By 3 p.m. on November 29, 1864, Union Gen. John M. Schofield realized his command was in great danger as the bulk of his army remained near Columbia, Tennessee, while Confederate Gen. John Bell Hood’s troops were north of him and approaching the Columbia Turnpike near Spring Hill. To avoid being cut off from the rest of the Federal army at Nashville, Schofield moved northward, and by nightfall the leading elements of his army were nearing Spring Hill. Gen. Thomas H. Ruger’s division led the column and passed to the north, moving directly past Confederate troops camped there, followed by Gen. Jacob D. Cox’s division and then Gen. Thomas J. Wood’s division. As they passed, the soldiers saw the lights of thousands of Southern campfires in the surrounding fields. At about 1 a.m., Gen. Nathan Kimball’s division also marched north and slipped away. Finally, at about 5 a.m., Gen. George D. Wagner’s division, which had arrived at Spring Hill about noon on November 29 and had helped fend off Gen. Patrick Cleburne’s movement toward the turnpike, began to withdraw and move north toward Franklin. Five relatively vulnerable Federal divisions had marched directly past Hood’s Confederates in what was perhaps the greatest escape in the history of the war, and Hood lost the opportunity at Spring Hill to cut off Schofield’s forces from Union troops at Nashville under Gens. Andrew J. Smith and George H. Thomas.