to Atlanta including the latter city send back all my wounded and worthless, and with my effective army, move through Georgia, smashing things, to the sea.  Hood may turn into Tennessee and Kentucky, but I believe he will be forced to follow me.  Instead of my being on the defensive, I would be on the offensive; instead of guessing at what he means to do, he would have to guess at my plans.  The difference in war is full twenty-five per cent.  I can make Savannah, Charleston, or the mouth of the Chattahoochee.

“Answer quick, as I know we will not have the telegraph long.

“W.  T. SHERMAN, Major-General. 
“LIEUTENANT-GENERAL GRANT.”

“CITY POINT, VIRGINIA, “October 11,1864—­11.30 P.M.

“Your dispatch of to-day received.  If you are satisfied the trip to the sea-coast can be made, holding the line of the Tennessee River firmly, you may make it, destroying all the railroad south of Dalton or Chattanooga, as you think best.

“U.  S. GRANT, Lieutenant-General. 
“MAJOR-GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN.”

It was the original design to hold Atlanta, and by getting through to the coast, with a garrison left on the southern railroads, leading east and west, through Georgia, to effectually sever the east from the west.  In other words, cut the would-be Confederacy in two again, as it had been cut once by our gaining possession of the Mississippi River.  General Sherman’s plan virtually effected this object.

General Sherman commenced at once his preparations for his proposed movement, keeping his army in position in the meantime to watch Hood.  Becoming satisfied that Hood had moved westward from Gadsden across Sand Mountain, General Sherman sent the 4th corps, Major-General Stanley commanding, and the 23d corps, Major-General Schofield commanding, back to Chattanooga to report to Major-General Thomas, at Nashville, whom he had placed in command of all the troops of his military division, save the four army corps and cavalry division he designed to move with through Georgia.  With the troops thus left at his disposal, there was little doubt that General Thomas could hold the line of the Tennessee, or, in the event Hood should force it, would be able to concentrate and beat him in battle.  It was therefore readily consented to that Sherman should start for the sea-coast.

Having concentrated his troops at Atlanta by the 14th of November, he commenced his march, threatening both Augusta and Macon.  His coming-out point could not be definitely fixed.  Having to gather his subsistence as he marched through the country, it was not impossible that a force inferior to his own might compel him to head for such point as he could reach, instead of such as he might prefer.  The blindness of the enemy, however, in ignoring his movement, and sending Hood’s army, the only considerable force he had west of Richmond and east of the Mississippi River, northward on an offensive campaign, left the whole country open, and Sherman’s route to his own choice.