Its spectacular. Its my real pleasure to introduce the next speaker. He is somebody you already know. You have heard him speak somewhere or on tv. He was born and raised in fredericksburg. He spent his career interpreting and preserving American Military history with the National Park service, the new york state government, Rensselaer County historical society, the Civil War Preservation trust, kentucky state parks and the u. S. Army. Do you think he is qualified to speak . He has written and spoken on various aspects of military history and leadership from 1775 to the present. He has published two books with the history press, the civil war at perryville and the Tullahoma Campaigns, and contributing to the emerging civil war bulldog and studied the 19411942 campaign released in late 2016. In september 2016, the u. S. Army published his volumes on the 1862 virginia campaigns as part of its series on the civil war. Last year at this event on friday night, i bought this book and by saturday night i spent , all night reading it. It is fabulous. This is the bataan book, highly recommend it. Last about chris, he is a great researcher. He knows an amazing amount of anything military, an excellent writer and most importantly of all, he is a really good guy who will share anything with you, the most important thing. He is getting ready to get married. Without further ado, chris. [applause] chris good morning, everybody. I see you all have drunk your coffee this morning judging by the energy by which you respond to me. Thats good news. Its great to be here. I have spoken at every single one of these. Every year the audience gets larger. Im not sure we can get much larger than this, but as far as im concerned, thats a great problem to have. If youre here for the first time, raise your hand. That also is fantastic. So welcome, and for the rest of you, welcome back. If you like what we do here, were doing a mini version of this in conjunction with my current employer, the mcarthur memorial in norfolk, on september 28 of this year called the reunion of blue and gray personified, looking at the mcarthur civil war ancestors, which are far more than you may think. There is information on that in your program as well. So i encourage you to take a look at that. How many people have ever been to tullahoma, tennessee . Thats actually a lot more than i thought. [laughter] chris how many of the rest of you know that there was a, before you saw the program, that there was a place called tullahoma, tennessee . Well, thats also really, really good. That must be a bunch of air force people in here because, the Arnold Air Force base, a lot of scientific testing, the old camp forest from the 1943 ma maneuvers. Thats really, really good. Im glad to see that. I want you to see if you can name this operation. It occurred in late june and early july of 1863. It drove a major Confederate Army back in defeat and secured a major Geographic Area for the United States. Are there any guesses in the room . And thats a rhetorical question because i know in this audience i will get many. I am, of course, referring to the Tullahoma Campaign of 1863. Thats where well send the next 45 minutes, 40 to 45 minutes discussing, is the Tullahoma Campaign. Now, the Tullahoma Campaign is june 24 to july 4 of 1863. So it is part of what turns out to be a very eventful series of weeks for both sides in the civil war. In many ways, it gets overshadowed, and we can discuss that, and i will touch on that a little bit later in the conversation. One other piece of logistics before we get going, did everybody get a copy, a hand copy of the map . Its the paper copy of this map, i dont expect you to strain your eyes looking at it all the time. Youve got your own copy. I will refer to it as we go along. The Tullahoma Campaign is fought between the army of the cumberland under William Stark rosekrans, 70,000 men ,and 45,000 men, the army of tennessee under the command of general braxton bragg. You can see the different corps that they will be deployed with. Rans will only bentley will ultimately take four, the cal valerie into the operation. Under gordon granger, alexander mccooks 20th court. George thomass and tommys core. Bragg for his part has two infantry corps under polk and william j. Hardy, plus cavalry under joe wheeler and some other detached elements. Some very prominent people here. A lot of them are familiar with each other because in many ways, this is the second round in the series of battles between rosekrans and bragg in middle tennessee, southeastern tennessee and northern georgia through the late fall of 1862 and all the way through the fall of 1863. This is round two in many ways between the two. To understand the story of understandwe have to the context in which its fought and the continuum in which its fought. Whatever campaign you are studying always remember that , its part of a continuum of the story of that particular campaign. A lot of times when you look at campaign histories, oh, it starts this day and ends this day, but you often forget that what has gone before sometimes overshadows and influences what has come. Having said that, let me know explained the context of tullahoma. Youve got to understand that context. From june 1863 back to early january 1863. January 5, 1863, when bragg leaves stones river, when he. Eaves the area of murfreesboro the yankees have more reinforcements and we have to withdraw. Bragg withdraws down southeast from murphreesboro, about 15 miles or so, to the area of the highland rim, the high ground that you see right there on the map, between murfreesboro and tullahoma. More to theient you map as we go. They will camp there and spend time in middle tennessee until the home operation begins in june of 1863. Almost immediately confederate press goes after general bragg. On new years eve, bragg had confidently predicted victorind anderson said we have driven the federals everywhere except on the extreme left and implied that rosecrans was finished. We had this great victory and bragg is retreating, why is that, especially when the armies in mississippi and virginia are won great victories and holding their ground if not advancing. And so newspaper reports and editorials began to come out about general bragg and impugning the performance of the army of tennessee. And that causes general bragg to light a fuse, to plant ill seeds that will bear ill fruit, whichever analogy you want to use. On january 11, against the advice of his staff, he sends a message to his corps commanders, you advise me to retreat. Please publicly say so. Put it in writing. We had a conference about it, you told me about it and put it in writing, and let us stand together against a program coming from the press. Thats a close paraphrase. He also said something else. Lost the goodve faith and confidence of my generals, i will retire without a murmur. And by the way, please talk to your division and brigade commanders as well and get their opinions before responding. I dont care who you are and what organization you are. If you are a c. E. O. And you put yourself in front of your subordinates for a referendum on your fitness for leadership, and your conduct of operations up to this point, even if you win that vote of confidence, you can never command that same respect. Ok . This is a capital error on the part of braxton bragg. The replies are very quickly coming. Polk is on leave. He has a couple of lawyers in his corps. They take a look at this and say is bragg really asking us two , questions or asking one . They wait until late january to get back. But the other commanders get back and say, yes, we advise retreat. We are happy to say that, and by the way, we are convinced that a change in this army is necessary, unquote. [laughter] chris polk gets back at the end of january and writes back to bragg, the feedback we are getting, is this one request or two . Bragg says i only meant one , question in there. Tries to shut it down. Polk decides its a good idea to write to president davis, packages all of this correspondence which they provided copies for, sends a message to davis and packages it all up and says, we didnt give our response about the fitness of the command of the army, but our opinions coincide with those of the other corps. And when davis gets this, he is angry. What is this . And he says this, why bragg would submit himself to that tribunal is beyond me. He tells the commander of the west, jo johnson, replace bragg with joe johnston. Go to tullahoma and figure out what the heck is going on. So in early february, joe johnston arrives in tullahoma. He talks to the commanders, and they provide their very frank views. Bragg wanted to be relieved at this point, but he doesnt force the issue by resigning. What johnston finds is that the morale among rank and file is pretty good. They are feeling pretty confident about their next round against those dastardly yankees, and im sure those terms were used at least once by the listed people to general johnston. Among the commanders, he figures out some of that, but also people are putting on a pretty good face as well. Even though bragg maybe a , heskerous old codger still got the job, and they have to show some loyalty to their superior officer. So johnston writes a favorable report and disappears. You think it is smoothed over now, right . Now comes the time to do the paperwork and the battle reports for the battle just concluded. So just as these wounds are beginning to scab over, now it is time to refight the Stones River Campaign. How many have looked at the official records of Stones River Campaign . Has anyone looked at that besides drew gruber back there . This spills back into the open. Records are really interesting for two parts. Several of them allow their feelings about the emancipation proclamation to show up in their description of the enemy. They Start Talking about the emancipationist friends, and a whole bunch of other horrible language that shows up about the enemy that makes sense that these reports are written in february of 1863. But for our purposes, the big thing to understand is bragg who gets all of these reports and then writes his own, takes the opportunity, he cannot resist the opportunity in his own report to start striking back at those people and painting the people that were most against him in that referendum of sorts in january in the worst possible light. To the point, and i have seen this nowhere else in the official records, to the point when John Breckenridge of kentucky writes his divisional report, bragg writes an addenda and proceeds to use the polite equivalent of lie as much as he can and pointing out where breckenridge was wrong and at fault, and basically pins the whole failure of the battle on John Breckenridge. He doesnt really care for kentuckians anyway because of what happened in the Kentucky Campaign the year before, when he advised jeff davis in the fall of 1862, we must leave the garden spot of kentucky to its stupidity. Thats how he feels about the bluegrass state and the officers from, breckenridge is from lexington which doesnt help matters. Once again its put publicly this fissure that has opened in the high command. Jeff davis at this point decides to act. He tells johnston, go to tullahoma, take command and send bragg to richmond for consultation. I think we could all read between the lines on that. Bragg is out. Johnston is going to be in. Joe johnston, because of his, he later would pin it on an exalted sense of honor, does not like to be creating the impression hes pulling down a brother officer so he can take the job he really wants, which is army command in the field. So when he shows up, he has a convenient excuse not to actually execute the order. Why . Mrs. Bragg is with the army, eliza bragg, she has drunk some bad water and is down with typhoid. She cant travel for a few weeks. So johnston says mrs. Bragg cant travel. Bragg cant travel to richmond , then, so we are going to suspend the order for the time being. Until mid april, from the beginning of march to april of 1863, here is the situation in the army of tennessee headquarters in tullahoma. You have joe johnston, Supreme Commander in the west, nominally in command because he is the senior officer present. Braxton bragg is present. He has not been officially relieved from the army of tennessee command, even though he knows even though everyone knows he should be relieved, but he is still there. Who is in charge . I dont think they ever figured it out. Now, who is the one person that could referee all of this and cut that knot and solve the whole problem . Jefferson davis. The fact that Jefferson Davis does not is a severe indictment of him as a commanderinchief of the confederacy. Call it in my book, and i do not withdraw the comment now, dereliction of duty. Finally, when mrs. Bragg is ready to travel, its early april of 1863, getting on toward midapril of 1863. The problem is now, Joe Johnstons virginia wounds have flared up. Hes unfit for field duty. Finally, when he is fit for field duty in mid april, is anything else going on in the west that might demand his attention . Thats when u. S. Grant runs the batteries at vicksburg, and it becomes clear that the mrs. Be front is about to get really active, which of course it does, so johnston is ordered away with elements of braggs army to go encounter that, and they will ultimately be defeated at the battle of jackson in may of 1863. So where are we as an organization in the army of tennessee at this point . Do using this is a functioning, happy organization, ready to take the field a good team of leaders . No, emphatically no. The wounds begin to heal over again once johnston leaves and realizes bragg will be here and we have to Work Together and we have to continue to Work Together. The wounds begin to heal, but a few weeks later, the scabs are ripped off again. I invite you at some point to go look at the Kentucky Campaign official records. You notice half of the reports were done in the fall of 1862. The other half were done in the spring of 1863, and braggs official report on the Kentucky Campaign was done in the spring of 1863. It rips all those scabs back off again. And at this point, bragg, even though in 1862 he had no problem with polks decision to act on his own initiative and abandon the city of bardstown in 1862. It is1862, bragg decides in the best of the service, we are going to courtmartial polk. Gathers all of the evidence, gets everything together and at the last minute decides were not going to courtmartial general polk. Yeah, im hearing some chuckles in the background. Thats the only reaction you can have. And it would be you have to laugh because its a tragedy because so many mens lives will depend on this ability of this army to function, high command to function well, and you can see whats happening to it. Do you know when the last actual correspondence relating to the campaign was dated . June 20, 1863. So this is going on literally up to 96 hours before rosecrans moves for the Tullahoma Campaign. There is a letter in the peers bill official record in the perryville official records report between polk and hardy dated may 1863, and hardy tells polk, if you want to rip up the Kentucky Campaign, now is the time to do it. In other words, the impending courtmartial. Polk writes back and says, its not the time to do that, but youre absolutely right that we need to watch tullahoma as much as we watch murfreesboro. Now what does that mean, and why is that important . Why is that line important . Who is in murfreesboro . The federal army, the enemy. The army of the cumberland. You have to watch them. Theyre going to advance at some point and youre going to fight another battle with them. But who is into loma . Who is in tullahoma . Where is the army of tennessee headquarters . Its tullahoma. So what hardy and polk are saying, we have two enemies. We have an enemy in the front, but we have an enemy in the rear as well, our ostencible boss, braxton bragg. We will talk more about that as these seeds are bearing bitter fruit, and they will bear bitter fruit as the campaign progresses, and we will talk more about that as we get closer. Over in murphreesboro, all is not well with the United States forces either. After january 1860 three, doesnt move out of murphreesboro in force, although he will sendvar cavalry and parties here and there. Sometimes they get the better of the confederates, others times they dont. They will be in that area, and they dont move until june 1863. How does that look in washington, by the way . Second largest army in the federal service doesnt move for practically six months. It does not look good, does it . Rosecrans gets in trouble with washington. He can manage people below him, he can manage people around him, but one of the essential abilities of a leader is managing your relationship with your superiors. Rosecrans finds time to lecture the commanding general and the secretary of war about warfare. And what you think that does for them . How well do you think that goes down, especially in the wake of what George Mcclellan the year before . Although there is considerable evidence that rosecrans did not maintain the animosity against lincoln and stanton, but he is there in 1863. He is planning a campaign. I will say this. He does have a couple of points. The first point is that most of his cavalry needs remounts. Theyre not in very good shape. Most of them have just come back from prison, having been captured the previous year. But hes also got another problem, and this is something i think, would people consider the army of the cumberland, they neglect to point out this one thing, and that is this. How far is the army of the potomacs line of communication at any point in its career . 50 miles to washington, or to one of the river ports in eastern virginia. Ok . How about the army out in mississippi . They can rely on the United States navy going up and down the mississippi river, right . Good, short, secure lines of supply. What about the army of the cumberland . The army of the cumberlands forward base in nashville, 30 miles northwest of murfreesboro, you can supply in through the Cumberland River, but the Cumberland River can be very fickle, shall we say. There are times where, because of the shoals just downstream from the city of nashville, you get steamers up as well as you can. You have the option of the railroad ational the louisvillenashville railroad, which parallels interstate 65 and at nashville, nashville and chattanooga and the rest is paralleled by interstate 24. You can see it marked on your map. Basically everything you are going to need are going to ride the rails, the single track railroad. Now, once you leave louisville, between louisville and nashville, that 183 miles, at best you are going through neutral territory, even though kentucky has voted to remain loyal to the United States. It is at best neutral territory. John morgan has made a career at this point of cutting that railroad. As a matter of fact, from july 1 1862 to june 30, 1863, do you know how much that railroad was fully operational . Seven months, 12 days. So almost five full months of that 12 month period, that railroad was not fully operational. And its not just bridges. Its just not taking up rails. There is a 2,000foot long tunnel just north of the town of gallatin, tennessee, 30 miles north of nashville, that john hutton morgan had blown up and burned and blocked, and was out of commission for two months in the fall of 1862. Whenever you think of the army of the cumberland, you must rumor. Whenever one says, what is rosecrans operate in fits and starts, why does he spend so much time of building up supplies, its the tenuous nature of his lifeline, back to nashville and back to louisville. Thats why his army always stops to prepare healthy railroad, bring up the supplies. That is not just rhetoric. It is not just an excuse. He needs it. The other thing is, what do you think that does to the reserves . The army, during the winter of 1862, is oftentimes down to three days of reserves in their roads is not going to move as good calvary and will not move before he has sufficient supplies on hand, especially to his he has the forest south to the west of shelbyville and the army of tennessee. Who does he have on the eastern flank . States . Ack to his home two of the rate graders of the confederate calvary. Joe wheeler is not bad either. I would be worried about my railroad, too, wouldnt you . One of the things that rosekranz bills up is three years of supplies, you can visit part of it today, part of Stones River National battlefield. More importantly when his troops leave murfreesboro, theyll take 11 days of supplies with them. He is going banking on a big reserve. He is going to ride on a very big cushion of supplies. I think this is very prudent on his part because he knows there is a pretty good chance he is going to lose communications with the rest of the or he is going to lose railroad communications at some point. Of course, what does this look like in washington, particularly because of what happens in may of 1863. We talked about what happened in mississippi in may of 1863, vehiclesburg. What happens here in virginia in may of 1863, the battle of chance loresville, the largest battle, largest single engagement in north american recorded history to be precise. Meanwhile, rosekranz sits in nashville and by the spring and by june of 1863, the War Department threatens him with relief. Are you going to move anytime soon, and rosecrans writes back and says if now means tomorrow, no. But if it means in five days, yes. And thats good enough. Thats good enough. And so rosekranz looking for the right opportunity, looking for the right amount of supplies, looking for the right way to go begins to cast his plans to go after general bragg. Look at the map, to understand the story im about to tell you, you got to understand something about the geography of middle tennessee. North is at the top. Murfreesboro is at the top. Shelbyville, tullahoma, 12 miles straight south from murfreesboro, from tullahoma, you go down the rail line about eight miles to the key rail bridge at estel springs. Once you cross there, you go through decker, the major rail tunnel at cowan and climb up into the cumberland plateau, the University Place, swanny, the home of the university of the south. The cornerstone had been laid and the war intervened. As a matter of fact, the cornerstone was laid in 1860 by general polk who we have spent time with already in this presentation. The big thing that you need to know about this ground, really two things you need to know. The first thing, if you look between shelbyville and murfreesboro and the gaps. That is known as the highland rim. Those mountains extend anywhere from 500 to 900 feet and theyre very steep. They can only be crossed by those three gaps that you see there on the map. There is one all weather road that runs out of murfreesboro, 41, it runs south through the gap down to manchester and continues southeast toward chattanooga. Thats the ground that were going to be fighting over. What bragg has done, he has deployed his army and extended his cavalry in several different directions. Forrest and wheeler will be west towards the duck river and in the northeast, between woodbury and minville in the top right corner of the map will be morgan, at least until june 20 of 1863 when he embarks on a raid into kentucky and disobeys orders and goes into indiana and ohio and will be captured at Buffington Island so hell disappear just before the Campaign Starts and rosecrans Campaign Starts and rosecrans has been waiting for that. Polk will be in and around shelbyville covering guys camp. Pat cleburnes division of 8,000 will hold liberty gap and the area fairfield will be alexander p. Stewarts division of 6,000 men holding that area. There are calvary, First Kentucky confederate calvary, being an alarm force in case the followers decide to move out from murfreesboro. The idea is to warn the infantry. Theyll have time to move up into the gaps and stop the followers. Federals. Thats the basic plan braggs army has come up with. Let me read you what rosecrans plans to do. This comes right out of the official records. I want you to follow along on your map. This is rosecrans plan for the operation. Positive information from various sources concurred to show the enemy intended to fight us in his entrenchments at shelbyville should we advance by that route and he would be in good position to retreat if beaten and retard our pursuit through winding roads which lead up into the barrens and inflict severe loss towards the mountains of their base. I was determined to render useless their entrenchments and if possible secure their line of retreat by turning their right and moving on the railroad bridge across elk river. Wheres the railroad bridge across elk river . Alsona and estill springs. I want you to remember that your that is the key point for the entire campaign. That is the object. If he takes it, rags army will be in very deep trouble. They will be cut off from chattanooga. Rosecrans said that would compel a battle on their own ground or drive them in a disadvantageous line of retreat. To accomplish this, it was necessary to make bragg believe he could advance on him by the shelbyville route and keep up the impression if possible until we reached manchester with the main body of the army. Let me translate that plan for you. Grangers corps, David Stanleys cavalry corps, grand total of 25,000 men all told along with alex mccooks corps moving south of murfreesboro will operate in the area southwest of murfreesboro and keep polk thinking theyll try to force guys gap and liberty gap. Meanwhile, the bulk of the army, George Thomas 14th corps, 25,000 men and 20,000 men with thomas l. Crittendens corps, will march east of murfreesboro and aim for manchester at which point theyll be in a good position to operate directly against tullahoma or down toward the rail bridge across the elk river. What do you think of the plan . Good plan, isnt it . Its a good plan. One problem. Speed is the vital factor. Its been a real nice dry summer but when these troops start marching out on the morning of june 24, 1863, it starts raining. Of the next 17 days, it will rain at least once, and im not talking about a sprinkle but a gully washing thunderstorm at least once 14 of those 17 days. So what do you think these roads turn into . And by the way, when its not raining, its overcast, 90something degrees with 100 humidity. This is miserable. For those of you familiar with the gettysburg retreat, the retreat from gettysburg, the horrible rain they have to go through starting july 4. Well, some of that comes from middle tennessee and meets the other armies up in pennsylvania later. This is atrocious weather and should always be remembered when you consider the Tullahoma Campaign. Early Morning Hours of june 24, the army to cumberland gets in motion. The decoy forces begin to move into their area and do their job. They skirmish with cleburne at liberty gap on 24 and 25th of june. The Main Elements of thomas corps begin to move southeast towards hoovers gap. In the front is a very special unit of mounted infantry. They dont want to be called cavalry. Mounted infantry under the command of intrepid 33yearold indiana colonel named john wilder. He realized that having tried to chase confederate cavalry by marching infantry, this wasnt going to work. I want as many horses and mules as i can and he fronts the money and is later reimbursed by the government to give them seven shot spencer rifles. And they have gone out and done very good work and they are now in front. Of course, some of the real cavalry is like, oh, youre tadpole cavalry. Thats the word they use. Tadpole cavalry. We know what were doing. On this day wilder wants to prove himself and they are out front as the rains start to come in and about seven miles out from murfreesboro towards hoovers gap, about the h in the word hoover on the map, they run into the First Kentucky cavalry and how do you think these federals do charging forward with spencers against confederates with single shot rifles spread out. Its quickly over and the kentuckians collapse. They lose their battle flag and begin to fall back under the pressure of the federals as they move into hoovers gap. As the confederates try to make a stand right there and send a courier riding as fast as they can back towards fairfield to wake up stewarts division, get them moving, wilder realizes the situation and he sends his vanguard unit, his 17th indiana, into the attack. They scatter the confederates and push into the gap itself. His orders only are to stop to take the foot of the gap and wait for the main body of the federal infantry to come up and complete the assault. But wilder realizes, those trenches arent occupied. And if i wait, they might be occupied by people very unfriendly to me so he orders his men into the gap and through the gap and actually takes position on a ridge on the other side where you see jacobs store, just before jacobs store. Its where if you go there today thats where the confederate cemetery is and the battlefield pavilion they have right off of exit 97 on or 107. One of the exits right there on i24. And take a position right there. They will be there in the afternoon because they can hear the long roll in the distance thanks to acoustics of the confederate infantry coming up and they will withstand several attacks by confederate infantry that afternoon and as one of the illinoisans said in that brigade, they went after it shooting. They lose a grand total of 60 men all afternoon they inflict over 200 confederate casualties and send most of the confederates back. This is good tennessee infantry. They would hold their own at threetoone odds. Thomas, when he gets up with the main body of the infantry, the battlefield surveys what wilder has done. For those of you who know George Thomas, hes not a demonstrative man but comes over to wilder, shakes his hand, pumps it, gushes, youve saved me 20,000 men and then the next day he publishes an order because of their fast move and hard strike, this brigade, wilders brigade shall ever after be known as the lightning brigade where they get their famous name where they will carry on at greater glory through the Georgia Campaign of 1864. Thomas will consolidate there. Both sides expect bragg to make a counter offensive. Bragg doesnt make a counter offensive and rosecrans decides to move towards manchester on the morning of the 26th. The largest battle of the campaign in and around a beach grove jacobs store area where thomas men will basically shove aside much like opening a hole in the line in football, will shove aside the confederates, push them south and begin to progress southeast and reach manchester on the morning of the 27th of june where they finally find crittendens corps. Crittendens boys have had to march up around bradyville, march up a slope like this. No joke. Ive driven it even today. 45 degrees. There have been orders put out, decrease your wagon train, decrease your baggage as much as you possibly can. Tommy wood, one of the division commanders, obeyed that order to the letter but the guy in front, john palmer, no, i know better. Were taking everything. I dont know whats on the other side of the hills. They are marching through roads that, no joke, are knee high. One of the brigade commanders, william hazon would say, between marching through the fields and on thed radio the road, i didnt know where the road was because of the mud. What do you think happens to those wagons and artillery . Even on flat land they start sinking. Sinking. And it takes them two days to get up that height. And how do they do it . You line up infantry men on both sides of the road and then with the teamsters, using their animals as hard as they can, they run up to the hill and as they falter, the infantry men come in, grab the wheels and push and begin to turn and crank them up. Literally crank them up the hill. It takes them two days to do that. And one of the officers who had seen many fights on many battlefields would say that was the worst march of the war for us. This distance, dry weather, should only be covered, about 15, 20 miles. 30 miles, excuse me. 30 miles. Two days, three days march. Right . It takes them four full days. What do you think their condition is when they reach manchester . Theyre exhausted. They are blown. This is also the day, by the way, where bragg finally decides hes going to do something. He sends a message to general polk on the 26th. And comes to see general polk and says, look, i have a plan. I want you to take the 15,000 men of your corps and advance up through guys gap and then i want you to turn right and i want you to fight your way up towards murfreesboro. Do we know whats on the other side of those hills . You can take care of it, youll be fine. The word man trap polk used to describe what bragg was proposing. He said this is nothing short of sending us into a man trap. And hes right. Hes absolutely right. Bragg gets back to his headquarters, what does he find waiting for him there . He finds waiting for him news of the defeat at beach grove that hardees men have been shunted aside towards fairfield and bragg sends a message and the worked is significant and indicative of braggs quality of leadership. He said movement proposed for tomorrow is postponed. First of all, hed ordered the movement. Why did he say he was proposing it . Now hes postponing it which means its not canceled and sends a series of questions to polk. Should we stand at shelbyville, retreat tullahoma or try to fight it out somewhere . I leave you to unpack that as you see fit. Heres where the bitter fruit of january, february, march, april and may come really to roost. Makes a bad metaphor. Theres another Confederate Army that has defended twice in this war will defend behind a Major Military obstacle, expecting the federals to try to cross that obstacle and will have two or three contingency plans ready to engage when the yankees get active. That, of course, is the army of northern virginia, 1863, winter 62, 1863, and winter of 1863, 1864. Lee is ready. Hes talked about it with his team and knows what he needs to do but its a matter of activating the contingency plan. Thats called good communication, coordination and collaboration, what a Successful Organization needs to achieve its objective and get done what it needs to get done. Do you think any of that is present in the army of tennessee . Absolutely not. You see it in the flatfooted reaction by general bragg. Here we are almost 72 hours into an active campaign and bragg is only now thinking of what he needs to do, cobbles together, tries to cobble together a counter offensive under a general he just tried to Court Martial a couple of weeks ago. This is one of the saddest stories in Confederate Military history. In American Military history, i would submit to you, as well. But that is they spent so much time in the spring and summer fighting paper battles over what has gone before that they forgot the enemy in front of them wearing blue uniforms and are caught flatfooted. One option i would submit to you is actually the best option that bragg has because once they get out of the highland rim, the advantage is all rosecrans. What bragg should have done is order polk to move from shelbyville up to fairfield and make a dawn attack on the morning of june 27, north to beach grove and try to retake hoover gap. Why would you do that . Because if you manage to threaten that area, you force rosecrans at manchester to turn around and reopen his line of communications back to murfreesboro and if you manage to take hoovers gap, youve now cut the army of the cumberland in two. Two corps at manchester and the rest of the army leaderless because rosecrans is with thomas at manchester on the other side of the highland rim. Thats a pretty decent plan, isnt it . Im not fishing for compliments but isnt that a reasonable contingency they might have thought about before the campaign started . Theres no evidence they ever even considered that in the events so the night of the 26th bragg orders everybody to concentrate on tullahoma. The rest of the campaign, after they leave the highland rim, at this point is somewhat anticlimactic because with rosecrans at manchester and bragg at tullahoma, bragg is bragg at tullahoma, bragg is ready to fight it out in the trenches of tullahoma. Rosecrans is feeling out bragg and so decides the best way to do that is to send john wilders mounted infantry men, the lightning brigade, into the confederate rear and its a day and a half, twoday odyssey into the rear for manchester. See you can see the dotted lines towards hillsborough, descartes, up towards alsona. Some of the creeks they have to swim the horses across because of the flooding rains. They cut the rail line, probe the bridge and the protection there. They raise a lot of havoc and then find out that Bedford Forrest is after them and Simon Buckner with 3,000 men is coming up by train through cowlen and they get back at noon june 30, walks into the headquarters, rosecrans is amazed to see him. He wasnt necessarily expecting to him and wilder says not only do i have the intelligence that you need, i did it without losing a single soul. Without a single casualty. An incredible odyssey in the civil war. On the other flank, by the way, one of the best days i dont have time to get into it one of the best days Union Cavalry has in the war is the battle of shelbyville where they forced joe wheeler to swim for his life on june 27, 1863. You can read a great chapter about it in my book. Bragg at this point, though, is not worried. The railroads reopen as june ticks down and approaches july, he has a council of war with polk and says were going to fight it out. They have reservations about that and start to talk about that and polk says i thought the railroad was cut. The railroads reopen great news and then polk says this. How do you propose to maintain your communications . Well, theyll reopen, ill string infantry along the railroad, well be fine. Polk and hardee look at each other. General hardee, polk says, what do you think about this . You can do what you want but i endorse the merit of polks views. Bragg says, were going to fight it out. Then he changes his mind overnight. This is june 29, the conversation takes place. June 30, he changes his mind. He says we are going to withdraw. On the night of june 30, the quartermasters move the wagons out of tullahoma and that means one thing, retreat. That night, the Confederate Army evacuates tullahoma, crosses the rail bridge. The last rear guard passes out in the morning of july 1, 1863, about the time that John Reynolds is shot outside of gettysburg, about the time that braggs rear guard leaves tullahoma. The federals enter the area quickly. Rosecrans sets up pursuit, a skirmish at the elk river bridge july 2 and bragg says we are going to fight it out. Buckner, polk and hardee say, you know what, we may have to somebody may have to take command of the army from him. Bragg changes his mind, retires, and rosecrans pursues and breaks off the pursuit at University Place july 4, 1863. Two days later, some of sheridans troopers below up the cornerstone of the university of south. Tullahoma is over. The conquest of middle tennessee has been amazingly cheap. In 11 days of operations from june 24 to july 4, only 570 federals were killed, wounded, captured or missing. Braggs army, never tabulated its losses but confederate Personnel Returns on july 10 show an effective strength nearly 5,000 men lower than on june 20. Half of that number, 2500, covered morgans raiders which had departed kentucky but still 2500. The federals captured more than 1600 prisoners while stewarts division lost 181 men at hoovers gap. Pat cleburne sustained 121 casualties at liberty gap for a total of 320 men killed or wounded in hardees corps. The balance of the army of tennessees loss is about 600 more, consisted of battle casualties, sick or deserters. A lot of those 1600 prisoners i quoted are tennesseans from this area or elsewhere realizing, i dont want to leave home that far behind. Its a sign of the disintegration of the army of tennessee to a certain extent. When this is reported to the War Department, Edwin Stanton congratulates rosecrans and they fire salutes when they get the news of gettysburg and vicksburg and then stanton says this. You and your noble army now have the chance to give the finishing blow to the rebellion. Will you neglect the chances . And this illustrates right here that tullahoma is obscure even in 1863, as opposed to 2019. This is what rosecrans says in reply. I just received the batch announcing the fall of vicksburg and confirming the fall of lee. You do not appear to observe the fact that this noble army has driven the rebels from middle tennessee of which my dispatch has advised you. I beg on behalf of this army that the War Department may not overlook so great an event because it is not written in letters of blood. I have now to repeat, that the rebel army has been forced from its strong entrenched position at shelbyville and tullahoma and driven over the cumberland mountains. And my cavalry advances within eight miles of the alabama line. No organized rebel force within 25 miles of there nor on this side of the cumberland mountains. Braggs retreat doesnt stop until theyre in chattanooga. And never again except for that last death ride of the army of tennessee in 1864 will the army of tennessee penetrate middle or western tennessee with any hope of sustained success. That makes this campaign a great victory and when you consider the events of the first week of july 1, 1863, gettysburg, vicksburg, tullahoma, port hudson, and you look at the collective body blow that put on the confederacy, that they never fully recover, that makes this Campaign Just as important an element of the civil war as any of the other three names that i just gave you. And ill leave you with this. Tullahoma is a huge link in that chain of events that leads from the ohio river all the way to savannah, atlantic coast. If you consider the chattanooga, tennessee, the federal presence in chattanooga is the dagger thrust against the vitals of the confederacy, well, before that, the dagger thrust directly into the vitals of chattanooga is the federal army at tullahoma which they won over 11 days of hard marching and fighting in the rain and the heat in june and july of 1863. It is not written in letters of blood, rosecrans was right. But the Tullahoma Campaign does not deserve the obscurity it has been placed into. Ladies and gentlemen, i liked to i would like to thank you for your attention. If you have any questions, ill be happy to answer them. Thank you very much. [applause] we actually dont have time for questions but i will ask my polish brother to comment on one thing as we wrap up. Why has this, then, been forgotten . And how much of that is a factor of rosecrans being his own worst enemy . Chris i think everybody views the battles between bragg and rosecrans through the prism of chickamauga and focus on that and it tends to overshadow everything that has gone before. Here is the real fight in north georgia. But in reality, the two rounds before that, stones river and tullahoma deserve far more attention. Chris will be available to answer questions back at his table. Thank you very much, Chris Kolakowski [applause] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2017] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] announcer guinness were watching American History tv. Follow us for information on our schedule and to keep up with the latest history news. Announcer next on the civil war, Louisiana StateUniversity Professor aaron sheehandean discusses his book, the calculus of violence. Good morning, everyone. Im peter carmichael, member of the History Department at Gettysburg College and director of the civil war institute. Its my pleasure to welcome aaron sheehandean. Aaron sheehandean is the fred c. Frye professor of southern studies at l. S. U