In the winter of 1844-45, he was on a deer hunting expedition on the Carolina coast, and got his right arm thrown out of joint by an accident. Being thus disabled he got a leave of absence and went North, going as usual to the centre of attraction at Lancaster. In March he returned to Fort Moultrie, just at the time when Congress provided for the annexation of Texas and war with Mexico was expected. He remained at Fort Moultrie, however, for some time longer. Charleston was then a proud, aristocratic city, and considered itself a most important place in the Union. There was already much talk about the right of secession and there were often angry controversies over the subject, even at the officers' own mess-tables. But Sherman at this time had no idea that such talk would ever go further than it had already gone in 1832-33, when "Nullification" was so promptly stamped out by President Jackson and General Scott. In the spring of 1846 Sherman was at Fort Moultrie, under the command of Captain, afterward General, Robert Anderson. Among other officers there at the time were Henry B. Judd, George B. Ayres, William Gates, Martin Burke, E. D. Keyes, T. W. Sherman, H. B. Field and Joseph Stewart. George H. Thomas and John F. Reynolds had already gone on to join General Taylor's army in Texas. In April, Sherman was sent to Governor's Island, New York, and thence to the recruiting station at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Soon after this he received authority to open a recruiting station at Zanesville, Ohio, to his great delight, for Lancaster and Miss Ewing were only thirty-six miles away. When news arrived of the battles of Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma he became much excited at the prospect of actual war and hurried back to Pittsburgh. There he found a letter from his friend Ord, then at Baltimore, saying that his company had just received orders to go to California and urging him to go also. Sherman at once wrote to the Adjutant-General, at Washington, D. C., applying for active service. Then, in his impatience and without authority, he left a corporal in charge of his office and hastened to Cincinnati. There he reported to Colonel Fanning, a veteran officer, and asked to be sent on to the front. But Fanning, instead of appreciating the young soldier's zeal, gave him a hearty scoring for leaving his post without orders, and told him to get back to Pittsburgh as quickly as he could. Sherman obeyed, but of course stopped off at Lancaster on the way. He arrived at Pittsburgh late in June and found there awaiting him an order relieving him from the recruiting service and assigning him to Company F, then under orders for California. He made up his accounts, turned over the balance of cash to the physician, and in a few hours was on his way to New York where his company was already aboard ship and ready to sail for California by the way of Cape Horn.