Call The Young and Middle-Aged Men of Ohio to Arms!

This entry is from The Sherman Letters; Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891 edited by Rachel Sherman Thorndike.  

The Civil War was mainly fought in the south, but some, including General Sherman saw a real threat to the Northern states in the early days of the war after Bull Run, which he writes to his brother.

September 9, 1861

. . .  Ohio, Indiana and Illinois must sooner or later arm every inhabitant, and the sooner the better. I hardly apprehend that Beauregard can succeed in getting Washington, but should he, it will be worse to us than Manassass; but supposing he falls back, he will first try to overwhelm Rosecrans in Western Virginia and then look to Tennessee. We ought to have here a well appointed Army of a hundred thousand men. . . .

. . . .and if you are full of zeal you could not do better than to raise your voice to call the young and middle-aged men of Ohio to arms. If they can't get muskets then let them get such arms as can be gathered together, or if not that, then let them organize in companies in every township and be ready to collect together and move on short notice. I am amazed to see here and everywhere such apparent indifference when all know that Rebels threaten the Capital and are creeping around us in Missouri and Kansas. If they are united, and we disunited or indifferent, they will succeed. I knew this reaction was natural and to be expected, but it is none the less to be deplored. . .

William Tecumseh Sherman, from Generalsandbrevets.com

That Vindictive Feeling

This entry is from The Sherman Letters, Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, Book by Rachel Sherman Thorndike, 1894.

Letter dated August 19, 1861 William Sherman to his brother Senator John Sherman

. . . There is no time to be lost and I will not spare my individual efforts, though I still feel as one groping in the dark. Slowly but surely the public is realizing what I knew all the time, the strong vindictive feeling of the whole South.

William Sherman as found at generalsandbrevets.com

The Incessant Wants of 5,000 Men

This entry is from Home Letters of General Sherman, by William T. Sherman, 1820-1891.  Sherman  is writing to his wife.

[Undated: apparently August, 1861.]

. . . .The incessant wants of 5,000 men, all complaining, with sick wives and children and fathers at home, wanting to go to Georgetown and Washington and every-wheres where they should not go, growling about clothing, shoes, beef, pork, and everything! Now in an army all these things are regulated by sergeants, captains and colonels. A brigadier only has to operate through them. An irregularity in a regiment is checked by a word to the colonel; but here every woman within five miles who has a peach stolen or roasting ear carried off comes to me to have a guard stationed to protect her tree, and our soldiers are the most destructive men I have ever known. It may be other volunteers are just as bad, indeed the complaint is universal, and I see no alternative but to let it take its course. When in Fairfax County we had a majority of friends. Now I suppose there is not a man, woman or child but would prefer Jeff Davis or the Czar of Russia to govern them rather than an American volunteer army. . . .

William Tecumsah Sherman, Brady National Photographic Art Gallery, from Library of Congress Collection

The Real War Has Not Yet Begun

This entry is from Home letters of General Sherman by William T. Sherman.  Sherman is writing to his wife, telling her about Bull Run, and what the future forebodes, "the destruction of all able-bodied men of this generation.".  He knew exactly what he was getting into. It was about this time that Lincoln appointed him a brigadier general.

Washington, August 3, 1861.

I sent you a long letter a few days ago, telling you all about Bull Run. The disaster was serious in its effect on the men who, whether they ought or not to be, are discouraged beyond measure. All the volunteers continue in a bad state, but we must do the best we can with them. " It seems regulars do not enlist, because of the preference always given to volunteers, whose votes are counted even in the ranks. I doubt if our democratic form of government admits of that organization and discipline without which an army is a mob. Congress is doing all that is possible in the way of laws and appropriations, and McClellan is determined to proceed slowly and cautiously.

I wish we had more regulars to tie to. We must be the assailant and our enemy is more united in feeling, and can always choose their ground. It was not entrenchments but the natural ground and woods of which they took good advantage, while we in pursuit had to cross open fields and cross the crests of hills which obstructed a view of their forces. This must continue to be the case . . . .

.  .  . Beauregard must have suffered much, else his sagacity would have forced him to take Washington, which he well might.


I prefer you should go to housekeeping in Lancaster. Don't come here. I would not permit you to visit my camp. I have as much as I can do to keep my officers and men from living in Washington, and shall not set a bad example. I never expect again to move you from Lancaster.


The simple chances of war, provided we adhere to the determination of subduing the South, will, of course, involve the destruction of all able-bodied men of this generation and go pretty deep into the next. 'Tis folly to underestimate the task, and you see how far already the nation has miscalculated. The real war has not yet begun.

An illustration from the book, Life and Deeds of General W T Sherman , Including the Story of His Great March to the Sea  by Henry Davenport Northrup

The Cynic

From Home Letters of General Sherman by William Tecumseh Sherman

Sherman was on the way to Washington from St. Louis when he wrote this to his wife.

June 8, 1861


. . . Now that the War has begun, no man can tell when it will end. Who would have supposed old England, chuck full of Abolitionists, would side with the southern against their northern descendants. Nations like men are governed solely by self interest, and England needs cotton, and the return market for the manufactures consumed in exchange. Again corruption seems so to underlie our government that even in this time of trial, cheating in clothes, blankets, flour, bread, everything, is universal.


It may be the simple growl of people unaccustomed to the privations of war. Again some three or four hundred thousand people are now neglecting work and looking to war for the means of livelihood. These, hereafter, will have a say in politics, so that I feel that we are drifting on the high seas, and no one knows the port to which we are drifting. The best chance of safety is our old government, with all its political chicanery and machinery, and to it we tie our fortunes. . . .

William Tecumseh Sherman, From the Library of Congress Collection