At his headquarters in Raleigh, North Carolina, Sherman was puzzled to receive a message notifying him that Grant was about to pay him a visit. Though he gave the matter little thought, he looked forward to seeing his friend. He made no connection between the visit and the recommended peace terms he had signed with Joseph Johnston. Be that as it may, Grant was scheduled to arrive on April 23.

Grant arrived as planned, but he was not bringing good news; the authorities in Washington, he said, had disapproved Sherman’s proposed surrender terms with Johnston, and furthermore they were holding Sherman responsible for exceeding his authority as a military commander in the surrender terms he had submitted. He cited a paragraph containing Lincoln’s instructions to Grant from March 3:

The president directs me to say to you that he wishes you to have no conference with General Lee, unless it be for the capitulation of Lee’s army, or on some minor or purely military matter. . . . [Y]ou are not to decide, discuss, or confer upon any political question. Such questions the President holds in his own hands, and will submit them to no military conferences or conventions. Meantime you are to press to your utmost your military advantages. EDWIN M. STANTON, Secretary of War.¹

Upon learning of Sherman’s surrender negotiations with Johnston, Lincoln immediately fired off a missive to Grant, instructing him to “give notice of the disapproval to General Sherman, and direct him to resume hostilities at the earliest moment.”² Sherman had been treated unfairly, because he had not been informed of Lincoln’s instructions to Grant regarding terms of surrender. For now, however, he had an immediate task: to notify Johnston of the disapproval and advise him that hostilities would recommence at the end of a forty-eight-hour period. He immediately sent two separate messages. One was stiff and proper, notifying Johnston of the Washington action; the other was a short, blunt demand for the surrender of the Army of the Tennessee based on the terms Grant had offered Lee at Appomattox. He showed both messages to Grant before sending them.

Sherman saw nothing alarming about the developments thus far. What he was unaware of was the fact that Grant was temporarily withholding the last paragraph of the Stanton letter, which could be the cause of radical action:

The President desires that you proceed immediately to the headquarters of Major-General Sherman, and direct operations against the enemy.³

Fortunately the term “direct operations” was open to interpretation. Quite possibly Stanton desired Grant to actually relieve Sherman of command. Grant, however, chose to read it in his own way. He did everything he could to minimize the effect of his presence at Raleigh. He made no move to supplant Sherman, and actually stayed out of sight of the troops. He studied the situation and waited until the twenty-seventh, when Sherman received Johnston’s acceptance of the demand for surrender and then left, satisfied that Sherman was handling matters well. As a result, Sherman still saw nothing in the situation to disturb him. He regretted the expression of dissatisfaction with his services, but was content that he had followed orders and terminated the truce.

Sherman was frank in admitting that he had exceeded his authority by dealing in political issues. Probably he realized that he had been overzealous in his desire to see the Confederate soldiers back on their farms by fall. But despite his admission of violating protocol, Sherman still thought that he had done right in making the terms as attractive as possible to Johnston. He wrote a letter to Grant in which he sought to express his concern about the future:

I now apprehend that the rebel armies will disperse; and, instead of dealing with six or seven States, we will have to deal with numberless bands of desperadoes, headed by such men as Mosby, Forrest, Red Jackson, and others, who know not and care not for danger and its consequences.

And in a letter to Secretary Stanton, he was blunt, even hostile. After admitting his “folly,” he went on:

I still believe the General Government of the United States has made a mistake; but that is none of my business—mine is a different task; and I had flattered myself that, by four years of patient, unremitting, and successful labor, I deserved no reminder such as is contained in the last paragraph of your letter to General Grant. You may assure the President that I heed his suggestion.

Notably, Sherman omitted the usual elaborate complimentary close of “obedient servant” or the like. He ended with a mere, “I am truly, etc.”

In so writing Stanton, Sherman was inadvertently making a bad situation worse, exacerbating the personal venom that Stanton seemed to have developed toward him. The secretary had already set out to reduce Sherman’s stature by ordering two other armies outside of Sherman’s command to move against Johnston. He also removed a couple of other units that were at least nominally in Sherman’s area of responsibility.

Sherman now began to realize how serious the situation was. As he was about to head for Charleston to supervise the surrender of that Confederate garrison, he was given a copy of The New York Times that carried a bulletin sent by the war department on April 22, the day Stanton had received Sherman’s recommended “terms.” The bulletin carried a touch of the frantic. It described in detail everything that had transpired, with two paragraphs added:

WAR DEPARTMENT WASHINGTON, April 22, 1885.

The orders of General Sherman to General Stoneman to withdraw from Salisbury and join him will probably open the way for [Jefferson] Davis to escape to Mexico or Europe with his plunder, which is reported to be very large, including not only the plunder of the Richmond banks, but previous accumulations.

A dispatch received by this department from Richmond says: “It is stated here, by respectable parties, that the amount of specie taken south by Jeff. Davis and his partisans is very large, including not only the plunder of the Richmond banks, but previous accumulations. They hope, it is said, to make terms with General Sherman, or some other commander, by which they will be permitted, with their effects, including this gold plunder, to go to Mexico or Europe. Johnston’s negotiations look to this end.”

This publication from the war department created a new dimension to the enmity between Sherman and Stanton. First of all, Sherman had expected that the exchanges between Stanton, Grant, and himself were the business only of the government; he had expected them to be kept secret. But even more outrageous was Stanton’s baseless implication that Sherman had ordered his cavalry commander, General George Stoneman, to withdraw from Salisbury to allow Jefferson Davis to make an escape to Mexico or Europe in exchange for great amounts of stolen specie.* It was a thinly disguised accusation of bribery. Sherman resolved at that point that he would always hold against Stanton what he termed a “resentment.” Nevertheless, he had things to do in the South, and he set about to do them.

Besides inspecting the condition of his troops, Sherman had to provide for their sustenance. Even though nearly all the Confederate armies had surrendered, the population surrounding the Union garrisons was still hostile. Fort Fisher, Savannah, and Wilmington, all situated on the ocean, were no problem. Nor was the garrison at Charleston. But a sizable Union force was located near Augusta, Georgia, 135 miles up the Savannah River, and provision had to be made to supply that force—which Sherman did.

With the war essentially over, Sherman could now indulge himself with a sentimental visit to Charleston. Here he was in for a saddening experience. Nearly all the friends he had associated with so fondly twenty years earlier were dead or departed. Part of the family of one lady, Mrs. Pettigru, was still there, but almost nobody else. Furthermore, the buildings of the center city had been virtually destroyed. No other city, he observed, had been so damaged. It was necessary for him to rationalize that it had been South Carolina, especially Charleston, that had historically been the perpetrator of rebellions. It had been at Charleston Harbor, in fact, that the first guns of the late Civil War had been fired on Fort Sumter under the command of P. G. T. Beauregard. But that reasoning was intellectual, not emotional.

—

Insults from Washington had not ceased during Sherman’s trip south. While Sherman was stopping at Hilton Head, a second article appeared in The New York Times, this time citing a letter from Halleck, now commanding Union troops in Virginia, to Stanton. On his own authority he had ordered Union generals not to obey Sherman’s orders while they were located in the territory of Virginia.⁴

Somewhat sadly, this sorry mess resulted in the end of the lifelong friendship between Sherman and Halleck. The rift was puzzling, because it transcended a mere disagreement over policy. There seems to have been no logical reason for the virulence of Halleck’s insulting actions toward his erstwhile friend.

—

Few students of this period excuse the actions of Stanton, Halleck, or even President Andrew Johnson. Nevertheless, it is difficult to reconstruct, after all these years, the panic pervading Washington following the Lincoln assassination. The drama of John Wilkes Booth’s actions is etched in everyone’s memories; it is almost forgotten that Booth was actually only one part of a cabal that was intended to murder others as well. Another assassin, at least, made a serious and nearly successful attempt on the life of Secretary of State William Seward. While Seward survived the attack, he sustained a severe wound, as did his son.

It is understandable, therefore, that Stanton, one of the top officials of the government, should have every reason to fear for his own life. Sherman’s brother John, who lived across the street from the secretary, reported that Stanton had stationed a heavy armed guard around his house for protection. In what appears to have been a somewhat deranged state of mind, Stanton was levying charges against the six persons allegedly responsible for Lincoln’s assassination. Even President Andrew Johnson, a citizen of Tennessee and former Democrat, was caught up in the confusion and rage against the people of the South. Stanton and Halleck were in widespread company.

Fortunately Grant, almost alone, seems to have kept his head. While he conceded that Sherman’s terms with Johnston were wrong by venturing into politics, he never lost faith in Sherman’s good intentions. Having been with Sherman and Lincoln at City Point and witnessed the warm exchanges between the two men—and having heard the expressed desires of Lincoln for generous terms so long as the Union was preserved and slavery abolished, he was understanding. As he described the situation in his memoirs:

Sherman thought, no doubt, in adding to the terms that I had made with General Lee, that he was but carrying out the wishes of the President of the United States. But seeing that he was going beyond his authority, he made it a point that the terms were only conditional. They signed them with this understanding, and agreed to a truce until the terms could be sent to Washington for approval. . . . As the world knows, Sherman, from being one of the most popular generals of the land . . . was denounced by the President and Secretary of War in very bitter terms. Some people went so far as to denounce him as a traitor—a most preposterous term to apply to a man who had rendered so much service as he had. . . . If Sherman had taken authority to send Johnston with his army home, with their arms to be put in the arsenals of their own States, without submitting the question to the authorities at Washington, the suspicions against him might have some foundation.

But Grant ended on a high note:

But the feeling against Sherman died out very rapidly, and it was not many weeks before he was restored to the fullest confidence of the American people.⁵

—

With the various Confederate armies dispersed, President Johnson now decided that the main Union armies could be disbanded. He had no intention of ending the war with a whimper, however. He would do so with ceremony—a grand parade to be held in the nation’s capital. He therefore ordered Meade’s Army of the Potomac and Sherman’s Army of the West to move to the vicinity of Washington.* While awaiting the event, Meade was to encamp on Arlington Heights and Sherman to the south of the Potomac, in and around Alexandria. Accordingly Sherman left Raleigh on April 29.

His route through Virginia took him to Richmond near City Point, where Halleck was still in command. For some reason, Halleck had decided to mend fences. He was, however, dealing with the wrong man. When Sherman reached Fort Monroe, he received a message from Halleck “professing great friendship” and inviting him to visit him when he reached Richmond. He answered by stating that he had seen Halleck’s dispatch of April 26 to Stanton, which he regarded as insulting. He declined Halleck’s hospitality, and added that he “preferred we should not meet as I passed through Richmond.”⁶

He went on, declaring that:

I will march my Army through Richmond quietly and in good order without attracting attention, and I beg you to keep slightly perdu [lost], for if noticed by some of my old command I cannot undertake to maintain a model behavior, for their feelings have become aroused by what the world adjudges an insult to an honest commander. If loss of life or violence result from this you must attribute it to the true cause, a public insult to a Brother officer when he was far away on public service, perfectly innocent of the malignant purpose and design.⁷

That was not quite all. At Manchester, Sherman found to his satisfaction that both the right and left wings of his army had arrived and were in camp. At the same time he learned that Halleck, on his own, had ordered a review, to be conducted in his own honor, by one of Sherman’s corps. Sherman forthwith forbade the review, finishing off his final insult. These gestures may have seemed petty, but in Sherman’s mind they were important for the morale of his troops. They were keenly aware of the insults he had suffered from both Halleck and Stanton, and he was conscious, rightly or wrongly, that they were watching him to see whether he would take those insults lying down. He would not.

On May 10 orders came from Grant sending his army on to the vicinity of Washington. Sherman crossed the James River on May 11, 1865, and marched through the streets of Richmond. His armies traveled in two wings, Slocum, as always, on the left and Logan on the right.⁸ It was a leisurely march, and Sherman’s men were able to witness many of the battlefields on which the Army of the Potomac had fought. The left wing did best by way of sightseeing, visiting Hanover Courthouse, New Market, Culpeper, Manassas, Spotsylvania, and Chancellorsville. The right wing marched by a more direct route, by Dumfries and Alexandria. Sherman himself was not bound to stay with his troops, and he set his route so as to see every battlefield. On the nineteenth his force reached its designated camping ground, a space about halfway between Alexandria and Long Bridge.^*

On arrival at Washington, Sherman accepted an invitation from Grant to visit the various governmental authorities. When he met them, he was perhaps surprised to receive such a friendly reception. Grant took him to visit many old friends and, most important, President Andrew Johnson himself. Johnson was particularly congenial, and when Sherman mentioned the two insulting bulletins that Stanton had sent to the Times, the president claimed that neither he nor any of his cabinet—with the exception of Stanton, of course—had ever seen them before they were sent. But the reconciliation could go only so far. Neither Sherman nor Stanton made any move toward each other despite Grant’s efforts to bring the two men together.

May 19 was a busy day. Not only did Sherman arrive in Washington, but on that day President Johnson specified the format for the grand review. It was to be held on Tuesday, May 23, and Wednesday, May 24. The troops were to march down Pennsylvania Avenue from the Capitol past a reviewing stand in front of the White House. As Meade’s army was closer to the city than Sherman’s, the Army of the Potomac would march on the twenty-third, Sherman on the twenty-fourth. It was a good arrangement, because the sizes of the forces were such that it took a whole day for each to march by.

Fortunately, the weather on both days was beautiful. Sherman had no role in the review on the twenty-third; while the president and his cabinet viewed the spectacle from their own stands, Sherman joined other distinguished guests in a separate stand. Notified sufficiently ahead of time, Sherman had sent for his wife, Ellen; her father, Thomas Ewing; and the Sherman son Tom.

The next day, however, at nine a.m., Sherman formed up in front of his troops and began the mile-long march to the White House. As they approached the stands along Lafayette Square on the north, he, who had been advised beforehand, rode over to the building on the southeast corner and raised his hat to Secretary of State William Seward, who had been placed at a window where he could witness the spectacle. A delighted Seward returned the salute and Sherman rode on.

Having passed the reviewing stand, Sherman and his staff peeled off and joined the presidential party to witness the rest of the parade. Sherman was introduced first to the president and then to each cabinet member in turn—with one exception. When Sherman reached Stanton, he ostentatiously refused to take the secretary’s outstretched hand, a gesture of revenge noted by all, to Sherman’s intense satisfaction.⁹ The group then settled back for the six-hour parade to pass, the troops leaving the city at the west end of Pennsylvania Avenue.

Aside from the elation of celebrating the end of the war in triumph, the grand review of two days served as an eye-opener for the viewers, because it demonstrated the difference between Meade’s and Sherman’s armies. The Army of the Potomac was neat, well dressed, and well drilled—an impressive sight. But Sherman’s men were different. As Sherman described it,

It was, in my judgment, the most magnificent army in existence—sixty-five thousand men, in splendid physique, who had just completed a march of nearly two thousand miles in a hostile country, in good drill, and who realized that they were being closely scrutinized by thousands of their fellow-countrymen and by foreigners. Division after division passed, each commander of an army corps or division coming on the stand during the passage of his command, to be presented to the President, cabinet, and spectators. The steadiness and firmness of the tread, the careful dress on the guides, the uniform intervals between the companies, all eyes directly to the front, and the tattered and bullet-riven flags, festooned with flowers, all attracted universal notice. Many good people, up to that time, had looked upon our Western army as a sort of mob; but the world then saw, and recognized the fact, that it was an army in the proper sense, well organized, well commanded and disciplined; and there was no wonder that it had swept through the South like a tornado. For six hours and a half that strong tread of the Army of the West resounded along Pennsylvania Avenue; not a soul of that vast crowd of spectators left his place; and, when the rear of the column had passed by, thousands of the spectators still lingered to express their sense of confidence in the strength of a Government which could claim such an army.¹⁰

A few days later Sherman took extended leave of the Military Division of the Mississippi. The war was over for him.