Prescott journal. [volume] (Prescott, Wis.) 1861-1871, 1864-09-24
R.F, TayIor on WThs Sltuatlou., ),

a Look Bdck7cqrd-A Picture of Federal Pro
gresS-1he Arnay Of he North-NcOl ellan
and FrenloHt-A .IoRdh-IOna Corci1s- Yet
Grams RaHying
Especial Correspondence OF the Chicago journal /
WASHINGTON, Sept. 2.
year is the tick of clock; while you
think, it is gone. A year ago to-day / was
beginning novel experience, for / was on
the way to that rough piece of veneering of
which had heard so much but had never
seen fragment-the Front the Front in
Tennessee. Everything looked cloudy and
wild; bayonets at depot, bridge and tunnel;
the quietest cottages filed with the bitterest
enemies side by side with spy in the cars;
face to face with rebel at the table Nash
vile magazine and an arsenal; Murfrees-
bOro huge fort. Trains crept out doubtful
| ly, and felt their way cautiously. Fired into
from the roadside cedars, blown from the
track by torpedoes, halted by guerrillas, it
was as good as smart skirmish to be pas
senger. Rosecrans had moved out from MUIR
freesboro; had expressed" it to TullahOma;
had gone over the mountains to Stevenson,
| in the edge of Alabama.
L had followed along the narrow track of
the Federal army; it had compelled submits
sion but it had made no loyal sentiment; it
was like carrying a lantern through thick
/ night: the moment the bearer moves on
darkness flows in, and his path is blotted out
behind him. But Rosecrans pushed forward;
he crossed the Tennessee he clambered
more mountains Bragg left Chattanooga at
/ one door and Roseerans entered it at anoth-
err. Then came the battle of Chickamauga
say what anybody may about it, that battle,
one of the bitterest and fiercest of the war,
was rather a necessity than a choice; we
must fight it or yield Chattanooga. The enc
my selected his ground and arranged the dar
ma pretty much in his own way; we took the
chances, and by splendid bravery that might
have been Spartan had itnot beenAmerican,
| the Federal army put the enemy in a condi-
ton to rest, fell back on Chattanooga and
hold it. Bragg, perched on mountain and
ridge, looked down upon US and counted our
tents and numbered our regiments, held the
| railroads, sent our boats on the Tennessee to
the right about, and tossed shells into our
laps. 1t was a sort of chicken pie we were
/ in, only the army of the Cumberland were
| no chickens, and the rebels were mounted
on the edge of the crust. Things might have
been pleasanter. September ran out, 0cto-
| Der wore away, November came in; the two
/ picket lines got to know each other they
| left the print of their teeth on the same plug
| of tobacco, and read rumors out of the same
soiled and tattered newspaper, old enough
| "to KILL" had it been a calf. We might
have had more bread and bacon 1t has been
nicely calculated that we might have had less.
Rosecrans went out and Grant came in. The
belts were drawn up another hole, things
were made ready, and mountain and ridge
were swept like threshing floor. Grant
put the mill in motion, and left Sherman to
| run it.
Perhaps one fact is as good as thousand;
within stones throw of the ridges, where
was, last November, three myriads of rebels,
| they held Lincoln and johnson" meeting
the other day. So the ballots are following
close on the fight of the bullets.
1t can hardly be believed that twenty mil
lions of people have been watching the PotO-
mac, these three years, for nothing The be-
ginning of the story so often told, will hardly
bear telling again. Now, have before me
one of the exquisite charts prepared by the
Coast Survey may of the United States.
Across it meanders a blue line, the southern
| boundary of loyal territory in the summer of
| '61. That blue line works its way up north
westerly from Fortress Monroe to Harper's
Ferry, narrowly leaving Washington on its
northern edge. Then, braided awhile with
the Potomac, it tends away south of west,
almost grazing Pennsylvania and cutting a
loop of the Ohio, a little south of Lexington,
| Kentucky +; then westward to Cairo, up stream
| to St. Louis, across the Mississippi, out and
| north of Jefferson and Boonville on the line
| of the Missouri, and fencing Kansas in among
the sheep. Excepting little suspicious of
/ blue south OF Florida, the blue blockaders
| dOtting the coast from GavestOn round to the
| Carolinas, all the rest was in possession of
| the goats .sst as
Below this line of blue, a line of red, that
| looks as if it might have been traced with
blood, defines the southern limit of the terri
| tory controlled by Federal arms in the sum-
mer of '63. Looped around Beaufort, New
bern, Norfolk, it sends out three suspicious
observation-disclosures Richmond, bears
up to Fredericksburg and leaves Harper's
Ferry Winchester and Washington away to
the north. Then down it goes across Ken
| lucky and the headwaters of the Cumberland,
dashes bravely into Tennessee to the east of
Tullahoma, then across the Tennessee into
Alabama, looping up Huntsville, and away
west, south of the river, curving grandly
| down, by Vicksburg and Jackson meander-
ing out Pascagoula, and the Delta of the Mis-
| sissippi; tying up New Orleans and Brashear
City; cutting the Red river away to the west !;
then up into Arkansas north of Little Rock,
| and west, by Forts Smith and Gibson, into
the Indian Territory. Then, one trickle of
red down the coast below Charleston to st.
Augustine, and another about Fort Pickens.
| 1t was a splendid march from blue to red,
thus binding anew in the sheaf, all of Ken
lucky, Missouri, a large portion of Tennessee,
and the valley of the Mississippi to the Gulf,
beside cleaning by the way in Alabama and
on the seaboard of Georgia and the Caro-
linas.
Below this rill of red, yellow line, like a
streak of sunshine, describes the Federal pro-
gress from the midsummer of 63 to New
| Years, '64. 1t streams across Virginia, be-
tween Fredericksburg and Gordonsville, to
Staunton; then down south, finishing up Ten
nessee, taking in Knoxville, Cleveland, Chat
tanooga, and piece Of Georgia. Far to the
| west it shines along Red river, and south it
glitters about the region from Matamoras to
Corpus Christi and Matagorda The field
between the red and the yellow is less broad
than between the red and the blue, but it
cost fierce battles to win, and is kindled with
the light of splendid victories.
There is yet fourth line upon the map
1t defines the southern boundary of the Fed
eral march, from January until yesterday.
The draughtsman who traced it for me an
hour ago, gave it a soberer tint, for he hap
pened to make it the color of dead leaf
But there is no reason for it. True, it pro-
iects an ugly rebel angle northward across
the yellow and red, from Stanton and Fred
ericksburg up to Winchester, but then it coils
| about Petersburg and curves like fisher
mans hook below Richmond. True, it drops
due south from Little Rocbeto the Gulf, but
ting off an arc of the red curve we described
there in '63, and letting the rebels something
L AL, ,,,osto,r, hanL of tho M;cc;co;,v;