with its primary base at Nashville, had been broken by the Confederate cavalry and rendered most uncertain.  Its supplies were scanty and growing daily less, while its artillery horses and draft mules were dying by hundreds, for lack of forage.  The only safe wagon roads to the rear were by a long and circuitous route through the mountains north of the Tennessee River, which was besides so rough and muddy that the teams could haul hardly enough for their own subsistence, much less an adequate supply for the troops.

All the contemporary accounts go to show that Rosecrans, while personally brave enough, was himself more or less confused and excited by the great disaster which had overtaken his army at Chickamauga.  He had been cut off and greatly shaken by the overthrow of his right wing, and consequently retired with it to Chattanooga.  Notwithstanding this unfortunate withdrawal and his failure to rejoin the organized portion of his army, which under General George H. Thomas, held on firmly to its position against every attack, those who knew Rosecrans best still believed him to be a most loyal and gallant gentleman who was anxious and willing to do all that could be done to save his army and maintain its advanced position.  But there is no satisfactory evidence that up to the time he turned over his command to his successor, he had formed any adequate or comprehensive plan for supplying it or getting it ready to resume the offensive.  Every general in it knew that it needed and must have supplies, and that the only way to get them, without falling back, was to open and keep open the direct road or “cracker line” to Bridgeport.  But how and when this was to be done was the great question.

Much has been written upon this subject; a military commission has had it under consideration; the records have been consulted; a report has been made, and comments upon it have been issued by General Smith and his friends.  Even the late Secretary of War, Elihu Root, has passed judgment upon it, and yet it can be safely said that nothing has been done to disturb the conclusion reached at the time, that General Smith in consultation with his superiors worked out the plan as to how, when and by what means the short supply line by the way of Brown’s Ferry and the Lookout Valley should he opened and maintained.  He certainly secured its adoption first by Thomas and afterwards by Grant, and finally when he had arranged all the details of the complicated and delicate operations, and had prepared all engineer’s materials and pontoons which were required, he personally commanded the troops and carried that part of the plan which was based on Chattanooga, to a successful conclusion.