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For the rapid transmission of orders in an army covering a large space of ground, the magnetic telegraph is by far the best, though habitually the paper and pencil, with good mounted orderlies, answer every purpose. I have little faith in the signal-service by flags and torches, though we always used them; because, almost invariably when they were most needed, the view was cut off by intervening trees, or by mists and fogs. There was one notable instance in my experience, when the signal-flags carried a message. of vital importance over the heads of Hood's army, which had interposed between me and Allatoona, and had broken the telegraph-wires--as recorded in Chapter XIX.; but the value of the magnetic telegraph in war cannot be exaggerated, as was illustrated by the perfect concert of action between the armies in Virginia and Georgia during 1864.
Hardly a day intervened when General Grant did not know the exact state of facts with me, more than fifteen hundred miles away as the wires ran. So on the field a thin insulated wire may be run on improvised stakes or from tree to tree for six or more miles in a couple of hours, and I have seen operators so skillful, that by cutting the wire they would receive a message with their tongues from a distant station.
As a matter of course, the ordinary commercial wires along the railways form the usual telegraph-lines for an army, and these are easily repaired and extended as the army advances, but each army and wing should have a small party of skilled men to put up the field-wire, and take it down when done. This is far better than the signal-flags and torches. Our commercial telegraph-lines will always supply for war enough skillful operators.
Personally, I saw but little of the practical working of the railroads, for I only turned back once as far as Resaca; but I had daily reports from the engineer in charge, and officers who came from the rear often explained to me the whole thing, with a description of the wrecked trains all the way from Nashville to Atlanta. I am convinced that the risk to life to the engineers and men on that railroad fully equaled that on the skirmish-line, called for as high an order of courage, and fully equaled it in importance.
***
In a
cotton-field back of that house was our signal-station, on the roof of
an old gin-house. The
signal-officer reported that by studying
the enemy's signals he had learned the key, and that he could
read their signals. He explained to
me that he had translated
a signal about noon, from Pine Mountain to Marietta, "Send
an ambulance for General Polk's body;
About
that telegraph-wire,
and all communication with the rear ceased thenceforth. I
traveled with the Fifteenth Corps,
and on the 8th of March reached Laurel Hill, North Carolina. Satisfied
that our troops mast be at Wilmington, I determined to send
a message there; I called for my man, Corporal Pike, whom I had
rescued as before described, at Columbia, who was then traveling
with our escort, and instructed him in disguise to work his
way to the Cape Fear River, secure a boat, and float down to Wilmington
to convey a letter, and to report our approach. I also called
on General Howard for another volunteer, and he brought me a very
clever young sergeant, who is now a commissioned officer in the
regular army. Each of these got off
during the night by separate
routes, bearing the following message, reduced to the same cipher
we used in telegraphic messages:
"Now came an aide from General Gillmore, at Port Royal, with your cipher-dispatch from Midway, so I steamed down to Port Royal to see him. Next day was spent in vain efforts to decipher-finally it was accomplished" - General Grant
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