LONGSTREET SAVES OFF DISASTER IN TENNESSEE

Last November and December have not been as promising as Richmond had hoped here in Virginia or out west in Tennessee.  As the year that began with much promise closes with much disappointment as our country finds Federals holding much of East Tennessee with the loss suffered at Chattanooga and at Knoxville. Union General Grant who moved to reinforce Chattanooga last fall replacing General Rosencrans with Maj. Gen. George Thomas, a native Virginian who to the disappointment of his family and his native state chose to remain loyal to the “old Union”. With a new supply line soon established, Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman arriving with his four divisions in mid-November, and the Federals beginning offensive operations, the ingredients were being mixed for a Yankee feast. On November 23-24, Union forces struck out and captured Orchard Knob and Lookout Mountain. On November 25, Union soldiers assaulted and carried the seemingly impregnable Confederate position on Missionary Ridge and one of the Confederacy's two major armies was routed.  The result of this November disaster for General Bragg is the Federals now hold Chattanooga.

  At Knoxville the situation was not as bitter as at Chattanooga, but equally as disappointing in Richmond.  With the Federal army in possession of the east Tennessee city General Longstreet attempted to retake the city and drive the invaders from it, but with little success. In attempting to take Knoxville, General Longstreet decided that Fort Sanders was the only vulnerable place where he could penetrate Union Maj. Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside's fortifications, which enclosed the city, and successfully conclude the siege, already a week along at the time. The fort surmounted an eminence just northwest of Knoxville. Northwest of the fort, the land dropped off abruptly. General Longstreet believed he could assemble a storming party; undetected at night, below the fortifications and, before dawn, overwhelm Fort Sanders by a “coup de main”. Following a brief artillery barrage directed at the fort's interior, three of our brigades charged.  Union wire entanglements and telegraph wire stretched from one tree stump to another to another, which delayed the attack, but the fort's outer ditch halted our advance complete. The ditch was twelve feet wide and from four to ten feet deep with vertical sides. The fort's exterior slope was almost vertical, as well. Crossing the ditch was nearly impossible, especially under withering Federal defensive fire from musketry and canister fired with tremendous fury upon our boys.  Brave Confederate officers did lead their men into the ditch, but, without providing scaling ladders to scale the walls from the ditch to the fort, few of our boys emerged on the scarp side and a small number entered the fort to be wounded, killed, or captured. Our losses were light, for few were able to crest the fort walls.  The attack lasted a short twenty minutes. Longstreet undertook this Knoxville expedition to divert Union troops from Chattanooga and to get away from Gen. Braxton Bragg, with whom he is engaged in a bitter feud. His failure to take Knoxville scuttled this purpose. This has come to be the decisive battle of the Knoxville Campaign. This defeat, plus the loss of Chattanooga on November 25, has put much of East Tennessee in the Union camp.

General Longstreet had to abandoned the Siege of Knoxville, on December 4, then retreated northeast towards Rogersville, Tennessee. Union Maj. Gen. John G. Parke pursued our army, but apparently not too closely or furiously, as his presence was as such unknown. Longstreet continued to Rutledge on December 6 and on to Rogersville on the 9th. Parke sent Federal forces under Union Brig. Gen. J.M Shackelford onward with about 4,000 cavalry and infantry to attempt to search for Longstreet. On the 13th, Shackelford was near Bean's Station on the Holston River. General Longstreet resolved to go back and capture Bean's Station and push the Federals out of the area. General Longstreet sent three columns of infantry and artillery to Bean's Station to catch the Federals in a squeeze.  By 2:00 am on the 14th, one column was skirmishing with Union pickets. The Federal pickets held out as best they could for sometime until withdrawing to report of our presence. The Federals deployed their force for an assault soon there after. The battle soon started and continued throughout most of the day. Confederate flanking attacks and other assaults occurred at various times and locations, but the Federals held until Longstreet sent reinforcements that tipped the scales. By nightfall, the Federals were retiring in earnest from Bean's Station on through Bean's Gap and on to Blain's Cross Roads. Longstreet set out to attack the Union forces again the next morning with ideas of their destruction, but as he approached them at Blain's Cross Roads, he found them well entrenched and concluded that to attack the Federal entrenchments, which were well fortified would meet with possible disaster for his army.  General Longstreet is one of our best Generals and his opinion of a situation is more correct than not and his actions at Blain’s Cross Roads duly justified.  Longstreet withdrew satisfied with the day’s action and the Federals, too, soon left the area. The Knoxville Campaign ended following the battle of Bean's Station. General Longstreet has gone into winter quarters at Russellville Tennessee. General Longstreet could claim success at Blain’s Cross Roads, but this means little to overall Confederate efforts in Tennessee except to have prevented further disaster.  

Closer to home dark clouds of despair and sorrow hang over our beloved Dominion. With the year of 1863 coming to a close and another Christmas of war hangs heavy upon the city of Richmond, the citizens of Virginia look to hope of victory in the coming new year and an independence won through perseverance and dedication to this just cause.  The President, who will take Christmas at his home in Richmond, desires peace with honor and recognition of the Confederate States Of America.  He reminds us that there can be no peace without victory for our forces over those of the invaders. Mr. Davis has assured the people of the Confederacy that his determination to achieve a victorious end to this conflict will remain strong and unresolved in the coming new year.

Tom R. Grandy

Daily Richmond Examiner