Stanton by Walter Stahr

Author:Walter Stahr [Stahr, Walter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Lincoln nominated Chase to be chief justice on December 6, 1864, and the Senate confirmed the nomination on the same day. Stanton’s aide Dana, writing to a friend a week later, said, “The appointment was not made by the President with entire willingness. He is a man who keeps a grudge as faithfully as any other living Christian, and consented to Mr. Chase’s elevation, only when the pressure became very general, and very urgent.” A few days later, when Chase took the oath of office as chief justice, Stanton was almost certainly part of what one paper called the “brilliant assemblage” in the courtroom.4

Stanton was more focused this December on Nashville and Savannah than on Washington. As he and Grant had feared, Hood marched northward as Sherman marched southward, and by early December Hood and his army threatened to capture Nashville. Gen. George Thomas had more than twice as many men as Hood, but he would not attack. On December 2 Stanton wrote Grant that Thomas was using “the McClellan & Rosecrans strategy of do nothing and let the rebels raid the country.” A few days later Stanton wrote to Grant again, lamenting, “Thomas seems unwilling to attack because it is hazardous, as if all war was anything but hazardous.” Grant agreed, promising that if Thomas did not move promptly he would replace him. On December 11 Grant ordered Thomas, “Delay no longer for weather or reinforcements.” Thomas responded that he could not move: “The whole country is covered with a perfect sheet of ice & sleet.” Finally, a little after eleven o’clock on the night of December 15, a telegram arrived from Thomas reporting that he and his troops had attacked Hood that day, driven the rebels from their trenches, killed or captured thousands. Stanton immediately sent this message to Dix, so that the news was in the papers the next morning. Then Stanton sent a message to Thomas, congratulating him on his victory and urging him to press forward. Thomas would do just that over the next few days, effectively destroying Hood’s army.5

On December 18 Stanton received a message from Sherman, sent on December 13 from a federal gunboat off the Georgia coast, reporting that his troops were attacking Savannah and that they would capture it within a few days. “The army is in splendid order and equal to anything. Our march was most agreeable, and we were not at all molested by guerillas.” Sherman boasted that his army had “utterly destroyed over 200 miles of rails, and consumed stores and provisions that were essential to Lee’s and Hood’s armies.” As soon as he entered Savannah, his “first duty” would be “to clear the army of surplus negroes, mules and horses.”6

Grant was in Washington on the day this message arrived, and he, Stanton, and Halleck discussed what Sherman should do next, after resting and resupplying in Savannah. Grant had been thinking about transporting Sherman’s army by sea so that Sherman could help him “wipe out Lee” in Virginia. Sherman’s message showed that he was thinking about another march, north through the Carolinas.

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