He was right. The Rebels were badly shot up. Forrest himself had two horses killed under him. Never a good loser, he turned on his youthful commander with such fury that aides barely prevented a duel. As it was, Forrest swore he would resign if forced to serve under Wheeler again.

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Wheeler and his troopers next struck a double blow against the Union railroads, shooting up one train and capturing another. Their haul included 70 Union prisoners, 40 freed Confederates and $30,000 in cash. The total human cost for both attacks was one man wounded.

When he was not in the field, Wheeler found time to write a new Confederate cavalry manual. Among the first to recognize that the day of the mounted charge was over, he advised troopers to ride to battle but fight on foot. That was a lesson many officers had still not learned 50 years later.

Throughout the long summer of 1863, Bragg pulled back before the weight of the Union army. Wheeler watched one flank, Forrest the other. Unable to keep Union raiders at bay, Wheeler was criticized in the Southern press for the first time. The Confederate retreat stopped at Chickamauga Creek. There, on September 19, Bragg hit Rosecrans with everything he had. Wheeler’s men drove the Union horsemen from the field, then joined Lt. Gen. James Longstreet as he hammered the Union infantry. By nightfall, a beaten Rosecrans was pulling back to Chattanooga.

Ten days after the battle, Wheeler hit the Union army from behind again. Crossing the Tennessee River, he burned two depots and 400 wagons before rain slowed his progress and the Federals caught up with him. He fought a running battle back to the Tennessee River, losing half of his cannons and a quarter of his men. The high cost of the raid made it his last under Bragg.

Wheeler wasted a month in Knoxville with Longstreet, then rejoined Bragg in Dalton after Bragg’s whipping at Chatta-nooga at the hands of the new Union commander in the West, Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant. During the winter, both armies got new leaders. Bragg was replaced by General Joseph Eggleston Johnston. Grant moved east, and Maj. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman stepped into his old command.

On May 7, 1864, Sherman moved forward, starting the Confederates on a two-month-long retreat. Each time they made a stand, the Union troops slipped around a flank and it all started again. Wheeler did some of his best work during that period. Time after time his scouting and screening warned Johnston of Union moves before they could spring the trap on him. In spite of that, Wheeler felt the wrath of the Southern press once more. They did not want retreats, no matter how well handled. They wanted victories. And they wanted Wheeler raiding in the Union army’s rear, not reconnoitering.

The Confederate government, like the press, wanted more action. As the Union army crossed the Chattahoochee River, word came from Richmond that Johnston was being relieved of his command. John Bell Hood, promoted to the temporary rank of general, took his place.

Hood’s mandate was to attack. Wheeler’s cavalry and one corps of infantry guarded the right, while the rest of the army hit the left at Peachtree Creek on July 20. When that produced no gain, Hood tried the other side of the Union line on the 22nd, again without success. In support of the second attack, he sent Wheeler on a raid behind the Union forces. That, too, failed.

Going on the offensive, Sherman moved on Ezra Church, west of Atlanta, on July 27. At the same time, he sent two cavalry forces against the railroad at Jonesboro. Brigadier General Edward M. McCook, on the right, had 3,500 men, while Maj. Gen. George Stoneman, on the left, had 6,500. Stoneman also hoped to free Union soldiers in prisoner-of-war camps at Macon and Andersonville. He split his force, leading a third against the prison camps and sending the rest, under Brig. Gen. Kenner Garrard, to meet McCook. Wheeler, with less than 7,000 troopers, was ordered to stop them.

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