The Military Theory on Which It Was Based
It seems hardly possible to speak seriously of many of the reasons given by Sherman for finally deciding to leave his old adversary to the care of Thomas’s inferior force. He said, for instance, in his despatch to Grant of November 2: “If I could hope to overhaul Hood, I would turn against him with my whole force.... No single army can catch him.”( 3) Sherman had been “catching” Hood with a single army all summer, and without the slightest difficulty. What reason had he to conclude that it would be impossible to do so later? As my experience proved, it was as easy to “catch” him in November, though with a smaller force, as it had been in July and August with a much larger force, and Thomas had the same experience in December. As Sherman knew from his own experience, as well as I, whether the pursuing force was larger or smaller, Hood was about the easiest man in the world to “catch,” even by a “single” army. But Sherman had under his command at that time, in Georgia and Tennessee, as he said with great emphasis and confidence, two armies, each larger than Hood’s, even assuming the largest estimate then made of the strength of Hood’s army. It appears that Sherman gave Hood credit at that time for only thirty thousand infantry, besides cavalry.( 4) If that was his estimate, then he had at least three or four armies (including the reinforcements he counted on for Thomas in Tennessee), each equal in strength to Hood’s. Is it possible Sherman thought he could not catch Hood with three or four armies? But another despatch from Sherman, dated November 2, seems to show that his estimate of Hood’s army was more than 50,000, instead of 30,000; for in that despatch he said in substance that unless he drew Slocum’s corps back from Atlanta, and abandoned that place, his army would be inferior to Hood’s.( 5) Now Slocum’s corps numbered 10,000 men, and Sherman marched to the sea with 60,000 after stripping down to the best possible fighting condition. Hence Sherman, after sending back the Fourth and Twenty-third corps to Thomas, and leaving out Slocum’s corps, had 50,000 men, and therefore according to this reckoning Hood had more than 50,000. Forty thousand would have been a reasonable estimate for Sherman to have made of Hood’s strength, with his more accurate knowledge than any of his subordinate commanders could have. But, somehow, the estimate of Hood’s force at that time accepted by Thomas and his subordinates in Tennessee was 45,000, besides cavalry, which as understood to be 10,000, or even 12,000 including Forrest’s separate command. But even this was less than half of Sherman’s two armies.
Sherman made no attempt to “catch” Hood during his raid in Sherman’s rear in September, 1864, nor to interfere with his movement to the west. In his “Memoirs,”( 6) Sherman says: “At first I thought of interposing my whole army in the Chattooga Valley, so as to prevent Hood’s escape south.... He would be likely to retreat eastward by Spring Place, which I did not want him to do.” Even thus early in the game Sherman saw the opportunity Hood was probably going to give him to make his projected change of base to Savannah, and hence he took care not to prevent Hood from completing his “co-operative” movement.
Sherman determined to destroy Atlanta and his railroad back to Chattanooga, abandon entirely his former base of operations and line of supply, and assume a new base of future operations on the Atlantic or the gulf. In other words, Sherman decided that he could not attempt to hold any part of the territory he had conquered in the Atlanta campaign; that conquest was valuable only in the opportunity it gave him to destroy everything of military importance in that territory—that is, Atlanta and the railroads. The question then arises, What possible difference could it make in which direction he moved after having decided not to hold any part of that territory, but to destroy it? Why would a move toward the west any more than a move toward the east have the appearance of losing all that had been gained, after he had destroyed it? The simple fact is, the Confederate commander had abandoned Georgia to its fate in the vain hope of putting Sherman on the defensive, not realizing, apparently, that Sherman had ample force for defensive purposes, besides an army superior to Hood’s for aggressive operations. The Southern army was thus placed where Sherman could operate against it by a much shorter line, and hence with a much larger force, if that was what he wished to do. He could at the same time, if he thought it necessary or desirable, inflict upon Georgia the destruction which the Confederate commander wanted to prevent, but had in fact invited by abandoning that State, and that without materially impairing the strength of his (Sherman’s) main army operating against the main force of the enemy. As suggested by Grant, a cavalry raid through Georgia would have accomplished that destruction as well as a march of 60,000 men. Hence, in the light of all that appears in the records up to the time when Sherman actually started on his march, no valid military reason had been given why Sherman should not have sent a cavalry raid into Georgia, as Grant suggested, to destroy everything there, and thus negative Mr. Davis’s promise of protection, while he (Sherman) pursued relentlessly the strictly military plan Grant had prescribed for him to break up Hood’s army or capture it, which Sherman had yet failed to accomplish.
Manifestly some other motive besides the motives stated in Sherman’s telegraphic despatches must have decided him to carry out his plan to make the march to the sea.
The boastful assurance and threat of the Confederate commander-in-chief,( 7) referred to by Sherman, gave at least some reason for Sherman’s defiant response by himself marching through Georgia instead of sending a subordinate; and the partial execution of that threat by Forrest’s cavalry, referred to in Sherman’s despatch of November 1 to Grant, gave a strong reason for Sherman’s eager determination to march at once, without waiting for anything but his own preparations. In his article, “The Grand Strategy of the Last Year of the War,”( 8) Sherman reveals one of the reasons for his haste in starting on his march. “How free and glorious I felt,” he says, “when the magic telegraph was cut, which prevented the possibility of orders of any kind from the rear coming to delay or hinder us!” A letter written by Sherman to Grant, November 6, on the eve of his start for the sea, also gave reasons, other than military, for his famous march. In Sherman’s “Memoirs” no quotation is made from this letter,( 9) and it is referred to very briefly without giving any suggestion of its important contents.
General Sherman thus stated his reasons for writing that letter: “I have heretofore telegraphed and written you pretty fully, but I still have some thoughts in my busy brain that should be confided to you as a key to future developments.”