Memoirs of General William T. Sherman — Complete
The railroad from Charlotte to Danville is all that is left to the
enemy, and it will not do for me to go there, on account of the
red-clay hills which are impassable to wheels in wet weather.
I expect to make a junction with General Schofield in ten days.
Yours truly,
W. T. SHERMAN, Major-General.
HEADQUARTERS MILITARY DIVISION OF THE MISSISSIPPI, IN THE FIELD,
FAYETTVILLE, NORTH CAROLINA, Sunday, March. 12, 1885.
Major-General TERRY, commanding United States Forces,
Wilmington, North Carolina.
GENERAL: I have just received your message by the tug which left
Wilmington at 2 p.m. yesterday, which arrived here without
trouble. The scout who brought me your cipher-message started back
last night with my answers, which are superseded by the fact of
your opening the river.
General Howard just reports that he has secured one of the enemy's
steamboats below the city, General Slocum will try to secure two
others known to be above, and we will load them with refugees
(white and black) who have clung to our skirts, impeded our
movements, and consumed our food.
We have swept the country well from Savannah to here, and the men
and animals are in fine condition. Had it not been for the foul
weather, I would have caught Hardee at Cheraw or here; but at
Columbia, Cheraw, and here, we have captured immense stores, and
destroyed machinery, guns, ammunition, and property, of inestimable
value to our enemy. At all points he has fled from us, "standing
not on the order of his going."
The people of South Carolina, instead of feeding Lee's army, will
now call on Lee to feed them.
I want you to send me all the shoes, stockings, drawers, sugar,
coffee, and flour, you can spare; finish the loads with oats or
corn: Have the boats escorted, and let them run at night at any
risk. We must not give time for Jos. Johnston to concentrate at
Goldsboro'. We cannot prevent his concentrating at Raleigh, but he
shall have no rest. I want General Schofield to go on with his
railroad from Newbern as far as he can, and you should do the same
from Wilmington. If we can get the roads to and secure Goldsboro'
by April 10th, it will be soon enough; but every day now is worth a
million of dollars. I can whip Jos. Johnston provided he does not
catch one of my corps in flank, and I will see that the army
marches hence to Goldsboro' in compact form.
I must rid our army of from twenty to thirty thousand useless
mouths; as many to go down Cape Fear as possible, and the rest to
go in vehicles or on captured horses via Clinton to Wilmington.
I thank you for the energetic action that has marked your course,
and shall be most happy to meet you. I am, truly your friend,
W. T. SHERMAN, Major-General.
In quick succession I received other messages from General Terry,
of older date, and therefore superseded by that brought by the tug
Davidson, viz., by two naval officers, who had come up partly by
canoes and partly by land; General Terry had also sent the
Thirteenth Pennsylvania Cavalry to search for us, under Colonel
Kerwin, who had dispatched Major Berks with fifty men, who reached
us at Fayetteville; so that, by March 12th, I was in full
communication with General Terry and the outside world. Still, I
was anxious to reach Goldsboro', there to make junction with
General Schofield, so as to be ready for the next and last stage of
the war. I then knew that my special antagonist, General Jos. E.
Johnston, was back, with part of his old army; that he would not be
misled by feints and false reports, and would somehow compel me to
exercise more caution than I had hitherto done. I then
over-estimated his force at thirty-seven thousand infantry,
supposed to be made up of S. D. Lee's corps, four thousand;
Cheatham's, five thousand; Hoke's, eight thousand; Hardee's, ten
thousand; and other detachments, ten thousand; with Hampton's,
Wheeler's, and Butler's cavalry, about eight thousand. Of these,
only Hardee and the cavalry were immediately in our front, while
the bulk of Johnston's army was supposed to be collecting at or
near Raleigh. I was determined, however, to give him as little
time for organization as possible, and accordingly crossed Cape
Fear River, with all the army, during the 13th and 14th, leaving
one division as a rearguard, until the arsenal could be completely
destroyed. This was deliberately and completely leveled on the
14th, when fire was applied to the wreck. Little other damage was
done at Fayetteville.
On the 14th the tug Davidson again arrived from Wilmington, with
General Dodge, quartermaster, on board, reporting that there was no
clothing to be had at Wilmington; but he brought up some sugar and
coffee, which were most welcome, and some oats. He was followed by
a couple of gunboats, under command of Captain Young, United States
Navy, who reached Fayetteville after I had left, and undertook to
patrol the river as long as the stage of water would permit; and
General Dodge also promised to use the captured steamboats for a
like purpose. Meantime, also, I had sent orders to General
Schofield, at Newbern, and to General Terry, at Wilmington, to move
with their effective forces straight for Goldsboro', where I
expected to meet them by the 20th of March.
On the 15th of March the whole army was across Cape Fear River, and
at once began its march for Goldsboro'; the Seventeenth Corps still
on the right, the Fifteenth next in order, then the Fourteenth and
Twentieth on the extreme left; the cavalry, acting in close concert
with the left flank. With almost a certainty of being attacked on
this flank, I had instructed General Slocum to send his
corps-trains under strong escort by an interior road, holding four
divisions ready for immediate battle. General Howard was in like
manner ordered to keep his trains well to his right, and to have
four divisions unencumbered, about six miles ahead of General
Slocum, within easy support.
In the mean time, I had dispatched by land to Wilmington a train of
refugees who had followed the army all the way from Columbia, South
Carolina, under an escort of two hundred men, commanded by Major
John A. Winson (One Hundred and Sixteenth Illinois Infantry), so
that we were disencumbered, and prepared for instant battle on our
left and exposed flank.
In person I accompanied General Slocum, and during the night of
March 15th was thirteen miles out on the Raleigh road. This flank
followed substantially a road along Cape Fear River north,
encountered pretty stubborn resistance by Hardee's infantry,
artillery, and cavalry, and the ground favored our enemy; for the
deep river, Cape Fear, was on his right, and North River on his
left, forcing us to attack him square in front. I proposed to
drive Hardee well beyond Averysboro', and then to turn to the right
by Bentonville for Goldsboro'. During the day it rained very
hard, and I had taken refuge in an old cooper-shop, where a
prisoner of war was brought to me (sent back from the skirmish-line
by General Kilpatrick), who proved to be Colonel Albert Rhett,
former commander of Fort Sumter. He was a tall, slender, and
handsome young man, dressed in the most approved rebel uniform,
with high jackboots beautifully stitched, and was dreadfully
mortified to find himself a prisoner in our hands. General Frank
Blair happened to be with me at the moment, and we were much amused
at Rhett's outspoken disgust at having been captured without a
fight. He said he was a brigade commander, and that his brigade
that day was Hardee's rear-guard; that his command was composed
mostly of the recent garrisons of the batteries of Charleston
Harbor, and had little experience in woodcraft; that he was giving
ground to us as fast as Hardee's army to his rear moved back, and
during this operation he was with a single aide in the woods, and
was captured by two men of Kilpatrick's skirmish-line that was
following up his retrograde movement. These men called on him to
surrender, and ordered him, in language more forcible than polite,
to turn and ride back. He first supposed these men to be of
Hampton's cavalry, and threatened to report them to General Hampton
for disrespectful language; but he was soon undeceived, and was
conducted to Kilpatrick, who sent him back to General Slocum's
guard.
The rain was falling heavily, and, our wagons coming up, we went
into camp there, and had Rhett and General Blair to take supper
with us, and our conversation was full and quite interesting. In
due time, however, Rhett was passed over by General Slocum to his
provost-guard, with orders to be treated with due respect,--and was
furnished with a horse to ride.
The next day (the 16th) the opposition continued stubborn, and near
Averysboro' Hardee had taken up a strong position, before which
General Slocum deployed Jackson's division (of the Twentieth
Corps), with part of Ward's. Kilpatrick was on his right front.
Coming up, I advised that a brigade should make a wide circuit by
the left, and, if possible, catch this line in flank. The movement
was completely successful, the first line of the enemy was swept
away, and we captured the larger part of Rhett's brigade, two
hundred and seventeen men, including Captain Macbeth's battery of
three guns, and buried one hundred and eight dead.
The deployed lines (Ward's and Jackson's) pressed on, and found
Hardee again intrenched; but the next morning he was gone, in full
retreat toward Smithfield. In this action, called the battle of
Averysboro', we lost twelve officers and sixty-five men killed, and
four hundred and seventy-seven men wounded; a serious loss, because
every wounded man had to be carried in an ambulance. The rebel
wounded (sixty-eight) were carried to a house near by, all surgical
operations necessary were performed by our surgeons, and then these
wounded men were left in care of an officer and four men of the
rebel prisoners, with a scanty supply of food, which was the best
we could do for them. In person I visited this house while the
surgeons were at work, with arms and legs lying around loose, in
the yard and on the porch; and in a room on a bed lay a pale,
handsome young fellow, whose left arm had just been cut off near
the shoulder. Some one used my name, when he asked, in a feeble
voice, if I were General Sherman. He then announced himself as
Captain Macbeth, whose battery had just been captured; and said
that he remembered me when I used to visit his father's house, in
Charleston. I inquired about his family, and enabled him to write
a note to his mother, which was sent her afterward from Goldsboro'.
I have seen that same young gentleman since in St. Louis, where he
was a clerk in an insurance-office.
While the battle of Averysboro' was in progress, and I was sitting
on my horse, I was approached by a man on foot, without shoes or
coat, and his head bandaged by a handkerchief. He announced
himself as the Captain Duncan who had been captured by Wade Hampton
in Fayetteville, but had escaped; and, on my inquiring how he
happened to be in that plight, he explained that when he was a
prisoner Wade Hampton's men had made him "get out of his coat, hat,
and shoes," which they appropriated to themselves. He said Wade
Hampton had seen them do it, and he had appealed to him personally
for protection, as an officer, but Hampton answered him with a
curse. I sent Duncan to General Kilpatrick, and heard afterward
that Kilpatrick had applied to General Slocum for his prisoner,
Colonel Rhett, whom he made march on foot the rest of the way to
Goldsboro', in retaliation. There was a story afloat that
Kilpatrick made him get out of those fine boots, but restored them
because none of his own officers had feet delicate enough to wear