150 years on, Sherman's March to Sea still vivid

MILLEDGEVILLE, Ga. (AP) — At the heart of this well-preserved antebellum city, sunbeams stream through the arched windows of a grand public meeting room that mirrors the whole Civil War — including its death throes, unfolding 150 years ago this week when Union Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman launched his scorching March to the Sea.

The first major objective along Sherman's route, Milledgeville was Georgia's capital at the time, and this room was the legislative chamber. Crossing its gleaming floor, Amy Wright couldn't help recalling family stories of the hated "foragers" who swept through then. "They were just called 'Sherman's men,'" she said in a hushed voice.

“None of the rest of us give a hoot where you fly your silly flags, on holiday’s or otherwise”

Not to mention shooting guns, carrying guns, drinkin shine and shooting guns and pretty much being free as opposed to you poor schnooks up in the new Communist States of America just North of the Mason Dixon line. So ask yourself who really won?

The slaves are up North now. LOL!

I never said that the battle didn't occur. I merely observed that it was yet another confederate defeat. To summarize, Johnston was under pressure to do something, anything, to stop Sherman. Finally seeing an opportunity, he launched an attack. There was fighting, at the end of which Johnston withdrew, having suffered losses of 2600 killed, wounded and missing, about 12% of his forces, compared to 1500 killed, missing and wounded for Sherman, about 2.5% of his forces. Sherman continued to march through North Carolina. Johnston surrendered his army four weeks later.

So the question is, what kind of propaganda mill has been messing with your head?

DiogenesLamp to DoodleDawg: "...the myth and inaccuracies are primarily from those who take the side that Fedzilla had a right to force people to remain in the Union. "

No, sorry, but the "myth and inaccuracies" all come from our Lost Causer illusionists who endlessly wave their "bright shiny objects" to divert attention away from the real facts of history.

DiogenesLamp to DoodleDawg: "When asked how they can defend a position so at odds with our founding principles (as articulated in the Declaration of Independence) their only answer is "Slavery!!!!"
But when it is pointed out that every state was a slave state in 1776, they simply ignore or rationalize the point."

Sorry, but you clearly have no clue what you're talking about.
Our Founders' principles of 1776 and 1787 are in no way related to those of Fire Eating secessionists of 1860 &1861.
If you read their own founding documents, secessionists of 1861 were only concerned with one issue: protecting slavery based on the unfounded belief that the 1860 election of Lincoln's abolitionist "Black Republicans" threatened their "peculiar institution".

But their secession did not cause Civil War, nor did their forming a new Confederacy.
What started Civil War was the Confederacy's provoking, starting and formally declaring war on the United States while sending military support to Confederate forces in Union states, all before a single Confederate soldier died in battle with any Union force or a single Confederate state was invaded by any Union army.

DiogenesLamp to DoodleDawg: "The fact is, the North could not invade the South for the stated purpose of forcing them back into the Union without violating the very principles upon which this nation was founded.
Their arguments invariably boil down to a form of 'Might makes right.' "

In fact, our Founders' Constitution specifically addresses the need for Federal response to "rebellion", "insurrections" "invasion", "domestic violence" and "treason" -- all of which were in play in early 1861.
So your old Lost Causer mythology simply won't stand up to examination of real historical facts, FRiend.

There was a worse and more evenly matched battle coming shortly thereafter at Raleigh, and both Johnston and Sherman knew it.

What, the confederates would have only been outnumbered 2-1 instead of 3-1? What Sherman knew was that some confederate force would have to attack him at some point. That it was Bentonville instead of near Raleigh was the only surprise. And Johnston's only hope was for Lee to send him men which Lee didn't have. And then there was Grant and his 100,000 men and Sheridan with his 50,000. Presumably they would have been involved. The fact is there was never going to be an evenly matched battle in 1865. The confederates were done.

The slavery issue and abolition were pushed to gin up northern support for a war agains’t the seceding states.

Tell me, Georgia Girl, have you read Georgia's Declaration of Causes for secession? The word "slavery" is mentioned 26 times. And you claim that it was the north that was ginning it up as an issue?

If you actually looked at the northern sentiment in 1861, it was far more about preserving the Union and avenging the attack on Sumter than it was about slavery.

DiogenesLamp: "I know that if you had asked a Northern soldier in 1861 why he was fighting, he would have told you 'because they attacked Ft Sumter.'
If you had asked a Southern soldier in 1861 why they were fighting, he would have replied "Because they invaded our homeland." "

No, from the beginning most Northern citizens understood that preserving the Union was at stake, but the question for months was: would secession start war?
And the answer was always: no, so long as Confederates don't start it, there will be no war.
That's what Lincoln's First Inaugural Address said.
What Fort Sumter did was clearly, unequivocally start the war.

Confederates began the war as an effort to assert their sovereignty over all Federal properties, especially Fort Sumter, and in the firm belief that Southern "manliness" would quickly & easily defeat those effete "Dough-faced" Northerners.

Remember, when Confederates began the bombardment of Fort Sumter, on April 12, 1861, their Army was authorized at 100,000 troops, quickly volunteered for, while the entire US Army totaled around 16,000 mostly scattered in forts out west.
Further, most Union generals were not overly enthusiastic about a war against their Southern class-mates.

So there was no big reason for Deep-South Fire Eaters to think that a "glorious war" would result in their utter defeat and destruction.

DioigenesLamp: "We like to think we are objective, but as has been pointed out, the difference between Heroes and 'War Criminals' is whether or not their side won the war."

No, hardly, and for examples, consider German Generals Rommel and Von Manstein -- both admired by their enemies and never accused of war crimes.
In the US Civil War, the same can be said of Generals Lee & Jackson, amongst others.

The charge of "war crimes" requires particularly heinous actions, of which our Civil War was remarkably free.
Yes, there were some "war crimes" committed, but in comparison to other wars at other times, remarkably few, imho.

DiogenesLamp to rockrr: "Much of our current problems are the result of consequences dating back to the Civil war.
The assertion of such great Federal powers trace back to the abuse of them which occurred in that conflict.
Lincoln created "Fedzilla."
Teddy Roosevelt expanded him.
Woodrow Wilson expanded him even further.
Roosevelt further still."

And that is pure Lost Causer mythology on display.
In fact, the Federal Government after the Civil War was basically the same as before -- about 3% of GDP, once the debt was paid down.
And that's roughly the same as the time of President Washington.
It remained at that same level -- circa 3% of GDP -- for another 50+ years, until the "Progressive Era" of Woodrow Wilson (1913 to 1920) and Franklin Roosevelt (1933 to 1945).
Then and only then, with the 16th & 17th Amendments, the Federal Government grew from 3% to 5% and 10% not counting National Defense.
And the Solid South solidly supported this Federal growth, even through the presidential elections of 1952 and 1956, after which it finally began to dawn on white Southerners that they were not necessarily going to be the biggest beneficiaries of Federal redistributionist largess.

Goldwater's campaign in 1964 was the first which brought large numbers of Southerners to vote Republican.
Johnson's resulting land-slide began the latest round of Federal growth from 15% to today's 23%.
Of course, I don't blame the Democrat South for Texas Democrat President Johnson, but the fact is that Texas-Johnson represented the Old South's love of government largess.

Zackly. Compare ANY other great civil war to ours and we had a LOT fewer atrocities.

At the worst atrocity, the Lawrence Raid, the southern irregulars didn’t rape the women. In fact, they’d generally tip their hats to the ladies before throwing their husbands and sons into the burning building.

Not pleasant, but a lot less awful than any other civil war.

You left a couple out. Lincoln declared a blockade of southern ports on April 19. Since a blockade was considered an act of war, it gave a not too bad rationale for the CSA declaring war on the USA a couple weeks later.

You also left out Virginia launching war on the United States by attacking Harpers Ferry and Hampton Roads before it had even formally seceded. That one’s pretty difficult to justify.

DiogenesLamp to wbarmy: "There is a pretty compelling argument that Lincoln deliberately coaxed them in to that attack because he needed them to attack to justify what he wanted to do to stop them from seceding.
It would appear that he laid out a trap, and they stupidly blundered into it.
In any case, the response was massively disproportionate."

"Unconditional surrender" was only "disproportionate" in the same sense as the US response to Pearl Harbor and Hitler's declaration of war were also "disproportionate".
Sorry, but the correct response to a declaration of war on the United States is "unconditional surrender".
However, destruction in the Confederate south was massively less than Axis powers in WWII.

As for Lincoln's alleged "trap", first, he clearly announced in his Inaugural Address that the Confederacy could not have a war unless they themselves started it.
So Jefferson Davis was fully notified.

Second, Lincoln offered to abandon Fort Sumter, for the right price, and his price was a pledge by Virginia not to secede.
A fort for a state was a good deal, in Lincoln's mind.
Of course, Virginians could make no such pledge, because they themselves needed war to start at Fort Sumter, in order to meet the conditions of their Constitution ratification statement.
War allowed them to claim "oppression" and therefore secede.

Lincoln, realizing he could get no promises from Virginians, left the issue of war and peace in Jefferson Davis' hands, and Davis decided on war.

I think you forgot one.

The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government

Pretty difficult to do it states can leave at will.

Billthedrill to DiogenesLamp: " Rhode Island had banned it in 1652.
First colony to do so.
Also, at the time, the biggest importer of slaves."

No, no, Rhode Island was a British colony until the Declaration of Independence in 1776.
Before that they were subject to British law, which allowed slavery in all colonies.
Yes, in 1652 a portion of Rhode Island, in the Narragansett Bay region did abolish chattel slavery of both whites and blacks.

The whole state of Rhode Island did not begin gradual abolition of slavery until 1782.
The 1840 census report showed on five slaves still living in Rhode Island.

It remained at that same level -- circa 3% of GDP -- for another 50+ years, until the "Progressive Era" of Woodrow Wilson (1913 to 1920) and Franklin Roosevelt (1933 to 1945).

It wasn't the Progressive Era that brought a big increase in federal spending as a percentage of GDP. It was WWI. In fact, by this metric spending generally declined from 1900 to 1916.

Found a neat chart. Don't know how to post it directly.

http://www.alhambrapartners.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/Ritholtz-spending-to-GDP-052812.png

I’m not the one patrolling these threads pretending not to have read a link I provided in order to hopefully add interest and detail, with that pretense being all for some apparent, peculiar political motivation. You are, and it’s quite tedious. You entered into the discussion with a chip on your shoulder and it will no doubt remain there.

And, you’re merely reiterating what Joe Johnston told Robert E. Lee before he ever reengaged Sherman in North Carolina. He put forth a valiant effort, however, something that most Americans came to appreciate within the lifetimes of both Confederate and Union officers.

Pity the same cannot be said for yourself.

The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government. Pretty difficult to do it states can leave at will.

But then there were States not in this Union, were there not? You're wresting Constitutional language just as badly as any strange religious cult wrests Biblical language. Do sets and subsets ring a bell? Does legally requiring that every car on a public roadway be in good repair with insurance mean that no car can leave the public roadway, lol? Has every State even been guaranteed a Republican form of government? That certainly wasn't the case in former Confederate states during Reconstruction, and hasn't been since.

Reconstruction was the method used to attempt to ensure a Republican form of government.

Can’t say I entirely agree with the method, but that was the theory. There are several ways Reconstruction would not have been so traumatic.

One would have been for southerners to accept that they’d fought a good fight but lost and would now have to adapt to that fact. Blacks would just have to be accepted as fellow citizens. Congressinal Reconstruction was to a considerable extent a reaction to southerners who started, fought and lost a civl war, then expected they could go on pretty much as they had before the war. Doesn’t work that way.

The other would have been for Lincoln to have survived. We can never know, of course, but it seems likely he’d have led a Reconstruction that wouldn’t have left so much bitterness behind.

BTW, in just about every other civil war in history, the winners killed tens or hundreds of thousands of the losers in revenge. The USA executed one man.

I've read plenty on Bentonville. The reason I asked who won that battle was your apparent delight in presenting it as some sort of confederate victory, with a tone like "we sure showed Sherman something there." I wanted to hear on what grounds you appeared to be presenting such a position for Bentonville. Something like:

He put forth a valiant effort, however...

Ah, yes, the moral victory in defeat. Carve it on southern tombstones. I wonder how many of the men who died at Bentonville would have like to have known that their commander knew the war was lost and that their deaths would be a moral victory for him that Americans would appreciate later.

You entered into the discussion with a chip on your shoulder and it will no doubt remain there.

It always amuses me when the Lost Causers play at being the unbiased parties on these threads, the only ones with a clear view of the truth that the world conspires to hide.

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