Sherman, William Tecumseh

(1820--91)

Born in Lancaster, Ohio. Orphaned at age nine and raised by a prominent Ohio politician, he graduated from West Point in 1840, saw service in Florida, and, during the Mexican War, in California; he stayed there and in 1853 resigned from the army to become a banker. When the bank failed in 1857, he became superintendent of the Louisiana Military Academy; he resigned when Louisiana seceded early in 1861. Reentering the army, he led a brigade at First Bull Run (July 1861), then was given command of the Union forces assigned to hold Kentucky in the Union; there (late 1861), under pressure from Washington and the press, he had a mild nervous breakdown. Recovered, he was assigned to Ulysses Grant's command and came into his own leading large units at Shiloh (1862), Vicksburg (1863), and Chattanooga (1863). When Grant left to take command of the Federal forces, Sherman assumed command of operations in the west and by September 1864 had captured Atlanta in one of the Civil War's most decisive campaigns. The advocate of a hard, unrelenting war on all fronts - "War is cruelty and you cannot refine it," he said, thus solidifying his reputation as the first modern general - he then set off on his famous March to the Sea. Cutting a wide swath of destruction through Georgia, and, in early 1865, through the Carolinas, by April 1865 he had forced the surrender of the last major Confederate forces. After directing the fight against the Indians as the transcontinental railroad was being built, he succeeded Grant as commander in chief of the army (1869--83). His excellent Memoirs were published in 1875. Asked to run for president in 1884, he sent his oft-quoted refusal: "I will not accept if nominated and will not serve if elected."