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Maj. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman |
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| Excerpts From His Memoirs | ||
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AFTER THE WAR |
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I have endeavored to describe
the public events in which I was an actor or spectator before and during
the civil war of 1861-'65, and it now only remains for me to treat of
similar matters of general interest subsequent to the civil war. Within a
few days of the grand review of May 24, 1865, I took leave of the army at
Washington, and with my family went to Chicago to attend a fair held in
the interest of the families of soldiers impoverished by the war. I
remained there about two weeks; on the 22d of June was at South Bend,
Indiana, where two of my children were at school, and reached my native
place, Lancaster, Ohio, on the 24th. On the 4th of July I visited at
Louisville, Kentucky, the Fourteenth, Fifteenth, Sixteenth, and
Seventeenth Army Corps, which had come from Washington, under the command
of General John A. Logan, for "muster out," or "further orders." I then
made a short visit to General George H. Thomas at Nashville, and returned
to Lancaster, where I remained with the family till the receipt of General
Orders No. 118 of June 27, 1865, which divided the whole territory of the
United States into nineteen departments and five military divisions, the
second of which was the military division of the "Mississippi," afterward
changed to "Missouri," Major- General W. T. Sherman to command, with,
headquarters at St. Louis, to embrace the Departments of the Ohio,
Missouri, and Arkansas. At the close of the civil war there were one million five hundred and sixteen names on the muster-rolls, of which seven hundred and ninety-seven thousand eight hundred and seven were present, and two hundred and two thousand seven hundred and nine absent, of which twenty-two thousand nine hundred and twenty-nine were regulars, the others were volunteers, colored troops, and veteran reserves. The regulars consisted of six regiments of cavalry, five of artillery, and nineteen of infantry. By the act of July 28, 1866, the peace establishment was fixed at one general (Grant), one lieutenant- general (Sherman), five major-generals (Halleck, Meade, Sheridan, Thomas, and Hancock), ten brigadiers (McDowell, Cooke, Pope, Hooker, Schofield, Howard, Terry, Ord, Canby, and Rousseau), ten regiments of cavalry, five of artillery, and forty-five of infantry, admitting of an aggregate force of fifty-four thousand six hundred and forty-one men. While these great changes were being wrought at the West, in the East politics had resumed full sway, and all the methods of anti-war times had been renewed. President Johnson had differed with his party as to the best method of reconstructing the State governments of the South, which had been destroyed and impoverished by the war, and the press began to agitate the question of the next President. Of course, all Union men naturally turned to General Grant, and the result was jealousy of him by the personal friends of President Johnson and some of his cabinet. Mr. Johnson always seemed very patriotic and friendly, and I believed him honest and sincere in his declared purpose to follow strictly the Constitution of the United States in restoring the Southern States to their normal place in the Union; but the same cordial friendship subsisted between General Grant and myself, which was the outgrowth of personal relations dating back to 1839. So I resolved to keep out of this conflict. In September, 1866, I was in the mountains of New Mexico, when a message reached me that I was wanted at Washington. I had with me a couple of officers and half a dozen soldiers as escort, and traveled down the Arkansas, through the Kiowas, Comanches, Cheyennes, and Arapahoes, all more or less disaffected, but reached St. Louis in safety, and proceeded to Washington, where I reported to General Grant. William T. Sherman Memoirs Volume 2 Chapter 26 Page 900 |
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