The Pulaski citizen. [volume] (Pulaski, Tenn.) 1866-current, 1884-01-17


an ex-Confederate general TO
News Journal reporter, "that non
of Che historians of the late wa
have given a full description of tb'
destruction of Johnsonville, Tenn.
| by the Confederate general, Forest
on the 4th day of November, 1864
The destruction of this place wa
attended with an Insignificant los
of life, but the immense loss of gov
ernment property was unparalleled
exceeding City Point, Va, or tht
evacuation of Corinth, Miss. II
! 1864, while Gen. Sherman as pre-
pairing for his famous march to tn,
sea, the low stage of water in the
Cumberland river, and the inability
of the Louisville IL Nashville rail
road to forward the enormous
stores required in the prescibeC
time, the government extended the
Nashville q Northwestern road tC
the Tennessee river, and Johnson
vile, at the terminus, became The
base of supplies for sherman
army. Leaving Gen. Thomas will
the fourth and twenty-fourth army
corps to defend Tennessee, Sher
man, after destroying Atlanta, star
ted on his famous march to the At
lantic Ocean. Gen. Hood, the Con.
federate commander, with his usual
impetuosity, started north to cap
ture Nashville and drive Gen.
Thomas to the Ohio river. His
disastrous defeat before Nashville
is matter of history, and we will
follow Forest, who left Hood at the
Tennessee river on a secret expedi
tion. Dispatches reached Gen.
Thomas at Nashville that Forest
had passed Gunter's Landing, Ala.
heading west. Old pap, after a
careful survey of the military map,
intuitively concluded that Forest in
tended to capture Johnsonyille, fol
low the line of the Nashville d
Northwestern railroad to Kingston
Springs, cross the Cumberland river
at Clarksville and appear in the
rear of Nashville simultaneously
with Hoods appearance before that
city. The entire Cumberland gun
boat fleet was dispatched to form a
junction with the Tennessee squad
ron. While the fleet was descend
ing the Cumberland and rounding
into the Tennessee twelve miles be
low, Forrest was wildly riding day
and night through Northern Missis-
sippi and into West Tennessee in a
frantic endeavor to arrive before
the fleet. Six hundred yards below
Johnsonville q small island divides
the river into two equal channels.
At them on the 4th of November,
the flagship and six other gunboats
appeared around the head of the is
land and cast anchor before the
fort. At two minutes past y For
est arrived on the opposite bank,
and, enraged at his i'll luck, com
menced one ofthe most savage bonn
bardments known during the late
war, the shot fired cutting out the
whole bottom of the Twenty Nine,
the flag g-ship, sinking her like lead.
So vicious and accurate Was his fire
that in twenty minutes every gun
boat above the island was blown
up, sunk or abandoned by the
crews. In the meantime the caval-
ry had disnounted, and creeping
down to the bank, poured incessant
volleys of leaden hail into the town,
which stampeded $500 armed quar-
termasters employees who volunteer
ed to defend the place, leaving the
brunt to fall on Colb's Wisconsin
regiment, the First Kansas, and a
cOlored United States battery. At
l o'clock the remnants of the fleet
left the scene Of action and dropped
out Of sight. The bombardment
was incessant till sundown and was
resumed with savage ferocity the
next morning. At 10 o'clock, dur
ing a temporary lull in the firing,
the ears of the gallant defenders
were greeted with the shrill shrieks
of approaching locomotives, bear
ing two brigades of the twenty
third corps, which Thomas had
sent to relieve the place. Forest
was foiled, but what desolate sight
saddened the eyes of the rescuers,
Eight fine gunboats, sixteen large
stean ers, $50 barges of hay, vast
quantities of government stores un-
der canvas, and the immense ware
house 600 feet long, packed to re-
pletion with commissary, quarter
master and sanitary stores, estima=
ted by the quarter master general
to be worth $20,000,O00, were a
grand smoldering ruin.