Chapter Sixteen   

THIS IS NO COMMON WAR

The Confederates had lost “a battle [they] simply had to win,” as Bruce Catton wrote of Shiloh, “a crucial effort to save the Mississippi Valley.” As the defeated Southern forces trudged back toward Corinth on April 8, the Confederacy suffered yet another blow. Island No. Ten, a major fortification in the Mississippi River near the Kentucky–Tennessee–Missouri boundary, was compelled to surrender. The great river thus lay open all the way to Fort Pillow, a strong point atop a Tennessee bluff only fifty miles north of Memphis. Unless the Rebels could hold Corinth, Fort Pillow would soon be cut off, as would the port city of Memphis.¹

After Shiloh, morale and discipline in the Confederate Army deteriorated critically, and the atmosphere at Corinth—where thousands of wounded soldiers overwhelmed the houses, churches and public buildings—exacerbated the aura of defeat. If the Confederacy had not passed a conscription act shortly after the battle, extending all enlistments to three years, the army at Corinth likely would have suffered crippling losses. Even with conscription, several thousand men deserted. Beauregard did receive some reinforcements, increasing the army to more than 50,000. He began preparing an impressive line of entrenchments to defend the vital crossroads, realizing, however, that his numbers were not adequate for the task he faced. He called upon Richmond for still more reinforcement, with the dire warning that if defeated at Corinth, “we lose the Mississippi Valley and probably our cause.”²

Meanwhile, General Halleck had begun assembling a massive force, eventually numbering more than 120,000 soldiers. Within a few days after arriving at Pittsburg Landing on April 11, Halleck issued an order reorganizing the whole army. He placed General Buell in command of the center. The left wing was led by John Pope, whose army was arriving at Hamburg Landing, following the surrender of Island No. Ten. George H. Thomas, Sherman’s friend and classmate at West Point, who had served as his subordinate in Kentucky, took command of the right wing. Sherman’s division was placed under Thomas. John McClernand commanded the reserve. General Grant, wrote Sherman, “was substantially left out,” and named “Second in Command,” a position depriving him of any actual command of troops. For more than a month, Grant remained without a command, but deeply aware, according to Sherman, of “the indignity, if not insult, [that had been] heaped upon him.” Sherman claimed not to have been bothered by his assignment to serve under George Thomas.3

Eventually the dejected Grant decided that he might as well go home. He applied for a thirty-day leave of absence, which was approved. By chance Sherman dropped in to visit with Halleck, who mentioned that Grant planned to leave the next morning. Sherman knew Grant had been “chafing under the slights of his anomalous position” and, immediately after leaving Halleck, he rode to Grant’s campsite. He found the general preparing to depart and pleaded with him to reconsider, telling how he himself had been overwhelmed by newspaper assertions that he was crazy, but the Battle of Shiloh had given him new life and “now [he] was in high feather.” Some unforeseen event, Sherman argued, well might restore Grant to favor. Grant promised to wait awhile before leaving and not to depart without again communicating with Sherman. A few days later, Sherman got a message from him, stating that he would remain with the army. Sherman responded with congratulations, declaring that “you could not be quiet at home for a week when armies [are] moving . . . and rest could not relieve your mind of the . . . injustice . . . done [to] you.” In urging Grant to stay, Sherman had rendered a major service to his country. His action also strengthened the growing friendship between the two; a respectful and trusting friendship that became invaluable in the future prosecution of the war.4

Not until three weeks after the battle of Shiloh did General Halleck begin advancing toward Corinth. On May 3, conveying aggressiveness, he telegraphed Secretary of War Stanton from Pittsburg Landing: “I leave here tomorrow morning, and our army will be before Corinth tomorrow night.” Halleck’s projection of a swift march proved absurd. Moving with extreme wariness, he told Stanton on May 13 that the Rebels were “strongly entrenched,” with numbers “equal if not superior to ours.” Clearly Halleck’s information about the enemy’s strength left a lot to be desired. His infinite caution did the rest, as he consumed a month advancing from the Shiloh battleground to the vicinity of Corinth, a distance of less than twenty miles.⁵

Sherman wrote in his memoirs that “the movement was provokingly slow.” Every time that the army halted, entrenchments were prepared “even though we had encountered no serious opposition, except from cavalry, which gave ground easily as we advanced.” Writing to Ellen on May 26, he touted the quality of the army, “now composed of all the best troops & men in the West and if we cannot conquer here we might as well give it up.” It was a remarkable force, in some ways as impressive as any Civil War army assembled during the entire conflict.⁶

In addition to the numerical strength, Sherman, Grant, Thomas and Philip Sheridan were all present—the four men eventually considered the best high-ranking officers the U.S. Army produced. At hand too were James McPherson, William Rosecrans, James H. Wilson and others who were developing into outstanding leaders. Sherman’s praise was hardly an exaggeration. The army’s slow and cautious advance on Corinth did give Sherman an opportunity to drill and instruct his division. Always a restless, active man, he worked tirelessly, teaching and explaining to his troops any and all military details that a good soldier might need to know. Soon he would proudly inform Ellen: “My Division is now esteemed one of the best.”⁷

Sherman’s May 26 letter to Ellen is also memorable for a striking commentary about receiving his commission as a major general of volunteers. “I know not why it gives me far less Emotion than my old commission as 1st Lieutenant of artillery. The latter I knew I merited, this I doubt—but its possession completes the chain from cadet up, and will remain among the family archives when you and I repose in Eternity.” In view of the embarrassment experienced in Kentucky, Sherman probably was more pleased than he admitted. Additionally, he was comforted that “Minnie is now old enough to remember,” and he thought that “even the rest may Keep me in their memory should my career close with this [campaign], and I do feel in this fact great consolation.”8

The big clash that Sherman, Halleck and many of the Federals expected was not to be. Beauregard, whose intelligence about Union strength was more accurate than Halleck’s knowledge of the Rebel numbers, waited until the Yankees were poised to launch their assault and then, believing that he was outnumbered two to one, pulled out under the cover of darkness. “That night,” remembered Sherman, “we heard unusual sounds in Corinth, the constant whistling of locomotives [which some assumed meant enemy reinforcements were arriving], and soon after daylight occurred a series of explosions followed by a dense smoke rising high over the town.” Sherman, who like Halleck had overrated the Rebel numbers, wrote his brother John, “I cannot imagine why Beauregard has declined battle.” But with gusto he exclaimed, “We want the Mississippi now, in its whole length, and a moment should not be lost.”⁹

Thus in early June 1862, General Halleck’s formidable army possessed Corinth, sitting on top of the greatest railroad prize in the western theater of the war. “Beauregard had saved his army,” wrote historian Robert S. Henry, “but had been forced to give up another great slice of Confederate territory.” With the Union Army holding Corinth, and occupying a substantial stretch of the Memphis & Charleston Railroad, both Fort Pillow and Memphis were doomed. Fort Pillow was evacuated immediately. On June 6, a Union flotilla under Flag Officer Charles H. Davis, which had quickly descended the Mississippi, appeared before Memphis. Davis soon destroyed some inferior Rebel gunboats and forced the surrender of the defenseless city.¹⁰

Already, near the mouth of “the Father of Waters,” a U.S. naval expedition commanded by sixty-one-year-old David G. Farragut had taken New Orleans. The capture of the Crescent City, which occurred in late April, was a devastating blow to the Confederacy. The population was four times greater than that of any other Southern city. New Orleans was the wealthiest Southern municipality, boasted the largest sugar refinery in the world and was the capital of King Cotton and the foremost export port on the North American continent. Second only to New York in imports when the war began, New Orleans also served as the banking capital of the South. From Fort Henry and Fort Donelson on the Confederacy’s northern border, to New Orleans on the southern, the decisiveness of the Union campaigning in the western theater during the winter and spring of 1862, which cost between 40,000 and 50,000 Confederate casualties, as well as immense territory and resources, would have seemed unthinkable back on New Year’s Day.11

NOW IT WAS decision time for the U.S. Army at Corinth. What would be the next objective? Essentially, the Federals had pursued a two-pronged waterway assault on the western Confederacy: the main advance via the Tennessee River, and a complementary movement via the Mississippi River. South on the Tennessee the Yankees first struck, breaking open that vital waterway at Fort Henry, advancing to defeat the Confederate counteroffensive at Shiloh and proceeding to capture the Memphis & Charleston rails at Corinth. South on the Mississippi, they capitalized on the Tennessee successes, occupying the Columbus fortifications, reducing Island No. Ten and capturing Fort Pillow and Memphis, which were outflanked when the Rebels evacuated Corinth. But the advance on the Tennessee reached a dead end at the Memphis & Charleston Railroad. No longer did that waterway penetrate southward, laying off to the east in northern Alabama, where impassable shoals blocked farther navigation anyway.

Up to this point, the Mississippi Valley, with Farragut steaming up the great river to take New Orleans, constituted the prime target of United States campaigning in the western theater. Sherman thought it should remain so. Whatever the goal, Sherman wanted the great bulk of the army at Corinth to continue operating as a unit. He declared in his memoirs that halting at Corinth and dispersing “the best materials for a fighting army that, up to that date, had been assembled in the West, [constituted] a fatal mistake.” If General Halleck had “held his force as a unit,” argued Sherman, “he could . . . by one move have solved the whole Mississippi problem.” Sherman thought “from what [Halleck] then told me” that the general intended just such a campaign “but was overruled from Washington.”12

At the time, Sherman refrained from any criticism of Halleck’s actions. Only in letters to selected family members can one surmise what he really thought in 1862. Strongly he demurred to any overland advance against the Rebels. He wrote John Sherman that he did not think Halleck would attempt to follow the enemy, who had retreated to Tupelo, fifty miles south of Corinth. He said “pursuing overland . . . would be absurd.” What Sherman wanted, of course, was control of the Mississippi River—all of it. On June 10 he wrote Ellen, “I think the Mississippi the great artery of America and whatever power holds it, holds the continent.” A month later, declaring to Halleck that “I attach more importance to the West than the East,” Sherman stated, “the man who at the end of this war holds the military control of the Valley of the Mississippi will be the man.” In 1863 he would write, “The Valley of the Mississippi is America.” On the decisive significance of the great river valley, Sherman’s drum never missed a beat.¹³

But General Halleck decided, perhaps due in part to pressure from Washington, that he could defend the railroads, administer the occupied towns and cities and still move offensively with a portion of his command. The advance would not involve the Mississippi River, however. The decision was to turn east—turn east and move by the Memphis & Charleston Railroad. The objective was one of great political import, dear to the heart of President Lincoln. East Tennessee and its heavy population of Union sympathizers would be the goal—specifically, initially, Chattanooga. A small city of fewer than 5,000 people, Chattanooga was militarily significant for one very important reason. It was a natural passageway north and south, east and west. This was partially true because of the Tennessee River. More momentous, however, was the fact that Chattanooga was a major railroad town—not even Atlanta equaled it in this regard at the time. Thus General Buell began moving eastward with considerably less than one-half of the force that Halleck had led to Corinth.14

While the Lincoln administration might rightly regard east Tennessee Unionism and the railroads emanating from Chattanooga—northeast to Knoxville and Virginia, south to Atlanta, the Atlantic, and the Gulf, northwest to Nashville and Louisville, and west to Memphis—as strategic prizes, the big picture of the war in the western theater should not be forgotten. Sherman and many military leaders, including Grant, as well as the great midwestern political base from which the President himself hailed, regarded the reopening of the Mississippi as the primary war aim. Thus Buell’s east Tennessee operation was a secondary effort when viewed in the larger context of western campaigning—a vital point in appreciating the Union war effort.

Shortly after Corinth fell, Sherman had been dispatched to Chewalla, fourteen miles to the northwest. There he began repairing the railroad, and trying to save anything of military value from half a dozen trains wrecked by the Rebels when they retreated to Tupelo. For the next few weeks Sherman’s troops worked on the Memphis & Charleston at various places, attempting to repair and protect the rails to Memphis. “I had my own and Hurlbut’s divisions about Grand Junction, Lagrange, Moscow, and Lafayette,” he explained, “building railroad trestles and bridges, fighting off cavalry detachments . . . and waging an everlasting quarrel with planters about their negroes and fences—they trying in the midst of moving armies, to raise a crop of corn.” The work was dangerous. Sherman said detachments of cavalry and guerrillas “infested the whole country,” and noted that General Grant and his staff, en route for Memphis with “a very insignificant escort . . . came very near falling into the hands of the enemy.”¹⁵

The problem of disease also loomed large. This was the first summer for the Union Army to campaign in the Deep South, experiencing extreme heat, sweltering humidity and, probably worst of all, insufficient clean water. “The sun is so hot,” Sherman wrote Ellen in a letter from Moscow, “that many of our men fall down in the road and have to be hauled in wagons.” He himself had been experiencing a “terrible headache, pains & lassitude, [and] for the first time in my life on a march I found myself unable to ride and had to use an ambulance.” Years later, Sherman attributed the sickness to “a touch of malarial fever, which hung on me for a month.” Attempting to reassure Ellen, he told her he got two straw hats from Memphis to more adequately protect his head from the heat. He also told her: “I am always discouraged when I come in contact with the People [who] all seem so deeply bitter. . . . Though they have lost all the River but Vicksburg, they are still as far from being subdued as . . . the first day of the Rebellion.”16

While Sherman worked on the railroad, he continued a brouhaha with the lieutenant governor of Ohio, Benjamin F. Stanton, about the issue of surprise at Shiloh. Stanton had published an article in a newspaper in Bellefontaine, Ohio, that reiterated the substance of Whitelaw Reid’s critical account of the battle, referenced in the previous chapter. Stanton decried “the blundering stupidity and negligence of the General in Command,” wrote of the “intense feeling of indignation against Generals Grant and Prentiss” and claimed that the “general feeling amongst the most intelligent men with whom I conversed, is that they ought to be court-martialled and shot.” When someone showed Sherman the article, his wrath grew white-hot.¹⁷

“The more I think of it, the more angry I become,” he told Ellen, vowing that he would “get even with the miserable class of corrupt editors yet.” Exchanging a number of heated letters with Stanton, over a period of several weeks, he charged upon one occasion that “your published statement is all false, false in general, false in every particular, and I repeat, you could not have failed to know it false when you published that statement.” The clash with Stanton also dredged up bad memories of the press in California.¹⁸

Declaring to a friend that “the evil [had been] stripped bare in California, when adventurers and rascals with Penitentiary Degrees got possession of the Press and openly attempted to black-mail & browbeat Citizens,” Sherman proclaimed that he had been “amazed at the meanness of [such] men . . . and . . . conceived a terrible mistrust of the Press.” Furthermore, he added: “I hope this war will not end . . . until the Press is made to feel that they cannot libel and violate common decency without punishment.”19

Fortunately for Sherman, Ellen and her father managed to restrain his pen when he initially dashed off a hotheaded, ill-considered message to Stanton, but first mailed it to the family for evaluation before publication. “I return your letter to Stanton, which Father took into his own hands,” responded Ellen, “and desires you to reconsider & write with greater care as he says it is not only for the present time but for future history.” Sherman accepted the wise admonition in a proper spirit and “modified [the letter] so as to be less belligerant & more in accordance with your father’s views.” He hoped to have the letter published in both Columbus and Cincinnati. Once Ellen and Thomas Ewing saw the revised version, they gave him their wholehearted support, Ellen reporting that “Father was very much pleased with it.” Thomas Ewing in fact wrote an article defending Sherman, published in the Louisville Journal, which Sherman told Ellen was “complimentary more so than I deserve from such a high source.”²⁰

Ellen’s fighting blood was really up. She was “so glad” to witness her husband’s defiant stance, informing him that “Father says I must send [your letter] to the Editors in every direction.” She promised to “send it North, South, East & West [naming prominent cities] . . . also to California & even to the Editors in the most obscure villages in the State.” Yet Ellen cautioned that he must not be “too sweeping & too general” in his denunciations. She reminded him that some leading city papers, citing St. Louis and Louisville in particular, had criticized others at Shiloh “whilst praising you to the skies.” Her advice was certainly sound. “Many of the Editors & their correspondents,” she wrote, “admire you and you ought not in common politeness to repulse them all without distinction.” John Sherman, whose take on the issue was a little different, added his straightforward advice about newsmen, asking his impetuous older brother, “Why can’t you keep on good terms with them?” John declared that newsmen are “very useful if you allow them to be, but if not they have a power for evil that no one can stand against. I see no reason for you to quarrel.” Sherman ceased the exchanges with Stanton only when General Halleck instructed him to do so. Writing to Phil Ewing, Sherman said that he was “very desirous of conforming to Halleck’s wishes,” agreeing with the general that “officers should not write for the papers, and it might have been better” had he never gotten into such a dispute.21

Halleck’s intervention came in a letter primarily devoted to informing Sherman of a major command change. Halleck was going to Washington, having been summoned to become general-in-chief of the U.S. Army. President Lincoln had been disappointed with George McClellan’s performance, generally and especially during the recent campaign against Richmond. The general’s advance on the Rebel capital seemed so promising and yet ended in failure. John Pope had been called to replace McClellan as commander of the Army of the Potomac, while Lincoln chose Halleck to organize the overall Union war effort, east and west.

McClellan was incensed at the prospect of serving under Halleck, “whom I know to be my inferior.” Sherman, on the other hand, deplored the loss of Halleck in the western theater. “I cannot express my heartfelt pain at hearing of your orders and intended departure,” he wrote. Halleck had taken control in the Mississippi Valley “at a period of deep gloom,” when Sherman felt that “our poor country was doomed to a Mexican anarchy, but at once rose order, system, firmness, and success.” Sherman concluded: “You should not be removed. I fear the consequences.” He wrote John that “the loss of Halleck is almost fatal.” He considered Halleck “the only man yet who has risen to the occasion.” Appreciative of Sherman’s strong support, Halleck responded that he was “more than satisfied with everything that you have done. You have always had my respect, and recently you have won my highest admiration.”²²

While Sherman’s praise of Halleck might be interpreted as effusive and self-serving, his words ring genuine. Sherman was a candid man who often spoke his mind without mincing words. Not all people cynically calculate their every action and every utterance in an attempt to advance themselves. That Sherman truly rated Halleck the best Union general at this time is apparent in his letters to several family members, particularly his brother John, Phil Ewing, Thomas Ewing Sr. and Ellen. To Ellen, for example, he said that Halleck “ever astonishes me by his sagacity,” while he told Phil, in the course of briefly assessing several generals, that “Halleck [is] the ablest man.” Sherman also liked Halleck, and telling the general of the high esteem in which he held his commander was not out of character.23

Halleck’s elevation to general-in-chief left Grant in command of west Tennessee and northern Mississippi. Sherman became commander of the District of Memphis, a clear indication that his problems in Kentucky were no longer of concern to either Halleck or Grant. His reputation seemed fully reestablished with the military people who mattered the most. Pleased to be placing his headquarters at a major commercial port on the Mississippi, Sherman arrived with his troops on July 21. He found Memphis virtually a dead city. A number of prominent citizens had taken flight, and many churches, businesses, schools and even the theaters had shut down. Sherman ordered that everything be reopened.²⁴

“I caused all the stores to be opened,” he wrote, and “churches, schools, theaters, and places of amusement to be reestablished.” He reopened the saloons, licensing them in order to prevent the smuggling of liquor into the city. “As to opening the Liquor saloons here,” ran his somewhat amusing explanation to Ellen, he claimed the deed “was done by the city authorities to prevent the sale of whiskey by smugglers.” As far as we know, he said nothing to Ellen about the brothels, for which Memphis was well-known, and which he permitted to remain open. Both black and white prostitutes were available, and Sherman did not believe that his responsibilities as a general included interfering with the sexual activities of the troops.²⁵

He also strengthened the police force, firmly established the city government and encouraged the people, despite their Rebel sympathies, to return their city to life as it had been before the Federals arrived. Memphis would be under military occupation for the foreseeable future, but Sherman tried to convey a respect for civil government and the rights of all citizens. Writing Mayor John Park, he said that he was “glad to find in Memphis yourself & municipal authorities not only in existence,” but exercising “important functions, and I shall endeavor to restore one or more civil tribunals for the arbitrament of contracts and punishments of crimes [for] which the Military has neither time nor inclination.” Sherman expressed “unbounded respect for the civil law, Courts & authorities,” pledging to do everything in “my power to restore them to their proper use . . . the protection of life, liberty & property.” He wanted the Memphis police prepared for “any probable contingency,” but also promised assistance by the army’s provost guard if a problem arose that was beyond the strength of the city police to handle.26

Not surprisingly, Sherman zealously attempted to keep abreast of all activities in and around Memphis. “I traverse the city day and night,” wrote the vigilant general. Not long after arriving in Memphis, he attended a church service, probably in part to create a ubiquitous sense of his presence. Accompanied by several staff members, he visited Calvary Episcopal, the leading church of that denomination in the city. After graduation from the U.S. Military Academy, Sherman seldom attended church anywhere. While at West Point, however, he had been compelled to go to Episcopal services each Sunday, which he well remembered. When the Memphis minister prayed the ritualistic Episcopalian prayer, he omitted the customary request that God’s protection be with the President of the United States. Sherman caught the omission at once, having heard the prayer every Sunday at the military academy for four years. Immediately Sherman stood up, and in a loud voice recited the customary words on behalf of the President for all to hear, after which he sat back down. The next day, he informed the preacher that if he resumed praying for the President, the church would remain open. Otherwise, it would be closed. No doubt the minister recognized that Sherman was not a man with whom one should trifle. From that week forward, at least as long as Sherman commanded in Memphis, the preacher complied with his wishes. Once Sherman remarked to Ellen that the minister had “preached a real good Union sermon.”27

Actually Sherman continued to attend services at Calvary Episcopal from time to time. Probably the main attraction was a woman whose singing he admired. On October 4, he wrote Ellen, “I have been to church 3 times—a young lady sings magnificently.” All his life, he was attracted to women who could sing well. He wrote a letter to his eldest daughter, soon to turn twelve, telling Minnie about the young woman “who sings beautifully and I rather think I thought more of that than the Sermons.” Declaring that “a sweet voice well cultivated is a gift which God alone can confer,” he observed that all ladies, whether possessing “a good natural voice or not [should] try & sing,” improving their voice “both to give pleasure to others & health to themselves.” He also encouraged her to dance, particularly “the waltz, Polka & Schottische.” Asserting that “Utility alone characterizes our American people,” he claimed that “all other people study to please others & themselves.” He urged her to study hard—naming several subjects including history and foreign languages—and suggested too that she play the guitar. He certainly wanted her to learn to ride a horse well. Instructing about self-image, the General stated that “modesty is the most beautiful feature in a young girl, but should not degenerate into bashfulness. Think yourself as good as any but never think yourself better than the poorest.” Finally, Sherman told her that “if this horrid war should ever end, how happy we could all be in some good home at St. Louis or Leavenworth, or in California—Write to me often, and try and write like Mama—Nobody can write better than she.”²⁸

Relative to Catholicism, which Sherman knew would always be of interest to Ellen, he reported that he had been called upon by “the Sisters from St. Agnes Academy, the Elder of whom Sister Ann is well acquainted with you & your mother and asked many questions, among which, of course, did I say my prayers.” Sherman said he replied that Bishop Joseph Alemany, who had been the first archbishop of San Francisco when he and Ellen lived there, and was a friend of the Ewings from earlier days in Ohio, “had specially exempted me because you were pious enough for half a dozen ordinary families. They were delighted with your zeal & also that I enabled them to get their supplies at a cheaper rate than they had hitherto done. I promised to call & see them, but doubt if I can find the time.” He did find time, as one might expect, to encourage the Memphis theater, attending the performances whenever his work permitted, and he noted in a letter to Ellen in mid-December that the theater was crowded.29

One of Sherman’s greatest problems was dealing with guerrillas. Southern insurgents infested the countryside around Memphis, as well as much of West Tennessee. They attacked communication lines, burned railroad bridges and trestles, ambushed small Federal patrols and preyed upon citizens known to be Union sympathizers, robbing, intimidating and terrorizing. Guerrillas also hid along the banks of the Mississippi River, firing on Union gunboats and merchant vessels. “There is not a garrison in Tennessee,” Sherman wrote Treasury Secretary Salmon Chase on August 11, “where a man can go beyond the sight of a flag-staff without being shot or captured.” He told Grant that “all the people are now guerrillas,” saying that whenever “a small body [of troops] goes out [the insurgents] hastily assemble and attack, but when a large body moves out they scatter and go home.” He told Halleck that “all the people of the South are now arming as partisan riders,” and wrote Ellen that “the whole interior is alive with guerrillas.”³⁰

Sherman realized the impossibility of hunting down the actual perpetrators of guerrilla acts. Early on he concluded that the best response was a policy of collective responsibility. After an attack on a U.S. forage train killed one soldier and wounded several others, Sherman told Halleck, who had employed such a principle in Missouri, “I am satisfied we have no other remedy for this ambush firing than to hold the neighborhood fully responsible, though the punishment may fall on the wrong parties.” He imprisoned twenty-five prominent men living in the vicinity of the ambush. Thus began a series of reprisals and collective punishments.³¹

Of all the guerrilla depredations during Sherman’s Memphis tenure, nothing incensed him quite so much as when United States ships were attacked from the banks of the Mississippi River. He called such actions “inhuman and barbarous”; the perpetrators were “assassins,” engaged in “an outrage of the greatest magnitude.” In Sherman’s mind, there was something very special, almost mystical, about the Mississippi. He spoke of the river as “the spinal column of America,” convinced that it inherently assured the unity of the nation, “a physical refutation of sectionalism.” The war to preserve the Union, in essence, was a war for control of the Mississippi. “The absolute destruction of Memphis, New Orleans & every city, town and hamlet of the South,” he wrote a Memphis lady, “would not be too severe a punishment to a people for attempting to interfere with the navigation of the Mississippi.”32

The act of retribution for which Sherman would be longest remembered in Memphis and west Tennessee came in late September 1862. Near the town of Randolph, in Tipton County, guerrillas fired on the Union steamer Eugene, an unarmed vessel with passengers aboard. Already incensed and frustrated by other attacks near Randolph, and on ships carrying women and children, Sherman sent the Forty-Sixth Ohio, Colonel Charles C. Walcutt commanding, to destroy the entire village, “leaving one house to mark the place.” While burning the town, if Walcutt found any men “whom you suspect of guilt, bring them in, but no women or children.” On September 26, Sherman reported to Grant that “the regiment has returned and Randolph is gone. . . . Punishment must be speedy, sure, and exemplary.” The next day he ordered that for every boat attacked, ten Memphis families, selected by lot, would be expelled from the city.³³

Memphis was shocked. Citizens, as well as Confederate officers, registered protests. Convinced that he was in the right, Sherman defended himself strongly. But once he thought his policy had restrained the insurgents—and probably disturbed by so much criticism—he suspended the expulsion order. A band of guerrillas then attacked two more ships, nearly capturing one of them, which barely managed to escape “with two dead and many wounded,” according to Sherman. “The conduct of the guerrillas,” he told Grant, “was fiendish in the extreme.” Again Sherman dispatched the Forty-Sixth Ohio to exact retribution, leveling all the houses, and destroying the farms and cornfields for a distance of fifteen miles along the Mississippi, where the attacks had occurred. “This is done” said Sherman, to let the guerrillas know “that certain destruction awaits the country for firing on steamboats engaged in carrying supplies.” He also renewed the expulsion order, reporting to Secretary of War Edwin Stanton on December 16 that forty people, their names drawn by lot, had been removed from Memphis. Sherman claimed that “the remedy struck at the Root of the Evil and no boat has been fired on since.”34

Perhaps recalling his Florida experiences with the Seminole Indians, Sherman told a protesting lady that “we are not going to chase through the cane-breaks & swamps, the individuals who did the deeds, but will visit punishment upon the adherents of that cause which employs such agents.” Which was the more cruel he wondered, for your partisans to “fire Cannon & musket balls through steamboats with women & children on board, set them on fire with women & children sleeping in their berth, and shoot down the passengers & engineers with the curses of hell on their tongues, or for us to say, the families of men engaged in such hellish deeds shall not live in peace where the flag of the United States floats.”³⁵

While in the throes of contending with guerrillas, Sherman assured his brother that “this is no common war,” and declared to Grant that “all the South is in arms and deep in enmity.” Convinced that “we cannot change the hearts” of the Southern people, Sherman forcefully asserted, “We can make war so terrible that they will realize . . . however brave and gallant and devoted to their country, still they are mortal and should exhaust all peaceful remedies before they fly to war.” John Sherman was supportive—“show no favor or even toleration to rebels”—although not as aggressively as Ellen, who sounded harsh like her husband. “I hope this may be not only a war of emancipation but also of extermination,” she declared. “May we carry fire & sword into their states until not one habitation is left standing.”³⁶

Only a few days after Ellen penned those words, Sherman actually possessed a radiant new sword. Fifteen men from New York had sent him a splendid ceremonial sword, in honor of his service at the Battle of Shiloh. Eloquently he expressed his appreciation to the gentlemen who conveyed “to me in terms of marked respect a sword of uncommon value, of great beauty in design & magnificently executed.” Sherman confessed himself “overwhelmed by the unexpected honor,” while experiencing “a just pride in the terms of your letter and especially in contemplating the name of the donors among whom I recognize not only personal friends but merchants whose fame is coextensive with the dominions of our Glorious Flag.” Such an august tribute “will nerve my arm and impel me to renewed exertions in the struggle yet before us.” Naturally the Sherman and Ewing families viewed the gift as yet another recognition of Sherman’s rising and deserved stature as a successful warrior. Maria Ewing wrote Ellen that Hugh Boyle and his wife “gave me a glowing description of the splendid sword, [which] must be Magnificent, but not more splendid & magnificent than the owner is deserving of.”37

Meanwhile “the struggle yet before us” continued unabated, and Sherman was never free of the guerrilla issue while he commanded in Memphis. His constant problem with partisans dovetails with recent scholarship, which suggests that guerrilla activity in Tennessee and Kentucky was more extensive than previously thought, and perhaps comparable with Missouri and Kansas, states traditionally considered hotbeds of irregular warfare. To conclude, however, that Sherman became an advocate of total war as a result of his guerrilla experiences in the fall of 1862 would be excessive. More accurately, he recognized the dynamic, driving force of an evolving conflict, which propelled men toward greater ideological rigidity, accompanied by increasing bitterness and escalating brutality, ever more destructive of both life and property.³⁸

Writing to his daughter about “how cruel men become in war,” Sherman said, “It now requires all my energy to prevent our soldiers from robbing & plundering the houses and property of . . . Enemies.” He claimed that “our Enemies are even worse than we,” and sadly spoke of old friends who “look on me as a Brutal wretch,” and if given the chance “would now shoot me dead.” Responding to Confederate General John C. Pemberton, concerning guerrillas and reprisals, Sherman wrote that he knew Pemberton did not sanction some of the deeds perpetrated by Southern partisans, and then implored, relative to possible reprisals for unjustified and despicable Federal actions: “Do not make this war more vindictive and bloody than it has been and will be in spite of the most moderate counsels” [emphasis added]. In Sherman’s mind, inevitably, the war would grow more ruthless.39

SHERMAN WAS ALSO troubled by the slavery question. The U.S. Congress had passed two Confiscation Acts—the first in the summer of 1861 and the second shortly before Sherman’s arrival in Memphis—declaring that slaves employed in support of the Confederate war effort or owned by masters who were in open hostility to the United States were free. Sherman found hundreds of fugitive slaves at Memphis. He had no interest whatsoever in trying to determine their status, under the Confiscation Acts, as slave or free. Nor did he conceive it his duty, believing that such work was the prerogative of the judiciary. He simply decided that if they remained in the city—and he did permit them to leave if they chose—then they must work. Slave labor would benefit the Union Army, while simultaneously depriving the Confederacy.⁴⁰

Initially Sherman employed the majority of the slaves, approximately 1,300 males, in building Fort Pickering, a fortification overlooking the Mississippi River. Designed to guard the land approaches to Memphis, the fort was already under construction when Sherman arrived. Several hundred more blacks were put to work on the levee, loading and unloading boats; eventually about 1,000 served as teamsters and cooks. “All such negroes will be entitled to rations,” he ordered, and “will be supplied with necessary clothing and [chewing] tobacco at the rate of one pound per month.” Records of their labor would be kept, but no wages were to be paid “until the courts determine whether the negro be slave or free.” Sherman anticipated that “a fair and equitable settlement [for loyal slave owners and freedmen] would be made at the ‘end of the war.’” He also forbade any Federal soldier from hiring a slave as a personal servant.⁴¹

Clearly Sherman regarded the Confiscation measures as vexatious, which several of his letters reveal—particularly those to John. The U.S. government, in his view, was freeing slaves without addressing the consequences, either for the army or the blacks. He considered the government’s action a typical procedure of blundering politicians, who failed to understand the practical aspects of their policies. Some of the freedmen could be put to work, but certainly not all, not even the majority. He wrote John that “no army could take care of the wants of the host of niggers, women & children that would hang about it, freed without the condition attached of earning their food and clothing.” Sherman said he had already employed “the labor of negroes as far as will benefit the army.” All others encumbered his forces. The army’s wagon trains already were “a horrible impediment, and if we are to take along & feed the negros who flee to us for refuge, it will be an impossible task. You can not solve this negro question in a day.”42

Then, on September 22, President Lincoln announced the preliminary Emancipation Act, to become effective on the first day of January 1863. That very day Sherman wrote his brother, “Are we to free all the negros, men, women, and children? Whether there be work for them or not?” The following day he addressed the provost marshal general of St. Louis: “I foresee much trouble as winter comes, to the women & children. Does Congress intend to feed & care for all the negroes? Is it not a task too great to be undertaken? These are serious questions and I can get no . . . word of advice from Washington.” A week later Sherman again vented his frustration in a letter to John: “The President declares negros free, but makes no machinery by which such freedom is assured. I still see no solution of this Great problem except in theory.” Sherman rightly foresaw that increasing numbers of refugee blacks—men, women and children—would constitute a tedious problem and a serious encumbrance upon Union military operations.⁴³

Equally distressing to Sherman was the presence of numerous Northern merchants engaged in trading with the enemy. The single greatest commercial problem was the exchange in cotton. Sherman said “hundreds of greedy speculators flocked down the Mississippi, and resorted to all sorts of measures to obtain cotton.” He claimed “swarms of Jews” were involved. Southerners selling the precious commodity demanded payment in gold, about three hundred dollars per bale, said Sherman, who had no doubt that the gold provided military supplies for the Confederacy. Thus he prohibited the purchase of cotton with gold, silver or treasury notes. Discovering that cotton could also be bought with salt, he forbade that exchange too, defining salt as contraband of war because of its use in curing meat for the Rebel armies.44

Sherman wrote Ellen on August 5, explaining that when he got to Memphis “the town was full of Jews & speculators buying cotton for gold, silver and treasury notes, the very thing the Confederates wanted, money.” He had stopped all that exchange, and expected to be “universally abused by the Northern merchants.” Sarcastically he declared, “I have no doubt the surrender of Memphis was made knowing that our People for the sake of a little profit would supply them the very thing they stood in need of.” Later in August, he told her, “I see the Cincinnati papers are finding fault with me again.” Then he claimed, “Cincinnati furnishes more contraband goods than Charleston, and has done more to prolong the war than the state of South Carolina.” Not a merchant there, he claimed, “but would sell salt, bacon, powder & lead, if they can make money by it. . . . The cause of war is not alone in the nigger, but in the mercenary spirit of our countrymen.” In a letter to Colonel William H. H. Taylor, Sherman wrote, “‘Commerce must follow the flag’ sounds well, but in truth commerce supplies our enemy the means to destroy that flag & the Government whose Emblem it is.”⁴⁵

Sherman’s cotton policy did not stand. Just as Grant’s order barring Jews from trains heading south was immediately overturned, so too Sherman found his prohibition of cotton purchases with gold and silver swiftly rebuked in Washington. By the summer of 1862, the Northern manufacturers had geared up to equip the Union armies with all manner of goods made from cotton fiber, the production of tents being a high priority at the time. Cotton was available in the South and the U.S. government intended to get it. With the growing demand, both manufacturers and speculators knew that big profits were likely, as government contracts for war materials proliferated. As ever in war, some men thought only of getting rich or richer—legally or illegally—and the number of American millionaires would increase many times over during the conflict, while hundreds of thousands of men suffered and died. With disgust Sherman wrote Ellen, “our people seem to measure everything by the money they can make.”46

The reversal of Sherman’s cotton order came from the secretary of war. Perhaps to cushion Stanton’s rebuff, General Halleck told Sherman that “tents for the new levies can not be furnished till we get more cotton, and hence the absolute necessity of encouraging that trade just now. Money is of no more value to the rebels than cotton,” the general dubiously claimed, “for they can purchase military munitions with the latter as well as the former.” Halleck ignored the obvious fact that a ready market for Southern cotton at a high price in gold greatly facilitated the acquiring of munitions in the South, both the ease and the quantity. Certainly Halleck, like Sherman, had no choice but to accept Stanton’s decision. He speculated that the policy would be changed “as soon as we get enough cotton for military purposes.” Sherman’s view, expressed to Adjutant General Lorenzo Thomas, was that “if the policy of the government demands cotton, order us to seize and procure it by the usual operations of war.” Writing to John, Sherman revealed his anger: “The mercenary spirit of our people is too much and my orders are reversed and I am ordered to encourage the trade in cotton and all orders prohibiting Gold, Silver & Notes to be paid for it are annulled by orders from Washington.” Bitterly he concluded, “but what are the lives of our soldiers to the profits of the merchant?”⁴⁷

Smuggling was also a problem. Confederate sympathizers, in league with Northern men whose greatest goal was gaining wealth, continually sneaked military supplies out of Memphis. These quickly found their way to the Southern armies. In an effort to stop this traffic, Sherman restricted all trade to five major roads, with travel during daylight hours only, without exception. These roads were constantly monitored by Federal soldiers. However, many other roads led in and out of the city. Although some of these were little more than rough trails and paths, they served the purpose for smugglers. Guarding all of them was impossible. Even the checkpoints on the five designated trade routes were not always effective. Some guards were deceived by ingenious methods of concealing medicine, ammunition, salt, whiskey and other contraband.

Sherman discovered “a handsome city hearse” in a Mississippi barn, with a coffin containing “a fine assortment of medicines” that had been smuggled out of Memphis under ruse of “a first-class funeral.” Guards sometimes could be bribed to allow forbidden items to pass. Considerable success was enjoyed by Southern women in moving illegal goods, because guards were reluctant to search females thoroughly, particularly to search under their skirts. All Sherman’s work to curtail smuggling achieved only mixed results. Doubtless his efforts slowed the contraband, but he reported that “in spite of all efforts smuggling is carried on. . . . I am satisfied that salt and arms are got to the interior somehow.”48

FAMILY LIFE back in Ohio—both the Sherman and the Ewing families—never seemed very far away from Cump, nor lacking for problems. Early in the war, Sherman had placed Charley Ewing, the youngest of Ellen’s brothers, in the U.S. Thirteenth Infantry, the regiment Sherman initially was to command, but never did. Charley eventually found himself guarding prisoners in Illinois. He had not seen combat, feared the war would be over before he ever got into action and wanted to serve with Sherman. Ellen, her father and Charley were not going to be satisfied until Charley joined Sherman in some capacity. Following Shiloh, Sherman spoke to Halleck about the matter, more than once, at last obtaining the general’s assurance that several companies of the Thirteenth, including Charley’s, had been ordered to join Sherman’s command.⁴⁹

Several weeks passed, however, and the Thirteenth remained in Illinois, with Charley shifted from guard duty to mustering in new troops, after Ellen went to see the governor of Ohio about what she termed her brother’s “ignominious post.” Ellen considered the mustering assignment as nothing more than a stopgap measure, and continued urging her husband to do something about Charley’s plight. Sherman was irritated by the pressure, writing Charley that already he had done “all a gentleman should do” in attempting to help, and declared that “your father [and] Ellen have written me some 500 times on this one subject.” But because Charley seemed “so deeply offended” at him, Sherman promised that “I will do what I would not do for myself; go behind Halleck and enquire of his adjutant what has been done. If Halleck find it out,” Sherman said, “my influence with him is gone,” for he would think that Sherman must have “doubted his word and promise.” He concluded the letter by stating: “We cannot change the inveterate hatred of these [Southern] People,” and thus Charley “need not be uneasy. You will get your belly full of fighting.” In early December, the Thirteenth Infantry, and Charley, arrived in Memphis. By then Ellen was working to get her brother Phil assigned to Sherman.50

Meanwhile, a long-festering source of tension between Ellen and Sherman’s sister Elizabeth resurfaced. At issue was control of the house that had belonged to Sherman’s mother. When Elizabeth decided to move out, Ellen wanted to live there, but Elizabeth intended to rent the place. Sherman had a strong claim on it, having contributed significantly to the support of his mother, also giving Elizabeth $2,000 when she was in dire need and allowing her, with John’s consent, to live there for several years until her financial condition improved. Spurred on by Ellen, Sherman contended with his sister for some time. He wrote John to help him. Sherman seemed particularly incensed that Elizabeth had rented the house to a preacher. Finally he did succeed in securing the place for Ellen and the children, beginning in the spring of 1863.⁵¹

Ellen also wanted to visit her husband in Memphis. Sherman did not like the idea, telling her that “in spite of my injunctions, several families have come to Memphis to see their husbands, but I do not wish you to come.” Clearly he did not like setting an example of that which he opposed. Sherman said that “military camps are no place for ladies,” a sentiment he repeated in letters to Ellen, brother-in-law Phil and John Sherman. Only when he thought John was coming to Memphis for a short visit did he relent, writing that Ellen might accompany John.

His brother eventually decided not to make the trip, but Ellen came anyway. She stayed for nearly a month, bringing the children, except for Minnie and Willy, who were away at school. She lodged some of the time at the Gayoso House, already a Memphis landmark dating from 1842, featuring an impressive Greek Revival portico with wrought-iron balconies overlooking the Mississippi, and offering amenities available nowhere else in the city, such as marble tubs, silver faucets and flush toilets. While visiting his father, six-year-old Tommy became “a corporal” in one of the companies, fitted with a little uniform which he “wore . . . like a real soldier,” according to Sherman. He was disappointed that Willy did not get “a chance to see a large army.” One evening, several of Sherman’s officers appeared, conducted a ceremony and presented the General with a fine sword. Ellen knew by Sherman’s response that he was deeply gratified by such “attachment and confidence on the part of his tried and valued officers.” She also observed that he was thin, and “more wrinkled than most men of sixty”; however, he was “so cheerful and well,” she wrote John, that she “ceased to lament the evidences of time & care.”52

By early December, Ellen had returned to Ohio. Sherman was preparing to begin a campaign against the Confederate stronghold at Vicksburg. Feeling good about his service in Memphis, he enthusiastically wrote Ellen, “I feel I have achieved perfect success”—an exaggeration, obviously, but he had done a creditable job in a difficult situation, perhaps as good as reasonably could have been expected. He told Halleck, “I think Memphis is now the best and most complete base of operations on the Mississippi.” He recognized that he was popular with his officers and men, and even some of the Memphis people. While he knew as well as anyone that he was not engaged in a popularity contest, the esteem he enjoyed boosted his confidence.

During his Memphis tenure Sherman took steps to assist the poor. “Generosity and benevolence to the poor and distressed are characteristics of good soldiers,” he wrote to his regimental and company commanders on October 30. He said that “many poor families in and about Memphis” were in need of wood, clothing and food. Declaring that the United States government “provides all these to our soldiers bounteously,” Sherman instructed that every company, “by the exercise of reasonable economy,” should save a portion of their allotment and give the surplus to the poor. He set up a Central Relief Committee, where “bread, flour, meat, rice, coffee, sugar, or anything needed by poor and sick families,” would be received and “distributed to the worthy.” This program enhanced the popular image of both the army and its commander, as well as helping the needy families.

Sherman does not seem to have regretted missing the Battle of Corinth. In early October the Confederates had tried to regain that vital crossroads. Hoping to deceive the Union defenders, a Rebel army moved north, as if to march into Tennessee several miles west of Corinth. The Confederates then turned back and attacked the town from the northwest. The Federals were prepared, however, and prevailed after a hard-fought two-day battle in which about 20,000 men were engaged on each side. Sherman did regard the effect of the clash as “very great,” because it ensured continued Union control of west Tennessee, and he wrote Grant that the confidence of Southern sympathizers in Memphis had been “shaken . . . awfully.”

What Sherman really wanted, as many times he had indicated, was “to stick to the Mississippi,” and he eagerly looked forward to a major military campaign on the great river. Plainly, the main obstacle blocking United States control of the Mississippi was the fortress at Vicksburg. In Sherman’s mind, no military objective of the war was of such importance at that time as reducing Vicksburg, and thereby clearing and securing navigation of the Mississippi all the way to the Gulf of Mexico. Comparatively, Port Hudson, standing some miles south of Vicksburg, would present a minor annoyance once the formidable bastion at Vicksburg was in Federal hands. Sherman was primed to get on with the job.53