"Hood's movements and strategy had demonstrated that he had an army capable of endangering at all times my communications, but unable to meet me in open fight. To follow him would simply amount to being decoyed away from Georgia, with little prospect of overtaking and overwhelming him. To remain on the defensive would have been bad policy for an army of so great value as the one I then commanded, and I was forced to adopt a course more fruitful in results than the naked one of following him to the southwest. I had previously submitted to the Commander-in-Chief a general plan, which amounted substantially to the destruction of Atlanta and the railroad back to Chattanooga, and sallying forth from Atlanta, through the heart of Georgia, to capture one or more of the great Atlantic seaports. This I renewed from Gaylesville, modified somewhat by the change of events. "On the 26th of October, satisfied that Hood had moved westward from Gadsden across Sand Mountain, I detached the Fourth Corps, Major-General Stanley, and ordered him to proceed to Chattanooga and report to Major-General Thomas at Nashville. Subsequently, on the 30th of October, I also detached the Twenty-third Corps, Major-General Schofield, with the same destination, and delegated to Major-General Thomas full power over all the troops subject to my command, except the four corps with which I designed to move into Georgia. This gave him the two divisions under A. J. Smith, then in Missouri, but en route for Tennessee, the two corps named, and all the garrisons in Tennessee, as also all the cavalry of my Military Division, except one division under Brigadier-General Kilpatrick, which was ordered to rendezvous at Marietta. Brevet-Major-General Wilson had arrived from the Army of the Potomac, to assume command of the cavalry of my army, and I dispatched him back to Nashville with all dismounted detachments, and orders as rapidly as possible to collect the cavalry serving in Kentucky and Tennessee, to mount, organize and equip them, and report to Major-General Thomas for duty. These forces I judged would enable General Thomas to defend the railroad from Chattanooga back, including Nashville and Decatur, and give him an army with which he could successfully cope with Hood, should the latter cross the Tennessee northward.