graph, to push rapidly southward, crossing movements, but who had nevertheless kept his army in a compact body, with insignificant losses of guns or material of war. His removal was loudly demanded, and on the 17th, in accordance with orders from the Confederate War Department, he turned over his command to General Hood. With this change in commanders commenced a change in the character of the campaign in accordance with the difference in the genius of the two generals, which it was hoped would have an important influence on the morale of the troops, discouraged by a long succession of retreats from fortified positions. the Coosa at the railroad bridge or the Ten Islands, and to push on thence by the most direct route to Opelika, with the object of destroying effectually the railroad running westward from that place, and thus cutting off from Johnston's army an important source of supplies and reinforcement. The command of this expedition was given to General Rousseau, commanding the district of Tennessee. As soon as Johnston was well across the Chattahoochee, and Sherman had commenced manoeuvring on Atlanta, the requisite notice was given, and on the 10th of July General Rousseau commenced his march. passed through Talladega, reached the railroad on the 16th about twenty-five miles west of Opelika, and broke it up all the way back to that place, as well as several miles of the branch railroads leading toward West Point and Columbus. Then turning northward he arrived at Marietta on the 22d, his loss not having exceeded thirty men. He The sudden abandonment of his formidable line of defences on the left bank of the river, by General Johnston, occasioned the utmost dissatisfaction with his conduct of the campaign, especially in Atlanta, where it was expected he would make a stand on the Chattahoochee, which it was argued he could easily do, being in the immediate neighborhood of his supplies. His retreat from the Chattahoochee was the crowning offence with the enemies of this able general, whose inferiority of force had made it impossible to avoid Sherman's outflank The whole of General Sherman's army crossed the Chattahoochee on the 17th, with the exception of General Davis' division of the fourteenth corps, left to watch the railroad bridge and protect the rear, and preparations were made to move upon Atlanta. The Army of the Cumberland, now occupying the right and right centre, rested on the river just above the railroad bridge. The left centre was occupied by the Army of the Ohio, the left by the Army of the Tennessee. The line thus formed made a grand right-wheel march, of which the Army of the Cumberland was the pivot, and on the evening of the 17th came into a position along the Old Peach Tree road, about northeast of the railroad bridge. On the 18th, the left wing, swinging round rapidly, struck the Georgia Railroad about two miles west of Stone Mountain, a huge mass of granite fifteen miles northeast of Atlanta. General McPherson, with the aid of Garrard's cavalry, which moved on his flank, broke up about four miles of this road, while General Schofield occupied Decatur, six miles east of Atlanta, and General Thomas moved his troops up toward Peach Tree Creek, a small stream flowing southwestward to the Chattahoochee, a little above the railroad bridge. The enemy, believing that their left was the real point of attack, and that Sherman would approach Atlanta from the southwest, had opposed these movements with an inadequate force of infantry and a few cavalry. Thus Generals McPherson and Schofield were able on the 19th to pass eastward of Decatur within the naturally strong defensive lines of Nance's and Peach Tree Creeks, and on the same day General Thomas, moving more directly from the north, though meeting with more opposition, succeeded in crossing Peach Tree Creek in front of the enemy's intrenched lines. The Federal armies then lay in a curved line north and northeast of Atlanta, extending from the railroad which runs between Atlanta and the river to the Georgia Railroad and some distance south of it. On the 20th, the Federal lines moved still nearer Atlanta; but as a gap existed between the lines of Generals Schofield and Thomas, two divisions of Howard's corps of General Thomas' army were moved to the left to connect with General Schofield. By this movement General Newton's division of Howard's corps was left alone to hold an important position on the road leading from Atlanta to Buckhead. General Hood soon detected the weak point, and was not slow in taking advantage of the opportunity thus afforded him, so soon after his assumption of the chief command, of striking a blow which might go far toward retrieving many disasters. General Sherman had, however, sent orders to General Newton and the rest of the Army of the Cumberland to close up rapidly toward the left. General Newton accordingly moved to a prominent ridge, where his troops stacked arms and made a temporary halt, but, beyond throwing up piles of logs and rails, made no defensive preparations, no attack being apprehended, prisoners just brought in having reported that there was no considerable force of the enemy within a mile and a half. General Hood had in the mean while been massing his forces in the woods immediately in front of the position of General Newton and of General Hooker's force, which was approaching from the right, hoping to fall upon his adversaries while in motion and cut the Federal army in two. At four o'clock in the after- July noon he advanced suddenly from 20. the woods, without skirmishers, directly on the position of General Newton. His appearance was altogether unexpected; nevertheless the Federal troops instantly sprang to arms, and from behind their log and rail breast-works poured a deadly fire into the dense masses of the enemy. Well-served batteries also, which General Newton had posted on his flanks, aided to keep the Confederates in check. General Hooker's whole corps was seventeenth corps, though with a loss uncovered, and had to fight on compara- of 750 men. Two desperate but unsuctively open ground. General Geary's cessful attempts to regain this position division was thrown back in some con- were made by the enemy, who when fusion, but rallying quickly recovered they finally retired left their dead and its ground and kept the enemy in check wounded on the slope of the hill. till Ward's division came up. General Ward met the enemy's charge by a counter-charge, and after a brief but fierce struggle they were driven back. The division of General Williams, farther to the right and next to that of General Geary, though desperately attacked, repulsed every onset with heavy loss. The battle had lasted four hours, when Hood drew his forces rapidly back to their intrenchments, leaving on the field 600 dead, 1,000 severely wounded, a number of prisoners, and seven regimental flags-his total loss being estimated by General Sherman at not less than 5,000. The Federal loss was 1,900, sustained principally by the corps of General Hooker, upon which fell the brunt of the battle. General Johnson's division of Palmer's corps had also been engaged, but being well defended its loss was comparatively light. The enemy kept within their intrenched position during the 21st, their right beyond the Georgia Railroad and their left extended toward Turner's Ferry, at a general distance of four miles from Atlanta. In the course of the day a strongly fortified hill in front of the extreme Federal left, which completely commanded Atlanta and the July two principal roads leading north 21. and south from the city, was carried by General Leggett's division of the On the morning of the 22d, the whole of the advanced line of the enemy was found abandoned, which led Sherman to suppose that Hood was about to give up Atlanta without further contest. He was, however, only preparing to repeat on a larger scale the experiment of the 20th. Pretending to be falling back upon the city, he hoped to decoy General Sherman into a rapid advance, and then suddenly, with all his force, strike the Federal army while in motion, at such weak points as should offer. Unsuspectingly General Sherman pushed his troops beyond the abandoned works, but found the enemy occupying a line of finished redoubts completely covering the approaches to the city, and actively engaged in connecting these redoubts with curtains, strengthened by rifletrenches, abattis, and chevaux-de-frise. Satisfied that Hood meant to fight, General Sherman immediately resumed the dispositions for pressing toward the city on its east and northeast fronts. The Federal line by these movements became so contracted, that the sixteenth corps, under General Dodge, which formed the right of the Army of the Tennessee, was crowded out of its position, and was directed to march to the extreme left of the line, to aid in the defence of the hill carried by the seventeenth corps on the day before, and |