The FReeper Foxhole Profiles William Tecumseh Sherman - Mar. 29th, 2003

http://www.civilwarhome.com/sherbio.htm ^

[SAMWolf]

Dear Lord,

There's a young man far from home,
called to serve his nation in time of war;
sent to defend our freedom
on some distant foreign shore.

We pray You keep him safe,
we pray You keep him strong,
we pray You send him safely home ...
for he's been away so long.

There's a young woman far from home,
serving her nation with pride.
Her step is strong, her step is sure,
there is courage in every stride.
We pray You keep her safe,
we pray You keep her strong,
we pray You send her safely home ...
for she's been away too long.

Bless those who await their safe return.
Bless those who mourn the lost.
Bless those who serve this country well,
no matter what the cost.

Author Unknown

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FReepers from the USO Canteen, The Foxhole, and The Poetry Branch
join in prayer for all those serving their country at this time.

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William Tecumseh Sherman
(1820-1891)

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He never commanded in a major Union victory and his military career had repeated ups and downs, but William T. Sherman is the second best known of Northern commanders. Born on February 8, 1820 in Lancaster, Ohio. His father died when he was nine years old. Widowed and unable to care for the entire family, his mother sent his brother Thomas to be raised by an aunt and William became a foster child to Thomas Ewing, his father's friend. Cump, as he was known, later married Mr. Ewing's daughter, Ellen. Through the influence of his patron, he obtained an appointment to West Point. Only five cadets of the class of 1840 graduated ahead of him, and he was appointed to the artillery. He received a brevet for his services in California during the Mexican War but resigned in 1853 as a captain and commissary officer.

The years until the Civil War were not filled with success. Living in California and Kansas, he failed in banking and the law. In 1859 he seemed to have found his niche as the superintendent of a military academy which is now Louisiana State University. However, he resigned this post upon the secession of the state and went to St. Louis as head of a streetcar company and then volunteered for the Union army.

His assignments included:

• Colonel, 13th Infantry (May 14, 1861)
• Commanding 3rd Brigade, 1st Division, Army of Northeastern Virginia June-August 17, 1861)
• Brigadier General, USV (August 7, 186 1, to rank from May 17)
• Commanding brigade, Division of the Potomac (August 17-28, 1861)
• Second-in-Command, Department of the Cumberland (August 28 - October 8, 1861)
• Commanding the Department (October 8 - November 9, 1861)
• Commanding District of Cairo, Department of the Missouri (February 14 - March 1, 1862)
• Commanding 5th Division, Army of the Tennessee (March 1 - July 21, 1862)
• Major General, USV (May 1, 1862)
• Commanding 5th Division, District of Memphis, Army of the Tennessee July 21 - September 24, 1862)
• Commanding lst Division, District of Memphis, Army of the Tennessee (September 24-October 26, 1862)
• also Commanding the District July 21 - October 26, 1862)
• Commanding District of Memphis, 13th Corps, Army of the Tennessee (October 24 - November 25, 1862)
• Commanding Yazoo Expedition, Army of the Tennessee (December 18, 1862 January 4, 1863)
• Commanding 2nd Corps, Army of the Mississippi January 4-12, 1863)
• Commanding 15th Corps, Army of the Tennessee January 12 - October 29, 1863)
• Brigadier General, USA July 4, 1863)
• Commanding Army and Department of the Tennessee (October 24, 1863 - March 26, 1864)
• Commanding Military Division of the Mississippi (March 18, 1864 - June 27, 1865)
• Major General, USA (August 12, 1864)
• Lieutenant General, USA July 25, 1866)
• General, USA (March 4, 1869)
• Commander-in-Chief, USA (March 8, 1869-November 1, 1883)

Appointed to the colonelcy of one of the regular army's newly authorized infantry regiments, he led the brigade of volunteers of the lst Division which crossed Bull Run to aid the 2nd and 3rd divisions after the attack on the enemy left had begun. Despite being caught up in the route-he already had a low opinion of volunteers-he was named a brigadier general the next month. Briefly commanding a brigade around Washington, he was then sent to Kentucky as deputy to Robert Anderson. He soon succeeded the hero of Fort Sumter in command of the department but got into trouble over his overestimates of the enemy strength. The newspapers actually reported him as being insane.

Removed from command, he was given another chance by his friend Henry W. Halleck in Missouri. But again, while inspecting troops in the central part of the state, he allowed his overactive imagination to run away with him. During the campaign against Forts Henry and Donelson he was stationed at Paducah, Kentucky and charged with forwarding reinforcements to Grant. Forming a good working relationship with the future commander-in-chief, Sherman offered to waive his seniority rights and take a command under him.



Commanding a division, he was largely responsible for the poor state of preparedness at Shiloh but redeemed himself during the defensive fighting of the first day and was wounded. The next day his command played only a minor role. Praised by Grant, he was soon made a major general of volunteers. He was instrumental in persuading Grant to remain in the army during his difficulties with Halleck during the advance on Corinth, Mississippi.

During the early operations against Vicksburg he ordered a doomed assault at Chickasaw Bluffs and a few days later was superseded by John A. McCiernand who accepted Sherman's proposal to attack Arkansas Post. Grant initially criticized this movement as unnecessary but declared it an important achievement when it succeeded and he learned that Sherman had suggested it. Sherman's corps did little fighting in the advance on Vicksburg in May until the disastrous assaults were made.

Following the fall of the river city he was named a brigadier general in the regular army and led an expedition against Jackson. That fall he went to the relief of Chattanooga where he failed to achieve his objectives in the assault against Tunnel Hill at the end of Missionary Ridge. Nonetheless, he was highly praised by Grant who then sent him to relieve the pressure on Burnside at Knoxville, Back in Mississippi, he led the Meridian expedition and then succeeded Grant in overall command in the West, Facing Joseph E. Johnston's army, he forced it all the way back to Atlanta where the Confederate was replaced by John B. Hood who launched three disastrous attacks against the Union troops near the city. Eventually taking possession of Atlanta, Sherman ordered the population evacuated and the military value of the city destroyed. Sending George H. Thomas back to Middle Tennessee to deal with Hood, he embarked on his March to the Sea.


Sherman and his son Thomas, San Francisco, 1865

Taking Savannah, he announced the city as a Christmas gift to the president and the country. Marching north to aid Grant in the final drive against Richmond, he drove through the Carolinas and accepted Johnston's surrender at Durham Station. His terms were considered too liberal and touching upon political matters and they were disapproved by Secretary of War Stanton. This led to a long-running feud between the two. Terms were finally arranged on the basis of the Appomattox surrender.

During the last two campaigns Sherman had earned a reputation for destruction and for the lack of discipline of his troops-his marauding stragglers being known as "Sherman's bummers." Especially resented by Southerners was the burning of Columbia, South Carolina. But there are indications that the fires had spread from cotton set ablaze by the retreating Confederates under Wade Hampton.



On August 12, 1864, Sherman had been promoted to major general in the regular army, and he vacated his volunteer commission. Also, he was the only man to twice receive the Thanks of Congress during the Civil War-first for Chattanooga and second for Atlanta and Savannah. After the war he remained in the service, and was promoted to full general, replacing Grant as commander-in-chief. One of his most important contributions after the war, was the establishment of the Command School at Ft. Leavenworth. He retire from the Army on February 8, 1884.He was noted for his absolute refusal to be drawn into politics. In 1886 he made his home in New York City, where he died on February 14, 1891. He is buried in Calvary Cemetery, St. Louis.

[SAMWolf]

I was surprised when the named the USS REAGAN, becasue I wan't aware thet th tradition had changed.

[MeekOneGOP]

For your Dad, Pippin . . .

[Aegedius]

Homes in Georgia that were occupied were typically -not- burned by Sherman's men. South Carolina got the treatment its leaders brought down on themselves though arrogance, hubris and treason.

You think the women and children of South Carolina who were raped and murdered by this beast deserved it? Including the nuns in the Ursaline Convent in Columbia, who were gang-raped because the brother of the mother superior was a secessionist? The sick people in hospitals, who were put outside in the cold to watch the hospital burn, and then had their blankets stolen by Sherman's goons - they deserved it? I hope the whole board reads and re-reads your comment to see that no post by you is deserving of even a modicum of respect.

The U.S. has never in its history, except for Lincoln/Sherman, send a fully equipped army against unarmed women and children. And, as long as people(sic) like you are kept out of power, we never will again.

[SpookBrat]

Hey guys. We've got our signs all made up and we're walking out the door for the Rally today in Jacksonville. Pictures when I get back.

[cherry_bomb88]

Morning all! And prayers to the families of our fallen troops!

[SAMWolf]

Looking forward to seeing the pictures, Spooky!

[MeekOneGOP]

Alright ! Way to go! I hope you enjoy your Rally as much as we did the Dallas Rally last Saturday.

Ping me when your pics are up ! Thanks . . .

[Pippin]

Thanks, Meekie!

[Pippin]

Way to go, Spooky!

I'm looking forward to seeing those pictures! :^)

[rustbucket]

He is hated in the South, he was one of the first proponents of "total war" and unfortunately he ended up practicing it on fellow Americans.

Along with Reconstruction, Sherman's war on civilians made reconciliation between the two sides after the war very difficult. My Georgia in-laws, whose parents saw and remembered Sherman's troops coming through, hated Sherman with a passion. Even the Slave Narratives speak of how badly Southerners were treated.

War on civilians was practiced by other Union commanders as well. For example, General Hunter burned a thousand homes in Virginia in 1864. However, it is Sherman's exploits in this regard that are most widely known.

Perhaps this practice did shorten the war, but it had consequences. As one Southern newspaper put it in 1865, "A hundred years will not wipe out the animosities and prejudices which this war will leave .... before us are a hundred years of agony..."

Sherman's war on civilians has had little effect on me except as a genealogist. Sherman's troops burned courthouses as they went -- destroying marriage records was, after all, vital to the war effort.

[Non-Sequitur]

I think that the Reagan was the first in this century, followed by a submarine named after Jimmy Carter and an aircraft carrier named after George Bush. Despite my respect for President Reagan I'm sorry that the tradition had been broken. The cat is out of the bag and I have no doubt that a ship will be named after Bill Clinton before long.

[SAMWolf]

The cat is out of the bag and I have no doubt that a ship will be named after Bill Clinton before long.

That is a thought that just sickens me.

[Non-Sequitur]

You think the women and children of South Carolina who were raped and murdered by this beast deserved it? Including the nuns in the Ursaline Convent in Columbia, who were gang-raped because the brother of the mother superior was a secessionist? The sick people in hospitals, who were put outside in the cold to watch the hospital burn, and then had their blankets stolen by Sherman's goons - they deserved it? I hope the whole board reads and re-reads your comment to see that no post by you is deserving of even a modicum of respect.

And no doubt you have verifiable information to document these claims? How about posting it.

The U.S. has never in its history, except for Lincoln/Sherman, send a fully equipped army against unarmed women and children. And, as long as people(sic) like you are kept out of power, we never will again.

And what about the air campaigns in World War II, Viet Nam and the Gulf?

[Non-Sequitur]

That is a thought that just sickens me.

Me too, but you know it's going to happen.

[Aegedius]

Vol III of Shelby Foote's works details the stealing of blankets from shivering patients while their hospitals burned. His book also documents the Ursaline Convent episode, but only says that Sherman's goons dished out "special" punishment to the nuns. If he burned everything else in the city, and meted out "special" punishment to the nuns, I look forward to your guess as to what that might have been. In Mr. Foote's defense, if I worked for 10 to 15 years, or whatever it was, on a book, I would probably soft pedal the most severe war crimes as well, because one sentence of the truth would have caused the volumes to be blacklisted by people, such as yourself, who irrationally cling to a sanitized version of the events in South Carolina.

The article, on which this thread is based, illustrates brilliantly the techniques of propaganda...the authors confess to 1% of the horrors committed by Lincoln/Sherman, (i.e., Georgia) and hope people will not look at the real horrors (South Carolina). It has worked for over 130 years, so far.

Are you saying that we AVOIDED military targets, in order to bomb civilians, in the bombings that you mentioned? Sherman AVOIDED military targets so that he could attack women and children. I repeat, no other U.S. military force has ever done that.

[Non-Sequitur]

Vol III of Shelby Foote's works details the stealing of blankets from shivering patients while their hospitals burned. His book also documents the Ursaline Convent episode, but only says that Sherman's goons dished out "special" punishment to the nuns. If he burned everything else in the city, and meted out "special" punishment to the nuns, I look forward to your guess as to what that might have been.

I will have to guess, I guess, because my volume of "The Civil War: Red River to Appomattox" doesn't contain any of that. And it's supposed to be complete and unabridged, too. No raped nuns, no stolen blankets, nothing like that. Oh it mentions the burning of Columbia, including the Ursuline convent, but doesn't provide the level of detail you do. Perhaps you could point out which page your version of the book contains the information you claim?

Are you saying that we AVOIDED military targets, in order to bomb civilians, in the bombings that you mentioned? Sherman AVOIDED military targets so that he could attack women and children. I repeat, no other U.S. military force has ever done that.

On the contrary, during the war the Air Force didn't avoide civilian targets in its attempt to get to the military ones. And often the line was blurred, like at Dresden, Tokyo, and Hiroshima. But that was war. And war, as some wise man once said, is hell. Those civilian deaths, while regretable, were the outcome from actions which may well have shortened the war. Likewise the removal of Georgia and South Carolina from their ability to support the cause of the rebellion.

[aomagrat]

Carl Vinson was still alive when the USS Carl Vinson (CVN-70) was launched.

[Non-Sequitur]

I had forgotten that. He died before she was commissioned though.

[aomagrat]

Wasn't it unusual to name ships after living people?

In addition to the USS General Sherman, there was also a USS General Bragg, named after Confederate General Braxton Bragg, and a USS General Thomas, named after Union General George H. Thomas. All three boats served on the Mississippi River and its tributaries during the Civil War. All of the generals outlived their namesakes in the Navy.

[SAMWolf]

Thanks for all the info, aomagrat.