ARMY OPERATIONS. 



83 



cavalry and Gen. Garrard's, comprising an ef- 

 fective force of 5,000 men, while Gen. McCook, 

 on the right flank, received his own command 

 and the cavalry brought by Gen. Rousseau, 

 amounting in the aggregate to 4,000 men. 

 This joint force Gen. Sherman supposed was 

 fully adequate to look after Gen. Wheeler's 

 rebel cavalry, and to accomplish the work allot- 

 ted to it, which was to rendezvous atLovejoy's 

 station on the Macon road, thirty miles south 

 of Atlanta, on the night of July 28th, and there 

 make such a complete destruction of the road 

 ns would lead to the speedy abandoment of At- 

 lanta. At the moment of starting, Gen. Stone- 

 man asked permission, after fulfilling his orders, 

 to proceed with his own command to Macon 

 and Andersonville, and release the Federal pris- 

 oners of war confined at those places. After 

 some hesitation Gen. Sherman consented, stip- 

 ulating, however, as a condition precedent, that 

 the railroad should be effectually broken up 

 and Wheeler's cavalry put hors de combat. 



On the 27th the two expeditions started 

 forth, Gen. Stoneman making for McDonough, 

 a town about ten miles east of Lovejoy's, and 

 sending Gen. Garrard to Flat Rock to cover his 

 movement ; and Gen. McCook keeping down 

 the right bank of the Chattahoochee. Gen. 

 Stoneman, however, almost immediately turn- 

 ed off toward the Georgia Railroad, which ho 

 followed as far as Covington, whence he struck 

 due south, and to the east of the Ocmulgee, for 

 Macon, distant sixty miles, in the neighborhood 

 of which he arrived on the 30th. A detach- 

 ment was sent east to Gordon, a station on the 

 Georgian Central Railroad, where eleven loco- 

 motives and several trains loaded with quarter- 

 masters 1 stores were destroyed, together with 

 several bridges between that place and Macon. 

 But as he learned that the prisoners in Macou 

 had on the previous day been sent to Charles- 

 ton, Gen. Stoneman decided to return at once 

 by the way he had come, without attempting 

 to reach Macon or Andersonville. On the even- 



CRCSS KEYS \ 



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