From October 3d to November 10th Sherman's army was continually marching,
manoeuvering and skirmishing. The battle of Allatoona had been fought, the pass
had been defended, the mad men who rushed up those rugged hills had been hurled
back, the army of Georgia and Tennessee had been saved by the handful of men
who stood there facing the grim monster as man never before had stood, and
November 11th we find the armies commanded by General Sherman in the vicinity
of Rome and Kingston. Hood was far to the northward. Sherman says: "He may
push on his conquests; I will leave Thomas to confront him. I will enter the
heart of the Confederacy. I will visit the South with war's stern
realities."
Orderlies and aids are dashing hither and thither. The order has been
given. Hark! We hear the drum and the bugle, as if to say "Up boys and be
ready, for Sherman is going to make a great stride in the South-land." The
Seventh is now ready, shod and equipped, and in the evening, under the command
of Lieutenant Colonel Hector Perrin, we move from Rome about six miles and go
into camp.
Rome is now burning, and to-night innocence, beautiful innocence is
crying, all because its brothers rebelled; because they leaped from liberty's
lap and struck the flag and swore this Union to divide, and her name and her
glories to blacken.
SOURCE: Daniel Leib Ambrose, History of the Seventh Regiment
Illinois Volunteer Infantry, p. 273-4
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