The National Tribune Remembers the Atlanta Campaign

Battles, Skirmishes, Marches, and Camp Life as Recalled by the Union Veterans Themselves

Stephen Davis

• Publisher: Savas Beatie
• Year: 2025
• eBook ISBN: 9781611217285
• Edition: 0
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: 19th Century History
• Index: History

As a repository for old soldiers’ writings, the National Tribune is unequaled yet remains mostly unused. Indeed, it is so good one might call it the Confederate Veteran for Billy Yank.

From 1877 to 1943, the National Tribune served as a compendium for Union veteran reminiscences, war yarns, and postbellum reflections. The firsthand treasure-trove began as an eight-page monthly newspaper in 1881 and within a few years it became a weekly. The Washington-based paper was founded by George E. Lemon, a veteran of the 125th New York. Initially an advocate for Union veteran pensions, the National Tribune hit its stride when it began publishing articles about the war penned by the Northern soldiers themselves.

Within three years, John McElroy, a Union veteran with editing experience and the author of a dramatic memoir about his confinement at Andersonville (1879), assumed the reins as managing editor. His keen eye for detail and deep connections elevated the quality and quantity of the content and resulted in the publication of thousands of exclusive firsthand accounts. The National Tribune’s final issue was on December 30, 1943. By that date, the Union veterans who had fought the war were nearly all gone.

More than 1,000 items were published on the Atlanta Campaign alone: articles, memoirs, and letters on every topic imaginable sent in by Union soldiers who had followed General Sherman into Georgia in 1864. The first appeared in June 1879 on the battle of Kennesaw Mountain. The National Tribune Remembers the Atlanta Campaign, edited by Stephen Davis, offers 70 selections pertaining to the Atlanta Campaign. These entries, coupled Davis’s insightful annotations, advance the cause of Civil War scholarship by bringing back into print an array of some of the most important writing about the conflict penned by the men who fought in it.

Table of contents

• Cover
• TABLE OF CONTENTS
• Introduction
• PHOTO GALLERY
• Map Gallery
• Chapter 1 - Sherman Establishes His Supply System
• Chapter 2 - Thomas Discovers Snake Creek Gap
• Chapter 3 - Sherman, McPherson, and Snake Creek Gap, May 8-10
• Chapter 4 - “It makes me hot under the collar”
• Chapter 5 - Who Took Snake Creek Gap?
• Chapter 6 - Thomas and Schofield Demonstrate, May 8-9
• Chapter 7 - “Well, Mac, you have missed the great opportunity of your life.”
• Chapter 8 - Charles Coffin Summarizes the Battle of Resaca
• Chapter 9 - Federals Drive Polk Back, Afternoon of May 14
• Chapter 10 - Resaca—Capture of a Rebel Battery
• Chapter 11 - General Sweeny Writes of Crossing the Oostanaula
• Chapter 12 - At the Octagon House—A Northerner’s Remembrance
• Chapter 13 - Cassville
• Chapter 14 - From New Hope Church to Pickett’s Mill
• Chapter 15 - Hooker Attacks, May 25
• Chapter 16 - Pickett’s Mill, May 27
• Chapter 17 - Pickett’s Mill: A Grieving General Hazen
• Chapter 18 - A Yankee Trick
• Chapter 19 - “Charlie, I am going to get killed to-day”
• Chapter 20 - “Just to see the splinters fly”: A Veteran Recalls May 25-June 1
• Chapter 21 - Thick of the Fight
• Chapter 22 - That Fateful Cannon Shot, June 14
• Chapter 23 - Extract from a Diary
• Chapter 24 - Kolb’s Farm, June 22
• Chapter 25 - Kennesaw Mountain, June 27
• Chapter 26 - McCook’s Brigade Charges Cheatham Hill
• Chapter 27 - General Harker Is Killed
• Chapter 28 - If Only We Had Formed Outside Our Works
• Chapter 29 - Approaching the Chattahoochee
• Chapter 30 - Federal Pontoon Crossing at Soap Creek, July 8
• Chapter 31 - Crossing at the Fish-Dam
• Chapter 32 - Sherman’s Construction Corps
• Chapter 33 - Events of July 17-19
• Chapter 34 - Union General Johnson Surveys Events, July 20-September 2
• Chapter 35 - Hood Plans His Attack at Peachtree Creek
• Chapter 36 - “A chaos of riderless horses”
• Chapter 37 - A Confederate’s Account
• Chapter 38 - A Female Rebel at Peachtree Creek
• Chapter 39 - Sherman’s Blunder Gives Hood an Opportunity
• Chapter 40 - Taking and Holding Leggett’s Hill
• Chapter 41 - General Leggett Writes on Defending His Hill
• Chapter 42 - He Found McPherson’s Body
• Chapter 43 - Cheatham’s Breakthrough, July 22
• Chapter 44 - Taking Back Those Parrotts
• Chapter 45 - Captain DeGress Sides with the Sixteenth Corps
• Chapter 46 - More on DeGress’s Guns
• Chapter 47 - Dodge Meets Sherman After the Battle
• Chapter 48 - The McCook-Stoneman Cavalry Raid, July 27-August 12
• Chapter 49 - Hood’s Third Attacking Battle, July 28
• Chapter 50 - From a Northern Soldier’s Diary
• Chapter 51 - Utoy Creek, August 5-6
• Chapter 52 - In the Middle of the Campaign, General Sherman Reflects on the South’s Blame for the War
• Chapter 53 - Sherman Sends Kilpatrick Off, August 18-22
• Chapter 54 - The Campaign’s Decisive Event
• Chapter 55 - “A chance to visit Andersonville”
• Chapter 56 - “Built breastworks on railroad”
• Chapter 57 - Editor McElroy Covers Howard’s March to Jonesboro and the Battle, August 31-September 1
• Chapter 58 - The Battle-born Babe of Flint River
• Chapter 59 - The Union Assault at Jonesboro, September 1
• Chapter 60 - An Incident of the Battle of Jonesboro
• Chapter 61 - Wheeler’s Raid, August 10-September 17
• Chapter 62 - The Occupation of Atlanta, September 2
• Chapter 63 - Lieutenant Colonel Walker Gets Some of the Credit
• Chapter 64 - Federal Campaign Casualties
• Chapter 65 - The Truce, September 12-21
• Chapter 66 - Playing Cards with the Johnnies
• Chapter 67 - Sherman’s Expulsion of Atlanta’s Citizens
• Chapter 68 - Sent Back to Andersonville
• Chapter 69 - A Monument for General McPherson
• Chapter 70 - And a Mile Away
• Appendix - Origin of Memorial Day
• Bibliography
• Index
• Acknowledgments
• About the Editor