Sherman refunded all of the money that his investors lost from his own savings. In , he joined a bank in St. Louis, Missouri. It failed as well, and Sherman began to practice law in Leavenworth, Kansas. In , Sherman became the superintendent of the Louisiana Military Academy. He also served as a professor of engineering, architecture, and drawing.
Sherman resigned his position and returned to the North. In May , he joined the Union army and was immediately commissioned a brigadier-general of volunteers. His men suffered numerous casualties in the battle. He was transferred to the Department of the Cumberland in August , and Sherman assumed command of that department in October of that year. In this position, Sherman played a vital role in securing Kentucky for the Union.
In the first year of the war, Sherman was highly critical of the Union war effort. He believed that an army of volunteers could not successfully prosecute the war. He argued that a massive army of seasoned veterans was necessary for the Union to triumph. Sherman was outspoken in his opinions and was reassigned to inspection duty at St.
Louis, Missouri, in December Grant's army. Grant was working to secure western Tennessee for the Union. Sherman developed a close friendship with Grant. This division fought hard at the Battle of Shiloh in April , and Sherman received two minor wounds. Grant gave Sherman credit for the Union victory at this battle and Sherman was promoted to the rank of major general of volunteers in May During the remainder of and the first seven months of , Sherman participated in the campaign against Vicksburg, Mississippi.
Joseph E. With the reorganization of the army that followed the war, Sherman was made lieutenant general on July 25, ; he superseded John Pope on August 11, , as commander of the Division of Missouri. After President Grant was inaugurated, Sherman was elevated to general, on March 4, , and named commanding general of the army four days later, a rank that he held until November 1, Extensive Comanche and Kiowa raids along the West Texas frontier brought Sherman on a personal tour of inspection in May Accompanied by Inspector Gen.
Randolph B. Nothing that Sherman saw on this ride altered his opinion that the frontier was pacific and that claims of Indian raids were greatly exaggerated. Joseph J. Reynolds , commander of the Department of Texas. Only a few days later, on May 17, this band of Kiowas perpetrated the Warren Wagontrain Raid near the spot where it had observed but failed to attack Sherman's entourage.
On learning of the raid, Sherman ordered Col. Ranald S. Mackenzie to pursue the Indians across the Red River and onto their previously sacrosanct reservation. Satanta's boastful confession of his responsibility for the raid led Sherman to order his detention and that of his colleagues at Fort Sill, Indian Territory, and thereafter the United States Army's attitude toward the defense of the Texas frontier became much more aggressive. Sherman had been pleased with the state's climate, finding it much more pleasant than he had been led to believe, and pronounced that White settlement would in time take care of the Indian problem and that Texas would "become a prosperous and rich state.
Sherman retired from active duty on February 8, The Union army had allowed this type of action before Sherman did not like the idea put forth by General Orders and That same month, however, Sherman became concerned about guerrilla cavalry, as they were constantly attacking his supply lines and destroying Union provisions. They attacked isolated Federal garrisons and scattered their soldiers.
When a larger force moved out to meet the bandits, the partisans dispersed in all directions, mingling with the populace. Sherman began to view Southern citizens differently, especially when they lived in areas where the guerrillas frequently operated. Sherman decided that if these bushwhackers hid among the local citizens, the Union army should retaliate against those who concealed them.
Sherman was not the only Union general moving away from the conciliatory stance. Commanders contending with guerrillas in Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, and western Virginia were also growing tired of the nuisances.
Guerrilla raids on Union supplies and firings upon boats along the Mississippi River continued to anger Sherman when his troops garrisoned Memphis in In September he wrote his brother, U. Knowing that he had the confidence of his brother, he wrote freely.
Sherman did not believe that all Southern civilians were at war with the Union army. The real enemies, he thought, were those citizens who supported the Confederate forces. Sherman began to take his pursuit of guerrillas and the punishment of those assisting them to the next level.
He began striking at points near to where the attacks had taken place. Walcutt of the 46th Ohio Volunteers to the town of Randolph, Tennessee. The day before, bushwhackers there had fired on the Union supply ship Eugene as it carried cargo south to Memphis. Sherman could not capture those directly responsible for the sniping, but, as an example to others, he decided to punish those who assisted in the attack on the boat—or did not prevent it. These were not hollow threats.
Sherman had already issued a special order empowering the provost marshal to prepare a list of thirty inhabitants. In the event a boat was fired on along the Mississippi River near Memphis, ten families from the list would leave the city.
In October an attack on the river craft Catahoula compelled Sherman to intensify retaliating against wrongdoers. Furthermore, he made good on his promise to expel Memphis citizens. After three subsequent guerrilla attacks along the river, he sent several families out of the city beyond Union lines.
These tactics seemed to work, as partisan attacks subsided for several months. While moving south down the Mississippi from Memphis on transports in December , as part of the Vicksburg Campaign, Sherman continued his policy of punishing those who sniped at river craft. Unless the marauders ended their attacks on riverboats, he wanted to ensure that they and their families and friends would feel repercussions. We at that time were restrained, tied to a deep-seated reverence for law and property.
The rebels first introduced terror as part of their system…. No military mind could endure this long, and we were forced in self-defense to imitate their example. That winter and spring, during the campaign to take the Mississippi River fortress, Sherman learned another important lesson that would prove extremely valuable in his later campaigns—and would change the way that he would conduct war against the Confederacy.
He had observed the two battling armies at Shiloh earlier that year and saw how bulky, slow-moving supply wagons could slow down an army. By late December, Grant had moved his Army of the Tennessee into northern Mississippi from western Tennessee, stretching his supply lines nearly sixty miles from his starting point. Confederate cavalry leader Major General Earl Van Dorn striking at his supply and communication lines at Holly Springs and Brigadier General Nathan Bedford Forrest hitting at other locations in northern Mississippi isolated the Union force from its base.
Grant immediately ordered his men to live off the countryside, hoping that he could reestablish his lines before continuing on the campaign. It showed me that we could have subsisted off the country for two months instead of two weeks.
Sherman understood that by not having to guard a supply or communications line, he could free the men previously used to protect that line for use on the battlefield. Furthermore, the Union army could subsist in unfriendly country at the expense of the enemy, while simultaneously removing valuable provisions from Confederate use. Now he understood that he would have to take his actions even further to obtain his desired goal—ending attacks on Mississippi River shipping.
The principle has been more and more acknowledged that the unarmed citizen is to be spared in person, property, and honor as much as the exigencies of war will admit.
General Order only served to further outline what General Orders and had defined in In the spring of , after another bushwhacking incident near Greenville, Mississippi, Sherman ordered Brigadier General Frederick Steele to clear the area of partisans and any Confederate regulars.
When out of sight of their officers or when negligently led, soldiers often took liberties with civilian property, seeking revenge or simply collecting luxuries for themselves.
Our men will become absolutely lawless unless this can be checked. When Grant marched on the capital of Mississippi in May , his men once again lived successfully off the land. Grant did not intend to hold Jackson. Instead, he wanted to remove any militarily beneficial materials from the city and rid the area of any Confederate troops, thus protecting himself from a rear attack while he moved on Vicksburg. It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, for vengeance, for desolation.
War is hell. Following his successful campaign through Georgia, Sherman turned his attentions northward and began marching through the Carolinas, chasing the Confederates under the command of Joseph E. He continued his campaign of destruction, in particular targeting South Carolina for their role in seceding from the Union first.
He captured Columbia, South Carolina, on February 17, , setting many fires which would consume large portions of the city. He went on to defeat the forces of Johnston in North Carolina during the Battle of Bentonville , and eventually accepted the surrender of Johnston and all troops in Georgia, Florida, and the Carolinas on April 26, , becoming the largest surrender of Confederate troops during the war.
After the war, Sherman remained in the military and eventually rose to the rank of full general, serving as general-in-chief of the army from to Praised for his revolutionary ideas on "total warfare," William T. Sherman died in Civil War Biography. William T. Title Major General.
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