Reminder to the reader--Sherman, Howard, and Thomas in council--The attack and repulse--The Sixth Kentucky in front again--In the trenches--Guarding train--Forward march.
I must remind the reader that I did not set out with the intention of giving a history of the grand campaign in which I took a humble part--a task of such magnitude and responsibility must be reserved for the future historian of one of the greatest and most complicated struggles that the world has witnessed. Indeed, the thoughtful reader, a thousand miles from the scene of strife, may have a better conception of a great battle than many of those engaged in it. The former, by the aid of maps, and the accounts given by various writers who beheld the different parts of the great struggle, may get a good general idea of it as a whole; while he who takes part in it, of necessity, sees only that portion of the battle in which he is engaged--and that generally is but a small part. Moreover, he is prone to judge of the result by the success, or suffering, of the regiment or brigade with which he is connected; while all are aware that a portion of an army may meet with great disaster, and yet the general result may be most glorious; but glorious it certainly does not seem to that portion of the army which has suffered most severely, although its suffering may have been the salvation of the rest. For instance, the celebrated charge made by Marshal Macdonald against the Austrian center at Wagram; although it turned the day in favor of the French army, yet it was most disastrous to the charging column, which is said to have lost in the proportion of ten out of every eleven men who composed it, not having as many hundreds in its ranks when the task was achieved as it had thousands when the word to charge was given. Thus, in some of the battles of this campaign, a brigade, and even a division, at times suffers terribly, and yet the battle was not lost, and the enterprise, as a whole, was a splendid success.
This view of affairs is absolutely necessary with regard to some matters in the present chapter which it is necessary to mention, as I am not attempting a general view of the campaign, but the part played in it by the brigade to which I was attached, and more particularly by my own regiment; and while not writing a history, I am preparing materials to be used by others in framing a full and perfect account of this truly-wonderful march. I write chiefly from what came under my own notice--those who were in other scenes than those in which I took part will do the same; and the truth must be gathered, not from any one account, taken separately, but from all the accounts in the aggregate. If, then, I speak of a success, do not think it was one achieved by the whole army; if I mention a disaster, let no one think that I regard the whole army as involved in it; for seldom has an expedition of like proportions met fewer reverses, or more glorious success.