Adairsville

On May 17, 1864, Confederate and Union forces clashed near Adairsville, just northeast of Rome, Georgia, in an engagement that formed part of the Atlanta campaign during the American Civil War. Though short in duration, the fight served a clear purpose for the Confederates: slowing the Union advance so that General Joseph E. Johnston could set up an ambush against the Union army further along at Cassville.

Prelude

After the fighting at Resaca on May 13-15, Joseph E. Johnston's forces withdrew toward the south with William Tecumseh Sherman's troops close behind them. Johnston could not locate suitable ground to make a stand below Calhoun, Georgia, so he pressed on toward Adairsville instead. Meanwhile, Confederate horsemen managed a skilled delaying action in the rear, holding Sherman's advance toward Atlanta at bay.

The battle

After crossing the Oostanaula River, Johnston hoped to halt and lure the Federals into an expensive attack. He anticipated favorable ground near Calhoun, but the terrain did not suit his purposes, so on the night of May 16-17 he moved his Confederate troops south toward Adairsville. Sherman pursued, splitting his army into three columns that advanced along a wide front. Skirmishing broke out repeatedly along the way, though the larger forces avoided direct combat.

About two miles above Adairsville, Oliver Otis Howard's Union IV Corps clashed with dug-in Confederate troops under William J. Hardee. Major Arthur MacArthur, Jr., father of Douglas MacArthur, led the 44th Illinois and 24th Wisconsin infantry regiments in an assault on Benjamin F. Cheatham's division, and the attackers took severe casualties. Howard readied the remainder of his corps for combat, but General Thomas called off any additional assaults. Near Adairsville itself, Johnston again searched for ground suited to a defensive fight, yet once more the landscape proved unworkable, forcing him to keep retreating. Even so, while pulling back he formulated a plan aimed at wiping out a portion of Sherman's army. Two routes ran southward out of Adairsville, one toward Kingston and another toward Cassville, and it appeared probable that Sherman would split his forces to use both. Such a division would give Johnston a chance to strike one Union column before reinforcements from the other could arrive.

When Confederate troops pulled out of Adairsville on the night of May 17-18, Johnston dispatched Hardee's corps toward Kingston while leading the rest of his army toward Cassville. His hope was that Sherman would assume most of the Southern army lay at Kingston and would mass his troops there in response. Hardee's men would then pin down the Federals at Kingston, giving Johnston, together with Leonidas Polk and John Bell Hood, the chance to crush the smaller Union column near Cassville.

Sherman took the bait just as Johnston anticipated, directing James B. McPherson along with most of George Henry Thomas's army toward Kingston, and sending only John Schofield with a single corps of Thomas's troops down the Cassville road. On the morning of May 19, Johnston instructed Hood to advance along a country lane roughly a mile east of the Adairsville-Cassville route and deploy his corps facing west for battle. The plan called for Polk to strike the front of the Union column while Hood hit its left flank. While maneuvering into position, however, Hood encountered Daniel Butterfield's Federal brigade approaching from the east, a dangerous development, since had Hood already been facing west, those Federals could have struck his corps from the exposed flank and rear. Following a short clash with the Northern troops, Hood withdrew to reunite with Polk. Convinced that his chance for a decisive engagement had slipped away, Johnston ordered Hood and Polk to fall back to a fresh line southeast of Cassville, where Hardee, having been driven from Kingston, soon joined them. Johnston positioned his army along a ridge, expecting Sherman to attack on May 20, and as always he felt certain his men could turn back the enemy.

That night, however, the Confederates crossed the Etowah River in retreat. Their emotions ran high as they withdrew, having already given up strong positions at Dalton and pulled back through Resaca, Calhoun, and Adairsville, and now once more slipping away under cover of darkness. Earlier that day, as they had readied themselves for combat, spirits had soared, making the letdown all the more painful. Confidence in the army would recover somewhat in the days that followed, but a good many Confederate soldiers never again trusted Johnston's judgment as fully as they once had.