November 15, 1864---Sherman begins his March To The Sea

NOVEMBER 15, 1864:       

The March To The Sea:                   

With the ruins of Atlanta still smoldering, sparks flying like motes in the breeze, and a dark and stinking cloud of consumption hanging over the ruined city, William Tecumseh Sherman gives his men the order to move out toward Savannah. In parting, they destroy the last rail lines in Atlanta, heating the iron rails on huge fires fueled with wooden ties. The softened rails are then twisted around tree trunks, telegraph poles, and fence posts, and are known ever after as “Sherman’s neckties.”

 

 

Sherman understands that the physical destruction of the city is but an adjunct to the psychological damage he is wreaking on the South by desecrating one of its crown jewels.

Sherman later wrote:

We rode out of Atlanta by the Decatur road, filled by the marching troops and wagons of the Fourteenth Corps; and reaching the hill, just outside of the old rebel works, we naturally paused to look back upon the scenes of our past battles. We stood upon the very ground whereon was fought the bloody battle of July 22d, and could see the copse of wood where McPherson fell. Behind us lay Atlanta, smouldering and in ruins, the black smoke rising high in air, and hanging like a pall over the ruined city. Away off in the distance, on the McDonough road, was the rear of Howard's column, the gun-barrels glistening in the sun, the white-topped wagons stretching away to the south; and right before us the Fourteenth Corps, marching steadily and rapidly, with a cheery look and swinging pace, that made light of the thousand miles that lay between us and Richmond. Some band, by accident, struck up the anthem of "John Brown's soul goes marching on;" the men caught up the strain, and never before or since have I heard the chorus of "Glory, glory, hallelujah!" done with more spirit, or in better harmony of time and place.

  

Sherman later estimated that the March To The Sea inflicted $100 million (1864) or $1.5 billion (2010) in damage to the South, a mere 20% of which directly "inured to our advantage." He called the rest "simple waste and destruction." Sherman’s two “wings” (supported by a free-ranging cavalry wing) destroyed 300 miles of railroad track, numerous bridges and trestles, and hundreds of miles of telegraph lines. 5,000 horses, 4,000 mules, and 13,000 head of cattle were seized from Southerners along the way, as well as uncountable chickens, ducks, geese and turkeys. The army tore up gardens, raided harvest stores, and confiscated outright 9.5 million pounds of corn and 10.5 million pounds of fodder. There is no estimate (beyond “thousands”) of the number of cotton gins and mills destroyed, nor of the number of barns and farm outbuildings gutted, nor the tonnage of farm implements destroyed. 

One of the local inhabitants’ great fears was that they knew neither where Sherman’s men were nor where they were headed; thus, fleeing was as bad a choice as staying. And as Sherman marched his men liberated thousands of slaves who followed behind Sherman’s wings. At least 40,000 African-American men, women, and children were emancipated during the March To The Sea.

Sherman gave strict orders that farmhouses and town residences were not to be despoiled. He also forbade the harassment of defenseless women and children on pain of execution. But unlike other campaigns, the men engaged in the March To The Sea did not stay ordered in its two columns. Instead the men fanned out over a swath of Georgia countryside nearly 70 miles wide. Farm buildings were ordered burned on the flanks just so Sherman could estimate by the smoke where his flanks were.   

Under such conditions it was impossible to maintain full military discipline; without a question rapes, abuses, brutalizations and other war atrocities occurred. Sherman’s rampaging foragers become known, amongst themselves and amongst Southerners, as “bummers,” and the bummers’ freedom to go wherever they chose convinced most Georgians (and many Confederates elsewhere) that the South’s until then vaunted army was unable to protect the citizenry from simple marauders. In all, Sherman’s wings cast their destructive shadow on 21,000 of Georgia’s 60,000 square miles, leaving ruin wherever they touched.