Today in History:

375 Series I Volume XLIX-I Serial 103 - Mobile Bay Campaign Part I

Page 375 WILSON'S RAID - ALABAMA AND GEORGIA.

Georgia toward North Carolina, and was also engaged in watching the Ocmulgee from the right of the Fourth Division to Macon, and in scouting the country to his front and rear. General Minty, commanding the Second Division, was scouting the country to the southeast, watching the lower crossings of the Ocmulgee, and had small parties at all the important points on the Southwestern Railroad and in Western and Southwestern Georgia. Detachments of the Seventh Pennsylvania Cavalry occupied Cuthbert, Eufaula, Columbus, and Bainbridge, and kept a vigilant watch over the lower Flint and Chattahoochee, while General McCook, with a detachment of his division of his division at Albany, and 700 men between there and Tallahassee, Fla., was scouting the country to the north and eastward. We also had raid and telegraphic communication from my headquarters at Macon with Atlanta, Augusta, West Point, Milledgeville, Eatonton, Albany, and Eufaula. By inspecting the map herewith it will be seen that my force of nearly 15,000 cavalry were occupying a well-defined and almost continuous line from Kingston, Ga., to Tallahassee, Fla., with detachments and scouts well out in all directions to the front and rear. From this it will be difficult to perceive how Davis and his party could possibly hope to escape. From the time that they were reported at Charlotte till the final capture I was kept informed of their general movements, and was enabled thereby to dispose of my command in such a manner as to render their capture morally certain. As reported by General Winslow, rumors came in from all directions, but by carefully weighing them the truth became sufficiently manifest to enable me to act with confidence and decision. It is to be regretted now, however, that the hurry of events precluded the use of written orders. In nearly every instance my instructions were given verbally to their subordinates. Such written dispatches and orders as were given are preserved in the records pertaining to the Cavalry Corps of the Military Division of the Mississippi, now on file in the Adjutant-General's Office.

In pursuance of my instructions to General Croxton, heretofore recited, Lieutenant Colonel Henry Harnden, with three officers and 150 men of the First Wisconsin Cavalry, left Macon on the evening of May 6, 1865, and marched rapidly, via Jeffersonville, toward Dublin, on the Oconee River. At Jeffersonville Colonel Harnden left one officer and thirty-five men, with orders to scout the country in all directions for reliable information in regard to the route of Davis' flight. With the balance of his command he continued the march all night and the next day, about 7 p.m. reaching Dublin. During the night and day he had sent out scouts and small parties on all the side roads, in the hope of finding the trail of the party for whom he was looking. Nothing of importance occurred till after he had bivouacked for the night. The white inhabitants of that place expressed entire ignorance and indifference in regard to the movements of important rebels, but were unusually profuse in their offers of hospitality to Colonel Harnden. This, together with the conduct of the colored servants, excited his suspicions, though he gained no valuable intelligence till about midnight, at which time he was informed by a negro man, who went to his camp for that purpose, that Davis with his wife and family had passed through Dublin that day, going south on the river road. The negro reported that the party in question had eight wagons with them, and that another party had gone southward on the other side of the Oconee River. His information seems to have been of the most explicit and circumstantial character. He had heard the lady called "Mrs. Davis," and a gentleman spoken of as "President Davis," and said that Mr. Davis had not crossed the


Page 375 WILSON'S RAID - ALABAMA AND GEORGIA.