Writing to his family, a Federal officer stated in disbelief, “I have dated my letters so long from Near Atlanta that it is quite a change to write ‘In Atlanta.’” Quite a change indeed — not only for soldiers in blue or gray, but also for residents of the now-occupied city.
The arrival of Federal troops startled many citizens who had just started calming down from the earthquake during the evening of Sept. 1, 1864 — not a natural seismic occurrence, but man-made.
The Battle of Jonesboro, and the severing of the last rail lines supplying Gen. John Bell Hood’s Army of Tennessee, left the Confederate commander no choice except to pull out of Atlanta. Meanwhile, a misunderstanding of an earlier directive to remove all rolling stock while there was the chance to do so had left more than 80 boxcars – many loaded with munitions – and five locomotives marooned in the city.
The Confederates ran out of time. Not wanting to have precious war matériel fall into the hands of the enemy, and having no other choice, Hood ordered all the cars and engines torched. The flames quickly spread and soon reached the cars containing the munitions. The explosions leveled several nearby buildings and rocked the ground – like an earthquake – for miles in all directions. This was an aftershock the citizens of Atlanta did not need.
Mary Rawson, a young diarist, noted, “The Heavens were in a perfect glow while the atmosphere seemed full of flaming rockets. Crash follows crash, and the swift moving locomotives were sent in pieces and the never tiring metallic horse lay powerless while the sparks filled the air with innumeral (sic) spangles.”
Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman, stationed not far from Jonesboro, readied his forces to drive the final nail into the Army of Tennessee’s coffin. But the Southern army was saved, thanks to the quick work of Confederate Lt. Gen. William Hardee.
Hardee had fallen back from Jonesboro and established a formidable defensive position at Lovejoy’s Station. After a few feeble attempts by Federal troops to run the works, Sherman put his hammer away and returned to Atlanta.
Sherman received several communications indicating Hood had vacated the city, but he awaited official confirmation. The word, announcing Atlanta’s capture by the blue coats, arrived Sept. 3 from Maj. Gen. Henry Slocum.
Sherman reveled in the moment before dispatching his famous telegram to Washington: “So Atlanta is ours, and fairly won.”
After four months of non-stop campaigning, the end of the fight around Atlanta let both combatants enjoy a much-needed time of rest and resupply. A series of skirmishes out in the countryside would follow in the coming weeks, but the city was securely in Northern hands.
As for residents who had endured weeks of siege and shelling, defeat was bitter enough; but an even greater trauma awaited.
Wishing to remove the citizens of Atlanta out of harm’s way for future military action, Sherman sent a dispatch across the lines to Hood on Sept. 7, indicating that he “deemed it to the interest of the United States that the citizens now residing in Atlanta should remove, those who prefer it to go south and the rest north.”
Hood agreed – he had little choice – and offered to provide transportation for those wishing to go south. But Hood took issue with the tone of Sherman’s directive: “Permit me to say that the unprecedented measure you propose transcends, in studied and ingenious cruelty, all acts ever before brought to my attention in the dark history of war.”
As the two officers exchanged messages, Atlanta Mayor James Calhoun decided to respect Sherman’s demand. The mayor issued a notice to all citizens, informing them of the need to evacuate.
A young woman wept as she penciled a late-night entry into her diary: “Dear dear Atlanta! When oh when shall I again tread your pavement and breathe your exhilarating atmosphere?”
Hood moved his army to Palmetto on Sept. 18, where he laid out a defensive position anchored on the left along the Chattahoochee River, and on the right along the Atlanta & West Point Railroad. Here, troops awaited the arrival of President Jefferson Davis, who – in making his third trip to the western theater – sought to reassure the citizens of the South as well as their soldiers of brighter days ahead. Hood and Davis met and talked of the Army of Tennessee’s next move.
The day following Davis’s departure, Sept. 29, Hood again had his men on the march. The lead elements began crossing the Chattahoochee near Campbellton. Early October would take the army back through Cobb County, heading north. Hood had set in motion his plan to draw Sherman’s forces out of Atlanta.
Michael K. Shaffer is a Civil War historian, author and lecturer. He can be contacted at: www.civilwarhistorian.net
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