THE BATTLE OF ATLANTA: Civilians were Sherman's targets

Not only was William Tecumseh Sherman guilty of many of the crimes that some apologists portray as "tall tales," but also his specter seems to haunt the scandal-ridden halls of the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

Sherman had a relatively poor record battling armies. His lack of preparation nearly destroyed Union forces at Shiloh. He was repulsed at Chickasaw Bluffs, losing an early opportunity to capture Vicksburg, Miss. The result was a bloody campaign that dragged on for months. He was blocked by Gen. Pat Cleburne at the Battle of Chattanooga and needed to be bailed out by Gen. George Thomas' Army of the Cumberland. His troops were crushed by rebel forces in the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain.

But Sherman knew how to make war against civilians. After the capture of Atlanta, he engaged in policies similar to ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia by expelling citizens from their homes. "You might as well appeal against the thunderstorm as against these terrible hardships of war," he told the fleeing population. Today, Slobodan Milosevic is on trial for similar actions in Kosovo.

An article on Sherman in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution last spring asserted that Sherman attacked acceptable military targets "by the standards of war at the time." This seems to assume that human rights were invented with the creation of the United Nations. But Gen. Grant did not burn Virginia to the ground. Gen. Lee did not burn Maryland or Pennsylvania when he invaded. Both sought to destroy each other's armies instead of making war against women and children, as Sherman did.

After promising to "make Georgia . . . howl," Sherman continued such policies in the Carolinas. Not only did he preside over the burning of Columbia, but he also executed several prisoners of war in retaliation for the ambush of one of his notorious foraging parties. While Andersonville's camp commander, Henry Wirz, was found guilty of conspiracy to impair the health and destroy the life of prisoners and executed, nothing like that happened to Sherman.

According to an article by Maj. William W. Bennett, Special Forces, U.S. Army, Sherman turned his attention to a new soft target after the Civil War: Native Americans. Rather than engage Indian fighters, Sherman again preferred a strategy of killing noncombatants. After an ambush of a military detachment by Red Cloud's tribe, Sherman said, "We must act with vindictive earnestness against the Sioux, even to their extermination, men, women and children."

Bennett notes that Sherman carried out his campaign with brutal efficiency. On the banks of the Washita River, Gen. George Armstrong Custer massacred a village of the friendly Cheyenne Chief Black Kettle, who had located to a reservation. Sherman was quoted as saying, "The more we can kill this year, the less will have to be killed the next war, for the more I see of these Indians, the more convinced I am that they all have to be killed or maintained as a species of paupers. Their attempts at civilization are simply ridiculous."

Such slaughter was backed by the extermination of the buffalo as a means of depriving the men, women and children with a source of food. Many Native Americans not killed by Sherman's troopers were forced onto reservations or exiled to Florida to face swamps and disease.

Now we have learned about the abuse of prisoners in Iraq. Such events may seem unrelated, were it not for reports that Sherman's policies are still taught to West Point cadets as an example of how to break an enemy's will to fight.

Are we therefore shocked by the acts of barbarity against Iraqi detainees? As long as we honor Sherman, teach his tactics and revise history to excuse his actions, we can expect more examples of torture and savagery against noncombatants we encounter in other countries.

John Tures is an assistant professor of political science at LaGrange College who was born in Wisconsin, opposes the 1956 Georgia flag and still has a low opinion of Sherman.

"The truth is you make as many leaps speculations as anyone else"

Bring them out and let's see.

"The problem with knowing something about logic is the tendency to label everything one disagrees with as this or that fallacy"

I have watched your postings for a long time. You usually begin with a benign statement, then twist it using a number of fallacious constructs. Many fall for your contortions. You either do that purposefully or it is done outside your consciousness. Which is it?

"Earlier opinions based on the ability to hold on to Pickens no longer had any substance, and the tide turned in the direction of resupplying Sumter, which was certainly a less forceful or risky option than reinforcement or an armed expedition against Charleston."

So, from your own comment, you admit that Lincoln was the one risking war. That solves the debate on Davis.

"The record doesn't provide enough evidence to support your speculations about Lincoln's motives."

During the week of Lincoln ordering the outfitting of the Union warships and their departure to Charleston, do we speculate that on being questioned why, he said, "Oh, but what would I do without my________:

1) Slaves"
2) Union"
3) Southern support".

He is quoted as saying, "Oh, but what would I do without my tariffs?"

No speculation about it.

"The truth is you make as many leaps speculations as anyone else"

Bring them out and let's see.

As I've said, you take the wildest leaps of speculation about Lincoln's motives and exclude any examination of Davis's. If you don't see that yourself -- if you can't distinguish between facts and inferences or recognize honest differences of opinion -- no one else is likely to make you do so. You've already demonstrated that you don't critically examine your own beliefs, so it's unlikely that anyone else could make you do so. It's clear that I'm not going to convince you, and I'm not going to get bogged down in this yet again but I do try to shed light on what I can.

I have watched your postings for a long time. You usually begin with a benign statement, then twist it using a number of fallacious constructs. Many fall for your contortions. You either do that purposefully or it is done outside your consciousness. Which is it?

In other words, you agree with some things I say, and disagree with others. And other people agree more than you do. That's natural. There's no need to hunt for demons or evil intent. We see things differently, and it's not likely that either one of us will convince the other.

It's clear, though, that some people do slap "fallacy" labels on the arguments of others to avoid seriously considering other points of view. Very often those labels don't apply, and just become a kind of mystification that gets in the way of a real exchange of opinions.

"Earlier opinions based on the ability to hold on to Pickens no longer had any substance, and the tide turned in the direction of resupplying Sumter, which was certainly a less forceful or risky option than reinforcement or an armed expedition against Charleston."

So, from your own comment, you admit that Lincoln was the one risking war. That solves the debate on Davis.

Read again. "Reinforcement or an armed expedition against Charleston" were regarded as "forceful or risky options" beside which mere resupply came to look benign, mild, and harmless. That probably was a misjudgment, but it was no surprise that Lincoln would choose an alternative that appeared firm, yet not belligerent to his mind. Kennedy searched for options that fit that description, and so have other Presidents. Maybe he ought to have known that the rebels would use any pretext for war, but he was acting within his rights as President.

And what makes you think that coming to a verdict on Lincoln lets Davis off the hook? Pointing out Ho Chi Minh's evils doesn't excuse Lyndon Johnson's errors or deceptions, nor does the alleged deceit of Franklin Roosevelt vindicate the aggression of Tojo and Hirohito. When you recognize that it's not simply a question of one "side" or the other you might be on your way to seeing things more clearly.

He is quoted as saying, "Oh, but what would I do without my tariffs?"
No speculation about it.

Even if true, that quotation doesn't close off all speculation. Revenue questions might have been on Lincoln's mind at that moment, perhaps because of who he was talking to, yet still not be his primary concern or chief motivation.

That quote shows up in all the neo-confederate material, in a wide variety of different wordings, because it seem to offer easy answers to what was on Lincoln's mind. It is the sort of thing that Confederate apologists would have invented if Lincoln hadn't said it. But the idea that this is some sort of "smoking gun" that proves crude and simplistic revisionist theories doesn't pan out.

And in fact, it may well be the case that Lincoln didn't say it. There's been a lot of controversy surrounding that veracity of that reputed comment of Lincoln's. The quote has taken on a life of its own, and been cast in various words and attributed to a variety of sources.

Virginia politician John B. Baldwin is one answer that's given. At least two accounts of the circumstances of Baldwin's meeting with Lincoln exist (see John Minor Botts's The Great Rebellion), both recorded after the end of the War and Lincoln's death, and they differ. The version attributed to John B. Baldwin about what allegedly happened behind closed doors can't be confirmed or denied, so Baldwin was free to say whatever he wished about the meeting. The comments attributed to him have been called into question however, and frankly, isn't it strange that the President of the United States would take a virtual stranger into his confidence, and tell him what you assume to be his deepest thoughts?

Baldwin's 1866 pamphlet, which seems to be what all the fuss is about, is available on line from the Library of Congress, and frankly it doesn't inspire too much confidence. The first part is an obsessive or paranoid attack on or rebuttal of Botts. The actual testimony is what you'd expect, if Baldwin knew all that would happen later, and if Lincoln's primary objective in seeing Baldwin was to ask him for advice and to sit through lectures by Baldwin. Both are unlikely, so I suspect that Baldwin's actual conversation with Lincoln was substantially different from his own account.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.