A history of the Confederate Army of Tennessee will show that after the disaster at Nashville on Dec. 16th, survivors retreated through Franklin, Columbia and Pulaski on the way to safety south of the Tennessee River. A desperate, exhausted and disorganized body of men managed to cross on a pontoon bridge on Christmas Day, just of out reach of Federal gunboats at Muscle Shoals AL. The army reassembled near Tupelo MS, wounded and sick soldiers being sent further south on the rail line. Many of them were admitted to hospitals at Meridian MS.