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Atlanta literally to the ground, and next morning Sherman?s long columns snaked out east toward the Atlantic.
By the time the Yanks were looking back at the smoking ruins of Atlanta, Pvt. Baxter had moved west with his 20th Mississippi Regiment and with Hood?s army on an excursion intended to capture Nashville, and perhaps, with success, to drive on into Kentucky. Hood, with prudence, first led his forces to Gadsden, Alabama, and then into a long sweep west and then north across the Tennessee River at Florence. Here his drive ran out of steam in the pine barrens of north Alabama. There was no way to keep his army alive in this povertvj^stricken land, and he lost three fatal weeks of delay assembling a wagon train and accumulating bare rations and ammunition. Baxter, while the army waited, was lucky to get dried corn, acorn coffee, and an occasional chunk of salt pork.
Finally Hood got his army moving again, and started his march toward the Federal stronghold at Nashville. The city had been in northern hands since February, 1862, when Baxter and the 20th Mississippi Regiment had been surrendered at Fort Donelson. And Baxter, remembering that cold, gray morning of surrrender, looked forward with hope to marching victoriously in the streets of Nashville.
As Hood?s columns moved north, they were paralleled by Gen. Schofield and the two corps Sherman had detached to aid Thomas in the defense of Nashville. The two armies, North and South, after a series of blunders on each side, finally met on November 30 at Franklin, some 20 miles south of Nashville. The meeting was an experience of blood-letting, and it likely marked the end of any Southern hopes for partial victory or even compromise.
Hood, demonstrating bad generalship, ordered his army to encamp on the night of November 29 near Spring Hill. By not moving in determined attack, he allowed Schofield?s army barely a mile away, to escap?,to some old entrenchments near Franklin. Next day after a long delay and with barely an hour of daylight left, Hood decided to send two of his three corps, 23,000 Confederates, against Schofield?s 25,000 Federals. Ignoring Forrest?s advice for a flanking movement, he threw brigade after
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