circumstances, the latter would have surrendered, and the war have been terminated without fighting a battle. The same end, though not so soon, would have been accomplished by moving Sherman's army round from Anapolis to Wilmington, as Schofield's afterwards was, and moving it up upon Lee's rear through North Carolina. Undeniably, General Sherman had it in his power to have finished up the war in a few weeks during the autumn of 1864.

Instead of discerning and availing himself of all these most palpable advantages, what were the visions which opened upon our General's mind and fixed his determinations? A thousand mile march of 62,000 men, first down to the ocean across one State, and then up through two other States, to the rear of General Lee's army before Petersburg. The advantages which such a march promised -feasting his army upon the hams, and pigs, and turkeys, and chickens of the Confederates on the way-outweighed, in the judgment of our General, all the palpable considerations and facts above indicated. Let us hear General Sherman himself upon this subject. "I only regarded the march from Atlanta to Savannah as a 'shift of base,' as the transfer of a strong army which had no opponent, and had finished its then work, from the interior to a point on the sea-coast, from which it could achieve other important results. I considered this march as a means to an end, and not as an essential act of war. Still, then as now, the march to the sea was generally regarded as something extraordinary, something anomalous, something out of the usual order of events; whereas, in fact, I simply moved from Atlanta to Savannah, as one step in the direction of Richmond, a movement that had to be met and defeated, or the war was necessarily at an end. Were I to express my measure of the relative importance of the march to the sea, and of that from Savannah northward, I would place the former at one, and the latter at ten, as the maximum." General Sherman is unquestionably right in his estimate of the relative importance of that famous march across the State of Georgia. Excepting as a means to an end, "a step in the direction of Richmond," that march had, in reality, no bearing upon the real issues of the war. The idea that feeding an army

of 62,000 men upon the people of a narrow territory across the State of Georgia, divided in sunder the Confederacy, as had often been affirmed, only betrays ignorance. The only real good proposed to be accomplished by that land march of 1,000 miles, was to get what might then remain of those 62,000 men into the rear of General Lee's army at Richmond. Here, undeniably, is a blunder of the gravest character. He might, by facing to the north instead of the south, and moving his army, not on foot, but by rail and steam, have reached that point, not after a wearisome and destructive march of five months, but in less than four weeks, and that without wearisomeness or loss of life on the way.

CHAPTER XXX.

GENERAL PRICE'S LAST INVASION OF MISSOURI.

WHEN General Rosecrans assumed the command in Missouri, he found all things there in a state of confusion and agitation. Oath bound secret organizations existed, not only in this State, but over the north-west-organizations prepared for an uprising as soon as the favourable opportunity should present itself. Not less than 23,000 individuals were, in this State alone, found to have been bound together under oath to join General Price as soon as he should appear with a force which promised success. In a meeting of " the Order of American Knights," in St. Louis, a resolution was proposed and laid over, to commence operations in that city by the assassination of the Provost-Marshal, and seizing the head-quarters of the department. By order of General Rosecrans, the State Commander, Deputy Commander, the Grand Secretary, Lecturer, and from thirty to forty influential members of the Order, were seized and lodged in prison. The State Commander turned out to be the Belgian Consul in that. city. An order for his release was sent on from Washington-an order which, by a disclosure of facts, General Rosecrans got reversed. While such a state of things existed, our commander found his embarrassments greatly augmented by the want of a military force adequate to the preservation of peace. Under such circumstances, General Price, with an army from 20,000 to 30,000 strong, mostly cavalry, entered the State at the south east, and advanced without resistance to Pilot Knob. There, as formerly stated, he met his first resistance from a single brigade commanded by General H. S. Ewing. In the

battle which there occurred, the invaders lost upwards of 1,000 men, Ewing losing about 200. Having inflicted this loss upon the invaders, and after bravely repulsing two determined assaults, General Ewing made a safe retreat to Rolla, having at Harrison been joined by a body of cavalry sent to his assistance, the Illinois 17th, under Colonel Beveridge. In his retreat, General Ewing moved his forces sixty-six miles in thirty-nine hours. At Harrison, our wearied forces were fiercely assailed by General Shelby. For thirty hours that brave band, under their brave commander, resisted the far superior forces precipitated upon them, until Colonel Beveridge arrived and Shelby drew off.

General Price having, as he intended, threatened St. Louis, and fixed attention in that direction, turned to the north-west, obtained a ready control in the interior of the State, and advanced in force against its capital, Jefferson City, having burned Herman, a Union settlement of Germans, on his way. In his advance, Price was vigorously, but with much care, pursued by General A. J. Smith, brought up, as formerly stated, from Cairo, while on his way to reinforce General Thomas. General Smith had under him some 6,000 men, and 1,500 cavalry. At this time an important accession of strength to our forces was made. General Mower, with quite 5,000 veteran troops, had followed in the rear of General Price out of Arkansas, having, over exceeding bad roads, marched upwards of 300 miles. in eighteen days. This force was brought by steamboats from Cape Girardeau to St. Louis, and from thence hastened on to Jefferson City to aid in its defence against General Price.

At this time "the indiscretions" of our military authorities at Washington brought upon the scene a man adequate to the occasion. General Pleasanton having been dismissed from the Army of the Potomac, and sent to the Western Department, arrived, and assumed command of the forces in the interior of the State. On his arrival, he found 12,000 men in Jefferson City, General Mower having arrived. Of these, about 5,000 were cavalry. These forces, commanded by General Fisk, were acting on the defensive, and were cutting down even the shade-trees.

about the city to strengthen the defences. the defences. General Pleasanton, having, as formerly stated, captured documents which revealed the plans of the enemy, determined upon a prompt and vigorous assumption of the offensive, combining with those before him the forces under General Smith, and others available for his purpose. Price's army was in no condition to meet such a movement. While his central force was before Jefferson City, nearly one-half of his army was north of the Missouri under General Shelby.

Two circumstances now occurred which prevented the utter annihilation of Price's army, General Smith was detained with our supplies, and by the destruction of the railroad bridge at Romine, where he was joined by General Mower. At this time Pleasanton and Smith both received positive orders from General Rosecrans to move in force to Lexington. This delay, on the one hand, and deflection from the proper line of pursuit on the other, enabled Price to widen the distance between him and his pursuers, to bring back his forces from the north of the Missouri, and to concentrate them for retreat, defence, or attack, as circumstances might require. Having as far as possible remedied the evils of a false move, which absolute orders from his superior in command compelled him to make, and having got his cavalry into a moving condition, General Pleasanton made a direct and most vigorous pursuit of the enemy. The detour referred to, however, rendered it impossible for General Smith with his infantry corps, all possible efforts to that end being put forth, to cut off Price's retreat south. All that could be done was by a vigorous pursuit. Now commenced a series of the most brilliant movements known in the history of this war. In three days General Pleasanton moved his cavalry quite 120 miles, fought four battles, and gained as many important victories on the way. His first encounter was at Little Blue, at 10 a.m., October 22nd. Driving the enemy from a strong position at this point, he pressed hardly upon his flying footsteps until nightfall, when Independence was captured by a brilliant charge of cavalry.

The next morning the pursuit was renewed. On arriving at the crossings of the Big Blue, the enemy, who