The Failure at Jonesboro’
So we started early in the morning to execute Sherman’s orders— thoroughly to destroy the railroad, and close down on Thomas toward Jonesboro’. That morning, as Sherman says (Vol. II, page 107), “Howard found an intrenched foe (Hardee’s corps) covering Jonesboro’,” and “orders were sent to Generals Thomas and Schofield to turn straight for Jonesboro’, tearing up the railroad track as they advanced.” But of course, as General Sherman had anticipated, such orders could not reach me in time to do any good. They were not received until after the affair at Jonesboro’ was ended. But hearing the sound of battle in our front, I rode rapidly forward to the head of Stanley’s column, which was then not advancing, made inquiries for that officer, and was informed that he was trying to find General Thomas to get orders. I immediately brought my infantry of the Twenty-third Corps out of the road occupied by Stanley’s corps, moved it to the front through woods and fields, and endeavored to find a way by which I could reach the enemy’s flank or rear, riding so far ahead with a few staff officers and orderlies that I escaped very narrowly being captured by the enemy. Finally, near dark, General Stanley’s troops began to deploy and attack the enemy; and as there were more troops on the ground than could possibly be used that day, I could do not more than stand and watch their movements, as I did with intense interest until my medical director, Dr. Hewit, one of the bravest and coolest men I ever knew, called my attention to the fact that the place was much too hot for a general and his staff who had nothing to do there. I believe if General Sherman had been in our place he would have thought it “more than a skirmish-line” (Vol. II, page 108) in Stanley’s front that gave us that fire both of musketry and artillery which my staff officers have frequently spoken of as one of the ugliest they ever experienced. General Stanley’s fault was, not that he deployed his troops, but that he did not put them in at once when he arrived on the ground, instead of waiting for orders. But General Stanley, whose gallantry was never questioned, was a subordinate in experience. He had but recently risen to the command of a corps, and had been little accustomed to act on his own responsibility. Feeling overburdened with the responsibility wrongfully thrust upon him that day, he naturally sought relief from it by reporting for orders to General Thomas as soon as his corps was reunited to the main army.
The failure at Jonesboro’, as at so many other places, was due to that erroneous interpretation of the law that threw the supreme responsibility at the crisis of battle upon untried and (in this case) unwilling shoulders, or else left the lawful commander without recognized authority, to beg in vain of others to “co-operate” with him.