Sherman announced his triumph to the President: "I beg to present you as a Christmas gift the city of Savannah, with 150 guns and plenty of ammunition, and also about 25,000 bales of cotton."

Lincoln and Grant address letters of

ulation to him.

To this Lincoln returned his heartfelt thanks, and Halleck, in a letter to Sherman (December 18th), thanks and congrat- said, "Your march will stand out prominently as the great one of this great war;" and Grant, rejoicing in the glory of his friend, wrote (December 18th) to Sherman: "I have just received and read with I need not tell you how much gratification your letter to General Halleck. I congratulate you and the brave officers and men under your command on the successful termination of your most brilliant campaign. I never had a doubt of the result. When apprehensions for your safety were expressed by the President, I assured him that with the army you had, and with you in command of it, there was no danger but you would reach salt water in some place. But I should not have felt the same security -in fact, I would not have intrusted the expedition to any other living commander.”

Losses during

In the entire command 5 officers and 58 men were killed, 13 officers and 232 men were wounded, and the march. 1 officer and 258 men were missing. There were 27 days of marching. The distance passed over was more than 300 miles.

A track of desolation marked the course that the army Conduct of the sol- had taken, though the soldiers were not perdiers on the march. mitted to enter the dwellings of the inhabitants or to commit any trespass. With less justification, the Confederate cavalry had not abstained from destruction. Houses were passed which had been rifled by them, the furniture wantonly broken and scattered about. Both parties, however, had respected the habitations of the " poor whites," often constructed of a few rough boards scantily nailed on a tumble-down frame, windowless, or, if it had a

sash, the broken panes replaced with flakes of bark or wads of old rags, the door often hanging by a single hinge. Sometimes a passing soldier would pick up a stone and hammer up tightly a board hanging by one corner, to keep, as he said, "the wind from the poor devils'

Their amusements

young uns."

The good-nature of the troops was constantly and retaliations. manifested. Many of the regiments were ac companied by goats, dogs, cats, and other animals they had adopted. Game-cocks might be seen riding on a cannon, or on the pack-saddle of a mule. Considering the matter from their professional point of view, a passion for cockfighting may perhaps be excused in soldiers. The birds which had come forth victorious from repeated battles were honored with such names as "Bill Sherman," "Johnny Logan;" while those that had suffered defeats received ignominious titles, such as "Jeff. Davis," "Beauregard," Bragg," and were doomed to a speedy expiation of their want of valor. The spit or the camp-kettle awaited them.

To the animals of the army the Western soldier is singularly attached. He can never speak of them in terms of sufficiently affectionate exaggeration. From the horse, and even from the mule, he can not withhold his caresses. "Fine fellow! what should we do without him? He will tug on, though his hip-bones do stick up as high as his

ears."

But sometimes the passions of these soldiers were aroused. Near Millen a house was passed which, with its outbuildings, and every thing that could be set on fire, was in flames-stables, cotton-gin, fodder-stacks, all were burning. The dead bodies of several bloodhounds which lay in the yard explained the cause of this severity. Their owner had used them for tracking national prisoners who had attempted to escape. After that, every dog that was seen was shot.

About 7000 slaves followed the march to the coast, and

Many slaves accompany the columns.

Slocum estimates that about as many more joined the column, but were unable to hold out. They had a simple but unbounded faith in their deliverers. They had been told that Sherman would put them in the front of the battle; that he had thrown women and children into the Chattahoochee; and that, before he burnt the buildings in Atlanta, he stuffed them full of negroes—"but, massa," said an old whiteheaded slave, "we all know'd better nor dat."

The devastation

march.

About 20,000 bales of cotton were burnt during the march. Of provisions there were captured occasioned by the ten million pounds of corn, and an equal amount of fodder; 1,217,527 rations of meat, 919,000 of bread, 483,000 of coffee, 581,534 of sugar, 1,146,500 of soap, and 137,000 of salt. Three hundred and twenty miles of railroad were destroyed, and the last links of communication between the Confederate armies in Virginia and the West finally severed by burning every tie, twisting every rail while heated red-hot over the flaming piles of ties, and laying in ruin every dépôt, enginehouse, repair-shop, water-tank, and turn-table. Georgia, as the foundery, machine-shop, granary, and corral of the Con federacy, was destroyed. Since the Mississippi had been seized, the supplies for the armies in Virginia had been largely drawn from this quarter. The cultivation of cotton had, at the earnest solicitation of the Richmond government, been suspended, and in all directions there were corn-fields of from 100 to 1000 acres.

From the time the army left Atlanta until its arrival before Savannah, not one word of intelligence was received in the North from it except through Confederate newspapers. Nothing was known of its whereabouts or its fate. Marching in four columns with a front of thirty miles, each column masked in all directions by clouds of skirmishers, Sherman was able to continue to the last to menace so many points that it was impossible for the ene

Minor contempora

my to decide whether Augusta, Macon, or Savannah was his objective, the Gulf or the Atlantic his destination. Soon after Sherman began his march, an expedition from Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and another from neous expeditions. Vicksburg, Mississippi, were started by Canby to cut the enemy's line of communication with Mobile, and detain troops in that field. The expedition from Vicksburg, under General Osband, destroyed the Missis sippi Central Railroad Bridge over the Big Black, thirty miles of the road, two locomotives, and many stores. The Baton Rouge expedition had not a favorable result. At the same time, General Foster, commanding the Depart ment of the South, sent an expedition by the way of Broad River to destroy the railroad between Charleston and Sa vannah. It was repulsed, with a loss of 746 killed, wounded, and missing; but on December 6th Foster obtained a position covering the Charleston and Savannah Railroad between the Coosawatchie and Tullifinny Rivers.

CHAPTER LXXXI.

CONFEDERATE SORTIE TO NASHVILLE. BATTLE OF NASHVILLE. DESTRUCTION OF THE SALLYING CONFEDERATE ARMY.

After the departure of General Sherman on his march to the sea, General Hood, under orders from the Confederate government, continued his sortie toward Nashville. The national troops fell back, as he advanced, from the Tennessee River. He overtook General Schofield at the passage of the Harpeth River at Franklin. THE BATTLE OF FRANKLIN ensued. He was unable to prevent Schofield joining Thomas at Nashville.

General Hood then moved forward to Nashville. For some days the armies were paralyzed by severe weather. THE BATTLE OF NASHVILLE was fought; General Thomas totally defeated the Confederate army, driving it from the field with great loss, and in the pursuit annihilating it.

General Hood escaped across the Tennessee River, and was relieved by the Confederate government from command.

"THOMAS has done magnificently," wrote Grant to Sherman, December 18th, 1864.

Hood marches north

marches to the sea.

We have seen that Sherman halted at Gaylesville, unable to bring Hood to battle, unwilling to ward, while Sherman follow him any farther, and that, preparing every thing to accomplish his double object -the protection of Nashville and the march to the seahe had divided his army, sending one part under Thomas to Nashville, and putting the other in motion through Georgia. In its consternation, the cabinet at Richmond had become He had been ordered demented. Not satisfied with the removal to make a sortie. of Johnston, the ablest general of the South, Davis insisted that Hood should attempt a sortie, removing, for that purpose, the only army that stood between Sherman and the Atlantic Confederate States. Such were the circumstances under which Hood had assumed command that, even had he disapproved of these measures, he must have yielded his consent. To exchange the military advantage of interior lines for the gratification of a delusive invasion was the device of a politician, not of a soldier-a bid for temporary public applause.