Hood's Tennessee Campaign

[larry_cockerham]

Sadly, for the Confederacy, I agree. Hood had little business in Tennessee in the winter of 1864.

[richard]

Maybe this is the incorrect place to state this question but I have wondered how big a part that the lack of good solid intel played in Hood's misguided trip into Tennessee. Or if he had good intel, would he have gone anyway?

[larry_cockerham]

Richard, my quick response, without much thought that has a tendency to cloud my mind anyway, is that intel was not a major cause or contributor to Hood's difficulties. It was more cranial in his case. He knew the size of Schofield's army from prior recon on the part of Forrest and Wheeler who had made contact with Schofield's guys as far west as Pulaski (Schofield's headquarters in November) and against Hatch in north Alabama in Novermber as well. Forrest certainly knew the terrain and the towns as well as anyone, so Hood didn't get lost, just befuddled. The only question would have been the size of Thomas' force in Nashville. Hood couldn't or didn't focus on that aspect, he was too busy with Schofield. By the time the battle at Nashville happened, Hood had a window of two weeks to get better recon on Thomas. That must have been available. Nope, Hood was focused on his goal of capturing middle Tennessee without paying much attention to facts.

[OpnDownfall]

If not Tn, where exactly should Hood have gone? Unlike, Johnston, he did not have all the time in the world. The war is approching it's crashing end in a few more mo's. Were there other options that promised more success?
Again, Spring Hill, almost succeeded, if it had, the Battle of Franklin would not have occurred, and Thomas would have lost the battle tested core of the army he was assembling.
Because of the disaster that ended the campaign, many now ignore that it came closer to success than they are willing to admit.
Hood led his army to ultimate defeat and ruin; Most of the best known generals in the confederacy did, including Bobby Lee himself.

[richard]

I don't recall any one mentioning Lyons march into Kentucky starting around Dec 5 or 6th. Was this an error on Hoods part, or was it an attempt to draw major forces away from Nashville?

[richard]

It is hard to say where Hood should have gone after Atlanta. One thing is for sure, he and Wheeler could not stop the supply line from Chattanooga for any length of time. Forrest did a good job of shutting down the Nashville and Decatur line in late September.

In January there is a thread that talkes about where Hood would go if he had won at Nashville. Here the question is should he have gone to Nashville at all. It is possible that he could have gone to Knoxville in order to join up with Lee. Could have been a good choice. On the other hand, He may have had better success chasing Sherman to the sea. Again, these three choices, Nashville, Knoxville, or chase Sherman, were all hard choices. With the advantage of 20/20 hind site, none of them would have been very good in the end.

[cw1865]

He should've stuck on Sherman, Sherman is living off the land, Hood could conceivably turn around and try to corner Sherman in.

[ole]

That makes good sense until you try to figure what Hood's army would have to live on. Living off Sherman's leavings would have meant certain starvation. He'd have had to run outside "the path" and get ahead of Sherman in order to pose a threat. Given that, harassing Sherman would have made more sense that shooting for Nashville.

ole

[larry_cockerham]

Ole wrote:

" He'd have had to run outside "the path" and get ahead of Sherman in order to pose a threat."

After the dumb assault on Nashville and a little r & r in north Mississippi, the AOT attempted just that. Six months and several thousand lives too late, they headed for North Carolina to kick Sherman's butt. Gave him a few bruises, much to Joe Johnston's credit, but little else. This silly war should have ended years earlier in a legislative chamber in Washington.

[samgrant]

Looks like a good spot in this long thread, to introduce my question.

As Jeff Davis' hand-picked commander after sacking Johnston, what did president Davis think about Hood's plan to forsake battling Sherman and to instead move toward Nashville?

Was there any correspndence between Hood and Davis which might show Davis' opinion on Hood's plan? Any evidence of agreement or disagreement?

I guess I could research this, but I'd rather have someone who knows tell me about it.

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