ly ten thousand men at Knoxville after allowance was made for
what could be gathered from the country. General Buell was
unquestionably correct in his view of the matter, but the strong
political reasons for liberating East Tennessee made the President
unwilling to be convinced that it was then impracticable. He,
however, could not furnish the transportation required for the
movement proposed by Fremont, and hesitated to interfere further
with the conduct of military affairs within Buell's territorial
limits. Besides this, Rosecrans's plan had found such favor with the
Secretary of War that it was laid before Fremont with official
approval. [Footnote: _Id_., vol. xii. pt, iii. p. 8.] The stripping
of West Virginia of troops to make a column in Kentucky seemed too
hazardous to the government, and Fremont changed his plan so as to
adopt that of Rosecrans with some modifications.

He proposed to leave General Kelley with sufficient troops to
protect the line of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, and with
Blenker's division (which was taken from the Army of the Potomac and
given to him) to advance from Romney in the valley of the South
Branch of the Potomac, ascending this valley toward the south,
picking up Schenck's and Milroy's brigades in turn, the latter
joining the column at Monterey on the great watershed by way of the
Cheat Mountain pass. From Monterey Fremont purposed to move upon
Staunton, and thence, following the southwestern trend of the
valleys, to the New River near Christiansburg. Here he would come
into communication with me, whose task it would have been to advance
from Gauley Bridge on two lines, the principal one by Fayette and
Raleigh C. H. over Flat-top Mountain to Princeton and the Narrows of
New River, and a subordinate one on the turnpike to Lewisburg. His
plan looked to continuing the march with the whole column to the
southwest, down the Holston valley, till Knoxville should be
reached, the last additions to the force to be from the troops in
the Big-Sandy valley. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xii. pt. i.
p. 7.]

General Garfield (then colonel of the Forty-second Ohio) had already
been sent by General Buell with a brigade into the Big-Sandy valley,
and General George W. Morgan was soon to be sent with a division to
Cumberland Gap. Although these were in Fremont's department, the War
Department issued an order that they should continue under General
Buell's command at least until Fremont shoul