ommand, and have in vain asked the War Department for
capable people." To my suggestion that he could hardly expect hearty
cooeperation from officers of whom he permitted himself to speak
contemptuously, he replied: "I speak the truth. The Government is to
blame for placing such men in high position." From that hour I had
misgivings as to General Bragg's success, and felt no regret at the
refusal of the authorities to assign me to duty with him. It may be said
of his subordinate commanders that they supported him wonderfully, in
despite of his temper, though that ultimately produced dissatisfaction
and wrangling. Feeble health, too, unfitted him to sustain
long-continued pressure of responsibility, and he failed in the
execution of his own plan.

The movement into Kentucky was made by two lines. General Kirby Smith
led a subordinate force from Knoxville, East Tennessee, through
Cumberland Gap, and, defeating the Federals in a spirited action at
Richmond, Kentucky, reached Lexington, in the center of the State, and
threatened Cincinnati. Bragg moved on a line west of the Cumberland
range toward Louisville, on the Ohio River; and this movement forced the
Federal commander, Buell, to march north to the same point by a parallel
road, farther west. Buell left garrisons at Nashville and other
important places, and sought to preserve his communications with
Louisville, his base. Weakened by detachments, as well as by the
necessity of a retrograde movement, Bragg should have brought him to
action before he reached Louisville. Defeated, the Federals would have
been driven north of the Ohio to reorganize, and Bragg could have
wintered his army in the fertile and powerful State of Kentucky,
isolating the garrisons in his rear; or, if this was impossible, which
does not appear, he should have concentrated against Buell when the
latter, heavily reenforced, marched south from Louisville to regain
Nashville. But he fought a severe action at Perryville with a fraction
of his army, and retired to Central Tennessee. The ensuing winter, at
Murfreesboro, he contested the field with Rosecrans, Buell's successor,
for three days; and though he won a victory, it was not complete, and
the summer of 1863 found him again at Chattanooga. In the mean time, a
Federal force under General Burnside passed through Cumberland Gap, and
occupied Knoxville and much of East Tennessee, severing the direct line
of rail communication from Richmond to the Southw