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  The Best Laid Plans Johnston’s decision to wait passively in his defensive works at Dalton meant that the Rebel commander had yielded the initiative completely to his opponent. Sherman, therefore, enjoyed the great advantage of selecting the time, place, and manner of opening the campaign. Johnston anticipated that once the advancing Union armies had been defeated, he would be able to assume the offensive. Until Sherman began his operations, however, Johnston and the Confederates would do little other than fortify their position, drill, rest, and wait. Several high, parallel ridges—some of the last, southernmost dribbles of the great Appalachian Mountains—cut diagonally across the northwestern corner of Georgia and extend into northeastern Alabama. These ridges give the whole area the appearance of an old-fashioned washboard. Dalton is situated just to the east of one of these heights. This steep, towering elevation, Rocky Face Ridge, so named because of the sheer rock wall (or palisade) that scars its western side, rises about four miles northwest of Dalton and stretches south for some twenty-three miles almost to the Oostanaula River. Near its southern end this ridge fans out to such an extent (some two and one-half miles east to west) that it is, in fact, three ridges. The westernmost of these heights is Horn Mountain, the center Mill Creek Mountain. At their highest points Rocky Face Ridge and Mill Creek Mountain tower about eight hundred feet above the surrounding valleys, Horn Mountain about six hundred feet. Three passes offered routes through this mountain barrier. Mill Creek Gap, known locally as Buzzard’s Roost, sliced through the ridge immediately northwest of Dalton. The Western & Atlantic Railroad and a wagon road passed through this opening in the Rocky Face to link Dalton The Best Laid Plans  and Chattanooga. Dug Gap (sometimes called Mill Gap, especially by Sherman’s Yankees), a man-made crossing, literally notched the top of the ridge about three miles south of Mill Creek Gap. Some thirteen miles southwest of Dalton, Snake Creek Gap pierced the ridge. A long, narrow passage, Snake Creek Gap ran from north to south between Horn and Mill Creek Mountains. It led into a more open area near Sugar Valley along the right bank of the Oostanaula River a short distance west of the little village of Resaca, where the  Railroad crossed the Oostanaula. Only at these three gaps could an army get through the Rocky Face. The ridge shielded Johnston and the Confederates at Dalton against any direct attack from the west. Rocky Face Ridge, however, was only a small part of the strategic position Johnston would have to hold to keep Sherman’s Yankees out of Georgia. The ridge, in fact, constituted no more than the right center of the long line the Rebels had to defend. The right end of the line lay in Crow Valley directly north of Dalton, the left at Rome, some forty miles southwest of Dalton. The Oostanaula River flows past the southern end of Rocky Face Ridge and then runs off to the southwest. At Rome, some twenty-five miles from the ridge’s southern tip (more as the river flows), the Oostanaula joins the Etowah (or Hightower) River, which comes out of the southeast. The two streams unite to form the Coosa, which flows west into Alabama and then turns to the south, eventually reaching the Gulf of Mexico at Mobile. Johnston’s true line of defense began in Crow Valley, ran south along Rocky Face Ridge, and thence continued down the Oostanaula to Rome. It stretched for a few more miles on down the Coosa. Rome was also important because of its industrial capacity, as a river port, and as the western terminus of the Rome Railroad, a branch line that ran east from the city some fifteen miles to join the  at Kingston. Although there was no rail line west of Rome, loss of the town would sever Johnston’s shortest and most direct line of communication with Rebel forces in Alabama. (A railroad did reach Blue Mountain [now Anniston], Alabama, fifty-five miles southwest of Rome. The Rome–Blue Mountain rail gap was one of the Rebels’ great strategic weaknesses.) The Yankees could reach Rome by marching directly south from Chattanooga through the valleys that paralleled Rocky Face Ridge on the west or by moving southeast from the line of the Tennessee River in North Alabama across several of the ridges that run through the area. Once at Rome...

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