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458

SHERMAN'S SECOND GREAT MARCH.

the field, as militia, every white man in the State between the ages of sixteen and sixty years, not already in the service. So urgent seemed the need, that he threatened conscription for all who should not volunteer. But very few of that militia force confronted the National troops anywhere in South Carolina.

The Confederates occupied the line of the Salkhatchie with infantry and artillery, at important points, while Wheeler's cavalry hovered around the advance of the National army; and when the Seventeenth Corps, with which Sherman was moving, approached River's Bridge, over that stream, and the Fifteenth moved on Beaufort Bridge, they found a force ready to dispute the passage of each. Those at River's Bridge were soon dispersed by the divisions of Generals Mower and G. A. Smith, of the Seventeenth Corps, who made a flank movement under extraordinary difficulties. They waded through a swamp three miles in width, with the water from one to four feet in depth, the generals wading at the head of the columns. The weather was bitter cold, and the water was almost icy in temperature. But the work was accomplished. The foe was quickly scattered in a disorderly retreat to Branchville, behind the Edisto, burning bridges behind them, and inflicting a loss on the Nationals of nearly one hundred men. The latter pressed rapidly on to the South Carolina railroad, at Midway, Bamberg, and Graham's stations, and destroyed the track for many miles. Kilpatrick, meanwhile, was skirmishing briskly, and sometimes heavily, with Wheeler, as the former moved, by Barnwell and Blackville, toward Aiken and threat

ened Augusta; and by noon, on the 11th, the Nationals had • Feb., 1865. possession of the railway from Midway to Johnson's Station, thereby dividing the Confederate forces which remained at Branchville and Charleston on one side, and Aiken and Augusta on the other.

Sherman now moved his right wing rapidly northward, on Orangeburg. The Seventeenth Corps crossed the south fork of the Edisto at Binnaker's Bridge, and the Fifteenth Corps passed over it at Holman's Bridge. These converged at Poplar Spring, where the Seventeenth, moving swiftly on Orangeburg, dashed upon the Confederates intrenched in front of the bridge near there, and drove them across the stream. The latter tried to burn the bridge, but failed. They had a battery in position behind the bridge, covered by a parapet of cotton and earth, with extended wings. This Blair confronted, with General G. A. Smith's division posted close to the Edisto, while two others were moved to a point two miles below. There Force's division, supported by Mower's, crossed on a pontoon bridge. When Force approached the Confederates, they retreated, and Smith crossed over and occupied their works. The bridge was soon repaired, and, by four o'clock that afternoon, the whole of the Seventeenth Corps was in Orange Feb. 12. burg, and had begun the work of destruction on the railway connecting that place with Columbia.

Without wasting time or labor on Branchville or Charleston, which Sherman knew the Confederates would no longer hold, he now turned all his columns straight on Columbia. The Seventeenth Corps pushed the foe across the Congaree, forcing him to burn the bridges, and then followed the State road directly for the capital of South Carolina, while the Fifteenth crossed the South Edisto from Poplar Spring at Schilling's

• Feb. 14.

SHERMAN MOVES ON COLUMBIA.

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Ige, and reached the State road at Zeigler's. They found the Confedes in strong force at a bridge over the Congaree Creek, which was deled by a heavy battery on the north side, that swept it, and a weaker one he head of the bridge, on the south side. This tete-du-pont was turned by division of General C. R. Woods, by sending Stone's brigade through a ress swamp on the left. The Confederates fled after trying in vain to in the bridge. Over it the main column of the Fifteenth passed, and bivoued that night near the great bridge that spans the Congaree, in front of Jumbia, where the Confederates, in and around that city, shelled

m.

That bridge was burned the next morning by the occu- * Feb. 16,

1865

its of Columbia, when the National vanguard approached it. In the mean time the left wing of the army, under Slocum, had pushed adily forward some distance to the westward of the right, but with the ne destination, Columbia. For awhile Augusta trembled with fear as his st passed by; and the troops for its defense were kept on the alert day d night. But Slocum was very little troubled excepting by Wheeler's valry; and those troopers were kept too busy by Kilpatrick to be very schievous. Through the swamps and across the streams he trudged on, Barnwell, Windom and Lexington, for the Saluda (which, with the Broad iver, forms the Congaree at Columbia), hearing now and then of the apoach of troops from the westward. Beauregard and Bragg had, in turn ad in conjunction, tried in vain to thwart Sherman's plans, and the Conspirors, in their despair, had turned to General Johnston as their only hope r the maintenance of their cause below the Roanoke. That able officer as now again in command in that region, and at the time we are considering, heatham was moving from Northern Mississippi with the remnant of Hood's my, with orders to get in front of Sherman, and, in co-operation with Haree at Charleston, arrest his progress through South Carolina.

But Sherman's movements were too rapid to allow Cheatham to execute is order, and the National army was at Columbia before any of Hood's men ppeared. Slocum had not been molested by them, and he arrived upon the anks of the Saluda, a few miles from Columbia, at almost the same hour when Howard reached it, after the burning of the bridge over the Congaree. The Nationals had tried to save that fine structure, but failed. They could ce the inhabitants hastening about the streets, and occasional squads of avalry. Upon the latter a single gun of De Grass's battery fired. But this Sherman checked, and limited him to a few shots at the unfinished State House.

2

1 "Terrible, meanwhile, was the press, the shock, the rush, the hurry, the universal confusion-such as night naturally be looked for in the circumstances of a city from which thousands were preparing to fly without revious preparations for flight-burdened with pale and trembling women, their children, and portable chatels, trunks and jewels, family bibles, and the lares familières. The railroad depot for Charlotte was crowded with anxious waiters upon the train, with a wilderness of luggage-millions, perhaps, in value-much of which was finally lost. The citizens fared badly. The Governments of the State and of the Confederacy absorbed all he modes of conveyance."-Sack and Destruction of the City of Columbia, page 10.

2 The author of the little pamphlet above quoted, speaks of this firing as if a regular bombardment of the ity had occurred. He says the shells "fell thick and fast about the town;" and he complains that "no summons o surrender had been made; no warning of any kind was given." I have recorded in the text substantially what Sherman says on the subject, in his report. The author above quoted says: "The damage was comparaively slight. The new capitol was struck five times, but suffered little or no injury." That building was commenced sometime before the war, and was designed to be the finest structure of the kind in the Union, and the most costly. It is of light-colored granite, with the surface smooth from base to roof. Its order of architecture s pure Corinthian throughout. It was not more than half completed when the war broke out, and labor upon t ceased. The picture on the next page shows it as it will appear when finished.

460

SURRENDER OF COLUMBIA.

Howard had marched up from the burning bridge to the Saluda, by Sherman's orders, with directions to cross that stream and the Broad River, and

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Columbia. Over that the brigade of Colonel Stone (Twenty-fifth lowa Infantry), of Woods's division of the Fifteenth (Logan's) Corps, passed, and under its cover a pontoon bridge was laid on the morning of the 17th. General Sherman was there, and at eleven o'clock information reached him that Mr. Goodwyn, mayor of the city, with a deputation of the common council, had come out in a carriage, and made a formal surrender of Columbia to Colonel Stone.

There seemed to have been no adequate military force for its protection. Wheeler's cavalry had done all in its power, in front of the National army, but the advance of the latter was irresistible. The shallow Beauregard was in command at Columbia. As usual, he had promised much, but did little. He made a slight show of resistance and withdrew, leaving Hampton's cavalry as a rear-guard for covering the flight of the Creole's army. Governor Magrath and suite, and a large train of officials had fled, and nothing could save the town from destruction but a peaceable surrender. This was done at the time when a small party of the Seventeenth Corps had crossed the Congaree in a skiff, and entered the city from the west, unopposed. Before noon, on the 17th of February, the National flag, so dishonored at the chief seaport of South Carolina four years before, was waving in triumph over the old and new Capitols of the State at the seat of Government.

In anticipation of the occupation of the city, Sherman had made written orders to General Howard, touching the conduct of the troops. They were to destroy absolutely all arsenals and public property not needed for the use of the army, as well as all railroads, depots and machinery, useful in war to an enemy, "but to spare all dwellings, colleges, schools, asylums, and harmless private property." The commanding general was the first to cross the por toon bridge, and, in company with General Howard, rode into the city. It was already in possession of General Stone, who had posted men about it

1 General Sherman's Report, dated April 4, 1865.

DESTRUCTION OF COLUMBIA.

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he protection of persons and property. The wind was then blowing a . Citizens and soldiers were upon the streets, and general good order ailed. Sherman had ratified the promise of protection given by Stone. will become my duty," he observed, substantially, "to destroy some of Government or public buildings, but I will reserve this performance to ther day. It shall be done to-morrow, provided the day be calm."1 That promise was faithfully kept, and had Wade Hampton, the comader of the rear-guard of the Confederates, who lingered in the town 1 ten o'clock that morning, been as careful of the interests of the citizens The Union troops, all would have been well. But he ordered all the cotton The city, public and private, to be taken into the streets and burned, to went its falling into the hands of the Nationals. When Sherman entered town, the cotton was in the streets. The cords and bagging of the bales been cut, and the white wool in tufts was flying about the city in the e, like snow, lodging in the trees and on the sides and roofs of houses. twithstanding the high wind, some of the bales, especially a pile of them he heart of the city, near the court-house, were already on fire when erman entered. His troops, by great exertions, partially subdued the mes. They broke out again, with greater intensity, that night; and the utiful capital of South Carolina-the destined seat of Government of the ospective independent "Confederate States of America"- was laid in ruins the course of a few hours. Among the public buildings then destroyed, s the old State House, delineated on page 46 of volume I. Hampton, the I author of the conflagration, afterward charged it upon Sherman-a arge which Beauregard, ever ready to "fire the Southern heart" with the ation of "Yankee atrocities," did not make at the time, and which Pollard, Confederate historian of the war, did not make afterward, except by plication, when he wrote that Sherman, "After having completed, as far possible, the destruction of Columbia, continued his march northward."

3

1 Sack and Destruction of the City of Columbia, page 18.

The Fifteenth Corps passed through the city in the course of the day, and went out on the Camden road. e Seventeenth did not enter the town; and the left wing was not within two miles of it at any time. 3 See General Sherman's Report, April 4, 1865.

4 General Sherman, in his Report, dated April 4, 1865, says: "Before one single building had been fired by er, the smoldering fires, set by Hampton's order, were rekindled by the wind and communicated to the Idings around. At dark they began to spread, and got beyond the control of the brigade on duty within the 7. The whole of Woods's division was brought in, but it was found impossible to check the flames, which, midnight, had become unmanageable, and raged until about 4 A. M., when, the wind subsiding, they were under control. I was up nearly all night, and saw Generals Howard, Logan and Woods, and others, laboring save houses and protect families thus suddenly deprived of shelter, and of bedding and wearing apparel. I claim, on the part of my army, any agency in this fire, but, on the contrary, claim that we saved what Columbia remains unconsumed. And, without hesitation, I charge General Wade Hampton with having rned his own city of Columbia, not with a malicious intent, or as a manifestation of a silly Roman stoicism,' t from folly and want of sense, in filling it with lint, cotton, and tinder. Our officers and men on duty worked Il to extinguish the flames; but others not on duty, including the officers, who had long been imprisoned ere, rescued by us, may have assisted in spreading the fire after it had once begun, and may have indulged in concealed joy to see the ruin of the capital of South Carolina."*

The conduct of the Confederate troops, and especially of Wade Hampton, the commander, after the mayor

* Major Nichols, in his Story of the Great March, under date of Feb. 17, 1865 (page 166), says: "Various causes are assigned to explain origin of the fire. I am quite sure that it originated in sparks, flying from the hundreds of bales of cotton which the Rebels had placed ing the middle of the main street, and fired as they left the city. Fire from a tightly compressed bale of cotton is unlike that of a more en material, which burns itself out. The fire lies smoldering in a bale of cotton after it appears to be extinguished, and in this instance, sen our soldiers supposed they had extinguished the fire, it suddenly broke out again with the most disastrous effect. There were fires, wever, which must have been started independent of the above-named cause. The source of these is ascribed to the desire for revenge in some 200 of our prisoners, who had escaped from the cars as they were being conveyed from this city to Charlotte, and, with the amories of long suffering in the miserable pens I visited yesterday, on the ot'er si ie of the river, sought this means of retaliation."

462

CHARLESTON EVACUATED.

The fall of Columbia was the signal for Hardee to evacuate Charleston, for it was then flanked, and he was threatened with isolation. He was in command of about fourteen thousand troops. It was supposed, until the last moment, that Sherman's march on Columbia, was only a feint, and that Charleston was his chief objective. With this impression, Hardee had concentrated the troops under his command in and around that city. To cherish that belief, General Gillmore, then in command on the coast in that vicinity, had caused feints to be made in the direction of Charleston. One of these was composed of a considerable body of troops, under General Schimmelfennig, who, on the 10th of February, made a lodgment on James's Island, within three miles of Charleston. At the same time, gun-boats and a mortar schooner moved up the Stono River and flanked the troops. An attack was made upon the Confederate works on the island, and their rifle-pits were carried, with a loss to the Nationals of about eighty

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Co-operative movements were made at the same time, by General Hatch, who led a column across the Combahee toward the South Edisto River, while General Potter, with another column from Bull's Bay, northward of Charleston, menaced the Northwestern railway.

These movements, with Columbia at the mercy of Sherman, warned Hardes hat he must instantly leave Charleston by the only railway now left open for his use, and endeavor to join Beauregard and Cheatham, who were then, with the remnant of Hood's army, making their way into North Carolina, where Johnston intended to concentrate all his available forces, in Sherman's path. Having determined upon a speedy evacuation, Hardee employed a short time in destroying as much property in Charleston, that might be useful to the Nationals, as possible. At an early Feb. 17, hour, every building, warehouse, or shed, stored with cotton, was fired by a guard detailed for the purpose. The few inhabitants were filled with consternation, as they saw the hands of their professed friends, applying the torch to the already sorely smitten city. The fire engines were brought out to endeavor to save buildings adjoining the cotton stores, but in vain; and on the western side of the city, the flames raged furiously. The horrors of the scene were heightened by a catastrophe which destroyed many lives. Some boys had discovered powder at the depot of the Northwestern railway, and amused themselves by throwing some of it on burning cotton in the street. The powder dropping from their hands, soon formed a train, along which fire ran to the large quantity stored at the depot.

and some of the council had gone out to surrender the city, had exasperated the National soldiers, and accorlizz to the laws and usages of war, subjected the city to lawful destruction. According to the author of The Sack and Destruction of the City of Columbia, the mayor and councilmen went out at nine o'clock, when "it was proposed," he says, "that the white flag should be displayed from the tower of the City Hall. But General Hamp ton, whose command had not yet left the city, and who was still eager to do battle in its defense, indignanti declared that, if displayed, he should have it torn down." The author adds: "Hampton's cavalry, as we have already mentioned, lingered till near ten o'clock, and scattered groups of Wheeler's command hovered about the Federal army at their entrance into the town." It appears by the testimony of this eager witness against the Nationals, who professes to have been an eye-witness of the destruction of Columbia, that the Confederale soldiery, under the direction of Wade Hampton, continued to fight the Nationals in the streets of the city after it had been surrendered by competent authority. That writer gives a terrible picture of the robberies committed by the Union soldiers not on duty. They seem to have followed the example of the Confederates themselves. He tells us of a building, in which valuable property of almost every kind had been stored, that was "broken open by a band of plunderers," early in the morning, before the arrival of the National troops and says, "Wheeler's cavalry also shared largely in the plunder, and several of them might be seen bearing of huge bales upon their saddles."-Page 12.

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