"Our troops raised sad havoc with the Mobile and Ohio and the Southern railroad lines. The Southern road was torn up, rails twisted, and sleepers burnt from Jackson to twenty miles east of Meridian to Cuba Station. The Mobile and Ohio road was destroyed for fifty-six miles, extending from Quitman to Lauderdale Springs. Five costly bridges were totally destroyed; the one spanning the Chickasawhay River was 210 feet long with trestle-work which required four months' hard labor of hundreds of mechanics to construct it. It was a substantial, covered bridge. The bridges over Octchibacah, Alligator, Tallahassee, and Chunky Rivers were also burned. The Mobile and Ohio road, which was so thoroughly destroyed, was considered by engineers to be the finest built road in the United States, costing $50,000 per mile. It was built principally by English capitalists, and George Peabody, the London banker, owned several thousand shares." After a week at Meridian, Sherman moved northward. On February 26th he encamped near Canton, and the great raid was practically ended. On March 3d, he was back in Vicksburg, exactly a month after he had left it. He left his army at Canton. It had marched about four hundred and fifty miles in less than a month, and had lived on the country it marched through. And it was now in better health and general condition than when it started. Its losses had been slight: 21 killed, 68 wounded, and 81 missing. It brought in over 400 prisoners, 1,000 white refugees, 5,000 negroes, and vast trains of cattle and wagons; while the damage it had done to the Rebel cause was simply incalculable. In summing up the results of the expedition, and describing one of its most picturesque and impressive features, a _New York Tribune_ writer said: "Everywhere the blacks testified unmixed delight at our approach, frequently meeting us with their wives and children 'toting' their little all along with them, and apparently fully satisfied of the advent of the 'day of jubilo.' Repeatedly were our men advised of the hiding places of hoards of bacon, pork, hams, stock, carriages, etc., the movements of Rebel military and the whereabouts of citizens fighting in the Rebel army. It is in vain that the people have sought to inspire them with aversion and terror of our Northern, especially Yankee, soldiers. They know better, and in spite of the habit of years to obey and believe their masters, they will not credit what they say, but preferring to cut loose forever from the associations of youth and all of home they know, throw themselves upon the uncertain issue of their new condition with a faith that is sublime.