would drop back with the
current and escape capture. But a still greater advantage would
be its tendency to _cut the enemy's lines in two_, by reaching
the Memphis and Charleston Railroad, threatening Memphis, which
lies one hundred miles due west, and no defensible point between;
also Nashville, only ninety miles north-east, and Florence and
Tuscumbia in North Alabama, forty miles east. A movement in this
direction would do more to relieve our friends in Kentucky, and
inspire the loyal hearts in East Tennessee, than the possession
of the whole of the Mississippi River. If well executed, it would
cause the evacuation of all those formidable fortifications on
which the rebels ground their hopes for success; and in the event
of our fleet attacking Mobile, the presence of our troops in the
northern part of Alabama, would be material aid to the fleet.

Again, the aid our forces would receive from the loyal men in
Tennessee would enable them soon to crush the last traitor in
that region, and the _separation of the two extremes_ would do
more than one hundred battles for the Union cause. The Tennessee
River is crossed by the Memphis and Louisville Railroad, and the
Memphis and Nashville Railroad. At Hamburg the river makes the
big bend on the east, touching the north-east corner of
Mississippi, entering the north-west corner of Alabama, forming
an arc to the south, entering the State of Tennessee at the
north-east corner of Alabama, and if it does not touch the
north-west corner of Georgia, comes very near it. It is but eight
miles from Hamburg to the Memphis and Charleston Railroad, which
goes through Tuscumbia, only two miles from the river, which it
crosses at Decatur thirty miles above, intersecting with the
Nashville and Chattanooga road at Stephenson. The Tennessee never
has less than three feet to Hamburg on the "shoalest" bar, and
during the fall, winter, and spring months, there is always water
for the largest boats that are used on the Mississippi River. It
follows, from the above facts, that in making the Mississippi the
key to the war in the West, or rather in overlooking the
Tennessee River, the subject is not understood by the superiors
in command.

The War Department looked over these papers, and Col. Scott, the
Assistant Secretary, pos