| Army of the South | |
|---|---|
| Active | February–April 1865 |
| Country |  Confederate States |
| Branch |  Army |
| Type | Field army |
| Battles | |
| Commanders | |
| Commanding Officer | Gen. Joseph E. Johnston |
The Army of the South was a field army of the Confederate States in the Western Theater of the American Civil War. Formed from a collection of separate Confederate commands, it participated in the Battle of Bentonville. The following month, the unit was reorganized as the Army of Tennessee.
In February 1865, Union armies commanded by William T. Sherman were advancing northward through the Carolinas towards Virginia. They were opposed by troops from the Department of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida; commanded by William J. Hardee, and cavalry commanded by Wade Hampton; both were under General P. G. T. Beauregard, commander of the Confederate Military Division of the West. However, both Confederate President Jefferson Davis and general-in-chief Robert E. Lee questioned Beauregard's ability to handle the situation in the Carolinas, so on February 23 Lee appointed General Joseph E. Johnston to command the Confederate forces in the Carolinas. [1]
Johnston established his headquarters at Smithfield, North Carolina and named his force the "Army of the South". It consisted of four separate field forces present in North Carolina:
Johnston had a total of less than 25,000 men, with at least 1,300 men without rifles and with a shortage of artillery and wagons. [2]
Johnston initially hoped to concentrate his forces at Fayetteville, North Carolina and attack part of Sherman's forces while it was crossing the Cape Fear River. But Sherman moved more rapidly than Johnston anticipated and another Union force was advancing from Wilmington to Goldsboro, which was on Johnston's flank. Johnston decided that remaining at Fayetteville was too risky, so he retreated back to Smithfield to concentrate his army. Meanwhile, he continued to look for an opportunity to attack an isolated portion of the Union force, hoping to overwhelm that part before the rest of Sherman's force could reach it. [3]
On March 18, Hampton and Wheeler reported that the two wings of Sherman's force were separated by twelve miles and a day's march from each other. Johnston decided to take advantage of the distance between the Union wings and attack Henry W. Slocum's wing near Bentonville. According to his plans, Hampton's cavalry would slow down the Union advance while the Confederate infantry deployed behind them; he believed that if he could defeat Slocum's wing and destroy the Union wagon train with it, he might have a chance to defeat the remainder of the Union army. [4] The Confederate infantry arrived at Bentonville on the 19th, with Bragg's force deployed on the left and Stewart's Army of the Tennessee on the right; due to inaccurate maps, Hardee failed to arrive until late morning and so was used as a reserve force. The attack hit the Union XIV Corps and routed the two divisions on the Union left; James D. Morgan's division on the right held its ground against multiple Confederate attacks. The Union units rallied near the Harper House and, reinforced by the XX Corps, managed to hold against additional Confederate charges. Sherman's other wing arrived during the night and formed on the right of Slocum's wing; Johnston refused his left to protect his line of retreat. He remained at Bentonville for two days, hoping that Sherman would make another costly assault like at the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain, but Sherman failed to do so. [5]
During the night of March 21, Johnston retreated back to Smithfield and waited there for Sherman's next move. Meanwhile, he attempted to obtain arms and rations for his men. Morale among the men started dropping in early April due to news of Confederate defeats and surrenders elsewhere and desertions began to become a problem, but Johnston still had about 28,000 men present for duty in late March, which increased to 30,000 by April 7. From April 8 to the 10th, Johnston reorganized the army, consolidating dozens of shrunken regiments and brigades, and forming the resulting divisions into three corps commanded by Hardee, Stewart, and Lee. Several commanders were relieved of command, including Bragg, McLaws, and Taliaferro. The reorganized force was named the Army of Tennessee. [6]
The Battle of Shiloh, also known as the Battle of Pittsburg Landing, was a major battle in the American Civil War fought on April 6–7, 1862. The fighting took place in southwestern Tennessee, which was part of the war's Western Theater. The battlefield is located between a small, undistinguished church named Shiloh and Pittsburg Landing on the Tennessee River. Two Union armies combined to defeat the Confederate Army of Mississippi. Major General Ulysses S. Grant was the Union commander, while General Albert Sidney Johnston was the Confederate commander until his battlefield death, when he was replaced by his second-in-command, General P. G. T. Beauregard.
Joseph Eggleston Johnston was an American career army officer, serving with distinction in the United States Army during the Mexican–American War (1846–1848) and the Seminole Wars. After Virginia declared secession from the United States, he entered the Confederate States Army as one of its most senior general officers. From 1888 to 1889 he was a vice president, from 1889 to 1890 president, of the Aztec Club of 1847.
Braxton Bragg was an American army officer during the Second Seminole War and Mexican–American War and Confederate general in the Confederate Army during the American Civil War, serving in the Western Theater. His most important role was as commander of the Army of Mississippi, later renamed the Army of Tennessee, from June 1862 until December 1863.
William Joseph Hardee was a career U.S. Army and Confederate States Army officer. For the U.S. Army, he served in the Second Seminole War and in the Mexican–American War, where he was captured and exchanged. In the American Civil War, he sided with the South and became a general. Hardee served in the Western Theater and quarreled sharply with two of his commanding officers, Braxton Bragg and John Bell Hood. He served in the Atlanta Campaign of 1864 and the Carolinas Campaign of 1865, where he surrendered to General Joseph E. Johnston to William Tecumseh Sherman in April. Hardee's writings about military tactics were widely used on both sides in the conflict.
The Army of Tennessee was the principal Confederate army operating between the Appalachian Mountains and the Mississippi River during the American Civil War. It was formed in late 1862 and fought until the end of the war in 1865, participating in most of the significant battles in the Western Theater.
Henry Warner Slocum Sr., was a Union general during the American Civil War and later served in the United States House of Representatives from New York. During the war, he was one of the youngest major generals in the Army and fought numerous major battles in the Eastern Theater and in Georgia and the Carolinas. While commanding a regiment, a brigade, a division, and a corps in the Army of the Potomac, he saw action at First Bull Run, the Peninsula Campaign, Harpers Ferry, South Mountain, Antietam, and Chancellorsville.
The Atlanta campaign was a series of battles fought in the Western Theater of the American Civil War throughout northwest Georgia and the area around Atlanta during the summer of 1864. Union Maj. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman invaded Georgia from the vicinity of Chattanooga, Tennessee, beginning in May 1864, opposed by the Confederate general Joseph E. Johnston.
The Battle of Averasborough or the Battle of Averasboro, fought March 16, 1865, in Harnett and Cumberland counties, North Carolina, as part of the Carolinas Campaign of the American Civil War, was a prelude to the climactic Battle of Bentonville, which began three days later.
Lafayette McLaws was a United States Army officer and a Confederate general in the American Civil War. He served at Antietam and Fredericksburg, where Robert E. Lee praised his defense of Marye's Heights, and at Gettysburg, where his division made successful assaults through the Peach Orchard and Wheatfield, but was unable to dislodge Union forces from Cemetery Ridge. After the Knoxville Campaign, he was court-martialed for inefficiency, though this was overturned for procedural reasons. Finally, he was sent to his native Georgia to resist Sherman's March to the Sea but retreated through the Carolinas, losing many men through desertion, and was presumed to have surrendered with Joseph E. Johnston in April 1865.
The Battle of Jonesborough was fought between Union Army forces led by William Tecumseh Sherman and Confederate forces under William J. Hardee during the Atlanta Campaign in the American Civil War. On the first day, on orders from Army of Tennessee commander John Bell Hood, Hardee's troops attacked the Federals and were repulsed with heavy losses. That evening, Hood ordered Hardee to send half his troops back to Atlanta. On the second day, five Union corps converged on Jonesborough. For the only time during the Atlanta Campaign, a major Federal frontal assault succeeded in breaching the Confederate defenses. The attack took 900 prisoners, but the defenders were able to halt the breakthrough and improvise new defenses. Despite facing overwhelming odds, Hardee's corps escaped undetected to the south that evening.
The Carolinas campaign, also known as the campaign of the Carolinas, was the final campaign conducted by the Union Army against the Confederate Army in the Western Theater of the American Civil War. On January 1, Union Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman advanced north from Savannah, Georgia, through the Carolinas, with the intention of linking up with Union forces in Virginia. The campaign culminated in the defeat of Confederate Gen. Joseph E. Johnston's army at the Battle of Bentonville, and its unconditional surrender to Union forces on April 26, 1865. Coming just two weeks after the defeat of Robert E. Lee's army at the Battle of Appomattox Court House, it signaled that the war was effectively over.
The western theater of the American Civil War encompassed major military operations in the states of Alabama, Georgia, Florida, Mississippi, North Carolina, Kentucky, South Carolina and Tennessee, as well as Louisiana east of the Mississippi River. Operations on the coasts of these states, except for Mobile Bay, are considered part of the Lower Seaboard Theater. Most other operations east of the Appalachian Mountains are part of the eastern theater. Operations west of the Mississippi River took place in the trans-Mississippi theater.
The following Confederate States Army units and commanders fought in the Battle of Bentonville of the American Civil War. The Union order of battle is shown separately.
The Second Corps, Army of Tennessee was a military formation in the Confederate Army during the American Civil War.
The Third Corps was a designation used by several military formations in the Army of Tennessee during the American Civil War. In practice, most Confederate corps were referred to by their commanders' name and not by numerical designation. In its various forms, the Third Corps served under William J. Hardee, Edmund Kirby Smith, Simon Bolivar Buckner, Leonidas Polk, and Alexander P. Stewart.
The Battle of Bentonville was fought in Johnston County, North Carolina, near the village of Bentonville, as part of the Western Theater of the American Civil War. It was the last battle between the western field armies of William T. Sherman and Joseph E. Johnston.
This is a list of battles and skirmishes of the American Civil War during the year 1865, the final year of the war. During the year, Union forces were able to capture the last major Confederate ports still open to shipping, along with the Confederate capital, and forced the surrender of the four major Confederate commands.
The 9th Arkansas Infantry Regiment was a regiment of the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War. It served in the Western Theater, seeing action in the Vicksburg, Tennessee and Georgia campaigns. Due to attrition; the 9th Arkansas was consolidated several times with other Arkansas regiments, finally merging in 1865 into the 1st Arkansas Consolidated Mounted Rifles.
The 1st Georgia Sharpshooter Battalion was a sharpshooter unit of the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War. It was authorized by an act in April 1862 by the Confederate Congress, and was formed in Savannah, Georgia. The 1st Battalion Sharpshooters served at Fort McAllister defending the coast of Georgia in the Battle of Fort McAllister (1863). They also saw action at the Battle of Jackson, Mississippi, as well as the Battle of Chickamauga, and the Chattanooga Campaign. The battalion fought to the end of the war, their last engagement being at the Battle of Bentonville in March 1865.
Hiram Bledsoe's Missouri Battery was an artillery battery that served in the Missouri State Guard and the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War. The battery was formed when the Missouri State Guard was formed as a pro-secession state militia unit in response to the Camp Jackson affair. As part of the Missouri State Guard, the unit was engaged in the Engagement near Carthage and the Battle of Wilson's Creek during mid-1861, before fighting at the Battle of Dry Wood Creek and the Siege of Lexington later that year when Major General Sterling Price led the Guard northwards towards the Missouri River. After the Missouri State Guard retreated into Arkansas in early 1862, Bledsoe's Battery served during the Confederate defeat at the Battle of Pea Ridge in March. The battery, as part of the Army of the West, transferred across the Mississippi River into Tennessee in April, where it left the Guard to enter Confederate service on April 21.
