Today in History:

378 Series I Volume XXXVIII-II Serial 73 - The Atlanta Campaign Part II

Page 378 THE ATLANTA CAMPAIGN. Chapter L.

reached us that Atlanta was entered and occupied by one of the brigades of our division of the Twentieth Corps. The casualties in the command during the campaign are: Killed, 21 enlisted men; wounded, 5 commissioned officers, 142 enlisted men; missing, 4 enlisted men; aggregate, 172. The officers and men of my command deserve great praise for their bravery and endurance during the whole campaign, and I shall not particularize where "each was a hero of himself."

I have the honor, sir, to be, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

SAM. A. WEST,

Captain, Commanding Seventy-ninth Ohio.

Lieutenant GEORGE W. GRUGGS,

A. A. A. G., 1st Brigadier, 3rd Div., 20th Army Corps.


Numbers 261.

Reports of Colonel John Coburn, Thirty-third Indiana Infantry, commanding Second Brigade.

HDQRS. SECOND Brigadier, THIRD DIVS., 20TH ARMY CORPS, Camp near Cassville, Ga., May 22, 1864.

CAPTAIN: I have the honor to report the following operations of the Second Brigade of the Third Division of the Twentieth Army Corps, from the 8th day of May to the 21st of May, 1864:

On the 9th day of May the brigade was encamped near Trickum, Ga., in Dogwood Valley, and on the right of the army at Buzzard Roost. Two regiments, the Nineteenth Michigan and Twentieth Connecticut, were ordered to march and occupy Boyd's Trail, over Rocky Face, or John's Mountain, south of Buzzard Roost. This was done after a slight skirmish, with the loss of 1 sergeant of the Nineteenth Michigan mortally wounded. These regiments remained there on the 10th, the remainder of the brigade still in their former camp. On the 11th the brigade moved with the division to Snake Creek Gap, some seventeen miles, and went into camp near the southern end,and at once began work on the road, making a double track for wagons and a by-way for troops. On the 12th the brigade continued at work on the road. At noon three regiments marched three miles in advance and encamped in the rear of a part of General McPherson's command. The Twentieth Connecticut and Thirty-third Indiana remained at work on the road during the day, and at night rejoined the brigade. May 14, the whole brigade marched at daylight, and at about 2 p.m. went into position on the left of the division, in rear of the Fifteenth Corps in the neighborhood of Resaca, having been deployed in two lines. In the evening the brigade marched to the left and front about a mile and a half, and encamped for the night in the rear of a part of the Fourteenth Corps. May 14, the brigade was moved forward about 400 yards and relieved a part of the Fourteenth Corps, Carlin's brigade, in front and to the left. The formation was in two lines deployed. The brigade encamped here for the night, on the left of the division. The position of the enemy was in our front and beyond a narrow cleared valley upon a low wooded ridge covered by fortifications. The Fourteenth Corps was severely engaged with the enemy here


Page 378 THE ATLANTA CAMPAIGN. Chapter L.