Description:

WILLIAM T. SHERMAN
(1820-1891) Union major general declared by the press to be "insane", he led his army in their March to the Sea, taking Atlanta, Savannah and Columbia along the way. Important, revealing A.L.S. as Lieutenant General on Military Division of the Missouri letterhead, 4pp. 8vo., July 8, 1868 to a fellow general essentially holding himself blameless for the sacking of Atlanta and the looting and destruction caused as his army marched through Georgia and the Carolinas. In part: "...I have just got back from the wedding in Cleveland, Ohio of General Miles with my niece Mary Sherman...Of course, it must be as you say. A church was burned in Atlanta. But I cannot recall the building to my memory though I daily visited every part of the place during September. More than a month before the great fire that occurred the day & night before I left viz. Nov. 12 [1864]...All through the South they charged to me and my army acts that were committed by vagabond whites & negroes. And it was of this that I wanted to inquire. I had heard that after we had gone from Atlanta hundreds of people flocked in and plundered and destroyed much we had left. Still as you say that makes no difference in the charity of the case. And I am glad you have succeeded in providing a proper place for the congregation...General Grant & family are now out on the farm of the Graves [?] 11 miles in the country. The Genl. will in a few days go up to Leavenworth and out on the Plains. I will go with him a part of his wandering way. Democratic nomination not yet announced though it will be made tomorrow or tomorrow...". Folds, with some light soiling to last page, else very good. It is widely believed that it was on Sherman's orders that Atlanta's munitions factories, railroad yards and mills were burned, the fire eventually consuming nearly the entire city. And of course, Sherman has been blamed for the depredations undertaken by the men under his command as they marched through Georgia and the Carolinas. Grant was likely on the road stumping for votes. He reluctantly accepted the Republican presidential nomination in 1868, easily winning the subsequent election against N.Y. Gov. Horatio Seymour. The first letter we have encountered in which Sherman mentions his role in the Atlanta.

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January 20, 2010 10:00 AM EST
Stamford, CT, US

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