By these changes we nearly or quite doubled our daily accumulation of stores at the front, and yet even this was not found enough.
I accordingly called together in Nashville the master of transportation, Colonel Anderson, the chief quartermaster, General J.L.Donaldson, and the chief commissary, General Amos Beckwith, for conference.

I assumed the strength of the army to move from Chattanooga into Georgia at one hundred thousand men, and the number of animals to be fed, both for cavalry and draught, at thirty-five thousand; then, allowing for occasional wrecks of trains, which were very common, and for the interruption of the road itself by guerrillas and regular raids, we estimated it would require one hundred and thirty cars, of ten tons each, to reach Chattanooga daily, to be reasonably certain of an adequate supply.
Even with this calculation, we could not afford to bring forward hay for the horses and mules, nor more than five pounds of oats or corn per day for each animal.

I was willing to risk the question of forage in part, because I expected to find wheat and corn fields, and a good deal of grass, as we advanced into Georgia at that season of the year.

The problem then was to deliver at Chattanooga and beyond one hundred and thirty car-loads daily, leaving the beef-cattle to be driven on the hoof, and all the troops in excess of the usual train-guards to march by the ordinary roads.

Colonel Anderson promptly explained that he did not possess cars or locomotives enough to do this work.