Sherman, William Tecumseh, as Union General

Autograph letter signed ("W. T. Sherman Maj Genl"), 3 pages (9 7/8 x 8 3/4 in.; 251 x 197 mm) on a blue-ruled bifolium with printed letterhead Headquarters, Military Division of the Mississippi, In the Field, Goldsboro, N.C., 5 April 1865, to Admiral John A. Dahlgren; mounting remnant on final blank.

Sherman's Civil War: Selected Correspondence, ed. Simpson and Berlin, p. 841

Sherman reflects on his Carolinas Campaign and the capture of Charleston: "No longer does a little dirty flag defy us on Salt Water. Encamped at Goldsboro, Sherman believed that the end of hostilities was near and consequently tempered his operations somewhat. On 28 March, Sherman met with President Lincoln, General Grant, and Admiral Porter at City Point to plot the end of the War. This prevented him from meeting with old friend John Dahlgren: "I was in hopes when we reached a port I would find you, but the winds & wane of fortune carried me beyond your jurisdiction and landed me in Admiral Porter's Dominions. I first found the Gunboat Eden in Cape Fear River, and Since have found Capt. Macomb in Pimlico Sound as well as the Admiral himself at City Point. But I hear you are relieved at your own request and gone home. I Should have much liked to have seen you and talked over the Symptoms which Our Patient Charleston exhibited as I touched one by one her vital chords with my blunt Army. You see I was right in not wasting time on Fort Moultrie, and had Adml. Porter waited [a] couple of months I could have taken Wilmington[,] Fort Fisher and all without a blow. There was no power Save Lee & Johnston combined that could prevent me reaching Fayetteville N.C. Over there no Enemy could remain down in the Right of Cape Fear River. I told Admiral Porter that he had stolen my thunder. But on the whole we all have reason to be satisfied. No longer does a dirty flag defy us on Salt Water. The majesty of our Govt. is beginning to be felt, and Guerillas will pause when they think of Charleston ere they dare raise their hands in anger against the emblem of our Nationality."

Charleston was the birthplace of the Confederacy and the site of the first shots of the Civil War. It was also a city that Sherman had lived in and knew well, but four weary years of war left him unable to sympathize with the rebel city: "I cannot even go to Charleston to weep over its Ruins—where many a happy day of my early life was spent—nor do I feel inclined to go, but its lesson will stand long after you & I are gone, Eloquent in its Sadness."

While the March to the Sea is more celebrated, Sherman's Carolina campaign, which forced the evacuation of Charleston, was probably his most significant contribution to the Union victory. "From Savannah to Goldsboro the Grand Army of the West had marched 425 miles in fifty days ... and must be reckoned a much greater achievement than the more famous march through Georgia, which by comparison was a mere pleasure trip. As a triumph of endurance and mechanical skill on the part of the army and of inflexible resolution in the general, it stands unrivalled in the history of modern war; and it had as direct an influence upon the final issue of the campaign around Richmond as if it had been conducted within sound of Lee's guns" (Wood and Edmonds, quoted in Boatner). Four days after Sherman wrote this letter, Robert E. Lee surrendered his Army of Northern Virginia to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Courthouse.

Sherman closes with a personal note about the loss of Dahlgren's son, Colonel Ulric Dahlgren, who was killed on 2 March 1864 at the head of a cavalry raid on Richmond. "I trust your health is better, and that you soon may realize another hope which I Know you Cherish, to go to that other proud but doomed city, and remove thence all that is left to earth of your son Ulric. May we meet soon in Peace." ("Angered by Confederate authorities' ill treatment of [Ulric Dahlgren's] corpse, the Union underground of Richmond ... spirited his corpse from an unmarked grave in the Oakwood Cemetery to the farm of Robert Orrocks, where it would remain until after the war," Simpson and Berlin, p. 841, note).

accompanied by: Contemporary clerical transcript of a dispatch sent in code from Sherman to Dahlgren at the beginning of the Carolinas campaign, 1 page, "Head Quarters Army in the Field," Lowry's, 7 February 1865, docketed at head by Dahlgren "Copy of dispatch sent in cypher. Received 12 Febr. while steaming out of Bulls Bay"; mounting remnant on verso. "We are on the Rail Road at Midway and will break fifty (50) miles from Edisto towards Augusta, and then cross towards Columbia. Weather is bad and Country full of water. This cause may force me to turn against Charleston. ... Watch Charleston close. I think Jeff Davis will order it to be abandoned lest he lose its garrison as well as guns. We are all well and the Enemy retreats before us."