What I want is to know how- in Richard M. McMurry's wording - "Hood had forgotten to take up the pontoon bridge the Confederates had put across the Coosa River at Gadsden - a bridge that Hood planned to have with the army in case he met with defeat and had to recross the Tennessee at a point where it could not be forded." - indicates good preparations.
This looks more like "careless off (the battlefield)".
Well this one is interesting. McMurry's source for this is Beauregard's memoir, which was written by Alfred Roman (largely via Beauregard's words and papers). Anyway, I have no reason to think that Beauregard would lie about this, but it does seem odd. OR 39, pt. 3, had plenty of correspondence about the bridge over the Coosa:
p. 834 - bridge is about to be laid
p. 841 - AoT leaves Gadsden; Beauregard says nothing Sam Cooper about the bridge being forgotten
p. 843 - Mason tells cavalry to swim and ferry across the Coosa which indicates the bridge is already gone
p. 866 - Mason is already referring to the bridge being potentially laid at Bainbridge
Also, a correspondent with the Montgomery mail wrote (and which was published in a Richmond newspaper barely two weeks later):
"The Southern papers bring us very little of the movements and operations of Hood's army. This may be accounted for from the fact that his army is constantly on the move, and there is very little opportunity for this reason of communicating with the press. From the accounts we get it seems to be a settled fact that General Hood broke up his camp at Gadsden (Alabama) on the 22d of October, moved northward in the direction of Gunter's Landing, on the Tennessee, and is now in all probability in Middle Tennessee. The events of the next few days will be looked for with interest. It is reported that Forrest has been ordered forward to attack Bridgeport. A corresponded of the Montgomery Mail, writing from Gadsden (Alabama), says: The army has moved. The troops are gone. The last train has disappeared, and the last soldier has taken his farewell peep of the south side of the Coosa. On Friday, October 21st, Stewart's corps marched out in the van. It was followed by Lee, or rather Dick Taylor, who occupies the center ; and to-day, at dawn, the delighted Tennesseans, under Cheatham, crossed the river Jordan, or Coosa. The transportation quickly followed, and at noon the pontoon was taken up end also hurried forward after the troops."
So if the bridge was "forgotten" it was remembered pretty quickly. My speculative answer is that 20 years after the war Beauregard may not quite have remembered it as it actually happened. The newspaper is pretty clear that the pontoon bridge was pulled up as soon as Cheatham's men crossed.
Long story short, Beauregard is the only source I am aware of that makes this claim. Had the bridge indeed been forgotten I suspect someone else might have had something to say about at the time it actually happened. But perhaps the "hurried forward" portion of the article is what Beauregard was referring to.
In closing, I find it implausible that ANY army commander would just forget his pontoon bridge. But hey, I've seen snow in mid-May so who knows.
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