Chapter 56

WHAT CAUSED THE FALL OF ATLANTA--A DISSERTATION UPON AN IMPORTANT
PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM--THE BATTLE OF JONESBORO--WHY IT WAS FOUGHT
--HOW SHERMAN DECEIVED HOOD--A DESPERATE BAYONET CHARGE, AND THE ONLY
SUCCESSFUL ONE IN THE ATLANTA CAMPAIGN--A GALLANT COLONEL AND HOW HE
DIED--THE HEROISM OF SOME ENLISTED MEN--GOING CALMLY INTO CERTAIN DEATH.

An intelligent, quick-eyed, sunburned boy, without an ounce of surplus
flesh on face or limbs, which had been reduced to gray-hound condition by
the labors and anxieties of the months of battling between Chattanooga
and Atlanta, seemed to be the accepted talker of the crowd, since all the
rest looked at him, as if expecting him to answer for them. He did so:

"You want to know about how we got Atlanta at last, do you? Well, if you
don't know, I should think you would want to. If I didn't, I'd want
somebody to tell me all about it just as soon as he could get to me, for
it was one of the neatest little bits of work that 'old Billy' and his
boys ever did, and it got away with Hood so bad that he hardly knew what
hurt him.

"Well, first, I'll tell you that we belong to the old Fourteenth Ohio
Volunteers, which, if you know anything about the Army of the Cumberland,
you'll remember has just about as good a record as any that trains around
old Pap Thomas--and he don't 'low no slouches of any kind near him,
either--you can bet $500 to a cent on that, and offer to give back the
cent if you win. Ours is Jim Steedman's old regiment--you've all heard
of old Chickamauga Jim, who slashed his division of 7,000 fresh men into
the Rebel flank on the second day at Chickamauga, in a way that made
Longstreet wish he'd staid on the Rappahannock, and never tried to get up
any little sociable with the Westerners. If I do say it myself, I
believe we've got as good a crowd of square, stand-up, trust
'em-every-minute-in-your-life boys, as ever thawed hard-tack and
sowbelly. We got all the grunters and weak sisters fanned out the first
year, and since then we've been on a business basis, all the time.
We're in a mighty good brigade, too. Most of the regiments have been
with us since we formed the first brigade Pap Thomas ever commanded, and
waded with him through the mud of Kentucky, from Wild Cat to Mill
Springs, where he gave Zollicoffer just a little the awfulest thrashing
that a Rebel General ever got. That, you know, was in January, 1862,
and was the first victory gained by the Western Army, and our people
felt so rejoiced over it that--"

"Yes, yes; we've read all about that," we broke in, "and we'd like to
hear it again, some other time; but tell us now about Atlanta."

"All right. Let's see: where was I? O, yes, talking about our