The National tribune., 1911-03-16

erals have an excellent position and are
well fortified
~ prefer to fight them here, where
they have had only Is hours to fortify,
than to strike them at Nashville, where
= they have been strengthening them
selves for three years and more, re-
piled Hood.
Il turned without another word, and
ordered Gen. Bate, who commanded
one of the divisions of my corps. to
move off TO the left toward the Bost-
wick House and attack on the flank.
had the largest corps in that army,
something less than 5000 men. Hoods
dispositions of his forces for that fight
was: The corps I was directing on the
left and center. Stewards Corps on my
right and Stephen ID. Lees Corps in re-
serve. My disposition was: Gen. Bate
on the extreme left; Gen. John c.
Brown, with my old division, on the
left OF the Columbia pike, with his right
resting on that road: Cleburne on the
right of the same pike, with his left
resting on ii. AS Gen. Bate had long
road around to the left, 1 waited some
time after he started before giving the
order to advance. Finally the whole
line moved forward. Brown and Gle
burne were to stop as they reached the
open fields at the foot of Winstead's
Hill. j rode forward to it's summit as
they moved, and established my head
quarters there and waited for the
troops to pass over.
ut was the grandest sight ] ever saw
when the army marched over the field
and reached the open field at its base.
Each division unfolded itself into a
single line of battle with as much stead
mess as II forming for dress parade.
The men were tired, hungry, footsore,
ragged and many of them barefooted
but their spirit was admirable. Bear
I'll ~tz..@ ~
two divisions of my corps, Cleburne's
and Browns. had met side by side in
full view of each other in an open field,
with the advantages for desperate work
equally balanced between them. For
years each had commended for the right
TO wear the name of the crack division
of that army, and the faces of both men
and officers seemed TO say: Here is the
field upon which the right shall be de-
cided.' The fight, however, was not
only in those two divisions, but in the
whole army that day. AS the troops
wheeled into line of battle, in full view
of the enemy, their precision and mill
tary bearing was as beautiful a sight
as was ever witnessed in war. ] could
see that the Federal line was short and
curved. and I knew we could easily
cover ii by going forward in line of bat
tie by brigades. So this formation was
made before the time to charge came"
The View From the Union Side.
The Union troops had never seen
anything like the portentous military
pageant which now presented itself to
their deliberate view. In all the pre-
vious battles of the Army of the Cum
berland the view of the field had been
obscured by trees, thickets, rocks and
mountains. At Stone River probably
not over one-fourth of Bragg's army
could be seen al any one time, and even
a smaller percentage was visible at
Chickamauga and on the Atlanta cam
paign.
That at Franklin was the reverse of
the spectacle upon which the Confed-
crates looked down from Mission Ridge,
when the Union army in front of them
was a solid line of blue coming out of
the far-away mist of the Tennessee
above Chattanooga, and stretched away
again into infinity under the clouds of
Lookout Mountain. Here were up
wards OF 10000 men massed directly
under the eye of Gen. Schofieid in Fort