The rational interpretation, and the one
Burnside gave it, was that the alternative which had been stated in
the earlier dispatch of the 11th had been settled in favor of a
general movement southward instead of eastward, and that this made
it all the more imperative that he should disembarrass himself of
General Jones and establish a line on the upper Holston which a
small force could hold, whilst he with the rest of the two corps
should move southward as soon as the Ninth Corps could make the
march from Kentucky. This was exactly what General Schofield did in
the next spring when he was ordered to join Sherman with the Army of
the Ohio; and I do not hesitate to say that it was the only thing
which an intelligent military man on the ground and knowing the
topography would think of doing. To make a panicky abandonment of
the country and of the trains and detachments _en route_ to it,
would have been hardly less disgraceful than a surrender of the
whole. To Burnside's honor and credit it should be recorded that he
did not dream of doing it. He strained every nerve to hasten the
movement of his troops so as to get through with his little campaign
against Jones by the time the Ninth Corps could come from Kentucky,
and if he could accomplish it within that limit, he would have the
right to challenge the judgment of every competent critic, whether
he had not done that which became a good soldier and a good general.
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