, and Texas, was in the al- 

 most undisputed possession of the enemy, with an 

 not Jess than 80,000 effective men 



that could have been brought into the field had there 

 been sufficient opposition to have brought them out. 

 The let-alone policy had demoralized this force so 

 much that probably little more than one-half of it was 

 ever present in garrison at any one time. But the 

 one-half, or 40,000 men, with the bands of guerrillas 

 scattered through Missouri, Arkansas, and along the 

 Mississippi River, and the disloyal character of much 

 of the population, compelled the use of a large num- 

 ber of troops to keep navigation open on the river, 

 and to protect the loyal people to the west of it. To 

 the east of the Mississippi we held substantially with 

 the line of the Tennessee and Holston Rivers, run- 

 ning eastward to include nearly all of the State of 

 Tennessee. South of Chattanooga a small foothold 

 had been obtained in Georgia, sufficient to protect 

 East Tennessee from incursions from the enemy's 

 force at Dalton, Georgia. West Virginia was sub- 

 stantially within our lines. Virginia, with the excep- 

 tion of the northern border, the Potomac River, a 

 small area about the mouth of James River covered 

 by the troops of Norfolk and Fort Monroe, and the 

 territory covered by the Army of the Potomac lying 

 along the Rapidan, was in the possession of the ene- 

 my. Along the sea-coast footholds had been ob- 

 tained at Plymouth, Washington, and Newbern, in 

 North Carolina ; Beaufort, Folly and Morris Islands, 

 Hilton Head, Fort Pulaski, and Port Royal, in South 

 Carolina ; Fernandina and St. Augustine, in Florida. 

 Key West and Pensacolawere also in our possession, 

 while all the important ports were blockaded by the 

 navy. The accompanying map, a copy of which was 

 sent to General Sherman and other commanders in 

 March, 1864, shows by red lines the territory occu- 

 pied by us at the beginning of the rebellion and at 

 the opening of the campaign of 1864, while those in 

 blue are the lines which it was proposed to occupy. 



Behind the Union lines there were many bands of 

 guerrillas and a large population disloyal to the Gov- 

 ernment, making it necessary to guard every foot of 

 road or river used in supplying our armies. In the 

 South a reign of military despotism prevailed, which 

 made every man and boy capable of bearing arms a 



soldier, and those who could not bear arms in the 

 field acted as provosts for collecting deserters and 

 returning them. This enabled the enemy to bring 

 almost his entire strength into the field. 



The enemy had concentrated the bulk of his 

 forces east of the Mississippi into two armies, com- 

 manded by Generals R. E. Lee and J. E. Johnston, 

 his ablest and best generals. The army commanded 

 by Lee occupied me south bank of the Rapidan, 

 extending from Mine Run westward, strongly in- 

 trenched, covering and defending Richmond, the 

 rebel capital, against the Army of the Potomac. 

 The army under Johnston occupied a strongly in- 

 trenched position at Dalton, Georgia, covering and 

 defending Atlanta, Georgia, a place of great import- 

 ance as a railroad centre, against the armies under 

 Major-General W. T. Sherman. In addition to these 

 armies, he had a large cavalry force under Forrest, 

 in northeast Mississippi ; a considerable force, of all 

 arms, in the Shenandoah Valley, and in the western 

 part of Virginia and extreme eastern part of Tennes- 

 see ; and also confronting our sea-coast garrisons, 

 and holding blockaded ports where we had no foot- 

 hold upon land. 



These two armies, and the cities covered and de- 

 fended by them, were the main objective points of 

 the campaign. 



Major-General W. T. Sherman, who was appointed 

 to the command of the Military Division of the Mis- 

 sissippi, embracing all the armies and territory east 

 of the Mississippi River to the Alleghanies, and the 

 Department of Arkansas, west of the Mississippi, 

 had the immediate command of the armies operating 

 against Johnston. 



Major-General George G. Meade had the imme- 

 diate command of the Army of the Potomac, from 

 where I exercised general supervision of the move- 

 ments of all our armies. 



General Sherman was instructed to move against 

 Johnston's army, to break it up, and to go into the 

 interior of the enemy's country as far as he could, 

 inflicting all the damage he could upon their war re- 

 sources. If the enemy in his front showed signs of 

 joining Lee, to follow him up to the full extent of his 

 ability, while I would prevent the concentration of 

 Lee upon him if it was in the power of the Army of 

 the Potomac to do so. More specific written instruc- 

 tions were not given, for the reason that I had talked 

 over with him the plans of the campaign, and was 

 satisfied that he understood them and would execute 

 them to the fullest extent possible. 



Major-General N. P. Banks, then on an expedition 

 up Red River against Shreveport, Louisiana (which 

 had been organized previous to my appointment to 

 command), was notified by me on the 15th of March, 

 of the importance it was that Shreveport should be 

 taken at the earliest possible day, and that if he 

 found that the taking of it would occupy from ten to 

 fifteen days' more time than General Sherman had 



given his troops to be absent from their command, 

 e would sena them back at the time specified by 

 General Sherman, even if it led to the abandonment 

 of the main object of the Red River expedition, for 

 this force was necessary to movements east of the 

 Mississippi ; that should his expedition prove suc- 

 cessful, ne would hold Shreveport and the Red River 

 with such force as he might deem necessary, and re- 

 turn the balance of his troops to the neighborhood 

 of New Orleans, commencing no move for the further 

 acquisition of territory unless it was to make that 

 then held by him more easily held ; that it might be 

 a part of the spring^ campaign to move against Mo- 

 bile ; that it certainly would be if troops enough 

 could be obtained to make it without embarrassing 

 other movements ; that New Orleans would be the 

 point of departure for such an expedition ; also, that 

 I had directed General Steele to make a real move 

 from Arkansas, as suggested by him (General Banks), 

 instead of a demonstration, as Steele thought ad- 

 visable. 



