Posted on 02/17/2020 8:06:30 AM PST by Bull Snipe
Union Army troops under the command of Major General William T. Sherman enter the city of Columbia, South Carolina. The evening of the 16th, retreating Confederate cavalry set fire to cotton bales in the streets of Columbia. High winds spread the flames. Sherman’s troops, under orders set fire to government buildings, installations and war factories. In addition, drunk Union soldiers and civilians also started fires. These flames spread and by the morning of the 18th, a majority of Columbia had burned. Sherman in his memoirs says “Though I never ordered it and never wished it, I have never shed any tears over the event, because I believe that it hastened what we all fought for, the end of the War.”
War crimes. If any commander said and did this in Afghanistan or Iraq they’d be on an all expanses paid permanent vacation in Leavenworth, Kansas.
That’ll be ‘The People’s Republic of Milwaukeestan’ this coming summer when the DNC arrives and Bernie is, once again, denied the nomination. :(
In the past, the winner wrote the history and doled out punishment to the enemy, not themselves
It’s going to be fun to watch. It would be better if it rivaled the Chicago 1968 Dem Convention riots.
Denied the nomination, because he can’t put together a broad enough coalition of voters, including black voters.
The initial fires in the afternoon and evening of the 16th were set by Joe Wheelers retreating cavalry. They were trying to destroy the cotton so it would not fall into Union hands. They slit bales opens and lighted them. The burning cotton lint was blown over the area and started other fires.
Milwaukee will be like Rome, except there will be 3,979 fiddlers.
I’ve decided to vote for Bernie in the primary to get the party started.
LOL! Operation Chaos. ;)
So then he torched Atlanta.
> War crimes. <
History is written by the winners, of course. But let’s say Sherman did order the burning of Confederate civilian buildings. Is that very much different from the Allied generals who ordered the fire-bombing of Axis cities?
I have no easy answer for that.
I would say that WWII is not the same as Civil War I, especially one that was very near the end.
That was earlier. In the fall of 1864.
> The initial fires in the afternoon and evening of the 16th were set by Joe Wheelers retreating cavalry. <
A little Joe Wheeler trivia: During the Spanish-American War, the divisional commander of Teddy Roosevelt’s Rough Riders was...Union major general Joe Wheeler.
Yep, same guy.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Wheeler#Spanish%E2%80%93American_War
Ha! I should have just said “major general Joe Wheeler” there (not Union).
loved that mans war time quotes.
Wheeler was not the only ex-Confederate general to serve in the U.S. Army during the Spanish American War. Mathew Butler, Fitzhugh Lee and Thomas Rosser also held commissions as General of Volunteers during the SpanAm war.
Wheeler later was commissioned a Brigadier General in the U.S. Army and served in the Philippines after his service in Cuba.
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