On August 30, 1864, after receiving Hardee’s report from Rough and Ready about Federal threats to the M. & W. R. R. at Jonesboro, Hood directed Hardee and S. D. Lee of the Confederates to come to headquarters. The locomotive N. C. MONROE was sent for them at sunset, picking up Hardee at Rough and Ready and Lee at East Point. On reaching Atlanta, Hardee was directed by Hood to march two corps—his own, under Cleburne, from near Rough and Ready, and Lee’s from East Point—to Jonesboro in an effort to checkmate the Federal threat to Atlanta’s last railroad. Hardee arrived by rail at Jonesboro before dawn on the 31st, in advance of his marching soldiers.