Baxter Springs news. [volume] (Baxter Springs, Kan.) 1882-1919, 1898-12-03
SATURDAY, DECEMBER 3.
BAXTER SPRINGS SKETCH BOOK.
Continued from last week.

Continued from last week.)
More than two years have we fol-
lowed the young soldier from ILL
nois. We saw him serve his ap.
premiership as soldier in Mis-
souri,; then after the surrender of
Island No. 10 he is at Fort Pillow;
there to the battlefield of Shiloh
and the siege of Corinth, and thence
Iuka. He spends more than year
in long and weary marches through
Kentucky and Tennessee, including
the terrible battles of Murfrees-
boro and Chickamauga, besides
many severe skirmishes. He has
seen no rest since he entered the
service. He was first under Hunter,
then Pope, then Grant and Halleck,
Rosecrans, Thomas; then under
Gen. Grant again; where he was
permitted to rest and at the same
time to witness scene which but
very few persons are permitted to
see in life time. II was in Novem'
Der, 1868, while near Chattanooga.
On the sd of the month from an
eminence he saw Gen. Thomas
move out from the center and take
possession of Orchard Knob. The
next morning he saw Hooker scale
Lookout Mountain, while he could
hear Sherman's army on his left
pressing hard on the northern part
of Bragg's army on Mission Ridge;
the next day, Noy. %. Hooker had
passed over Lookout Mountain.
fought the battle above the clouds
and descended into the valley and
pressing toward the southern end
of Bragg's army, when the sig.
nal was given and Thomas center
sprang forward and joined the line
of march and began the ascent.
The line was several miles long;
there was no break; the Union
army moved on and captured one
redoubt after another of the enem, q
works and without halt continued
the ascent of Missionary Ridge un-
til they occupied the heights and
Bragg's army retreated in hot
haste. 1t was the grandest scene
witnessed during the entire war.
After Grants great victory at Chat
tanooga he was called east and
Sherman was left in command. The
winter was spent in preparation and
on the fifth of May Grant entered
the battle of the Wilderness while
Sherman began that line of battle
that extended from Chattanooga to
Atlanta. Promptly on the 9TH OF
May Gen. Sherman moved out of
Chattanooga; at Dalton he found
Johnson, who had been erecting
Notifications during the winter.
This was to be our comrade's last
campaign. After maneuvering and
fighting for several days by flank
movement the Confederates were
forced to fall back to Resaca where
on the l4th and 18th two hard bat
ties were fought in which the Union
army was victorious. The Con-
federates retreated through Cal
houn and Kingston to Dallas,
where Johnson made another stand
May Is, but outnumbered. out
flauked, but fighting all the way,
was compelled to fall back to Lost
Mountain; from this position he
was forced in like manner after
three days fight to retreat.
Johnson made his next stand at
Great and Little Kenesaw Mount
aims. Here line was formed on
the 22d of June when Gen. Hood
fiercely assaulted the Union center,
but was repulsed with heavy losses.
Five days afterwards Sherman
made an assault with great audac-
ity and attempted to carry Kene-
saw by storm, but was hurled back
with loss of nearly three thous-
aud men. Sherman at once re-
sumed his former tactics, outflanked
his atagonist and on the Sd of July
drove him across the Chattahochee
A week later the whole Confed-
crate army were crowded back with
in the defeuses at Atlanta, and our
Illinois soldier who had now spent
more than three years in the
service of his country was per-
mitted to return home.
What a history that home had
made since his departurel His ia.
Their and two brothers had entered
the Union army after his depart
ure. While fighting in the rear of
his father had lost an
arm. That father in after years was
a conspicuous figure as he drove in
to Baxter Springs and walked our
streets. II was in the home of this
son whose soldiers life we have
60 rapidly that father
breathed his last and~as by loving
hands laid to rest in OR Baxter
cemetery where oufcouutry's gran
lite shaft marks the resting place of
90 many of our heroic dead.
The subject of our sketch en-
tered the army a boy, but, In expert
ence left II man. On his return to