Personal Recollections of Distinguished Generals — John Shaqi
Personal Recollections of Distinguished GeneralsShanks, William Franklin Gore
History
Personal Recollections of Distinguished Generals
Shanks, William Franklin Gore
Generals -- United States; United States -- History -- Civil War, 1861-1865 -- Biography
In July, 1864, while besieging the enemy's position at Kenesaw
Mountain, an incident occurred which may be given as illustrative
of Sherman's energy. When the campaign opened he had published an
order informing the army, in terms which were laughed at at the time
as rather bombastic and slightly egotistical, that "the commanding
general intended making the campaign without a tent," and during the
greater part of the march his head-quarters actually consisted of
nothing more than a tent-fly for the use of his adjutant general.
He generally slept under a tree during dry weather, and in very wet
weather in any convenient house. When the army was concentrated in
the gorge of Snake Creek Gap, in which there was not a house of any
character, General Logan "raised the laugh" on Sherman by sending him
a tent to protect him from the rain, and which, owing to the terrible
state of the weather, Sherman was compelled to use. But the greater
part of the campaign was actually passed by Sherman without any other
quarters than I have described as for the convenience of his adjutant
general. Early one morning a regiment of troops passed his bivouac
near Kenesaw Mountain, Georgia, and saw him lying under a tree near
the roadside. One of the men, not knowing the general, and supposing
him, from his jaded, weary, and generally dilapidated appearance, to be
drunk, remarked aloud, "That is the way we are commanded, officered by
drunken generals." Sherman heard the remark and instantly arose. "Not
drunk, my boy," he said good-humoredly, "but I was up all night looking
after your rations, and am very tired and sleepy." He soon after broke
up head-quarters, and, passing the same regiment on the march, was
received with loud and hearty cheers.
He makes his subordinates work, too, with the same zeal. When the
rebels, in evacuating Resaca, succeeded in burning the railroad bridge
over the Oostenaula River, he turned to Colonel Wright, his engineer
in charge of railroads, and asked him how long it would take him to
replace that bridge. Colonel Wright replied after a short calculation,
during which Sherman showed his impatience at the delay in the answer,
that he could rebuild it in four days.
"Sir," exclaimed the general, hastily, "I give you forty-eight hours,
or a position in the front ranks."
The bridge was forthcoming at the proper time.
This nervousness of Sherman's organization has naturally produced a
peculiar restlessness of manner and admirable vigor of expression. He
talks with great rapidity, often in his haste mingling his sentences in
a most surprising manner, and accompanying his conversation by strange,
quick, and ungraceful gestures, the most common of which is the
knocking of the ashes from his cigar with the little finger of his left
hand, frequently knocking at it until ashes and light too are gone.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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