November 14, 1864---William Tecumseh Sherman destroys Atlanta

NOVEMBER 14, 1864:      

The Burning of Atlanta: 

  

The city of Atlanta is destroyed in flame. General William Tecumseh Sherman U.S.A. writes in his diary:

We will soon be moving out of Atlanta and heading East towards the Atlantic Ocean. I have ordered my troops to completely destroy all useful military facilities in the city in which the Confederate would be able to use after we depart. It will not be long until the Confederates recapture the city and it would be foolish to leave them anything useful. Soldiers were sent to destroy ammunition they were not able to carry, train equipment, and industrial machine shops. Even though I have ordered thousands of men into the city, approximately only 30 percent of the city lay in ruins. After the war we will need to rebuild these cities and residential homes do not need to be destroyed for military purposes.

 

Regardless of Sherman’s assertion that “only 30 percent” of Atlanta is afire, the commercial heart of the town, along with many central city residences, are consumed by fire this day. And although Sherman has promised not to burn the churches and hospitals, the unchecked fire does do great damage to all buildings without discrimination. A great reek and pall rises over the burning city as building after building catches aflame. Homes farther from downtown are more likely to be spared, though sparks and flaming debris borne on the wind burn many outlying houses as well. 

Atlanta burns all day and night, its lurid red glow reflected on the cloud bottoms and visible for miles. Just beyond the city, terrified refugees who cannot not find space on a train, hire a carriage, or find a wagon, run from the fire in the hell-lighted night. 

 

With John Bell Hood’s army far away in Tennessee and no regular Confederate forces closer at hand, the fleeing people become the targets of highwaymen, many still wearing the tatters of their Confederate uniforms. Bitterly do they rue their stubbornness in returning to the doomed city, though they blame Sherman, “That red-headed devil”, “Judas Iscariot”, as the author of their woes.  

 

November 13, 1864---Marietta in flames

NOVEMBER 13, 1864:      

General Sherman begins the Burning of Atlanta by putting the nearby town of Marietta to the torch. While he is setting Marietta aflame, the last civilian holdouts in Atlanta --- who Sherman did not want in the town anyway --- are hurriedly packing a few belongings. Most of these geegaws are left abandoned on the railway station platform when it is discovered that the escape trains are too crowded to allow for baggage. 

Father Thomas O’Reilly of Our Lady of The Immaculate Conception wrings a last minute concession from Sherman not to burn the town’s hospitals and houses of worship. Sherman’s men move over Atlanta like a horde of locusts, seizing anything that may be of use on the March, and setting the rest afire. 

November 12, 1864---"A devastation more or less relentless . . ."

NOVEMBER 12, 1864:     

Generals Grant and Sherman meet at Kingston, Georgia. Despite some concerns about John Bell Hood’s Confederate force away north, Grant gives Sherman the go-head to cut loose from his supply lines and march to the sea with 60,000 troops arrayed in two parallel columns of 30,000 men each. Since Union forces were abandoning their supply and communication line to Chattanooga, Sherman gave orders to “forage liberally during the march.” He also ordered mills and cotton gins burned along the way and if guerrilla activity was encountered then “army commanders should order and enforce a devastation more or less relentless according to the measure of such hostility.” Although Confederate resistance was nil during the March, much devastation was wrought. 

November 11, 1864---"Now, Mr. Hay, see if you can get this open . . ."

NOVEMBER 11, 1864:       

John Hay, one of President Lincoln’s two secretaries (the other being John Nicolay), and a future Secretary of State under President Theodore Roosevelt, writes of the first post-election Cabinet meeting in Washington. Back in the dark summer, Lincoln had written a letter and had had his Cabinet all endorse the back on trust without knowing the contents. Hay writes:

At the meeting of the Cabinet today, the President took out a paper from his desk and said, "Gentlemen, do you remember last summer I asked you all to sign your names to the back of a paper of which I did not show you the inside? This is it. Now, Mr. Hay, see if you can get this open without tearing it!"  

He has pasted it up in so singular style that it required some cutting to get it open. 

It read: "This morning, as for some days past, it seems exceedingly probable that this Administration will not be re-elected. Then it will be my duty to so co-operate with the President elect, as to save the Union between the election and the inauguration; as he will have secured his election on such ground that he can not possibly save it afterwards." 

When he revealed the contents of the note, the President said, 

'You will remember that this was written at a time when as yet we had no adversary, and seemed to have no friends. I then solemnly resolved on the course of action indicated above. I resolved, in case of the election of General McClellan, being certain that he would be the candidate, that I would see him and talk matters over with him. I would say, 'General, the election has demonstrated that you are stronger, have more influence with the American people than I. Now let us together, you with your influence and I with all the executive power of the Government, try to save the country. You raise as many troops as you possibly can for this final trial, and I will devote all my energies to assisting and finishing the war.'"

 

Mr. Seward said, 'And the General would answer you, 'Yes, Yes;' and the next day when you saw him again and pressed these views upon him, he would say, 'Yes, Yes;' & so on forever, and would have done nothing at all.'

 

"At least,' answered Mr. Lincoln, 'I should have done my duty and have stood clear before my own conscience."

  

November 10, 1864---100 miles from Washington D.C. they ask, "Did Lincoln win re-election?"

NOVEMBER 10, 1864:      

The Richmond Times-Dispatch comments on the expectation that Abraham Lincoln will win re-election in the North:

[O]ur men . . . still remain [ ] in momentary expectation of a shouted salute, wherewith it is expected the Yankees will greet the first news of Lincoln's success at the Northern polls. It was not thought they will wait for official returns as to the general result of the election, but will bang away with their double-shotted guns over any important success. Our men [are] prepared to hurl back a defiance in kind . . .  the result of the election in the principal cities must be known to-day.