of the State, where were located its foundries, arsenals, and workshops, deemed secure by their distance, from the Northern base of operations, and the apparent impregnable obstacles intervening. His pathway, therefore, was through a country which was full of natural barriers, as well as fortified places. Discarding the old policy of sitting down before them and taking them by assault or tiring them out by siege, which has always been associated with a fearful loss of life, and made military movements slow, solemn, and difficult, Gen. Sherman adopted the process of flanking, which compelled the Confederates to abandon one fortified place after another in rapid succession, until he reached Atlanta, the goal of his aspirations, and contemplated operations when he set out on his march into Georgia.

In a "Congratulatory Order" to his soldiers, dated Atlanta, Sunday, Sep. 11, 1864, Gen. Sherman says:

"On the first day of May we were lying in garrison, seemingly quiet, from Knoxville to Huntsville, and our enemy lay behind his rocky-faced barrier at Dalton, proud, defiant, and exulting. He had had time since Christmas to recover from his discomfiture on the Mission Ridge, with his ranks filled, and a new commander-in-chief, second to none of the Confederacy in reputation for skill, sagacity, and extreme popularity.

"All at once our armies assumed life and action,

and appeared before Dalton: threatening Rocky Face we threw ourselves upon Resaca, and the rebel army only escaped by the rapidity of its retreat, aided by the numerous roads with which he was familiar, and which were strange to us.

"Again he took post at Altoona, but we gave him no rest, and by a circuit toward Dallas, and a subsequent movement to Ackworth, we gained the Altoona Pass. Then followed the eventful battles about Kenesaw, and the escape of the enemy across the Chattahoochee River.

"The crossing of the Chattahoochee, and breaking of the Augusta road, were most handsomely executed by us, and will be studied as an example in the art of war. At this stage of our game, our enemies became dissatisfied with their old and skilful commander, and selected one more bold and rash. New tactics were adopted. Hood first boldly and rapidly, on the 20th of July, fell on our right at Peach Tree Creek, and lost.

Again, on the 22d, he struck our extreme left, and was severely punished; and finally again, on the 28th, he repeated the attempt on our right, and that time must have been satisfied, for since that date he has remained on the defensive. We slowly and gradually drew our lines about Atlanta, feeling for the railroads which supplied the Rebel army and made Atlanta a place of importance.

"We must concede to our enemy that he met these efforts patiently and skilfully, but at last he made

the mistake we had waited for so long, and sent his cavalry to our rear, far beyond the reach of recall. Instantly our cavalry was on his only remaining road, and we followed quickly with our principal army, and Atlanta fell into our possession as the fruit of well-concerted measures, backed by a brave and confident army.

"This completed the grand task which had been assigned us by our Government, and your General again repeats his personal and official thanks to all the officers and men composing this army, for the indomitable courage and perseverance which alone could give success.

It was fully expected, however, that a desperate conflict awaited Sherman before he could march his columns into the above named city, as the Southerns had vowed that the Yankees should never press its pavement with their feet; but on approaching the city, a negro, named "Julius," first announced its evacuation by Gen. Hood, the commander of the Southern army, in the following extraordinary manner, "For Gor Amighty, Massa, de debil is dar sure enuff," referring to the miniature earthquakes occasioned by the blowing up of magazines, the explosion of ammunition, the bursting of bombshells and guns to prevent them falling into the hands of the enemy. The news spread from tent to tent, and from regiment to regiment with the utmost rapidity, until it permeated the whole army, and even to the hospitals, where the mortally wounded rose

from their couches of pain to listen to the intelligence which was on every lip, "Atlanta is ours."

The soldiers now claimed rest after their long weary marches and severe skirmishes, and battles, consequently, the defenceless inhabitants were driven out to accommodate them under the plea of military necessity, but as Gen. Hood got upon Sherman's rear with his army and broke up his communications, Gen. Sherman was compelled to relax his hold on Atlanta to the inconceivable joy of those who, a short time previously, had been made houseless, homeless wanderers, and exposed to privation, suffering, and want, by his studied and ingenious cruelty, an act which Gen. Hood in a letter to Sherman, said "transcends all acts ever brought to his notice in the history of war." Being in the midst of an hostile country, and without a base of supplies, the Confederates considered that the time had come "to strike the greatest blow for their deliverance that had been dealt by the Confederate armies since the war began." An effective blow, therefore, was to be given to the Federal army which should make a signal example of them for their temerity to all coming time, but the code of tactics which Gen. Sherman adopted completely bewildered and defeated them; and also made desolate the country through which he passed and left many of the Southern cities a heap of smoking ruins. Driven to a game of chances, and entirely subject to the force of circumstances, he

marched his army through South Carolina in two columns towards the sea-board, laying under tribute the resources of the country through which he and his army passed, creating the wildest consternation amongst the people by their rioting amidst a carnival of destructiveness, destroying often by the torch of the incendiary what the hand of the spoiler could not appropriate or turn to profitable or useful account. The Confederates, therefore, were at a loss to conceive by Gen. Sherman's double move what place he would try to reach first, and as many important places were threatened at the same time, they had to divide their forces to try to keep him in check, which rendered them powerless and helpless. When they sought to impede one column in its advance the other was always near enough to concentrate, should a large force threaten either. The greatest difficulties of Sherman were in the neighbourhood of great rivers, whose sedgy oozy banks were flooded for miles with dismal swamps.

Across these swamps and rivers Sherman's columns had either to build roads, or to advance on a single causeway barely sufficient for four men abreast, whilst the head of it in many cases was strongly guarded and entrenched.

In a speech made by Wendell Phillips, Esq., at Boston, January 26th, 1865, we learn that one of these causeways is associated with one of the most infamous acts that ever disgraced a nation or people. Phillips says, Gen. Sherman paused at