Folks - thanks for bringing up this topic about a general whom I have grown fond of over the many years and one that needed a fresh re-examination and thanks to David Moore we have one. I have been over the ground from Nashville to Chattanooga and from Chattanooga to Atlanta for decades just driving from place to place and leading Civil War tours of the Atlanta Campaign for years as well as the Tullahoma Campaign and even Chickamauga/Chattanooga twice (with the amazing Jim Ogden). I have led several Tullahoma tours for civilians including Dave Powell and Eric Wittenberg along with Army staff rides of the campaign. Michael Bradley is my mentor for this campaign as it was he who wrote the first book on the topic and and my behest, Blue & Gray magazine redid their Tullahoma Campaign issue some years ago with Mike writing it and I contributing with an article and the tour. This is simply a fascinating campaign and as one who also studies Napoleon and Frederick the Great, is one that both of them would have been proud to have lead.
Several issues I see here that need to be addressed. I don't thatink that many of the posters have even been over the terrain from Murfreesboro to Chattanooga nor do I think some truly understand what Rosecrans was trying to really do in the Tullahoma Campaign. First, the reason why he delayed after Stones River to late June 1863 was several fold, logistics being paramount (and I rate him as the third best logistician of the Civil War). He had to rebuild railroads and bridges back to Louisville. The Gallatin South Tunnel, dropped by Morgan, needed rebuilding which took three months. The source of this headache was two-fold - CS cavalry raiders like Morgan, Forrest and Wheeler plus some guerrillas and the water levels of the Cumberland River from the Ohio to Nashville. No locks and dams like today - if you had little rain the water levels would be below the draft of large river boats which needed more than 7 feet under their keels. This was why Rosecrans started the extension of the Nashville & Northwestern RR from Kingston Springs west of Nashville to Johnsonville on the Tennessee River. This took months to build but as the Tennessee River was bigger than the Cumberland (and still is today) it was worth it and Johnsonville became a major Union supply depot for the Nashville Depot.
In addition to building up logistics, Rosecrans need to rebuild his cavalry arm and got David Stanley, a pre-war veteran of the US Army's 1st US Cavalry, to take charge of his cavalry forces that had been beaten like a drum by Confederate cavalry to that point. Rosecrans went to war with the War Department trying to get Stanley better horses (they kept giving him **** mounts which, as Rosey pointed out, cost the same as good mounts so why not get good mounts instead?) and, if not more cavalry units then things like repeating rifles to use as a force multiplier. His telegram exchanges with the WD show how out of touch the folks in Washington really were with the situation in Tennessee at the time - Henry Halleck *****ed about the cost of his telegrams! After one request for more cavalry, QM General Montgomery Meigs replied suggesting that Rosecrans put infantrymen into wagons to deal with raiding Confederate cavalry. His response was brilliant - "That would do well on Pennsylvania Avenue but not in middle Tennessee." After Rosey took Chattanooga, Meigs came down, saw the terrain first hand and apologized for not understanding what the Army of the Cumberland had been dealing with. Building up the cavalry was not only a protecting the logistics issue but it was also a striking arm issue and Rosecrans wanted his cavalry to be able to go on the offensive in conjunction with his army when the time came. Meanwhile, Stanley was forming a potent cavalry arm with excellent brigade commanders but mediocre division commanders Robert Mitchell and John B. Turchin, both of whom would later be replaced. By March 1863, Stanley told Rosecrans that his troopers wer eready to hit the field and their first misson was to test Bragg's defense line which ran from McMinnville in the east toward Columbia in the west. For several months, Stanley's troopers, sometime with infantry support, attacked points along the line which served to give his men needed field experience but also to gather intel as to where Bragg was the weakest. Turns out that after several victories against Bragg's right held by John Hunt Morgan, gave Rosey the seeds for where his Tullahoma planning was to attack with his main thrust. By contrast the Union attacks on Bragg's left, held by Forrest and Van Dorn (until his death) were repulsed virtually every time.
So now with his cavalry arm in place and his logistics secure and his army reinforced, Rosecrans planned to execute the Tullahoma Campaign The main attack would be by Crittenden's Corps moving east/southeast from Murfreesboro through Gillie's Gap with the goal being Manchester. From Manchester the next goal was Allisonia/Estill Springs which is where Bragg's railroad supply line crossed the Elk River. The goal was to force Bragg to fight for his line of supply on ground of Rosey's choosing and hopefully smash Bragg's army. The other Corps of Thomas and McCook were feints designed to fix Bragg's center in place with Granger backing up the cavalry movement towards Shelbyville. The friction of war set in on the opening day when it began to rain, and as Rhea noted here, a 500 year rain event, or as one of Rosey's men stated, "not just a regular rain but a Baptist downpour!" This slowed Crittenden, who had the toughest terrain to deal with (drive through this area sometime!!!) and he bogged down going only a few miles in several days. As we know Wilder blew through the defenses of Hoover's Gap and gave Rosey a big break and Rosey was swift enough of thought to move Thomas to the main force column and bring McCook over from Liberty Gap to follow behind him. Manchester was still the target but the rains just messed the roads and finally Bragg figured it out and reacted. So Rosey's plan was forced to change from smashing Bragg to getting him out of Middle TN altogether. This is what took place.
After this, Rosecrans had to rebuild track torn up by Bragg's retreat as well as bridges including the big one over the Tennessee River at Bridgeport which would not get rebuilt until the winter of 1863/1864. That all took time to do and about a month after Tullahoma had concluded, Rosecrans moved on Chattanooga and took it without a shot fired. The plan of using three or more maneuver columns worked twice for him as it gave the enemy pause as to where the real main attack was coming from. The issue in north Georgia was even bigger mountains and further apart gaps in them which gave Bragg the idea of defending in place and going after each column if possible. Plus he was massively reinforced. There is nothing that Rosecrans did here that I would not have tried as well. You have to balance risk with gains made by aggressive movement and what can possibly be achieved.
Rhea has waxed well here about the amazing traits of the Army of the Cumberland which, in my opinion as well as that of a couple NPS historians, Rhea and some others, was probably the most advanced of the Union field armies on several levels. Rhea's post about lines of sight communication with signal flags is key here and Rosey used the terrain to its best for this. Some years ago, Rhea too me to a ridge west of Murfreesboro to where one signal station was (and Granger's HQ if I have that correct). From the ridge top looking east you could easily see the cupola of the courthouse in downtown Murfreesboro, also a signal station and about ten miles further east Pilot Knob also a signal station and Rosey's final one of the line in that direction. To the west was Roper's Knob by Franklin and the signal line went even further west. So getting a message from the furthest west signal station to Pilot Knob would take only minutes. Rhea gave a signals demo to an Army staff ride I conducted some years ago and to this day some of the attendees who I am friends with remain amazed, one officer, now a major, actually writing a post-ride report about how the Army should go back to signal flags as a back up for comms today. Rhea has forgotten more about Rosey's Signal Corps than any of us has ever known to begin with and he remains by go-to guy for this for any tours/staff rides I do for the campaign.
Until you get eyes onto this terrain, drive around and through it and see the signal line hilltops, the road gaps and surrounding terrain you simply cannot understand the Tullahoma and Chattanooga Campaigns at all. Nor can you fully comprehend what Rosecrans was dealing with at the time. Again, Meigs apologized to him once he got down there and saw it for himself! Additionally, the land itself in the area in and around the Highland Rim is of a clay like consistency which, in heavy rains, turns to goo. Also, the limestone underpinnings of the top soil is very shallow and when it rains a good bit there even today the water backs up and causes flooding. Some years ago, after a couple days of rain, I took the Columbus, OH CWRT on a Tullahoma tour and one road that I wanted to use heading south from Christiana to the Railroad Gap was flooded so we had to drop that part. There was standing water everywhere that day! I have done another tour right after significant rain and the same thing happened which gave us all a good bit of detail as to what Rosey was dealing with when the campaign began.
Two last things. First, Rosey's Tullahoma Campaign began before the battle of Gettysburg by a week and ended on July 4th. This coincided with the surrender of Vicksburg and the end of Gettysburg (but not the long retreat). So Tullahoma was well within these other events. Secondly, one poster here noted that had Rosecrans moved sooner then Bragg could not have detached reinforcements to other places. Right before Stones River, the CS War Department ordered Stevenson's Division, Bragg's largest by far, to Vicksburg. Right before Tullahoma they ordered another sent to Mississippi and Grierson's Raid forced the break up of the CS Cavalry Corps with another division being sent to Mississippi. We will never know if the CS War Department would have left these units with Bragg had he moved sooner. But with the issues Rosecrans was dealing with that I have outlined above, I am not sure he could have moved sooner. The one battle that I think was most affected by the loss of troops was Stones River; Bragg really could have used that large division there.
Secondly, Brian Wills is a friend of mine and he heard my program on the Tullahoma Campaign given to the Cobb County CWRT in Georgia before Covid. I asked him his thoughts about Rosecrans and the Army of the Cumberland that he built with regards to George Thomas (whom Wills has written a bio) what Thomas would have thought about Rosecrans. He stated categorically that the AOC of Thomas was great because of Rosecrans and Thomas fully knew that and appreciated that.
Rhea has mentioned how the rank and file of the AOC felt about Rosecrans. Here is another source -
Major James Connolly, 123rd Ill. Mtd. Infantry (Wilder), "we don't look for defeat, we don't count on a retreat; with Rosecrans to lead we think we can go anywhere in the Confederacy."
Bringing the