arms for a surrender?' 'No, sir,' says Field. Take arms! shoulder arms! by the right flank, file right, march!' just as cool and deliberate as if on dress-parade. Bragg looked scared. He had put spurs to his horse, and was running like a scared dog before Colonel Field could answer him. Every word of this is fact. We at once became the rear-guard of the army. I felt sorry for Bragg. Poor fellow! he looked so whipped, mortified, and chagrined at defeat! And all along the line, when Bragg would pass, the soldiers would raise the yell, 'Here's your mule!' 'Bully for Bragg! he's great on retreat!" (")

Night has come. The sun has gone down behind Walden's Ridge, its departing rays falling upon the Stars and Stripes everywhere waving on Missionary Ridge, where an hour before the Confederates had stood, masters of the situation, as they believed themselves to be. Under cover of the gathering darkness Hardee withdraws from the northern edge of the ridge, retreating across the Chickamauga.

The battle was over. Bragg had met with a crushing defeat, losing forty cannon, seven thousand muskets, six thousand one hundred men as prisoners, besides the killed, wounded, and missing. His army was demoralized. Longstreet could not rejoin him, and he retreated to Dalton.

The troops of General Grant followed the retreating army to Tunnel Hill. There were sharp engagements between Cleburne's division-the rear-guard of Bragg's troops-and the pursuing Union brigades; but for want of horses and supplies, General Grant could not enter upon a new campaign; besides, General Burnside was besieged by Longstreet at Knoxville, with provisions for only a week; and unless relieved, East Tennessee would again fall into the hands of the Confederates. No time was to be lost. The troops were recalled from Tunnel Hill, and the corps commanded by General Granger, and that commanded by General Sherman, with the Eleventh Corps, under General Howard, were ordered to hasten to the relief of General Burnside.

NOTES TO CHAPTER XXII.

(1) Bragg's Orders to Longstreet.

(2) Grant's Despatches.

(3) Grant," Personal Memoirs," vol. ii., p. 61.

(4) Idem, p. 42.

(5) Idem, p. 79.

(6) W. B. Hazen,

(7) H. Allspaugh, Thirty-first Ohio Regiment, National Tribune, June 2, 1887.
(8) W. B. Hazen, "Narrative of Military Service," p. 177.

(9) General Bragg's Report.

(10) H. Allspaugh, National Tribune, June 2, 1887.

(1) Watkins's "History of First Tennessee Regiment," p. 104.

W

CHAPTER XXIII.

DEFENCE OF KNOXVILLE.

E have seen General Longstreet leaving Chattanooga to regain East Tennessee to the Confederacy, and reopen the railroad to Virginia. He had twenty-four thousand men and eighty cannon, but his supply of food was so scant that he was obliged to send out his wagons to gather grain from the farmers' wheat-stacks, which the soldiers threshed, and which was ground in the mills along the route thus subsisting his army in part till his supply-trains arrived.

The Union troops under General Burnside, in East Tennessee, were encamped in several places, that forage and food might be obtained instead of transporting supplies over the mountains from Kentucky. The Ninth Corps was thirty miles west of Knoxville, at Lenoir's, where there were two grist-mills. Other troops were at Knoxville and Cumberland Gap.

General Longstreet laid his plan to strike a blow before Burnside could concentrate his scattered divisions. He reached the Holston River on November 14th, and began to construct his pontoon-bridge. Burnside had a pontoon across the river opposite the town of Loudon, but, seeing what Longstreet was intending to do, took it up and began to move his troops towards Knoxville. The Confederates were marching on a parallel road, hoping to reach Campbell's Station, where the two roads come together, in advance of the Union troops, and thus get between them and the other divisions.

Rain was falling, and the mud so deep that Burnside's artillerymen were obliged to double their teams to get the cannon over miry places. The Union wagons blocked the way of the troops, while there was nothing to obstruct Longstreet. Through the night the six thousand men of the Ninth Corps plodded through the mud, drenched with rain. Daylight was appearing when General Hartranft's division reached Campbell's Station, filing into a field, deploying in line of battle, to hold the road over which they knew the Confederates were marching. Scouts informed them that they were close at hand.

The wagon-train was hurried on towards Knoxville. White's and Ferrero's divisions, which were behind Hartranft's in the march, hastened towards the station. A few minutes later the muskets of the skirmishers were heard. Longstreet formed his lines and advanced, but his troops were held in check till the Union trains were well on their way towards Knoxville, when the Union troops also took up their line of march. Longstreet had been foiled in his plan. The Union trains were safe; the scattered divisions were rapidly concentrating; the pontoons were being laid at Knoxville, to enable Burnside to hold the hills on the south side of the river, and prevent the Confederates from planting their cannon there and bombarding the town. Soldiers, loyal citizens, negroes-all were at work with pickaxes and spades, constructing breastworks. The loyal women were baking bread, frying bacon, caring for the sick in the hospitals. The Union men had suffered so much from the Confederates they were determined that never again should the flag of the Confederacy wave in Knoxville.

The town is situated on a plateau, on the north side of the Holston River, which has high, steep banks. The hills around are green and beautiful. North-west of the town the plateau slopes down to a valley with a creek winding through it. General Burnside's engineers built a dam across the stream and so flooded the valley. An earthwork was constructed on the highest hill west of the town, which was named Fort Sanders, in honor of a clear-headed, energetic, resolute officer, General Sanders, only twenty-one years old, who had been directing affairs at Knoxville, who was imparting to the troops his own enthusiasm and energy, and who was placed in command of the defences on the hills on the south side of the river.

General McLaws was sent by Longstreet up the south side of the Holston, to capture the hills upon which General Sanders had posted his troops. If they could be carried, cannon could be planted there, and shells sent into the town, and along the line of defence which Burnside had chosen. McLaws attempted it, but was repulsed with great slaughter, whereupon Longstreet determined to begin a siege. He would sit down. and wait till Burnside was starved out, or, watching his opportunity, would rush upon the works. He sent a party with axes up the river to fell trees, build a great raft, and send it down-stream to break the pontoonbridge; but the Union troops picked up the logs, and used them for their bivouac fires.

The main body of the Confederates were on the north bank of the river, in front of Fort Sanders and the Union breast works which had been erected on College Hill. On the night of November 23d they gained a