e were lacking; and the civil population hoped
to save all that was not considered warlike stores. Thus immense
supplies fell into Sherman's hands. Savannah was of course placed
under martial law. But as the wax was now nearing its inevitable
end, and the citizens were thoroughly "subjugated," those who wished
to remain were allowed to do so. Only two hundred left, going to
Charleston under a flag of truce.

[Illustration: CIVIL WAR CAMPAIGNS OF 1864]

The following official announcement reached Lincoln on Christmas
Eve.

Savannah, Georgia, December 22, 1864.

TO HIS EXCELLENCY PRESIDENT LINCOLN,
WASHINGTON, D. C.

I beg to present you as a Christmas gift the city of Savannah,
with one hundred and fifty heavy guns and
plenty of ammunition,
also about twenty-five thousand bales of cotton.
W. T. SHERMAN, Major-General.

In the meantime Hood's desperate sortie had struck north as far
as Franklin, Tennessee. Here, on the last of November, General
John Schofield, commanding the advanced part of Thomas's army,
gallantly withstood a furious attack. On this the closing day of
a lingering Indian summer the massed Confederates charged with
the piercing rebel yell, and charged again; re-formed under cover
of the dense pall of stationary smoke; and returned to the charge
again and again. Many a leader met his death right against the
very breastworks. Another would instantly spring forward, only
to fall in his turn. Thirteen times the gaunt gray lines rushed
madly through the battle smoke and lost their front ranks against
the withering fire before the autumn night closed in. Schofield then
fell back on Brentwood, halfway on the twenty miles to Nashville.
He had lost over two thousand men. But Hood had lost three times
as many; and Hood's were irreplaceable except by a very few local
recruits.

Hood now concentrated every available man for his final attack on
Thomas, who had odds of twenty thousand in his favor. Hood marched
his thirty-five thousand up to Nashville, where he actually invested
the fifty-five thousand Federals. By this time even Grant was so
annoyed at what seemed to him unreasoning delay that he sent Logan
to take command at once and "fight." But on the fifteenth of December
Thomas came out of his works and fought Hood with determined skill
all day. Having gained a decisive advantage already he pressed it
home to the very utmost on the morrow, breaking through Hood's