What do you think of our own people who had to know Sherman was advancing to Atlanta and yet left our women and children in the path of the army and working in the mill right up until they were overrun by Sherman's army. The best way to protect those women would have been for our own people not to have left our women to face Sherman's army but to have gotten them out of the way.
From what I understand there were no people/men left to defend them.
The Roswell Battalion, a local defense unit made up largely of mill workers, had been called out, three hours before the arrival of the blue clad troops, leaving only a small detachment of cavalry behind to guard the Roswell Road. Confederate troopers collided with the advance guard of Garrard's cavalrymen just outside of town. Overwhelmed and outnumbered, the Confederates raced through Roswell and over the covered bridge but not before setting it ablaze.
