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A world on fire, nations collapsing, ideologies clashing, and ordinary men and women caught in the storm.

Hi, I'm Ray Harris Jr. of the History of World War II podcast, and we'll cover the battles that shaped the war, from the deserts of North Africa

to the frozen forests of the Ardennes, because history isn't just names and dates.

It's people, choices, and consequences at World War II podcast.net. net. Hey, everyone. Welcome to Episode 514 of our Civil War podcast. I'm Rich and I'll be flying solo again with this show.

After a round of colds and coughing, we're both better, but now Tracy is out of town visiting some family here before the holidays. But I'm here

in Colorado holding down the fort, which was about blown away the last week if you've heard

about the crazy windstorms we've had here. But thankfully, we've had power the whole time and no damage in our

neighborhood. So we're thankful for that. Anyway, as you guys will recall with the last episode,

we looked at the struggle along the Dallas New Hope Church Pickets Mill line in late May 1864 as the

federals moved away from the railroad out into the North Georgia countryside. But by the end of

the show, with the failure of that movement, the Yankees had returned to the line of the Western and Atlantic.

We said that although William Tecumseh Sherman hadn't been able to end this stage of the campaign

by reaching the Chattahoochee River, as he'd so optimistically expected to do, and although he'd suffered clear tactical defeats at New Hope Church

on May 25th and at Pickett's Mill on May 27th, well, Sherman had nonetheless won yet another

crucial strategic victory, since in the end Joe Johnston had proved unable to prevent Sherman

from taking one more step down the railroad closer to Atlanta, as another slice of North Georgia

passed into federal hands. In late May and early June, as the armies grappled in the woods around New Hope

Church, and then as they shifted back to the line of the railroad, three important changes took

place in the campaign. One concerned the day-to-day fighting. Beginning in late May, both the Confederates and the Federals built field fortifications on a scale not seen before in the war except in siege operations.

Now, earlier in the campaign, the men had thrown up simple breastworks when

and where it appeared that serious fighting was imminent. Rebel soldiers had piled up rocks on

...