Therefore, by the 23d, I was in Milledgeville with the left wing, and was in full communication with the right wing at Gordon.  The people of Milledgeville remained at home, except the Governor (Brown), the State officers, and Legislature, who had ignominiously fled, in the utmost disorder and confusion; standing not on the order of their going, but going at once—­some by rail, some by carriages, and many on foot.  Some of the citizens who remained behind described this flight of the “brave and patriotic” Governor Brown.  He had occupied a public building known as the “Governor’s Mansion,” and had hastily stripped it of carpets, curtains, and furniture of all sorts, which were removed to a train of freight-cars, which carried away these things—­even the cabbages and vegetables from his kitchen and cellar—­leaving behind muskets, ammunition, and the public archives.  On arrival at Milledgeville I occupied the same public mansion, and was soon overwhelmed with appeals for protection.  General Slocum had previously arrived with the Twentieth Corps, had taken up his quarters at the Milledgeville Hotel, established a good provost-guard, and excellent order was maintained.  The most frantic appeals had been made by the Governor and Legislature for help from every quarter, and the people of the State had been called out en masse to resist and destroy the invaders of their homes and firesides.  Even the prisoners and convicts of the penitentiary were released on condition of serving as soldiers, and the cadets were taken from their military college for the same purpose.  These constituted a small battalion, under General Harry Wayne, a former officer of the United States Army, and son of the then Justice Wayne of the Supreme Court.  But these hastily retreated east across the Oconee River, leaving us a good bridge, which we promptly secured.

At Milledgeville we found newspapers from all the South, and learned the consternation which had filled the Southern mind at our temerity; many charging that we were actually fleeing for our lives and seeking safety at the hands of our fleet on the sea-coast.  All demanded that we should be assailed, “front, flank, and rear;” that provisions should be destroyed in advance, so that we would starve; that bridges should be burned, roads obstructed, and no mercy shown us.  Judging from the tone of the Southern press of that day, the outside world must have supposed us ruined and lost.  I give a few of these appeals as samples, which to-day must sound strange to the parties who made them: 

Corinth, Mississippi, November 18, 1884.

To the People of Georgia: 

Arise for the defense of your native soil!  Rally around your patriotic Governor and gallant soldiers!  Obstruct and destroy all the roads in Sherman’s front, flank, and rear, and his army will soon starve in your midst.  Be confident.  Be resolute.  Trust in an overruling Providence, and success will soon crown your efforts.  I hasten to join you in the defense of your homes and firesides.