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[187] have teams for neither their ammunition-nor subsistence-wagons, while one-third of the artillery-horses have been left dead on the field. But by planting itself in front of Rosecrans it closes to him the Bridgeport railroad and all the roads on the left bank of the Tennessee. Henceforth, the Federals not being able to take in supplies of provisions except by means of wagons over a chain of mountains covered with dense woods, will be reduced to hunger as soon as the season shall have rendered the roads impassable. If this partial investment does not suffice to compel the abandonment of Chattanooga, Bragg indulges the hope of making this movement a necessity by hurling his cavalry against the long line of railway between Nashville and Bridgeport, and which Rosecrans will not be able to protect. In the morning of the 23d the Southern army reaches the different passes of Missionary Ridge to the northward of Rossville. Polk, on the right, halts on the crest. Longstreet, on the left, posts himself about eleven o'clock in the positions occupied on the day before by McLaws, and his lines take in the point of Lookout Mountain. The Bridgeport railroad, which passes around this point, is thus intersected. Forrest, supported everywhere by the infantry, brings back his exhausted troops to Tyner's Station, beyond the Chickamauga River, where they will rest. Wheeler, on the contrary, who has suffered less, is sent to the west in Lookout Valley; after having occupied Trenton, he must cross the Tennessee to destroy the enemy's railways beyond Bridgeport. The Confederate infantry, whose looks are darting even into Chattanooga, immediately go to work to throw up a line of works around the rich prey which they certainly intend shall not escape from them. Notwithstanding all the time lost, there seems to be some ground for this hope. It will be a retaliation for the loss of Vicksburg. Really, the situation in which Rosecrans is placed resembles that of Pemberton. Beaten as Pemberton was, Rosecrans, like Pemberton, allows himself to be pent up within a narrow place. He abandons Lookout Mountain, which covers Chattanooga, as the opponent of Grant had abandoned Haynes' Bluff. We have alluded to that chain of abrupt mountains extending like a long wall toward the south and stopping bluntly on the
Philadelphia, Jos. H. Coates and co., 1888.
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