By Gary W. Dolzall
The light of dawn remained two hours distant on the chilly morning of Wednesday, November 30, 1864, as a small group of bone-weary blue-clad riders reined their horses to a halt before an ample brick house on the southern fringe of Franklin, Tennessee. Union Brigadier General Jacob Cox and his staff dismounted at the home of aged planter and Confederate sympathizer Fountain Branch Carter. It was just after 4:30 a.m. By the time that day's light had once more given way to darkness, Cox, Carter and the red brick house would forever be welded together into history.
Cox and his staff had come to the Carter house to set up a temporary field headquarters for Maj. Gen. John M. Schofield. The hard-pressed Schofield, at the head of the IV and XXIII corps of the Army of the Cumberland, was trying to slow the northward surge of Confederate General John Bell Hood's increasingly emboldened Army of Tennessee. With more than 30,000 baffle-tested infantry and 9,000 cavalry under the redoubtable Maj. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest, Hood had promised his men to "redeem one of the fairest portions of our Confederacy" Schofield, on the other hand, was simply trying to buy time for Maj. Gen. George H. Thomas to concentrate his forces at Nashville and stop Hood's northward thrust. But with fewer than 28,000 men in his own"little army," Schofield risked being trapped and crushed by Hood's superior numbers and Forrest's often-demonstrated tactical genius.
Schofield had first come into contact with the enemy six days earlier at Columbia, a small village 23 miles south of Franklin on the Duck River. That meeting had its genesis in Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman's defeat of Hood at Atlanta three months earlier. After a conference with Conf&lerate President Jefferson Davis in September, Hood moved northwest around the city to strike at Sherman's communications and supply lines and attempt to draw him back into Tennessee.
Hitting the Western & Atlantic Railroad at Big Shanty; Ga., on October 3 and at Allatoona Pass, Ga., on the 5th, Hood compelled Sherman to leave one corps at Atlanta and attempt to pursue the Southern troops. After another railroad strike on October 13 at Dalton, Ga., Hood withdrew southwest to Gadsden, Ala. Sherman followed briefly across the Alabama border, then halted. He guessed correctly that Hood would now move northwest into Tennessee to fulfill what Sherman called Davis' "vainglorious boasts" about Tennessee and Kentucky troops returning to their "native soil."
Forrest, meanwhile, had been raiding in western Tennessee before withdrawing into northeastern Mississippi. The prospect of the fabled cavalryman linking his three divisions with Hood's infantry was a move that Sherman found particularly ominous. "I can whip [Hood's] infantry" he reported, "but [Forrest's] cavalry is to be feared." Sherman, however, would leave those worries to Thomas while he and his Army of the Tennessee set out on their March to the Sea. "The only question was Thomas' strength and his ability to meet Hood in the open field:' Sherman admitted.
To strengthen Thomas' numbers and resolve, Sherman had assigned an increasingly powerfiil force to protect Tennessee. While Hood dallied in Alabama, beset by indecision, poor weather and want of supplies, Schofield's small command was dispatched to Pulaski, Tenn., where it was supported by Maj. Gen. James H. Wilson's Union cavalry. The troopers kept tabs on the Army of Tennessee and on Forrest, who had joined Hood on November 14.
As the third week of November opened, Hood finally acted. Crossing the Tennessee River at Florence, Ala., on November 19, Hood moved north to the west side of Pulaski, oufflanking Schofield and initiating a wild dash toward Columbia. Cox's division was in the vanguard of Schofield's infantry during the rush from Pulaski on November 24. Cox reached Columbia at 7:30 that morning, just in time to interpose Colonel Horace Capron's 800-nun cavalry brigade between the town and the oncoming horsemen of Brig. Gen. James Chalmers.
Having blunted the rush of Forrest's cavalry at Columbia, Schofield pulled back to the north side of the Duck River three days later. Sherman had advised Thomas a month earlier to "get about Columbia as big an army as you can and go at [Hood]," but the Federals lacked the potency to fulfill Sherman's aggressive orders. Instead, Thomas ordered Schofield to wait for Maj. Gen. A.J. Smith's approaching XVI Corps and delay Hood as long as he could. Schofield was only to fall back if he judged his men were at grave risk.
Once again, Hood outflanked Schofield. On the afternoon of November 28, Rebel cavalry forded the Duck River to the east of the Union army. Leaving behind two divisions of Lt. Gen. Stephen Lee's corps and most of the army's artillery to deceive Schofield, Hood crossed the rest of his army at dawn the next morning and headed straight for Spring Hill, 12 miles to the north.
While Forrest was pushing the over-matched Federal horsemen north, Schofield remained at the Duck. With the bulk of his ~ cavalry so occupied, he had little means of divining Hood's movements. He knew that Forrest was across the river, but it was not until 7 a.m., when a dispatch written by Wilson six hours earlier finally reached him, that Schofield learned Hood's infantry was also on the move. Schofield immediately made plans to move his army and its 800-wagon supply train toward Spring Hill. Brigadier General George D. Wagner's IV Corps division led the way and covered the trains. Cox's division from the XXIII Corps remained along the Duck, skirmishing throughout the day with an aggressive Lee. The rest of Schofield's army was spread out defensively along nearby Rutherford Creek and the Columbia-Franklin Turnpike, with Hood's infantry marching menacingly to the east.
At Spring Hill, the Union situation was even worse. Brash young James Wilson, well north of town with most of his cavalry, was certain that Forrest was bound for Nashville. "You had better look out for Forrest at Nashville tomorrow noon," he airily warned Thomas. In truth, Forrest had detached a brigade to occupy Wilson while he and 4,500 horsemen advanced on Spring Hill. With Lee's two divisions blocking the pike to the south, Forrest moved to cut the turnpike at Spring Hill while two corps of Confederate infantry moved in on Schofield fl-nm the east. A potential disaster loomed for the Union forces.
But Hood's tremendous opportunity soon unraveled. Forrest's attempt to block the turnpike was dulled by a small band of Union cavah'y buying just enough time for Wagner's infantry to arrive. The Confederate infantry, meanwhile, was slow to come up. The head of the main Rebel column did not arrive southeast of Spring Hill until after 3 p.m.. its progress slowed by a poor map and Hood's uncharacteristic caution.
Still, the Confederate initiative remained rich in promise. At 4p.m., following Hood's orders, Maj. Gen. Patrick Cleburne's division attacked the Union forces along the turnpike just south of Spring Hill. Chaos in the Confederate high command followed. Hood, who envisioned a westward, then southwestward, pivot of his infantry to cut the Columbia-Franklin Pike, soon retired from the field, settled into a nearby farm house and remained effectively out of touch with his army for the rest of the afternoon and night Hood was most likely exhausted and in pain, the hard campaigning having aggravated wounds from earlier battles. Major General Benjamin Cheatham, meanwhile, arrived on the field without having conferred with Hood and sent his forces to attack in a northwestern direction toward Spring Hill. Major General John C. Brown, who was supposed to initiate the attack with his division on the right, somehow believed he was oufflanked and cautiously held his position.The attack fizzled, and Schofield's army began marching toward the comparative safety of Franklin.
Amazingly, as the Northerners tramped toward Franklin in the evening darkness, they were so close to the Confederates silhouetted around their campfires east of the pike that they could hear the Southerners' camp chatter. Some of the exhausted Rebels heard theYankees as they marched, but they made no effort to attack the Union column. It was yet one more Southern misfire that helped the Federals.
For Jacob Cox, the leg of the journey that brought him to the Carter house began with the approach of darkness on No-venter 29. Leaving behind a picket lineMajor General Nathan B. Forrest's cavalry attack at Spring Hill was one of the few Southern attempts to threaten the retreating Unionists. The troopers could not break through the Union rear guard and were repulsed, giving the Federals a few more critical minutes to escape northward and reach Franklin.
alung the Duck River to cover his division's escape, Cox marched at 7 p.m. toward Spring Hill, passing two divisions of the IV Corps en route. Finding Schofield at Maj. Gen. David Stanley's TV Corps headquarters around midnight, Cox was instructed to continue to Franklin. After passing Brig. Gen.Thoma.s Ruger's division at Thompson Station, Cox's troops became the vanguard of the Union army
After a day of sparring with Lee's divisions, followed by a 22-mile all-night march, Cox stepped into the Carter house before dawn on the 30th. While his exhausted men filed along each side of the pike and broke ranks to make coffee and doze until dawn, Cox and his staff took custody of Carter's sitting room and threw themselves upon the floor to get a few minutes of greatly needed sleep.
Cox's slumber was soon interrupted by the arrival of his commanding general. Schofield, usually calm, seemed uncharacteristically agitated. "In all my intimate experience with him, I never saw him so manifestly disturbed as he was in the glimmering dawn of that morning;' Cox observed. Free of Hood's potential death grip at Spring Hill, Schofield intended to move into Franklin, cross the horseshoe-shaped Harpeth River at the rear of town and take up a defensive position opposite Franklin on the river's north bank. What disturbed Schofield was that the army had little means to cross the river, The turnpike bridge had been destroyed earlier in the war, and a second structure had been burned in a recent skirmish. A railroad bridge was intact but ill-suited to crossing infantry or wagons. Fording the river was possible but slow The danger of being trapped again by Hood loomed as a distinct possibility.
Schofield now turned to Cox. "General;' he said, "the pontoons are not here, the county bridge is gone, and the ford is hardly passable.You must take command of the XXIII Corps, and put it in position here to hold Hood back at all hazards." Schofield was anxious to move the artillery north of the river, telling Cox, "Let your artillery go over at once, I will give you batteries ftom the IV Corps as they come in."
As the morning light began to filter over the fields south of Franklin, Cox began his cmcial task. First, he carefl.illy examined the ground. What he saw, standing atop the slight hill occupied by the Carter house, then trotting his horse across the ground, was mostly rolling, open land. From the south, the Columbia Franklin Turnpike approached the center of the fields after skirting a wooded, craggy height, Winstead Hill, a couple of miles away Nearby the pike passed Privet Knob a mile away then approached the Carter house. To Cox's left, the Harpeth River arched southward behind his troops, while the CentralAlabama Rail-road and the Lewisburg Pike approached from the southeast. To his right, a third road, Carter's Creek Pike, led up from the southwesr. Around the Carter house itself Cox found all that might be expected of a moderately prosperous Southern farm a large garden, farm office, smokehouse and outbuildings.To the left, about 80 yards east of the Columbia Franldin Pike and 120 yards south of the house, stood a large wooden building that housed Carter's cotton gin.
Tucked into the river-sculpted semihorseshoe, Cox drew a defensive line across its southernmost, open face. "It was evident that the Caner Hill was the key to any strong system of defense in ihant of the town," Cox recalled,"and that the line from the cotton gin as a salient to the river bank must form our line of batde on the left:' The right flank was problematic, since a gallop to the Carter's Creek Turnpike revealed to Cox that it would not do to throw a wing out to the Bostick home, since the flank would be left in the at with no guarantee against its being turned by the enemy. He would have to develop a shorter line. "At any rate, it was the best we could do:' said Cox.
With this line in mind, Cox set about giving it teeth. His own division was the only infantry present, and Cox put his three brigades on the left, hoping to anticipate what Hood would do. "It [was] probable that Hood would push his right flank forward on the shortest line to our communications with the north bank of the Harpethi Cox reasoned, "the nearest and most available fords by which his cavalry, under Forrest, could cross and turn our position?
Handing responsibility for the corps to Schofield, Cox turned over temporary command of his own division to his senior brigade commander, Brig. Gen. James W Reilly. The troops were ordered to stack arms and entrench. On the far left, from the river and the Central Alabama Railroad cut to the Lewisburg Pike, Colonel Israel N. Stiles' brigade was positioned, with three regiments in the front hne and one in reserve.To Stiles' right, stretching west nearly to the cotton gin, stood Colonel John S. Casement's brigade. Reilly's own brigade would form the division's right, wrapping through the salient in front of the cotton gin to the Columbia Franklin Pike. With perhaps 500 feet of earthworks along his front, Reilly placed two regiments in front, holding one in reserve.
While Cox's men began entrenching, the other division from the XXIII Corps Ruger's two brigades marched up the pike around 7 am. Extending the army's line west from the pike and in front of the Carter house was the brigade of Colonel Silas Strickland. Meanwhile, Colonel Orlando H. Moore's brigade attempted to fashion a thin line westward toward Carter's Creek Pike.Two companies from one of Strickland's reserves, the 183rd Ohio, were detached to help fill the line.
Now the blue infantry was entirely in place, but a complex problem at the center of the hne had to be resolved. The IV Corps and the ammunition trains were still advancing up the Columbia Franklin Pike, and the road had to be left open. To allow passage for the approaching troops and yet not permit a wide gap in the defensive hne, Cox ordered an earthwork built across the road with a turn trains could pass arou ordered by Cox to di their stressfull retreat, the reserves found the energy to expand the earthworks into a 2nd protective line. It would prove to be s fortunate improvisation.
As the morning warm, the IV Corps General Nathan Kimball's Division was imediately enlisted to fill out the line west of the Carter's Creek brigades, each commanded by a brigadier general William Grose, Issac M Kirby and Walter C. Whitaker- extended the west flank to touch while, Brig. Gen. Thomas J. Wood Div. moved through Franklin, crossed the river and took up position with the XXIII Corps artillery to protect against the possibility of a Rebel attei Federals. Colonel Emerson Opdycke's Brig deployed as a rear guard, jostling with the enemy cavalry along the pike.
As the Union men worked on the entrenchments, Stiles' and Casement's troops on the left, further strengthened the e fenses by turning a hedge of thorny Osage orange into a makeshift abatis that stretched from the railroad cut to near the cotton gin. On the right of the pike, Ruger's men were doing the same thing , hacking apart a grove of lucust trees and an apple orchard to strengthen their fortifications
Finally, there was the artillery. When Captain Lyman Bridge, the IV Corps Cheif of artillery, arrived in late morning, Cox directed him to place four guns of the 1st .entucky Light Battery in the front line on the immediate left of the Columbia Franklin Pike. Two guns from the 6th Ohio ight Battery were rolled into the cotton in salient, and two more were placed on- far left. The 20th Ohio Battery moved ito position just west of the Carter house, near the retrenched line atop Carter Hill.position allowed them to fire over the ont-line troops. Battery B of the Pennsylvania Veteran Volunteers protected Ruger's along the Carter's Creek Pike.
As noon approached, the Federal army's rear reached Winstead Hill. Hood's infantry ad not yet been sighted, but Forrest's cayy was already jousting with Wilson along the army's flanks. In Franklin, all was relatively calm. Most of A.J. Smith's troops had arrived in Nashville, and a concentration of the two forces farther north seemed
in the offing. Schofield, in anticipation of moving his army northward under cover darkness, re-established his headquarters north of the river.
His defenses complete, Cox allowed his men to eat their noon meal. Already planing his next movement, the general had his headquarters tents struck and packed. "The air was hazy and except for, an occasional straggler nothing was to be seen between md Winstead Hill," he recalled. "A distant cannon shot now and then told us that Wagner's division was checking the enemy's advance on the other side of the hill." The Federals did not know it yet, but from the other side of that hill would soon come all the fury of an angry, aggressive, even vindictive John Bell Hood. Schofield's little army was about to have the fight of its life.
While the Union army was straggling into Franklin in the pre-dawn hours of November 30, Hood awoke near Spring Hill believing that his army had trapped the Federals and that the coming day would bring a wondrous victory. But upon his discovery of Schofield's escape, Hood's mood darkened.The frustrated general began plotting another thrust at the bluecoats. Unlike his previous flanking moves, this time Hood would throw his army headlong at the Union forces. Unsophisticated frontal attacks would be the order of the day, despite the potential for massive casualties.
The foot soldiers of the Army of Tennessee were first sighted by the Union troops at Franklin shortly before midday, marching up the Columbia Franklin Pike. Hood deployed Maj. Gen. Alexander P Stewart's corps to the right, crossing to approach the Lewisburg Pike. Cheatham's officers and troops, the men Hood most blamed for the Spring Hill fiasco, formed along the pike from Columbia, facing the center of the Union lines. Wagner's unfortunate division remained isolated southeast of Franklin, its flanks unprotected.The division's fortunes slipped a bit more with the approach of Hood's men, as the Northerners were caught between their own army and the Confederates.
Wagner had been ordered by his corps commander, Maj. Gen. David Stanley, to "hold the heights of (Winstead Hill) you now occupy, unless too severely pressed." When the full butternut-clad army appeared, it seemed clear to Stanley that Wagner's men could be easily oufflanked and "severely pressed." Wagner, though, overlooked the obvious and showed no disposition to withdraw his men. One of his brigadiers, hot-blooded Emerson Odycke, had already feuded with Wagner over his unrelenting use of Opdycke's brigade as the rear guard from Spring Hill. Opdycke saw nothing but trouble in staying on the heights, and in an act of insubordination, he formed up his brigade and marched back into Franklin, with Wagner accompanying him in heated debate. Wagner's other two brigades, commanded by Colonels John Q. Lane andJoseph Conrad, remained at the front.
Shortly after 2 p.m., pressure from Cheatham's Confederates pushed back Lane's brigade, which was posted near Privet Knob. Lane then took up position on the west side of the pike, some 400 yards in front of the main Union entrenchrnents. Conrad's brigade was nearby on the left.
An hour later, an ominous yet grand sight unfolded: North of Winstead Hill more than 20,000 Confederate infantrymen began to deploy in line of battle. As Cox reported, "The men in the line were everywhere agog with the news of the imposing formation of the enemy in frill view of Wagner's advance brigades." Still, Wagner ordered his men to stand pat, going so far as to instruct Conrad to have his sergeants fix bayonets to keep their men in
place. No one knew whether Hood was really planning to attack, or merely enacting an elaborate ruse.
While the Confederates formed their lines in the hazy afternoon sunshine, Cox rechecked his own line. He encountered Wagner and urged him not to leave his troops too long on Winstead Hill. Then, hearing from Stiles that Hood's forces could be seen from the knoll on the left, Cox galloped eastward to see for himself "Their line could be continuously traced from the Harpeth River on our left till it was lost near Privet Knob," Cox remembered. "Soon the long lines of Hood's army surged up out of the hollow in which they had formed, and were seen coming in splendid array. The sight was one to send a thrill through the heart, and those who saw it have never forgotten."
It was about 4 p.m., little more than an hour before sunset. The Confederates rolled forwain, three divisions of AP Stewart's corps heading toward Cox's left along the Lewis-burg Pike. Cleburne's division of Cheatham's corps marched to the east of the Columbia Franklin Pike, heading for the Union center, while Maj. Gen. William Bate's division moved toward the Federal right.
Union and Confederate artillery blast quickly signaled the transtion from martial splendor to deadly battle. A section of 3 inch rifled guns manned by the 1st Ohio Light Artillery opened on Cheatham's line at about 4:10 p.m. from Winstead Hill. Moments later a Rebel screamed toward the Carter house, ripping into the back porch and narrowly missing one of Cox's aides his younger brother Theodore. Quickly the guns on Cox's flanks responded, as did the cannons at Fort Granger , an old earthen fortification north of the river
Schofield, hearing th mediately sent orders to his men to cover the nv there be a break in Cox's time, he also ordered the Nashville. Then he headed to observe the rapidly Stanley rapidly rode for the top of the knob on the union left, Cox watched Wagner's men with grave concern. While the artillery to the front retired inside the main works, the infantry, heedinging Wagner's orders, dug in. I sent a aide down the line to warn the center to withhold their fire till Wagners's men could get in," Cox related, "and to direct Opdycke to be ready to charge with his brigade if any break should occure"
Within moments, chaos desended upon c Wagner's isolated brigades. Cleburne's and John Brown's divisions slammed imto Conrad's and Lane's men and quickly sent them tumbling backward in a rout. The blue clad troops stumbled back into Cox's main line with the onrushing Confederates right behind them. Meanwhile, on the union left Stewart's corps entered the fray.
With the enemy coming Cox galloped for the Carter he found a desperate swirl of Union troops had been unable to shoot at the approaching Confederate lines because Wagner's hapless men were racing toward Franklin, blocking their comrades field of fire. Hood's veterans took advantage of that confusion, and the center of the union line was engulfed by the Rebels. Near the cotton gin, Cox saw that Reillys reserve was prepairing to charge forward. Meanwhile, at the Carter house, he found Opdycke's brigade already in motion, charging at the double-quick through the retreating blue coats and smacking headlong into the enemy. "The men looked as if breasting a furious gale, with strained and set teeth, " Cox observed.
All the bedlam around the carter house. Pouring over the first entrenchment, the rebels had taken the cannons of the 1st ky battery and were turning the loaded guns around to fire into the faces of the federals. On the Pike and in the carters yard, Opdyke's six regiments roared into a boiling cauldron of hand-to-hand fighting, their colonel at the center, smashing Confederate skulls with the butt of his pistol. Having retreated to the basement of their home, Fountain Carter and his family huddled against the roar of the cannons and the demonic shouts of the struggling soldiers.
Along the pike, Opdycke's brigade fought furiously with Cleburne's troops. To the west of the house, Brown's men had pushed in the left of Strickland's brigade. While the Confederates searched in vain for friction primers to discharge the captured cannons into theYankees' very faces, the 12th and 16th Kentucky regiments, led by Lt. Cols. Lawrence Rousseau and John S. White, smashed into the Rebel troops and regained the battery. The moment that might have changed the battle entirely in the Confederates' favor was lost.
Along the line immediately west of the cotton gin, the entrenchments were again secured by the Federals. In the center at the Columbia Franklin Pike and around the Carter house, Opdycke held the retrenched line. West of the house, a tenuous link held between the retrenchment and Colonel Orlando Moore's front-line brigade. For the Confederates, caught between the two Union lines, the Carters' yard was a slaughter pen, a no-man's-land of flying lead where they huddled on the outside of the main parapet and the Federals held the trenches, perhaps 200 feet apart.
The retreat of Wagner's troops and the break in the line had made the Federal center the vortex of the early fighting, but it was not the only desperately held ground. On the Union left, Cox's division was being challenged by three of Stewart's divisions, along with Brig. Gen. Abraham Buford's cavalry division 10,000 Confederates attacking 5,000 Federals. But the Union soldiers had prepared well; the Osage orange abatis, the artillery support and the earth-works gave the Union troops cover and plenty of firepower to engulf the attackers in a maelstrom of death. Slowed and entangled amid the gripping, twisted Osage, Maj. Gen. William W Loring's Confederate division was cut to pieces. A few brave Southerners made itto the Union trenches but were iimnediately shot down or captured. When some Rebels tried to push east around the abatis through the railrnad cut,they were met by volleys from the 120th Indiana, canister from a section of the 4th U.S. Artillery, and plunging cannon fire from Fort Granger.
To Loring's left, Maj. Gen. Edward C. Walthall's division also encountered the Osage abatis and was virtually slaughtered. The remainder of Walthall's division, along with Maj. Gen. Samuel G. French's division, was squeezed toward the Union center and mingled with and disrupted Cleburne's troops. Meanwhile, on the west of the battlefield, Bate's troops ran into the locust and apple tree abatis, and the men suffered from a galling fire. Somehow, the Confederates gained a foothold on the western entrenchments, but fire from two batteries of the Pennsylvania Light Artillery soon sealed the breech.
With destruction on its flanks, the Confederate force became increasingly interwoven and confused as scores of field officers were mowed down. The leaderless troops migrated toward the center, where the initial break had occurred, and the Confederates still held the outside of the entrenchment. Wave after wave of Southerners attacked around the Carter house, but never again was a serious breach made in the Union line.
Even the gray-coated infantry huddling outside the entrenchment were ripped by enfilade fire from Federals at the cotton gin salient. Captain WE. Cunningham of the 41st Tennessee was one of those who were trapped at the parapet. "It was certain death to retreat across that plain, and equally bad to remain," he recalled.
Brigadier General Edward Johnson's division made the last assault on the Union line. Arriving on Winstead Hill after sunset, Johnson received word from Hood to support Cheatham's attack. In pitch-black darkness, with men carrying torches to light the way, Johnson's four brigades moved forward over the bodies of fallen comrades into a hailstorm of Union musketry and canister. Hitting the enemy center, Johnson's men bravely forced their way to the main entrenchments, fighting hand to hand with the grim, determined Federals. Once they had crossed the primary entrenchment, the Southerners faced another sheet of flame and lead, The choice now was to retreat or be cut down.
After Johnson's gallant but forlorn assault, the Battle of Franldin sputtered to a close.On the Confederate side, the butcher's bill was staggering. The Army of Tennessee had lost some 7,000 men to death, injury or capture one out of, three of the men engaged. Hood's losses were more than those suffered during Pickett's Charge at Gettysburg or by Ulysses S. Grant at Cold Harbor. Six Confederate generals Patrick Cleburne, Hiram Granbury, John C. Carter, States Rights Gist, Otho S. Strahl and John Adams were killed. Another brigadier, George W Gordon, was captured. The Union casualties amounted to 2,326 men, of whom 1,000 were from the two brigades left in the open by Wagner at the battle's start.
As for Jacob Cox, who had directed the construction and defense of the Union center at Franklin, John Schofield wrote: "Brig. Gen. J.D. Cox deserves a very large share of credit for the brilliant victory at Franldin. The troops were placed in position and entrenched under his immediate direction, and the greater portion of the line engaged was under his command during the bade. I recommend General Cox to the special consideration of the Government." Perhaps an even greater compliment came from Confederate General Cheatham, who later said,"If it hadn't been for the mistake [by Wagner] your side made, you would have killed every man in our army"
Gary W. Dolzall has written four books on railroads in America.
Further reading:
The Confederacy's Last Hurrah: Spring Hill, Franklin and Nashville, by Wiley Sword
Sherman's March to the Sea: Hood's Tennessee Campaign & the Carolina's Campaign of 1865, by Jacob D. Cox.
