When General Buell was ordered into East Tennessee in the summer of 1882, Chattanooga was comparatively unprotected; but Bragg reached there before Buell, and, by threatening his communications, forced him to retreat on Nashville and Louisville.  Again, after the battle of Perryville, General Buell was urged to pursue Bragg’s defeated army, and drive it from East Tennessee.  The same was urged upon his successor, but the lateness of the season or other causes prevented further operations after the battle of Stone River.

Last spring, when your movements on the Mississippi River had drawn out of Tennessee a large force of the enemy, I again urged General Rosecrans to take advantage of that opportunity to carry out his projected plan of campaign, General Burnside being ready to cooperate, with a diminished but still efficient force.  But he could not be persuaded to act in time, preferring to lie still till your campaign should be terminated.  I represented to him, but without avail, that by this delay Johnston might be able to reenforce Bragg with the troops then operating against you.

When General Rosecrans finally determined to advance, he was allowed to select his own lines and plans for carrying out the objects of the expedition.  He was directed, however, to report his movements daily, till he crossed the Tennessee, and to connect his left, so far as possible, with General Burnside’s right.  General Burnside was directed to move simultaneously, connecting his right, as far as possible, with General Rosecrans’s left so that, if the enemy concentrated upon either army, the other could move to its assistance.  When General Burnside reached Kingston and Knoxville, and found no considerable number of the enemy in East Tennessee, he was instructed to move down the river and cooperate with General Rosecrans.

These instructions were repeated some fifteen times, but were not carried out, General Burnside alleging as an excuse that he believed that Bragg was in retreat, and that General Rosecrans needed no reenforcements.  When the latter had gained possession of Chattanooga he was directed not to move on Rome as he proposed, but simply to hold the mountain-passes, so as to prevent the ingress of the rebels into East Tennessee.  That object accomplished, I considered the campaign as ended, at least for the present.  Future operations would depend upon the ascertained strength and; movements of the enemy.  In other words, the main objects of the campaign were the restoration of East Tennessee to the Union, and by holding the two extremities of the valley to secure it from rebel invasion.