central_va: "As far as I know the raping was at a minimal by Yankee bushwackers, unless you include the livestock."
Late in the war, there was burning and looting on both sides -- Chambersburg, Pennsylvania comes to mind -- but it's hugely important to remember that compared to most any war you can think of, the US Civil War was fought mainly by gentlemen who did not deliberately assault civilians.
As for post-war scalawags and carpetbaggers, no one here has defended them, and all generally agree the South had a hard go of it for many years.
But a more neutral report describes scalawags as just another political party, no more or less corrupt than others:
"In South Carolina there were about 100,000 scalawags, or about 15% of the white population.
During its heyday, the Republican coalition attracted some wealthier white southerners, especially moderates favoring cooperation between open-minded Democrats and responsible Republicans.
Rubin shows that the collapse of the Republican coalition came from disturbing trends to corruption and factionalism that increasingly characterized the party’s governance.
These failings disappointed Northern allies who abandoned the state Republicans in 1876 as the Democrats under Wade Hampton reasserted conservative control.
They used the threat of violence to cause many Republicans to stay quiet or switch to the Democrats..."...Scalawags were denounced as corrupt by Redeemers.
The Dunning School of historians sympathized with the claims of the Democrats.
Agreeing with the Dunning School, Franklin said that the scalawags "must take at least part of the blame" for graft and corruption.
'But their most serious offense was to have been loyal to the Union during the Civil War or to have declared that they had been loyal and thereby to have enjoyed full citizenship during the period of Radical Reconstruction.'"The Democrats alleged the scalawags to be financially and politically corrupt, and willing to support bad government because they profited personally.
One Alabama historian claimed: 'On economic matters scalawags and Democrats eagerly sought aid for economic development of projects in which they had an economic stake, and they exhibited few scruples in the methods used to push beneficial financial legislation through the Alabama legislature.
The quality of the bookkeeping habits of both Republicans and Democrats was equally notorious.'However, historian Eric Foner argues there is not sufficient evidence that scalawags were any more or less corrupt than politicians of any era, including Redeemers."
We both know the entire "March to the Sea" and the South Carolina campaign were slash and burn operations. You lose credibility when you make statements like that. Ridiculous.