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But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate—we cannot consecrate—we cannot hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us, the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion; that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain; that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom; and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.24

—

Henry Yates Thompson arrived at Bridgeport, Alabama, forty-seven miles downstream from Chattanooga, on Friday, November 20, carrying a letter of introduction from Edward Everett to Dr. John Newberry, the head of the Western Department of the Sanitary Commission. It was late, so instead of continuing his journey to the commission’s headquarters, Thompson bedded down in one of their tents at Bridgeport. “Before I went to sleep,” he wrote, “I heard a solemn thudding sound outside. I asked my companion what was it and he said: ‘Oh, the last of Sherman’s men crossing the pontoons.’ ”25

Grant had been waiting for Sherman’s troops to arrive before he made his attack against General Bragg. By November 21 he had accumulated more than sixty thousand men. Staring down at them from Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge was a diminishing army of 33,000 Confederates. The “Cracker Line” had answered the Federal hunger pains, but no such relief had come to Bragg’s army. “Never in all my whole life do I remember of ever experiencing so much oppression and humiliation,” wrote the Confederate private Sam Watkins. “The soldiers were starved and almost naked, and covered all over with lice and camp itch and filth and dirt. The men looked sick, hollow-eyed, and heart-broken, living principally upon parched corn, which had been picked out of the mud and dirt under the feet of officers’ horses.”26

Thompson and Dr. Newberry boarded a steamboat for the last leg of the journey. It was another two days of arduous travel before they reached Chattanooga on November 22. That day, Bragg stacked the cards against himself still higher by sending two more divisions to Knoxville. “I had a fine view of the whole Rebel position on Missionary Ridge about three miles distant across a wooded valley,” wrote Thompson on the twenty-third:

The pickets and the skirmishers of both sides were behind their respective rifle pits in the valley below us and the Rebel pickets were plainly visible from Fort Wood, about half a mile from where I stood. All those round me were expecting immediate fighting. Soon I saw a sight I shall never forget. The whole Union army in the town—about 25,000 men under General Thomas—left their tents and huts and marched out past Fort Wood in long winding columns creeping into the valley and into line of battle round the town. From Fort Wood it all looked like a great review. But it was in deadly earnest.

Thompson was observing Grant’s test of Bragg’s resolve, to see whether the Confederate general was prepared to fight over Chattanooga or was planning to withdraw. The Union line charged toward Orchard Knob, a fortified hillock at the base of Missionary Ridge. The Confederates in the rifle pits, as mesmerized as Thompson by the bright spectacle rushing toward them, fled. Federal private Robert Neve was surprised to take the hill so easily: “We kept rushing on until we got in sight of their works, which we took with little opposition, and captured a number of prisoners. I took two myself,” he added. Thompson watched as the prisoners were brought in and noticed that