May, and then, leaving southwest Virginia, had raided Kentucky
and taken Lexington, but been defeated at Cynthiana and driven back
by overwhelming numbers till he again entered southwest Virginia
on the twentieth of June. Forrest raided northeastern Mississippi,
badly defeated Sturgis at Brice's Cross Roads in June, but was
himself defeated by A. J. Smith at Tupelo in July.

Meanwhile Sherman had been tapping Johnston's fifty miles of
entrenchments for three weeks of rainy June weather, hoping to find
a suitable place into which he could drive a wedge of attack. On
the twenty-seventh he tried to carry the Kenesaw lines by assault,
but failed at every point, with a loss of twenty-five hundred--three
times what Johnston lost.

By a well-combined series of maneuvers Sherman then forced Johnston
to fall back or be hopelessly outflanked. Johnston, with equal skill,
crossed the Chattahoochee under cover of the strongly fortified
bridgehead which he had built unknown to Sherman. But Sherman, with
his double numbers, could always hold Johnston with one-half in front
while turning his flank with the other. So even the Chattahoochee
was safely crossed on the seventeenth of July and the final move
against Atlanta was begun. That same night Johnston's magnificent
skill was thrown to the winds by Davis, who had ordered the bold
and skillful but far too headlong John B. Hood to take command
and "fight."

Five days later Hood fought the battle of Atlanta. Just as Sherman
was closing in to entrench for a siege Hood attacked his extreme
left flank with the utmost resolution, driving it in and completely
enveloping it. But Sherman was not to be caught. Knowing that only
a part of Hood's army could be sent to this attack while the rest
held the lines of Atlanta, Sherman left McPherson's veteran Army
of the Tennessee to do the actual fighting, supported, of course,
by the movement of troops on their engaged right. McPherson was
killed. Logan ably replaced him and won a hard-fought day. Hood's
loss was well over eight thousand; Sherman's considerably less
than half.

On the twenty-eighth Hood attacked the extreme right, now commanded
by General O. O. Howard in succession to McPherson, whose Army of
the Tennessee again did most distinguished service, especially
Logan's Fifteenth Corps near Ezra Church. The Confederates were
again defeated with the heavier loss. After this the siege continued
all through the month of August.

While H