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the ten-hour drive, frankly was definitely worth it. according to your program, what we're supposed to do today is first offer some insights speak briefly on a portion of the campaign they believed to be particularly illuminating. two things i'll do real quickly, if i can, the first one deals with spring hill. spring hill was the day before the battle of franklin and what it represented was a lost opportunity to attack some union troops either at spring hill itself or some who were in colombia and would come up to franklin pike that night. essentially what happened is a profound mystery in many ways. hood planned a flanking movement which was extremely successful. in fact there were federal troops still at columbia who were going to come up the pike that night. they failed to do two things. they could have launched an attack on the yankees who were

in spring hill. they did not do that. there was a fight but it was not the larger fight that i think the generals had contemplated. the other thing they could have done potentially was to cut off the pipe so that as troops came up from columbia they would be met by confederate resistance. the thing that always sort of astonished me about this is that it's always deemed as a confederate failure, which it was, but there's tremendous assumptions made about what the federals would have done which is essentially they would have inevitably been snared and destroyed. our irish guy today said that at spring hill they had an opportunity of destroying or mangling a large part of the union army. that's possibly true. but what i think they've lost in spring hill in some ways it never gets the attention it is due, is that the yankees in this case appear as simply unwitting accomplices of confederates who were bent on destroying them. these were veteran federal

soldiers though. these were battle-hardened veterans of the atlanta campaign and elsewhere. the idea that they would simply encounter confederate troops and meekly hand over their weapons is to me simply preposterous. there could have been a battle. it could have been at spring hill. it could have been somewhere between columbia and spring hill. but i think the idea that the federals would have been dispatched with ease is simply nonsense. but you can do what i did when i was a kid with my toy soldiers. you can basically do whatever you want with your imagination. if you're a confederate partisan, you can wipe out john skofield's army to a plan. if you are a union you can have your union an ses tore fight his way through, then go on to franklin, then nashville. both sides would have suffered casualties. a night attack if that had taken place was fraught with danger. there could have been a battle november 29th. there could have been a battle fought somewhere else in frank ln lin on november 30th.

but the claim this could havale al altered things is simply false. frankly, there is an elephant in the room here. his name is john bell hood. i went to visit hood's boyhood home. everyone properly associates him with texas but he was actually born in kentucky in bath county. i went over to see his boyhood home. looking for inspiration. there was none. the house has been sided. there is a nice car port and really he left when he was so young i could not have imagine little toddler john bell hood with his beard. you know. in the driveway. so alas. some of you know there's been a new book published by a fellow named stephen m. hood. it's called "the rise, fall and resurrection of a confederate general." it is a major reappraisal.

essentially he believes historians formed an inaccurate portrayal of hood, that they have ignored positive views of him both during the war and post-war period. he believes that historians have accentuated the negative and written things that are basically false. he believes that historians have copied anecdotes and statements from other historians without going critically to the original source. they take citations out of context that defame hood and ignore larger context which would make him look better. frankly, there is a long line of historians he asailssailsassails including me. mr. hood conveniently tells me that in prewar -- in 1950s america, $2,500 would have been the equivalent of $68,000 today. he's right. i should have couched it in terms of something to the effect

like, "he was viewed as aggressive," and this anecdote even though it is preposterous illustrates it. but there are other people that he takes on more. there's the tennessee connection. starts with thomas r. hay who comes off relatively better than stanley horn thomas connelly. then wiley sword is his particular target. i really have the impression that sam hood would like to get all of us historians in a big room and just beat the hell out of all of us. i will tell you that sam hood has lots of supporters. i went on amazon right before i came. there were 60-some odd comments and 44 gave him either a five-star or four-star rating. so i do think that there are people who have felt that john hood has been maligned unfairly, that he deserves better and that if it was a failed campaign -- which sam hood acknowledges that maybe john bell hood has been wronged by historians. all i'll say is that what we historians do though. we take historic events and

figures, we interpret the past and there is conflicting interpretations and if it were not so, to be honest with you history would not be much fun. so i'm glad to have you here and hope you enjoy the festivities for the rest of the day. thank you. it is a pleasure to be here as we commemorate the civil war and particularly the middle tennessee campaign of 1864. it is good, it is an honor to be on the program with these distinguished gentlemen who have been studying the civil war for many years. certainly, as chris said, we all are appreciative of your presence here today. thank you very much.

the events leading to the confederate mashlg intorch into central tennessee began with the conclusion of the atlanta campaign. in september 1864, united states military forces led by william sherman triumphantly entered atlanta which had become a major southern city, railroad center, and symbol of confederate resistance. the victim climaxed a four-month long, 100,000-man strategic offensive. the confederate army pulled out of the city just before being trapped by the federals. the atlanta news electrified the nation. dramatically and undeniably demonstrating that the united states war effort was at last succeeding. the grand achievement also contributed significantly,

possibly decisively, to president lincoln's campaign for re-election. the success of which virtually assured the ultimate doom of the confederacy. desperate to somehow minimize the united states victory, john bell hood led the southern army northward in late september disrupting the western and atlantic railroad between chattanooga and atlanta. we served as sherman's supply route. although sherman initially pursued hood with a portion of his forces, the union commander had no intention of relinquishing the military initiative to the enemy who soon moved into north alabama. sherman had all together another campaign in mind with 60,000 veteran troops, he determined to

march across georgia from atlanta to charleston or savannah, living off the land, breaking up roads destroying all manner of war resources, leaving a trail, he remarked that will be recognizable 50 years hence. the impact on southern resources and morale, he believed would be more devastatingeing than the capture of atlanta. if hood continued to move west and north into middle tennessee rather than following sherman then georgia s. thomas in nashville who was amassing widely separated troops, and also reinforced by thousands of sherman's veterans from the atlanta campaign, would defend against the rebel offensive. in mid-november, sherman began the march for which he will ever be remembered, while hood and the army of tennessee, instead

of pursuinge ingingeing sherman, prepared to cross the tennessee river and drive northward toward nashville. the resulting campaign in central tennessee highlighted by events at spring hill franklin and nashville, and characterized by mystery and misery, anger and turmoil, suffering, slaughter and tragedy soon became and ever after it has remained a subject of endless controversy. the spring hill affair was an intriguing enigmatic episode, and has been the focus of much attention. the bloody, tragic clash at franklin has attracted even more attention. but the two-day battle of

nashville has a highly:8q& significant feature which neither spring hill nor franklin can claim. i refer to the participation of african-americans. several thousand strong, in a combat row for the union army the black regiments had come to be officially known as united states colored troops. usct. they fought both days of the engagement, and this is a major reason why the battle of nashville deserves to be commemorated. certainly not the only one but a major one. the experience of serving as a member of the united states colored troops a black soldier in a blue uniform, was not easy, as you well might expect. when the civil war began, president lincoln rejected any idea of abolishing slavery or seeking black military

assistance for the war effort. he feared that such action wop ale would alienate the border slave states which had remained loyal to the union, arouse the racial prejudice of northern whites and further harden confederate union, arouse the racial prejudice of northern whites, and further harden confederate resistance. by the late summer of 1862 however -- the president had come to believe that undermining slavery would significant weaken the confederacy and should become a major priority overriding any negative factors. thus, after the emancipation proclamation was issued, the union army with lincoln's full support launched a drive to recruit african-american soldiers. by the war's end, nearly 180,000

blacks would serve in the usct. more than 0807 0 80% of them coming from the confederate states, and most of those former slaves. the great majority of officers for those black troops were white men. this was in order to provide the inexperienced african-american soldiers with leadership by combat veterans. it also certainly reflected, in part considerable part a bow to racial prejudice because it was believed that few white union soldiers would take orders from a black officer. the black soldiers had to deal with discrimination in several ways. their pay was $10 per month while a white private received $13 per month.

many union generals thought the usct should be used only as laborers or asgarrison troops having no faith in their fighting potential. when black troops did get into combat, they sometimes carried inferior weapons, and if they got sick, they well might receive inferior medical care. if they were captured they often were mistreated or even murdered. at the battle of nashville general george h. thomas, like many of his peers, harbored doubts about the combat prowess of african-americans. but with black troops available thomas decided to use them. on both days of the battle the united states colored troops made a diversionary attack against the confederate right flank.

the african-american infantry were serving in a division commanded by james b. steedman. it was composed of two black regiments and one white regiment, and numbered approximately 7,500 men. through no fault of the blacks, as the fortunes of war dealt with them harshly the diversionary attack on december 15 resulted in heavy casualties. the situation was even worse on december 16 when corps commander thomas j. wood decided instead of a demonstration, to launch an assault in hope of carrying the formidable rebel right flank. it was a blunder a hastily conceived affair that cost the union troops dearly, both white and black.

in fact the attack exacted approximately one-third of the total union casualties for the two days fighting at nashville. and suffering the greatest loss of any regiment was the 13th usct, a regiment raised in nashville, which lost approximately 40% of its men. once more as so often in the civil war, glory-hungry commanders in frontal assaults against strong defensive positions proved a lethal combination. there were numerous accolades for the fighting prowess of the black troops, and some of them from southerners. confederate brigadier general

james t.holsclaw whose firing brigade devastated the 13th usct was deeply impressed by their furious and desperate assault. he reported how the blacks gallantly -- that was his term -- "gallantly" assaulted. again and again they charged, he said right into the abity. but, "they came only to die." holtzclaw continued ask the i have seen most of the battlefields of the west, but never saw dead men thicker than in front of my two right regiments." the magnificent effort of the black troops seemed to deserve a better fate, but the battle of nashville did prove that african-americans would fight, would fight offensively and aggressively, even when

assaulting a heavily defended and naturally strong>5 enemy position. >> thank you, jim and chris. i guess i am the counter point to stephen sam hood's book on the resurrection of john bell hood. and i will say in preface here that my aim certainly is not to get john bell hood, but in a tragedy such as the battle of franklin represents responsibility should not be overlooked even in a modern sense in terms of our generation. just please bear with me. in examining the many specific

points of controversy about the events at spring hill and franklin, as ordered by general john bell hood on november 29th and 30th, 1864 perhaps the most critical are the reasons for the key decisions that he made. in an attempt to explain some of hood's actions that affected major aspects of the crucial events, often we have heard of his alleged use of an opium derivative taken for pain but which during the civil war era was regarded more of an aspirin-like medicine than a mind-altering drug. theoretically, from a modern perspective, if hood was on an opium substance, he would not be reasoning with a normal

lucidness. thus his decisions would not necessarily be wise or proper. yet that drug in my opinion, really should be a non-issue with john bell hood and the spring hill and franklin series of events. why? because there are much better explanations for the key events at spring hill and franklin as orchestrated by general john bell hood. first, at spring hill the confederate army had the majority of the opposing union army trapped in the vicinity of columbia, tennessee, during the late afternoon of november 29th, but let them march past the

deployed grey ranks that evening and night without a major fight. this has been debated and analyzed extensibilityvely with various explanations and blame apportioned to certain confederate commanders. the truly critical aspect which had generally been overlooked by some modern generation historians was that john bell hood abdicated his command responsibility by turning over control of active operations on the afternoon of november 29th, 1864 to major general frank cheatham. the rationale and reason for this is not often explained. hood went to oak lawn, the thompson house which he established as his headquarters, about 4:00 p.m. the thompson house was more than

a mile distant from the front line operations at spring hill. thus, hood was absent from the critical area of observation and decision making by his own doing. why he, in essence gave up command at the very critical moment in the spring hill series of events likely relates to his physical fatigue at that point. hood had been in the saddle since 3:00 a.m. that morning, and with a missing leg and a formerly severely injured arm, he would logically have experienced fatigue and weariness. as general steven d. lee later wrote, john bell hood was so physically incapacitated while acting in the role of an

in-field commander that he never should have been selected as the army's commander. hood's lack of endurance and vulnerability to fatigue makes far more sense in explaining why he wasn't on the front lines at spring hill to make critical decisions when needed. a succession of generals and curriers had to make their way back and forth from the hood headquarters at the thompson house to convey data and get instructions. this was the real boondoggle for the confederates at spring hill. and while hood could give authority to frank cheatham for these operations he could not delegate the responsibility.

hood was thus directly to blame for what happened despite the confusion, mistakes and omissions of others particularly frank cheatham who was very much a culprit. a dire result of skofield's army escaping hood's trap by marching past the confederates at spring hill that night resulted in the obvious cause for the second major decision controversy. why hood determined to make a masked assault on the entrenched union army at franklin on november 30th. it seems that the real reason was hood's anger and distress with the events of the previous evening. skofield's troops having escaped from the spring hill trap without difficulty. this matter is crucial to the

entire story. hood was described by an observer as "as angry as a rattlesnake," striking out at anyone and anything on the morning of november 30th when he found out the extent of the union army's escape from under the very muzzles of the confederates' guns. his reported ire and discussions with other generals that morning only confirmed that hood was bitter and very highly upset. and, while on the road to franklin, he saw the debris and even the stragglers from skofield's army strewn all over the landscape in obvious disarray. logically, he would have concluded that the enemy was

distressed and perhaps demoralized in their retreat. then, from winstead hill overlooking the panoply over franklin, john hood saw the flimsy fortifications and supposed that the enemy was attempting to further escape. intelligence from forest cavalrymen and other sources added to this conviction. thus, his spur of the moment decision to make a grand attack at franklin was rooted in what he believed was strong evidence that the yankees could not resist an overwhelming spirited masked assault. it waslikely his smoldering

anger over spring hill and the circumstances involved that this command decision was to be one of the very of the war. it was evident before the attack began. being without nearly all of his artillery, there were only two batteries present with hood's army then since the rest had been left behind at columbia with general steven d. lee. and hood had, thus very little cannon fire covering lis attack. inging his attack. further, nearly one-third of his army was missing with lee, they being en route from columbia to spring hill, and were then marching toward franklin at a very leisurely pace. steven d. lee, on reaching spring hill that morning had been told by hood not to hurry

his troops forward because the enemy had already seemingly escaped. of course this is further prime evidence of hood's impromptu spur of the moment decision to attack at franklin. amazingly, he ignored the vast open terrain at franklin about two miles of which across his columns must cross to reach the union fortified lines of headlog entrenchments, some were fashioned with tang lle lled briers of osage orange. as such, it was a further indictment of his hasty decision making. essentially, it is a commander's responsibility to use his men wisely and not compel deaths and wounds without a fair prospect

of success. yet throughout his career, john bell hood never seemed to learn the evolving lessons of the battlefield. even in a farewell message to his army, in 1865, he said he loped the men might be supplied with more bayonets because "it was the bayonet which gave the soldier confidence in himself and enabled him to strike terror into the enemy." unwilling to admit his mistakes hood was duly recognized for his failures by a grieving confederate officer when he wrote that after butchering 10,000 men around atlanta, and as many in tennessee, hood had betrayed the whole army. "he might command a brigade and

even a division, but to command the army, he is not the man," said the officer. to call him a general is a disgrace to those generals who are worthy to be so called. even the veteran enemy soldiers who knew the wisdom of the battlefield were amazed at the lack of common sense which the confederates now used in making so many head-long frontal assaults against prepared defensive positions. "we killed a great many reds in the fights how to," wrote a union corporal following the battle of atlanta. "more so than ever because they come out from their works and charge our men which is useless for them. where they do not do any good, only get their men slaughtered."

in all the decision to attack at franklin was a disaster in the making of one man, and this despite the arguments of other commanders hop point ersers who pointed out the danger, loss of life and likely failure involved, but to no avail. we will make the attack, fumed hood, and so it was. as he confided in his memoir, "advance and retreat," this decision was made so he wrote on the following -- "the discovery that the army, after a forward march of 180 miles, was still seemingly unwilling to accept battle unless under the protection of breastworks caused me to experience grave concern.

in my innermost heart, i question whether i would succeed at eradicating this evil. it seemed that i had exhausted every means and the power of one man to remove this stumbling block to the army of tennessee." amazingly, this indictment came from the intensely aggressive commander who at atlanta had orchestrated major head-long frontal attacks from peachtree creek to the battle and beyond to ezra church. yet in his memoirs hood had the tim timerity to suggest that the valiant army of tennessee wouldn't fight unless behind breastworks. this apparently was a veiled reference to the lack of a major confederate attack at spring

hill by cheatham's corps the previous day, which again, reflects upon hood's state of reasoning. some have attempted over the years to soften the consequences of hood's attack orders over the years. but really there is no valid exculpating evidence. and the wasteful sacrifice of about 7,000 men of his army was the consequence. further, as evidence of hood's recklessness as a combat army commander, we have his directive to attack en masse again, on the morning of december 1st, which was prior to his learning of the union army's withdrawal from franklin on the night of the 30th. skofield's troops remained. the extent of disaster would

certainly have been compounded on december 1st furthering hood's legacy of too much lion and not enough fox. now despite these enormous controversies at spring hill and franklin, the story is one of the most dramatic and poignant of the civil war. thus, my biggest concern is that the controversies engendered by a few will perhaps tend to take away from the essential facts and story itself. the real unimpeachable focus of these battles should be that the valor and grit of both the union and confederate soldiers who fought at franklin and

nashville. indeed their valor and character will stand forever as a fine representation of the inherent spirit and commitment of the american people and its soldiers. thank you very much. >> okay. now, folks we want to open up for questions. i know we have mikes out in the passageway. this is being taped so that's why we want you to use the mikes. if you could sort of line up behind those and start that process, i'll do the moderator's sort of privilege of asking the first question as everyone gets

set. and this one gentlemen, i would just like to throw out for your consideration and i would like to hear your assessment of another figure that's not really been talked about much today. we've talked about the confederate command. we've talked about john skofield. but let's talk some about george thomas and your assessment of his strategy for and his effectiveness at the battle of nashville. >> i'll start out. i've done quite a bit of research on george thomas in terms of his military career his character, and so forth. and many of you probably know the circumstances involving thomas at nashville which was

that thomas was very, very close to being removed from command by general ulysses grant in the east because in grant's estimation, he wasn't moving fast enough, he wasn't doing the right things in terms of preventing the confederate army from perhaps advancing across the river bed into ohio and into northern territory. but -- and this is i think a key to thomas' character as i see it -- that he was -- he was certainly going to do everything he could not to delay, but he was not going to make a move and risk his soldiers' lives without a very very fair prospect of winning the battle that he knew he should. so thomas, in my estimation, is deserved an enormous amount of credit for resisting.

and orders were perhaps being prepared even as he began to fight the battle of nashville for his own removal -- thomas' removal. yet, he would not be pushed, he would not be shoved into doing something that he knew was wrong that could be corrected and rectified by his actions in terms of fighting the battle when it was proper to do so. >> i might add that i think that is a point that certainly deserved emphasis. it made me think as he was talking about general winfield scott who was in command of the union ar ms. atmyies at the beginning of the war. after the union disaster at bull run, scott said -- not sure i

can quote it exactly but certainly to the effect that, "i ought to be removed from command because i knew that army was not ready and i did not stand up and oppose the advance and what resulted in the battle of bull run. certainly thomas was under tremendous pressure to move out to attack, and yet he waited until everything was set. and i guess if that meant that he would be removed from command, so be it. and i might also add in regard to grant he didn't really understand the situation at nashville. and from hundreds of miles away to be trying to direct things as he did was not quite pretty. >> one thing i'd like to add is,

there is a lot of controversy on the could be fed rat side which has been plumed by a lot of people for a long time. but there's controversy on union side with the spring hill-sfrank lynn campaign as well. john skofield particularly felt his band had been dispatched into central tennessee to hold john bell hood at bay as long as he could. and then after the near miss at spring hill i think he realized how perilously close that his men had in fact come to being entrapped. so there was a whole post-war skofield-thomas controversy. a letter appeared in "the new york herald" i believe it was, it was written by one of skofield's staff officers. it was an anonymous letter basically saying george thomas had essentially botched the campaign in some ways and really came close to losing a good part of his army. george thomas was preparing to answer that article when he had a stroke and fell dead. so i think there is a lesson there about not answering your

critics. but at nashville, i really think that jim is right. i really do think that washington authorities were panicked. they knew there was still a major confederate army outside nashville. i don't think they realized how badly damaged had it been at franklin. all they knew was there was still an army out there in middle tennessee and they were really very worried about it including lincoln. but i think thomas was prupt in not attacking. i think he waited. if you read the accounts the weather was terrible. if they had gone and attacked a couple of days earlier, it would have been through snow and sleet and civil war generals, especially those educated at west point always had this notion. they'd studied napoleon's campaigns and they always had this notion they could annihilate an enemy army. albert sidney johnson would have liked to done it at shiloh.

but the only person who really came close to it was george thomas at nashville who over those two days just pummelled the confederate army of tennessee. had not steven d. lee's corps not been there, who had not been bloodied at franklin i don't flow that he would not have in fact essentially taken care of most of a.p. stewart and frank cheatham's corpses. so he deserves a lot of credit in some ways. several biographies of thomas have been written that sort of restore him to a more stellar place fltin the pantheon of union generals. he did extraordinarily well at the battle of nashville. >> thank you very much. we'll open it now to the very patient gentleman who's been waiting to ask a question. >> guys, thank you so much for your scholarship and willing to accept questions. my question also refers to general thomas. it seems to me that another major missed opportunity was at the atlanta campaign. i believe thomas really wanted

to push on at jonesboro. he had hardy's men trapped, could have destroyed them. as i recall sherman said no. seems like they could have prohibited a lot of the whole tennessee campaign from even happening at that point but it already seemed also sherman never liked the army of the cumberland. he was more the army of the tennessee man. so i'm just interested on your thoughts at what happened at jonesboro with general thomas and how that impacted the tennessee campaign. thank you. >> i'll be honest with you. jonesboro is a battle that i don't really know a lot about, partly because frank cheatham was absent. but it was hardy's corps. that belonged to him who went down there. it was a battle where the confederates were badly outnumbered and the goal really for the federals was to sever the last rail line into atlanta

which by winning at jonesboro they did. i really didn't know that thomas had wanted to continue on and really follow up the victory more than he did. i think -- my guess is that sherman felt that he had gotten his objective which was the railroad and so that atlanta could not be resupplied. and for him that was good enough. just a difference in philosophy, i would say probably. >> i might add that i think by that stage of the war, very much through the entire atlanta campaign sherman increasingly saw the benefits of maneuver. he was sick of all of the killing that was taking place. i think he believed, as chris was saying, that he had what he wanted, and he was not inclined then to initiate still more bloodshed.

i think also that sherman -- this has been a controversial issue, but i'm not sure sherman held thomas in particularly high regard regard. but he and grant were somewhat kin in that respect. any other comments? >> yes. i would just add, i agree. i think sometimes in analyzing the relationship between some generals, a senior and a subordinate, that it's often esz to easy to overlook the personalities of the generals involved. now thomaseasy to overlook the personalities of the generals involved. now thomas was more of a flamatic type personality. he certainly wouldn't overt in terms of his maneuvering like sherman was and whatnot.

and so sometimes i think a relationship between individuals -- and we've all seen it in civilian life -- it's influenced somewhat by the personalities of the generals and the people in this particular case that were involved. so without getting into specifics of jonesboro, which again, like chris, a technical aspect, i would say it may have had something to do very much with the personalities of the two. >> thank you, gentlemen, for coming. i would like to reflect a little bit on what you said and aim it toward the battle of nashville. cheatham of course didn't do very well at spring hill. we're aware of that. hood had endorsed him for

promotion. and then on december the 6th, he sent a telegram to beauregard indicating that he was summarily withdrawing that recommendation for promotion. that's the prelude to my question. on the first day of the battle of nashville, focused on the refused left flank along hillsborough road, cleatheatham appears to have been quite slow in responding to the order to send troops from his positions over to the refused left flank. the question i'm asking is, do you suppose that beauregard -- excuse me -- that hood divulged his withdrawal of that promotion to cheatham? and if he did tell cheatham, would have in your opinion account for what appears to be a rather slow response of cheatham

to send troops when ordered by hood to the refused left flank early to mid afternoon along hillsborough road. >> well, you're right in saying that hood originally recommended him for lieutenant general, and then he withdrew that recommendation, and then later on said, well, let's just forget about it. and because he's learned his lesson. i don't know that carried out tover to nashville. i think the acrimony between john bell hood and frank cheatham was more a post-war development an athan a war time development. i think they really worked well together given their limitations. with regard to the battle of nashville, i think the reason he was slow in sending troops over there was a large demonstration headed largely by those u.s. colored troops and it did essentially what it was designed to do to keep his men occupied. they were successful in doing

that and he felt like he could not strip men away from his section of the battlefield without endangering that part of the battlefields. you're right he doesn't send them for a while but i think he feels he literally cannot spare them and needs to have them. so when he feels that the threat lass been eliminated to some degree, he does it later. but i don't really think it is because he has a bone to pick that day with john bell hood. no i don't. >> any other comments? >> in considering general george thomas at nashville i think it might be useful to consider why he was here. he was here because general sherman ordered him here. and to me, that suggests an extreme amount of confidence on the part of general sherman as to general thomas' abilities. because had thomas failed at nashville, sherman would have

shared a great deal of the blame for that for having separated his two armies. so it it seems to me in looking at why thomas is here, one should consider that maybe sherman showed the ultimate confidence in him when he sent him here. >> i'll start out with just a comment in general in terms of thomas, as we've mentioned. thomas was not going to move until he was convinced that everything was in reasonable place. and one of those aspects, and it's a very important aspect especially in my opinion, because i studied for many years, and i was a very active collector in military weapons. well, as some of the civil war soldiers pointed out, there's a tremendous difference between a spencer rifle and a

muzzle-loading springfield .58 caliber mini ball firing a weapon, single shot. one of the reasons that thomas delayed at nashville was to make sure his horsemen, which they played a major role in attacking some of the outlying fortifications and forts, and redoubts of the confederate army, were armed with spencers, and a spencer rifle seven-shot repeating-type rifle. was one heck of a weapon, as they proved in not only previous engagements, but at nashville, where the confederates were, indeed, driven out of very strong redoubts by spencer-armed troops. cavalry. >> i think that sherman, whether

right or wrong saw thomas as a very solid stable dependable commander. but i don't think that he had the confidence in him to lead the maneuvering aspects, the flanking force that he did in james macpherson. also my reading of it is i think he may have had more confidence also in schofield, even, than thomas.>be but, so far as putting thomas in charge of defending nashville, and the defenses there, and to stop hood he felt he had a very solid general there. who could do the job. and as you pointed out, if thomas had failed then

sherman's decision to take 6,000 men and march to the sea wouldn't look nearly as good as it did later. >> okay, sir? >> yes, i have a question about jefferson davis, and hood's campaign. in his post-civil war writings, davis implies that he did not approve of hood's move-in to tennessee. and i've done some other reading which says that he did. and i was wondering what your opinion was. did davis approve it, or didn't he? thank you. >> well, i'll start with my answer in terms of you're asking, in essence, about the

jefferson davis/hood relationship. one of the things we didn't get into, when i was talking about john bell hood, was his surreptitious correspondence with the davis administration, particularly hood ingratiated himself very much with the davis administration, and particularly jefferson davis during his convalescence period. prior to being assigned as a core commander in the west. and if you go to the western reserve historical society, the braxton-bragg papers, and bragg at the time was, of course, jefferson davis's special military advisor, giving davis all the advice about the commanders who he knew in the west and you find that john bell

hood was keeping a secretive correspondence with the administration through bragg and a lot of others that was, in effect, spying on joe johnson in terms of his conduct of the army of tennessee during the initial atlanta campaign. so you find, i think, that there was a certain measure of trust between jefferson davis and john bell hood, because really hood was jefferson davis' man, so to speak, in the west. he was the president's watch dog, as i termed in one of my chapters on -- in "embrace an angry wind." but not that he couldn't give hood advice, because he did give hood advice during the atlanta campaign that he was losing perhaps too many men and he'd better be circumspect in terms of the casualty figures that he

was enacting, because of his offensive concepts, so i think, in my estimation, there was always a favoritism on the part of jefferson davis to the command situation of general hood in the west. >> jefferson davis made a couple of trips over from richmond to the western theater, one was after the bat of chickamauga when his generals were battling among each other and he felt he needed to intervene. the other one was after the fall of atlanta. by that time, the confederate army had moved out of palmetto. and looped around to northern georgia. and i think he comes basically to see for himself what's going on. he says to the confederate troops there that essentially they're going to go into tennessee and they will make atlanta a perfect moscow. a reference to napoleon's failed campaign in russia. and northern newspapers got wind of it. and so, to say that jefferson davis did not approve hood's tennessee campaign is incredibly

duplicitous, if that's the case, because he certainly did so, and he told the troops that. and they simply did what he beauregard and hood sort of thrashed out, an invasion of tennessee. >> just following up a bit on hood's relationship with richmond, one of the things that has disturbed me for a good many years, more disturbing things about hood jacksons was that he was, i believe this was in a letter to bragg, i'm not certain, i would have to check that. but he is talking about how johnston would not attack and how he had urged again and again that the confederates should attack during the atlanta campaign, almost to the point, he says, that he had become -- i don't think obnoxious was the word he used, but anyway, sort

of a sore thumb to a lot of the confederate officers, because he continuing to urge attack. well, that simply wasn't true. he, hood, advised retreat at adairsville. he advised johnston to retreat from the edewaw river. he advised him to retreat from kennesaw mountain. he advised him to retreat from the chattahoochee. >> just a general comment perhaps, some of the discomfort from washington on hood might have been because he was a virginian. >> i didn't understand that. >> didn't understand. >> did you want reaction? >> i'm just making a comment. >> he made a general comment. >> we didn't understand. >> could you repeat your question? they didn't catch it.

i'm sorry. >> he's saying that general thomas was a virginian and you wonder if some of the washington distrust of him was based upon his nativity. >> that is true. >> okay. >> i don't know about that. john pemberton was a pennsylvanian. of course he didn't fare too well, either. you know, thomas' family disowned him. i don't think that they ever communicated with him again. and i don't know that the washington authorities used that against him. i think what they thought was that he was slow and too methodical and waited too long. without really knowing the situation, particularly in nashville. you know, i think there were people in the north maybe who were somewhat suspicious of him. but after chickamauga, how anyone could doubt george thomas' devotion to the union is just beyond me. and i don't think washington -- i don't think that was a factor,

to be honest with you. >> any jobs, i think, in the mind of the administration in washington was early, very early dissipated by the victories of thomas early in the war and his excellent combat record. indeed, he may have been criticized as being slow and methodical, but they knew he was a fighter and not only a good fighter but he was certainly committed to the fighting on the union soldiers' part, winning battles. >> i might add, another factor in the nashville situation, it seems to me, with grant and washington worrying that thomas is not attacking, they couldn't conceive -- i don't believe they could conceive of how inadequate

hood's logistics situation was, worrying about him going into kentucky and on up the ohio river, he couldn't have begun to do that. he just didn't have the logistics situation to do it. and i think grant probably found it difficult to believe that he would have come all this way into central tennessee with such poor logistics. >> we all know that general forrest had a lot of problems with his commanding officers. what i would like to ask is, what was his relationship with general hood? how did he get along with him? and also in regards do we have any comments or thoughts from him regarding springhill regarding franklin, regarding the battle of nashville?

>> okay. the question was, how forrest and hood related to each other at the springhill situation is that what i understand? >> and nashville. >> and nashville. well, in regard to franklin, certainly, forrest did not agree with hood's decision to attack there. back at springhill, it seems to me that forrest was never fully clear about hood allegedly wanting to block the pike, and instead was coming in and

attacking the union troops that were marshaled there, maybe some 6500, rather than trying to concentrate on blocking the pike. i think there's misunderstanding certainly between hood and forrest at springhill. i don't know that that particularly affected what happened the next day at franklin. i think that probably forrest just disagreed totally with the idea of a frontal attack, a frontal assault at franklin and, of course, wanted to try and blank the federals out of their position. >> i think another interesting point is that what happened in the nashville circumstances, forrest was detached and sent down to murfreesboro with the idea that it was presumed that,

per se the pressure brought to bear on the union garrison at fort rose crans and the murfreesboro area would forces union army to come out of their entrenchments, and attack the confederate army and their fortified redoubts and so forth at nashville. well, it didn't work out that way. in fact, forrest took a pretty good beating at -- down around murfreesboro. but the point of the matter is that -- and i've never seen anything that per se discounts the relationship in terms of forrest after the campaign, the tennessee campaign. he was so upset with the command staff and the command of the army of tennessee that he wanted to go to richmond. in fact, he asked permission to

go to richmond. he wanted to go and set the record straight, according to his concept versus that of john bell hood in terms of why there had been so much failure and frustration. he, forrest, seemed to be, from what i've read, very, very, very upset with the campaign as conducted from the very beginning of the tennessee campaign. >> the only thing i would add is that in sam hood's book, he criticizes forrest for springhill, particularly. forrest allegedly had a meeting with him. and hood asked him if he could send troops, and the road north of springhill. and forrest said, my men have been fighting all day and we're short of ammunition and apparently a.p. stewart's men gave him some ammunition and then the pike wasn't blocked. so somehow along there, what hood really desired forrest to do and part of that controversy,

apparently, you know, hood says to somebody, don't worry about it. general forrest is going to cut off the road. and apparently it didn't happen. we know it didn't happen. as to their personal relationships, i don't know. it always struck me that forrest had been a superb independent commander of raids and things like that. some historians have said that he should have been put in charge of the army of tennessee. and i think he would have been a miserable failure. he didn't like criticism, was used to doing things his own way. i just think that that would have been -- that's not his forte. but, you know, he doesn't get criticized very often. but you know you can argue that at springhill particularly, so sometimes i think that if we ever perfect time travel, i would like to go back and go to frank cheatham and some of you go to nathan bedford forrest and say get across the damn road and let's see what happens. you know because if they had done that at least we would have a little different topic to talk

about. >> yes, sir? >> yes. this is less a question and more a plea for help, i guess. my wife purchased this for me about 25 years ago. it's a swagger stick. and i got it from the veterans home in california, in napa valley. it's got the name of wheeler on it and the name of palmer on it and a date of '65. so if anyone wants to take a look at it, maybe some shed light on it, i'd be most appreciative. thank you. >> make sure you're standing in a good corner so we can find you when this is over. >> how about the museum? >> yes, sir. >> general hood seems to get short shrift in everything i ever read. seems to me that, number one, he was ordered by president davis to take the army of tennessee on the offensive. number two, the only thing that made any sense was what he tried to do, namely to retake

nashville for the confederacy and go join lee in virginia. certainly he deserves criticism for, i guess, the rashness of the attack on franklin. on the other hand, it's a little different than what general lee did at gettysburg and yet he gets virtually no criticism for that. so i guess it just surprised me that the history doesn't seem to find anything favorable about the general. >> okay. well, and i have a little different perspective, to say the least, because i think there are tremendous differences between gettysburg and franklin. lee had a lot of artillery, for one thing, in terms of he bombarded the daylights out of the line on cemetery hill. and hood didn't. but those are technical points.

the aspect i think is that you've got to put things in context the way i see it. you've got to put it in context in the sense that hood had a tremendous responsibility. he had the hopes of the confederacy really riding on his troops in terms of what he was trying to do, the desperation circumstances that he was in as a result of atlanta. the south was losing the war. they weren't going to do anything about bringing in black soldiers, so on and so forth. so the whole scenario was unfavorable. so hood was in a desperate strait. but still, in terms of the decisions that you make as a commander, you cannot, on the basis of desperation and the

basis of a circumstance that doesn't look favorable, you can't just commit men in terms of a frontal assault like at franklin without paying the responsibility in terms of the consequences, not only then but now. and i think it's a disservice, to be honest with you, to bring up the fact that john bell hood should not be regarded as anything other than a tremendous failure in his responsibility for making that attack. will stay with him, in my opinion, forever. >> i'm more sympathetic to john bell hood than wiley. here's why. when he takes over the command of the army of tennessee in 1864 he's in a no-win situation. he's taken over for a commander who has surrendered about 100 miles of north georgia. as an aside, if you want

somebody who has taken a beating historically, there's not a soul who has anything nice to say about joseph e. johnson anymore. he just gets battered by historians, left and right. so hood takes over, and he knows that richmond thinks that this fabian strategy of falling back has to stop. and it has to stop now. so he fights three battles, around atlanta in about eight days or so, and none of them go the way he wants. tactically, none of them go the way he wants, partly because there's new commanders in unfamiliar positions and trying to take on this responsibility in ways that they have not grown into. so i think he loses those battles in part because he just can't get the army to do quite what he wants, and part of it is because the army is in command shuffles. if you want to give the best case construction for hood, at franklin and here's what sam hood says, schofield was there.

and if you let him go, what happens? he goes all the way to nashville and he augments george thomas' numbers at nashville. so this is your only opportunity to get him before he withdraws, and gets all the way to the capital. so he makes this decision. now, was it an impulsive decision? i don't know. i know that frank cheatham advised him against it. i know nathan bedford forrest advised him against it and other officers had great doubt about it. but i just don't know that he felt he had much choice, in the sense that if you let schofield go, he'll be criticized by people later for that too. i mean, this is sort of a damned if you do and damned if you don't situation for hood. and then you know, after franklin -- let me tell you this. when the battle starts to be honest with you i think what happens and i see it primarily through cheatham who was closer to the batfield. he sent his staff officers in and not a one of them ever came back.

once the smoke and the darkness came, those generals had no idea what was transpiring. all they knew was that there was still musketry going for a long period of time. there was obviously a lot of fighting taking place. but they had no idea how ghastly the casualties would be particularly on the confederate side. so the best case for john bell hood, i think, at franklin, is they're there. if i let them go, i've made things worse for myself. at nashville. i've got to inflict as much damage as i can. and i'm going to roll the dice. and, you know, it's easy for us to sit here in 2014 and say, man, what a terrible decision. i think whatever decision he makes is bad, you know. i do think that. >> yes, sir? >> and we've got two more questions, so greg and then. >> dr. west, panel thank you all for being here. i've followed your work for a long time. i've always enjoyed and appreciated what you've done.

i do have a question along the lines of the prior gentleman about general hood. about four years ago, several boxes of documents previously unknown, i think were discovered as hood's personal papers. i wonder if you guys have had the chance to review those? and if so has it changed your thoughts in any way about 450d's performance? thank you. >> i never have had any opportunity to see those papers. >> sam hood found those papers -- like some relatives said hey we've got these old things, they knew he was working on general hood. as it turned out it was this treasure trove of papers. i mean it's a thing that we all would die for, you know. and it happens very rarely. frank cheatham's papers are burned, i'm afraid. what they -- if you want to know, sam hood has written a book about them, taken the documents and, you know, edited them and things like that. if you want to know what's in there -- i don't have that book.

i have his study of his ancestor. if you really want it, it's available, i think. and it is widely available, i think. so you can buy it. and see what -- and make up your own mind. >> well, again, as i say, i don't want to beat a dead horse to death, but in terms of my view, my view is, again, you look at john bell hood, what did he have access to when he wrote his memoirs. did he have these papers that sam hood found? i presume he did. certainly, why didn't he -- if there's any really tremendously exculpating evidence or something that hasn't been brought out why didn't hood utilize them in his own defense? which that certainly his book, his memoir advance and retreat, was based on his perspective in

terms of the events and whatnot. why wouldn't he use these papers if they were so important? and critical in terms of the memoir he wrote? i'm not saying -- i certainly haven't examined the papers. maybe there are some great material there. i presume that there's a lot of post-war material in the collection. and i'm sure that there probably is some material of very much value. but, again, in terms of hood's defense, in terms of himself, if he had access to these papers to begin with, it seems to me that he certainly would have utilized these papers in his defense in writing that book. "advance and retreat" his memoirs. >> the only thing i want to say

in addition is i think that hood died really before that book was fully fashioned. he died of yellow fever. he may have had access to the documents. the advance and retreat has this feeling of -- it's not really polished, not that it necessarily would have been. but it's almost like an incomplete work that he would have gone through and revised. so i don't know that he wouldn't have made better use of those documents, but yellow fever came along and took him away, so. >> yes, sir? >> in the aftermath of the battle of franklin, the federal troops leave in the middle of the night, leaving behind all the severely wounded men, thousands and thousands of confederates and union wounded are there. what happens to them when the confederates move on to nashville? are they just told to go home? i mean, there's very little transport. what happens to these people? >> the really severely wounded stayed here in franklin.

franklin, like a lot of towns, sharpsburg, you know gettysburg, wherever you want to talk fredricksburg, became a vast hospital for wounded men. and robert hicks' novel describes -- that's really the basis of his novel. i would think that some of the more slightly wounded, if they're confederates, would have gone on to nashville to reunite with their commands. but there were an awful lot of people here. the other problem is what to do with the dead. i think what they did with the union dead, there were two lines. they simply threw a lot of them into one of those lines and took the dirt that they had piled up and put it on the bodies. those bodies sometime after the war were disinterred and taken to nashville and put in the national cemetery. the confederate bodies were removed after the war. and one of the things that eric jacobson has said it looks like the space between graves is so small, and that's because even though it had only been a few years after the battle that there really wasn't that much left.

you could put them in little, i mean these human remains you could put in boxes about this size. so that's what happened to them. when the yankees came back through, they basically reclaimed franklin, and took care of theirs as well as confederates who were here. and some of the union probably felt that they had not been cared as well as the confederates had. but i'm not sure that that's accurate to say. confederate medical doctors and medical personnel probably did, my guess is as good as they could with what they had to work with. >> i'm going to squeeze in that last one. but to be like george plaster, you've got 30 seconds. >> shouldn't take that long. basically this is a two-part question. first, in reality, is it possible that the south could have taken nashville? and what would have been the strategy implications had they taken nashville? thank you. >> well, i'll give a simple answer. i don't think they had a chance

of taking nashville. now, to speculate then on what might have been the strategic implications of something that i don't think could have happened, i find rather difficult to deal with. >> i completely agree with james. because the -- you look -- from any aspect the technical aspect, the ordnance aspect whatever, there was really very little chance that, unless there was some major, major mistakes made by thomas and the union command, that there was very little chance of nashville falling to the confederate forces. especially after they had been so greatly devastated at franklin. but indeed, the question -- the old saying "if" is the biggest word in the english language. if nashville had fallen, what

difference would it have made? i think, indeed, that's probably an imponderable question. but in my opinion, the concentration that would have been brought -- if hood and his army somehow had managed to take nashville, the concentration that would have been brought against that army through the influence of grant and others would have been such that i think, they would have had no chance, even after the shall we say, the conquest or victory at nashville. >> real briefly i'll just agree with my two other panelists. i really think that nashville by late 1864 was one of the most heavily fortified cities in america. and let's take franklin out of the equation. let's say it never happens and hood had some with his army intact and everything. i really just don't think he had the men to covers rotedous of nashville. i don't think you could storm nashville. vicksburg told us that. grant tried on may 15th and may 22nd to storm the works at vicksburg and was unsuccess.

ful. i don't think that would could have happened. the best hood could have done is wait for thomas to come out and if lucky destroyed a part of thomas' army. that might have been a gateway into the city. i think it's highly, highly unlikely and i really don't think it would have happened. >> well, let's give our historians a big round of applause. [ applause ] you've been watching c-span's american history tv. we want to hear from you. follow us on twitter@c-span history. connect with us on facebook at facebook.com/cspan history. or you can leave comments too. and check out our upcoming programs at our website c-span.org/history. >> we'd like to tell you about some of our other american history tv programs. be with us every saturday at 8:00 p.m. and midnight eastern for lectures in history. join students in the classroom to hear lectures on campuses

across the country on topics ranging from the american revolution to the 9/11 terrorist attacks. lectures in history every saturday at 8:00 p.m. and midnight eastern here on american history tv on c-span three. new year's day on the c-span networks, here are some of our featured programs. 10:00 a.m. eastern, the washington ideas forum. energy conservation with david crane. business magnate t. boone pickens. cake love owner warren brown. and inventor dean cayman. at 4:00 p.m. eastern the brooklyn historical society holds a conversation on race. then at 8:00 p.m. eastern from the explorer's club, apollo seven astronaut walt cunningham on the first manned space flight. new year's day on c-span2 just before noon eastern author hector tobar on the 33 men that were buried in a chilean mine. and at 3:00 p.m. eastern richard norton smith on the life of nelson rockefeller. then at 8:00 p.m. eastern.

former investigative correspondent for cbs news sharyl attkisson on her experiences reporting on the obama administration. new year's day on american history tv on c-span3, at 10:00 a.m. eastern juanita abernathy on her experiences and the role of women in the civil rights movement. at 4:00 p.m., brooklyn collegem /ñ professor benjamin cart on the link between alcohol and politics in pre-revolutionary new york city. and then at 8:00 p.m. cartoonist patrick oliphant draws ten presidential caricatures as historian david mccullough discusses the presidents and some of their most memorable qualities. new year's day on the c-span networks. for our complete schedule go to c-span.org. on december 21st, 1864, union forces under general william tecumseh sherman captured savannah, completing the march to the sea campaign that started in atlanta more than five weeks earlier.

todd gross, president of the georgia historical society, talks about the significance of the campaign, and how it has been remembered. this ceremony inlict that created

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p.m. eastern here on american history tv on c-span3. you've been watching c-span's american his try tv. follow us on twitter @c-span history. connect with us on facebook at facebook.com/cspan history. where you can leave comments too. and check out our upcoming programs at our website, c-span.org/history. >> new year's day on the c-span networks. here are some of our featured programs. 10:00 a.m. eastern, the washington ideas forum. energy conservation with david crane. business magnate t. boone pickens. cake love owner warren brown. and inventor dean cayman. at 4:00 p.m. eastern the brooklyn historical society holds a conversation on race. then at 8:00 p.m. eastern from the explorer's club, apollo seven astronaut walt cunningham on the first manned space flight.