| Garfield’s popularity grows, his military career ends |
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By: By MIKE WEST, Managing editor
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Posted: Sunday, August 24, 2008 8:17 am
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A would-be government bureaucrat fatally wounded President Garfield.
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As James A. Garfield’s military duty expanded, he discovered that his popularity in his home state of Ohio was growing.
Word about his strong anti-slavery beliefs spread as well.
After the battle of Shiloh, Garfield was ordered to instruct his men to hunt down a runaway slave.
Division commander Brig. Gen. T.J. Wood issued the order and threatened Garfield with court-martial for refusing to obey it. Garfield successfully argued that neither he nor his men had joined the Union army to hunt slaves.
Following Shiloh, Garfield was assigned to oversee the rebuilding of the Memphis and Charleston Railroad lines and the fortification of Huntsville, Ala. During that stint, he contracted malaria and was sent home to Ohio to recover.
Once upon arriving in Ohio, Garfield was surprised to discover he was the Republican nominee for Congress from his home district. He won the seat in the November 1862 general election, but it would be a long time before he actually assumed his post.
Recovering from malaria, he was assigned to temporary duty in Washington and then assigned to Rosecrans’ army in January 1863.
Garfield’s famous report that got the Army of the Cumberland moving against Gen. Braxton Bragg’s Army of Tennessee, won him more friends in Washington.
The so-called Tullahoma Campaign was to prove the highlight of Gen. William S. Rosecrans’ military career.
"The flanking of Bragg at Shelbyville, Tullahoma and Chattanooga is the most splendid piece of strategy I know of," President Abraham Lincoln wrote.
But the Tullahoma Campaign was lost in the shuffle. The brilliant effort that drove Bragg and his Rebels out of Middle Tennessee coincided with the Vicksburg surrendering to Union Gen. U.S. Grant and Robert E. Lee losing at Gettysburg.
With victories at Gettysburg and Vicksburg getting all the ink, Secretary of War Stanton looked to Rosecrans to finish off the Confederacy.
Stanton telegraphed Rosecrans, "Lee's Army overthrown; Grant victorious. You and your noble army now have a chance to give the finishing blow to the rebellion. Will you neglect the chance?"
Typically, Rosecrans was angered by Stanton and once again responded rashly.
"Just received your cheering telegram announcing the fall of Vicksburg and confirming the defeat of Lee. You do not appear to observe the fact that this noble army has driven the rebels from middle Tennessee ... I beg in behalf of this army that the War Department may not overlook so great an event because it is not written in letters of blood,” Rosecrans responded.
Instead of crushing the Army of Tennessee, Rosecrans again hesitated by taking time to regroup and consider the possibilities. This gave the Confederates time to retreat toward Chattanooga and rebuild for a battle that proved to be Rosecrans’ undoing ... Chickamauga.
Bragg’s army had been reinforced. Gen. Joseph E. Johnston's army dispatched a division from Mississippi under Maj. Gen. Hiram T. Walker, and Lee dispatched a corps under Lt. Gen. James Longstreet from Virginia.
Chickamauga was a costly victory for the Confederacy. It claimed an estimated 34,624 casualties: 16,170 for the Union; 18,454 for the Army of Tennessee.
The battle ended Rosecrans’ career, but gave Garfield a glorious moment.
Most of the Army of Cumberland was in full retreat except for the corps of Maj. Gen. George H. Thomas, who was to earn the nickname of “The rock of Chickamauga” for preventing the complete rout of the Union forces.
Ironically, the situation at Chickamauga shared some similarities to Stones River and was marked by the inabilities of some of the same field generals who had failed at Murfreesboro.
At Stones River, Rosecrans helped save the day by riding to the front and using a hands-on approach to realign his army. At Chickamauga, he took the opposite approach after consulting with Garfield.
Garfield was of the opinion that if most of the army was in full retreat, Rosecrans’ place was in Chattanooga where he could reorganize his forces and save the army from complete destruction.
Garfield volunteered to carry the notice of the retreat to Thomas and rode through heavy enemy fire that downed two members of his party.
Brig. Gen. Henry M. Cist, who served on Rosecrans’ staff, said the opposite should have been done.
“Rosecrans should at once have gone to the front, and by his presence there aided, as he did at Stone's River, more than any other thing to retrieve the fortunes of the day, and pluck victory from disaster. Had Rosecrans gone to the front, and discovered from a personal observation the true condition of affairs, and the spirit and morale of the troops there, the chances are that he never would have ordered their retirement to Rossville the night of the 20th. That was the turning-point, and his hour had arrived,” Cist wrote.
Garfield arrived in time to save Thomas's force from being flanked, and he was promoted to major general on Sept. 19, 1863. Rosecrans was relieved from command.
At this point, President Lincoln had new plans for Garfield. He told him to assume his seat in Congress.
On December 7, 1863, when the 38th Congress convened, Garfield received an appointment to the military affairs committee and an appointment to a special committee investigating the expansion of the railroad system.
Many of his early actions in Congress helped set the tone for Reconstruction including the outlawing of slavery and the establishment of Union military governments in Confederate states.
Garfield’s fame as an orator continued to grow as well. By the 40th Congress, he was invited to be the keynote speaker at the dedication of Arlington National Cemetery.
He emerged as a fiscal expert in Congress and was dedicated to tying paper money to the gold standard, making him a leading “hard money” supporter. His ideas about banking were firmly backed by President U.S. Grant. Garfield was named to the House rules committee and was chair of the appropriations committee from 1871 to 1875.
Corruption in the Grant administration did touch Garfield, who was accused of accepting a bribe in the Credit Mobilier scandal and from accepting money from a paving company. Neither allegation was ever proved.
During his days in Congress, Garfield also got involved in the controversial Civil Service reform issue.
Garfield repeatedly won re-election for 18 years and was the leading Republican in the House, but never won the coveted speaker’s post.
At the 1880 Republican Convention, Garfield attempted to win the Presidential nomination for his friend John Sherman. Finally, on the 36th ballot, Garfield himself became the "dark horse" nominee.
By a margin of only 10,000 popular votes, Garfield defeated the Democratic nominee, Gen. Winfield Scott Hancock.
Once president, Garfield soon found himself embroiled in a patronage battle with Sen. Roscoe Conkling of New York. It was a complete victory for the former Ohio Congressman, who seemed to have a goal of Civil Service reform.
Less than four months after becoming president he was shot July 2, 1881 by Charles Julius Guiteau, a deranged man who had sought a consular post. Robert Todd Lincoln, President Lincoln’s oldest son, was a witness to the assassination.
Mortally wounded, Garfield lay in the White House for weeks. Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone, tried unsuccessfully to find the bullet with a metal detector, which he had designed. On Sept. 6, Garfield was taken to the New Jersey seaside. For a few days he seemed to be recuperating, but on Sept. 19, 1881, he died from an infection and internal hemorrhage.
It has been said by experts 1880s medical care contributed to Garfield’s death, and he succumbed from wounds easily survived today.
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