Page:Memoirs of Henry Villard, volume 1.djvu/361

1862] He fell in Sherman's Atlanta campaign. In his anxiety for the reputation of his brother, the General, he fairly boiled with indignation at the derelictions of Buell and Gilbert. He conducted me to the several positions occupied during the conflict, and demonstrated how, on the one hand, the falling back from the position taken from the rebels early in the morning had left Rousseau's right unprotected, and how, on the other, the rebel turning movement might have been used to our advantage by falling upon their flank and rear. He took me to the headquarters of General Sheridan, with whom I had a long talk. I had met him casually more than once during the Corinth campaign as Colonel of the 2d Michigan Cavalry. Up to that time, his army record did not indicate the brilliant future before him. Nor did he impress me as a man of more than ordinary intellectual ability. His exterior was anything but prepossessing. Of hardly middle height, with a round head, low brow, and decidedly coarse Irish features, a disproportionately broad and long body on short legs, he did not make a very imposing personality. He looked like a bold sabreur, but nothing more. The arrival of General Sill's division being assured for the evening of the 11th, Buell, on the same day, sent out three brigades from Crittenden's and Gilbert's corps, headed by my friend Colonel Edward McCook's and Colonel Gray's mounted commands. Having learned this, I made my way at once to McCook, who was very willing to have me accompany him again. He had been incessantly engaged in outpost and advance-guard duty during the march from Nashville to Louisville and thence to Perryville, and there had been but few days on which his command had not rubbed against the enemy. We followed the pike from Perryville to Harrodsburg, and encountered and skirmished with rebel cavalry, apparently supported by a strong infantry force. But they fell back before evening, and we entered Harrodsburg unopposed, where we found more than a thousand rebel sick and wounded. The next