Southern Storm (78 page)

Sherman’s successful completion of the march further strengthened his great friendship with Ulysses S. Grant. Grant had expended much political capital with President Lincoln in helping to convince the chief executive to approve the operation at a time when some of the lieutenant general’s senior staff opposed it. Even though the public record made clear that it initially took Grant a while to become comfortable with the March to the Sea concept, after the war he would loyally insist that he had been “in favor of Sherman’s plan from the time it was first submitted to me.”

Sherman actually passed two tests in Grant’s way of measuring things. The first was his demonstration of professional competence in managing the campaign. The second was the public manner in which he resisted the kinds of boosters who would have had him competing with his friend’s accomplishments. When Sherman’s senator-brother John reported some talk about promoting him to the same rank as Grant, the General would hear none of it. “I will accept no commission that would tend to create a rivalry with Grant,” he declared. “I want him to hold what he has earned and got. I have all the rank I want.” “How few there are who when rising to popular favor as he now is would stop to say a word in defense of the only one between himself and the highest in command,” Grant confided to his wife at this time. “I am glad to say that I appreciated Sherman from the first feeling him to be what he has proven to the world he is.”

While honest in his respect and affection for what he called “the singular friendship of General Grant,” Sherman also noted that the lieutenant general was “almost childlike in his love for me.”

Sherman’s generalship for the first portion of the march (Atlanta to Milledgeville) showed him at his thoughtful, self-confident best. Both wings moved under instructions drafted beforehand, with neither encountering anything to cause them to alter the program. Kilpatrick’s mounted command operated with the Right Wing, where it provided invaluable service when Howard’s columns passed closest to Macon. Wheeler’s failure to interdict the Federal procession to any serious
degree owed as much to the dispersion of his forces (thanks to conflicting priorities imposed on him by the Confederate leadership) as it did to the effectiveness of Kilpatrick’s screen. Had the Rebel leaders clustered in Macon used their combined militia-infantry and cavalry with a coherent and targeted plan, Sherman’s dispositions might have proven inadequate to shrug off the blows, but as events played out, the disorganized enemy was never able to do anything more than annoy isolated Federal units.

Once at Milledgeville, Sherman rapidly assessed the condition of his forces as well as the Confederate response, then made adjustments. He clearly expected much more trouble coming out of Augusta than he had registered from Macon. (From contemporary communications, the intensity of the fighting at Griswoldville was very much underreported at the time.) Sherman’s willingness to switch Kilpatrick’s command from the Right Wing to the Left shows the flexibility the General applied to his thinking. While he afterward downplayed any danger from Confederate troops gathered in Augusta, his decision to closely support Kilpatrick’s forays with infantry suggests that he viewed the threat seriously.

The cavalry commander’s inflated claims of success at Waynesboro were accepted without question by army headquarters, and based on that assessment of damage, Sherman left his vulnerable logistical tail open to attack by spreading Kilpatrick’s men thin across the entire rear of the Left Wing. Once again, what might have proven to be a fruitful opening for enemy thrusts coming out of Augusta became no more than a mild bother as Braxton Bragg steadfastly refused to release any infantry from the earthworks protecting his temporary charge. Bragg’s tunnel vision was compounded by Hardee’s decision (firmly seconded by Beauregard) to transfer most cavalry operations to South Carolina, leaving just a few mounted units to harry the Federal logistical tail. It was another opportunity squandered.

(Ironically, Sherman scored a significant success against a target not even on his hit list. On November 21, workers began dismantling the irreplaceable machinery at the Confederate Powder Works in Augusta for transportation out of danger. For the next month no gunpowder was produced there. Everything was returned in early December so that the mill complex was back in business by the end of the year. Still,
for thirty critical days, the South’s largest gunpowder maker was virtually shuttered. Production in November 1864 topped 101,000 pounds; that for December was little more than 13,600 pounds.)

Sherman’s equanimity was showing cracks by the time he confronted Savannah’s formidable defenses. Fort McAllister was assaulted without any thought given to less costly alternatives. Luck was again riding with Sherman as the Rebel defenses proved more theoretical than actual. Smart, potentially murderous preparations had been made, but here Union courage and determination overwhelmed any positional advantages enjoyed by the Rebels.

The completely unexpected news that Grant wanted him to break off operations short of finishing the job further upset Sherman’s equilibrium. His thinking on the capture of Savannah veered all across the spectrum. At first he was prepared to tighten his grip in order to starve the garrison into submission. Then, when Grant’s bombshell message was received, he considered a quick assault heedless of the casualties. Sherman finally settled on a third option—a direct assault combined with a strong move against Hardee’s sole link with Charleston, before the Confederate officer saved him the trouble.

Throughout the march, Sherman demonstrated the ethical inconsistency of a person whose strong general principles had to personally confront individuals affected by those policies. His sparing of cotton holdings in Milledgeville, and the varying degree of sympathy he showed to families he encountered along the way, speak to a moral drift that doesn’t match the traditional image of stone-faced devastator. Except on those cases where his acutely personal standard of right and wrong was violated, Sherman never sanctioned destruction outside the limits he had established. Yet he had accepted from the outset that damage would occur that he could not control. Much to the discomfort of those near him who expected a rigid consistency, Sherman embraced the seeming contradictions, assuaging his conscience by blaming southerners for their complicity and deeming himself powerless in the random destructiveness of the storm he had unleashed.

Most of these rough spots were progressively forgotten by Sherman as he later wrote and talked about the March to the Sea. As well written as they are, his
Memoirs
grant him a degree of insight and calm reasoning that is not always borne out by more contemporary correspondence and actions. Sherman eventually distilled his recollections
into a summary overview that trimmed off the dross, leaving only hard certainties. His thoughts were clearly expressed in a speech he gave at a reunion of the Army of the Tennessee (Howard’s wing) that took place in Des Moines, Iowa, on September 30, 1875. On that occasion he delivered what in many ways were his valedictory thoughts on the campaign that would forever define him and set his place in history.

MILITARY DIVISION OF THE MISSISSIPPI

Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman, commanding

ARMY HEADQUARTERS

Lieut. Col. Charles Ewing, inspector general

Capt. Lewis M. Dayton, adjutant general

Capt. Orlando M. Poe, chief of engineers

Capt. Thomas G. Baylor, chief ordnance officer

Brevet Brig. Gen. Langdon C. Easton, chief quartermaster

Col. Amos Beckwith, chief commissary

Dr. John Moore, chief medical director

Maj. J. C. McCoy, aide-de-camp

Maj. Henry Hitchcock, aide-de-camp

Capt. Joseph C. Audenried, aide-de-camp

Capt. George W. Nichols, aide

ARMY OF THE TENNESSEE (RIGHT WING)

Maj. Gen. Oliver O. Howard

PONTONIERS

1st Missouri Engineers

Lieut. Col. William Tweeddale

FIFTEENTH ARMY CORPS
[15,894]

Maj. Gen. Peter J. Osterhaus

FIRST DIVISION

Brig. Gen. Charles R. Woods

FIRST BRIGADE

SECOND BRIGADE

THIRD BRIGADE

SECOND DIVISION

Brig. Gen. William B. Hazen

FIRST BRIGADE

SECOND BRIGADE

THIRD BRIGADE

THIRD DIVISION

Brig. Gen. John E. Smith

FIRST BRIGADE

SECOND BRIGADE

FOURTH DIVISION

Brig. Gen. John M. Corse

FIRST BRIGADE

SECOND BRIGADE

THIRD BRIGADE

ARTILLERY BRIGADE

SEVENTEENTH ARMY CORPS
[11,732]

Maj. Gen. Frank P. Blair Jr.

FIRST DIVISION

Maj. Gen. Joseph A. Mower

FIRST BRIGADE

SECOND BRIGADE

THIRD BRIGADE

THIRD DIVISION

Brig. Gen. Mortimer D. Leggett

FIRST BRIGADE