Sherman's March To The Sea, And The Burning Of Columbia, South Carolina, From His Memoirs (Unabridged)

This recording comprises part of chapter 22 and all of chapter 23 of American Civil War General William Tecumseh Sherman’s Memoirs. Sherman was one of the premier generals fighting for the North. In 1864, Sherman succeeded Grant as the Union commander in the western theater of the war. He proceeded to lead his troops to the capture of the city of Atlanta, a military success that contributed to the re-election of U.S. President Abraham Lincoln. Sherman's subsequent march through Georgia and the Carolinas further undermined the Confederacy's ability to continue fighting. He accepted the surrender of all the Confederate armies in the Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida in April 1865. Sherman’s scorched earth policy marching his army through Georgia from conquered Atlanta to coastal Savannah was a strong factor in breaking the South’s will to fight. The South’s surrender came just five months later. He steadfastly refused to be drawn into politics and in 1875 published his Memoirs, one of the best-known first-hand accounts of the American Civil War. British military historian B. H. Liddell Hart famously declared that Sherman was "the first modern general"