Gen.William Tecumseh Sherman biography and quotes*********

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War is the remedy our enemies have chosen and I say give them all they want....William Tecumseh Sherman

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The Battle Hymn Of The Republic Melody 1

Battle Hymn Melody 2

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Pictures of General Sherman*[1]*[2]*[3]*[4]*[5]*[6]*

Statue of Sherman by Saint-Gaudens, Grand Army Plaza, Central Park, New York

Burial Monument Inscription

Burial Monument

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General Sherman's biography...

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William Tecumseh Sherman was born in Lancaster, Ohio, February 8, 1820. The family was of New England origin and had come to America from England in the seventeenth century.

When sixteen years of age, Sherman secured an appointment to West Point where he tells us " I was not considered a good soldier." But he was at least a good student for he graduated number six in a class of forty-two. The survivors of one hundred and forty-one who had entered four years before.Graduating in 1840 he served in the South and California, resigning from the military in 1853.

Next he worked at banking without great success and then went to Kansas and was admitted to the bar to practise law, on as he put it "general intelligence". Sherman's law career was rather humorous. He lost his only case, a dispute over the possession of a shanty, but joined with his client to defeat the judgment by removing the house at night.

Having little success in civilian life, in 1859 he decided to return to the military but some friends in The War Department helped place him as superintendent of the Louisiana State Seminary (now Louisiana State University) a military college. He was an efficient administrator and well liked by the young students and the faculty. He was a good story-teller and frequently his room would be crowded with students and young professors, listening to his descriptions of army life and of the great West.

With the start of the Civil War he resigned his position. He was said to have wept bitterly when he heard of the withdrawal of South Carolina from the Union. He believed that the South, though itself at fault, was aggrieved. He declared that " the politicians have got the country into this trouble; now let them get it out."

Within a few months he had a change of heart and offered his services to the Union. He was appointed Colonel of the 13th US Infantry. At Bull Run or Manassas, he commanded a brigade with credit and though it was routed he quickly restored its organization and morale and for this he was made a brigadier-general of volunteers.

Next he went to the West and after analyzing the situation made some statements about the troop strength needed to win in the West. These statements turned out to be correct but were politically  incorrect and an attempt was made to drive him out of the service. The politicians sought to paint him as insane, unsuccessfully.

The next year in the campaign to open the Mississippi Valley he began to show his wonderful capacity for making marches count as much as fighting. He was now regarded as one of the best minor leaders. With victory at Vicksburg under Grant his military reputation was secure.

For his success in the capture of Atlanta against two highly regarded southern generals he was made major general in the regular army. What followed was his March to the Sea through Georgia(during which he was out of contact with the north for a month). End result he captured Savannah then went north to the Carolinas and was a force in the conclusion of the war.

 

Military experts feel that he was a great strategist if not so successful a tactician. He struck decisively at the South's weak points and according to Gen. Lee, he was able to give the Confederacy a mortal wound before any of its armies surrendered. I read one account of a confederate officer...who intended to blow a railway tunnel and one of his fellow officers said 'Don't bother, Sherman probably has another one in his pocket'. To relate what the Union Army was capable of accomplishing, the following took place on the advance to Chattanooga. The confederates had destoyed a great distance of railway line needed to supply the northern army's advance. The union troops without a dedicated engineering construction unit were able to repair the line. As most of the troops had been civilians before the war, they already had the various skills necessary. They completed the repair of 102 miles of track and 182 bridges(many over deep wide chasms) in forty days, while also maintaining defense of their lines.

There was much comment that his armies unecessarily stripped the land on their marches and caused much suffering therby to the local civilian population. That Sherman himself did not intend to go beyond the limits of legitimate warfare is clear but his troops of necessity had to forage and this behavior led to excesses. That could have been curtailed with more effective supervision, leadership. Increasing bitterness was developing as the war progressed on both sides. One anecdote....The story is told that some Union troops were intent on confiscating a women's dog...she said...'Surely this dog poses no threat as it is a poodle'. The Union soldiers replied 'Yes man, but we cannot be sure what it will grow up into'.(lmao) 

In later life he spent his time in New York amongst old army associates and died there on February 14, 1891, aged seventy-one years. Inconspicuous among the many generals who went to New York to pay respect to the dead leader was an older man in civilian dress...Sherman's ablest foe in war, Gen Joseph E. Johnston, CSA. Gen. Sherman was buried in St. Louis by the side of his wife and his little son, who had died nearly thirty years before. At the grave in St Louis another man, who had been a young professor under Sherman in Louisianna and a soldier under Stonewall Jackson, was also seen to pay his last respects to Sherman.

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Sherman's Quotes * * * ********* * * * ******** * * *                                                        

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This war differs from other wars, in this particular. We are not fighting armies but a hostile people and must make old and young, rich and poor, feel the hard hand of war.

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Every attempt to make war easy and safe will result in humiliation and disaster.

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An Army is a collection of armed men obliged to obey one man. Every change in the rules which impairs the principle weakens the army.

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Courage_A perfect sensibility of the measure of danger and a mental willingness to endure it.

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Grant stood by me when I was crazy and I stood by him when he was drunk and now we stand by each other.

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Hold the fort! I am coming!

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It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, more vengeance, more desolation. War is hell.

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I beg to present you as a Christmas gift the city of Savannah.

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I hate newspapermen. They come into camp and pick up their camp rumors and print them as facts. I regard them as spies, which in truth, they are.

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I will accept no commission that would tend to create a rivalry with Grant. I want him to hold what he has earned and got. I have all the rank I want.

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If nominated I will not run; if elected, I will not serve.

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If the people raise a great howl against my barbarity and cruelty, I will answer that war is war and not popularity seeking.

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It's a disagreeable thing to be whipped.

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My aim then, was to whip the rebels, to humble their pride, to follow them to their inmost recesses and make them fear and dread us. Fear is the beginning of wisdom.

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The carping and bickering of political factions in the nation's capital reminds me of two pelicans quarreling over a dead fish.

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The whole army is burning with an insatiable desire to wreak violence upon South Carolina. I almost tremble for her fate.

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War is cruelty. There is no use trying to reform it. The crueler it is, the sooner it will be over.

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War is the remedy our enemies have chosen and I say give them all they want.

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here is a link to...Gen Ulysses S Grant...Battle hymn

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