About this time we detected signs of activity on the part of the enemy.  On the 21st Hood shifted his army across from the Mason road, at Lovejoy’s, to the West Point road, at Palmetto Station, and his cavalry appeared on the west side of the Chattahoochee, toward Powder Springs; thus, as it were, stepping aside, and opening wide the door for us to enter Central Georgia.  I inferred, however, that his real purpose was to assume the offensive against our railroads, and on the 24th a heavy force of cavalry from Mississippi, under General Forrest, made its appearance at Athena, Alabama, and captured its garrison.

General Newton’s division (of the Fourth Corps), and Corse’s (of the Seventeenth), were sent back by rail, the former to Chattanooga, and the latter to Rome.  On the 25th I telegraphed to General Halleck: 

Hood seems to be moving, as it were, to the Alabama line, leaving open the road to Mason, as also to Augusta; but his cavalry is busy on all our roads.  A force, number estimated as high as eight thousand, are reported to have captured Athena, Alabama; and a regiment of three hundred and fifty men sent to its relief.  I have sent Newton’s division up to Chattanooga in cars, and will send another division to Rome.  If I were sure that Savannah would soon be in our possession, I should be tempted to march for Milledgeville and Augusta; but I must first secure what I have.  Jeff.  Davis is at Macon.

On the next day I telegraphed further that Jeff.  Davis was with Hood at Palmetto Station.  One of our spies was there at the time, who came in the next night, and reported to me the substance of his speech to the soldiers.  It was a repetition of those he had made at Colombia, South Carolina, and Mason, Georgia, on his way out, which I had seen in the newspapers.  Davis seemed to be perfectly upset by the fall of Atlanta, and to have lost all sense and reason.  He denounced General Jos.  Johnston and Governor Brown as little better than traitors; attributed to them personally the many misfortunes which had befallen their cause, and informed the soldiers that now the tables were to be turned; that General Forrest was already on our roads in Middle Tennessee; and that Hood’s army would soon be there.  He asserted that the Yankee army would have to retreat or starve, and that the retreat would prove more disastrous than was that of Napoleon from Moscow.  He promised his Tennessee and Kentucky soldiers that their feet should soon tread their “native soil,” etc., etc.  He made no concealment of these vainglorious boasts, and thus gave us the full key to his future designs.  To be forewarned was to be forearmed, and I think we took full advantage of the occasion.

On the 26th I received this dispatch.

CITY POINT, VIRGINIA,September 26,1864-10 a.m.

Major-General SHERMAN, Atlanta It will be better to drive Forrest out of Middle Tennessee as a first step, and do any thing else you may feel your force sufficient for.  When a movement is made on any part of the sea-coast, I will advise you.  If Hood goes to the Alabama line, will it not be impossible for him to subsist his army?  U. S. GRANT, Lieutenant-General.