Vast army in another semicircle, crossed the Oostanaula River and

again struck at the railroad in the Confederate rear. Again the

gray lines were summoned swiftly from their red ditches to defend

the railroad, and, weary for sleep, exhausted from marching and

fighting, and hungry, always hungry, they made another rapid march

down the valley. They reached the little town of Calhoun, six

miles below Resaca, ahead of the Yankees, entrenched and were again

ready for the attack when the Yankees came up. The attack came,

there was fierce skirmishing and the Yankees were beaten back.

Wearily the Confederates lay on their arms and prayed for respite

and rest. But there was no rest. Sherman inexorably advanced,

step by step, swinging his army about them in a wide curve, forcing

another retreat to defend the railroad at their back.

The Confederates marched in their sleep, too tired to think for the

most part. But when they did think, they trusted old Joe. They

knew they were retreating but they knew they had not been beaten.

They just didn't have enough men to hold their entrenchments and

defeat Sherman's flanking movements, too. They could and did lick

the Yankees every time the Yankees would stand and fight. What

would be the end of this retreat, they did not know. But Old Joe

knew what he was doing and that was enough for them. He had

conducted the retreat in masterly fashion, for they had lost few

men and the Yankees killed and captured ran high. They hadn't lost

a single wagon and only four guns. And they hadn't lost the

railroad at their back, either. Sherman hadn't laid a finger on it

for all his frontal attacks, cavalry dashes and flank movements.

The railroad. It was still theirs, that slender iron line winding

through the sunny valley toward Atlanta. Men lay down to sleep

where they could see the rails gleaming faintly in the starlight.

Men lay down to die, and the last sight that met their puzzled eyes

was the rails shining in the merciless sun, heat shimmering along

them.

As they fell back down the valley, an army of refugees fell back

before them. Planters and Crackers, rich and poor, black and

white, women and children, the old, the dying, the crippled, the

wounded, the women far gone in pregnancy, crowded the road to

Atlanta on trains, afoot, on horseback, in carriages and wagons

piled high with trunks and household goods. Five miles ahead of

the retreating army went the refugees, halting at Resaca, at

Calhoun, at Kingston, hoping at each stop to hear that the Yankees

had been driven back so they could return to their homes. But

there was no retracing that sunny road. The gray troops passed by

empty mansions, deserted farms, lonely cabins with doors ajar.

Here and there some lone woman remained with a few frightened

slaves, and they came to the road to cheer the soldiers, to bring

buckets of well water for the thirsty men, to bind up the wounds

and bury the dead in their own family burying grounds. But for the

most part the sunny valley was abandoned and desolate and the

untended crops stood in parching fields.

Flanked again at Calhoun, Johnston fell back to Adairsville, where

there was sharp skirmishing, then to Cassville, then south of

Cartersville. And the enemy had now advanced fifty-five miles from

Dalton. At New Hope Church, fifteen miles farther along the hotly

fought way, the gray ranks dug in for a determined stand. On came

the blue lines, relentlessly, like a monster serpent, coiling,

striking venomously, drawing its injured lengths back, but always

striking again. There was desperate fighting at New Hope Church,

eleven days of continuous fighting, with every Yankee assault

bloodily repulsed. Then Johnston, flanked again, withdrew his

thinning lines a few miles farther.

The Confederate dead and wounded at New Hope Church ran high. The

wounded flooded Atlanta in train-loads and the town was appalled.

Never, even after the battle of Chickamauga, had the town seen so

many wounded. The hospitals overflowed and wounded lay on the

floors of empty stores and upon cotton bales in the warehouses.

Every hotel, boarding house and private residence was crowded with

sufferers. Aunt Pitty had her share, although she protested that