Before Hood’s evacuation he ordered all public buildings and possible union assets destroyed. The following day, September 3, Sherman entered Atlanta and ordered the civilian population to leave on September 7. Two months later, on the November 11 Sherman ordered the city to be burned to the ground, as observed by a union soldier-“everything of importance was on fire”.
Sherman remained in the city for two months, then on November 15, 1864, General Sherman and 62,000 men left Atlanta on a march “that was to make the finish certain-the wild, cruel, rollicking march from Atlanta to the sea”, quotes historian Bruce Catton (pg 354). One week earlier Abraham Lincoln was re-elected president, defeating Democrat George B. McClellan with 55 per-cent of the popular vote.
Leaders involved:
John Bell Hood:
John Bell Hood was born on the 29th June 1831, Owingsville Kentucky. Hood learnt very young of the importance of political influence; as it was through his uncle, Richard French who served in the US House of Representatives that Hood secured a position in West Point Military Academy. After his graduation he became a member of the U.S. Army. However when war broke out, Hood quickly resigned and joined the newly formed Confederate Army, where he was promoted to the position of Lieutenant Colonel almost immediately. Hood was then promoted to General and saw action in Seven Days, Second Manassas (Second Bull Run) and Gettysburg before becoming involved in the Atlanta Campaign, where he tried many offensive tactics before having to retreat behind the fortified lines of Atlanta.
William Tecumseh Sherman:
William T. Sherman was born on February 8th 1820, in Lancaster Ohio. Orphaned at nine years of age Sherman was left to be raised by Thomas Ewing a prominent Republican politician. At 20 years of age he graduated West Point Military Academy sixth in his class. In 1853, tired and bored with the U.S. Army, Sherman resigned. However when the succession movement began he was offered a commission in the Confederate Army, which he refused, and when war broke out he rejoined the U.S. Army. When promoted and put in charge of Union forces in Kentucky he suffered a nervous breakdown and was sent home to rest. In February 1862, he returned and was assigned the lead a division of the Army of the Tennessee. It was this army, under the lead of Sherman that skilfully and methodically attacked and overran Atlanta and from there went on the controversial “March to the Sea” a punishing, destructive campaign from the heart of Georgia to Savannah.
Jefferson Davis:
Jefferson Davis was born June 3, 1808, in Kentucky. Jefferson Davis was sent to Transylvania University in Kentucky as an early teen and at age sixteen, he was appointed to West Point Military Academy as a cadet and when he graduated was immediately assigned to First Infantry in the U.S. Army. Davis left the army in 1835 when he got married. In 1845 Davis’s career became more public when he was elected to congress as a democrat. Davis was then elected to the United States Senate where he became a leading spokesman for southern rights and in 1853 he became the secretary of war in the cabinet. In 1861, with the formation of the Confederacy, Davis received news of his selection as provisional President for the Confederate States. Jefferson Davis accepted the position, and on February 18, 1861 he was inaugurated president.
Abraham Lincoln:
Abraham Lincoln was born near Hodgenville, Kentucky on February 12, 1809. Lincoln’s education was limited to a few months here and there throughout his childhood and teens; he avidly read books such as the Bible, Pilgrim's Progress, and Aesops Fables. In 1834 Lincoln ran and was elected the Illinois State Legislature. During this period, Lincoln also began to study law and was licensed to practice in 1836. Elected to the House of Representatives in 1847 he became known for his opposition to the institution of slavery. In July of 1860, the Republicans nominated Lincoln to run for presidency and on the 4 March 1861 he was sworn in.
Significance of the battle in the specific campaign and the Civil War:
The Battle of Atlanta was very significant in the civil war, with many factors influencing the outcome of the war as well as the political and social situations in America at the time.
In Congress the war was not only about the results on the battlefield but how peoples perceptions were shaped because of those outcomes. In the north the fall of Atlanta had a powerful political effect. It guaranteed Lincoln’s re-election and consequently the continuance of the Unions attritional strategy of unconditional and complete Confederate surrender. After the re-election of Lincoln any notions from the democratic party of a truce were all but dissolved as a result this. In the North, the nation gained confidence in Lincoln’s objectives (resulting in his re-election), while the Southern population began to lose faith in the leadership of Jefferson Davis, doubting his actions at Atlanta. This doubt led to the eventual collapse of the Confederate Government thus Davis being the one and only president of the Confederate government. The historian Bryan Holden Reid supports this notion when he claims, “the Confederacy had now lost all credibility”, as a result of Atlanta’s capture.
After the war, General Hood’s actions were attacked by a number of people, many blaming Hood for the Confederate loss in the Atlanta Campaign and then Sherman’s subsequent ‘March to the Sea’. As stated above, Hood’s actions were often unplanned and the results of his actions unexpected, and usually unsuccessful. John P. Dyer supports this, when he claims Hood was “a man of emotion rather than of intellect….”. In latter letter written by Hood, he tries to explain and make excuses for his actions even passing blame to his former commander, sub-commanders and even the men. The Atlanta Campaign was consequently the last major battle General Hood was involved in.
The capture of Atlanta was one of the most important military events of the war, however the subsequent burning of the city was convincing proof to the people of the South that the strength of the secessionist movement fading. This event also arose moral issues for the members of the Confederate Army who were losing faith in their cause and beginning to doubt the realism of the south winning the war. The burning of the city is symbolic of the union dominance and of the south no longer having the strength to defend their state and own population.
After Sherman had taken hold of the city on September 2nd 1864, he and Hood became involved in bitter correspondence concerning the treatment of the civilian population of Atlanta. In a famous exchange, Sherman told the protesting mayor, James M. Calhoun, “War is cruelty and you cannot refine it”. Later in a letter to General Henry Halleck he wrote that “if the people (the civilians) raise a howl against my barbarity and cruelty, I will answer that war is war and not popularity seeking” These actions as well as Sherman later unforgiving and relentless ‘March to the Sea’ demonstrated that Confederate civilians would not be spared from the Union’s attritional policy.
The campaign resulted in disastrous effects for the city of Atlanta. Atlanta was a significant town being one of the Confederate’s great military depots, full of foundries and workshops for the manufacture and repair of arms and material for war. The city was also a major rail hub, beginning in Savannah and leading all the way up to northern Mississippi and western Tennessee. For the union, gaining Atlanta would have been an enormous advantage. While without it the Confederate Army was still powerful, being able to move men and guns/ammunition into the western theatre of the war, as well as maintain the south’s limited industrial infrastructure. When Sherman destroyed the city, this major infrastructure was lost, leaving the south at a great disadvantage leaving them almost completely surrounded, powerless and extremely venerable and giving the Union the advantage it needed to swarming the south in Sherman’s devastating “March to the Sea”.
Conclusion:
The Battle of Atlanta was a pivotal point in the American Civil War, which shaped the subsequent events that led to the end of the war. These include the Presidential Election of 1864, the military actions that followed the war, and the consequences of Atlanta’s destruction on the civilian population and the southern army.
Bibliography:
Books:
Catton, B “This Hollowed Ground” (Doubleday and Company, New York 1956)
(no author) “Oxford History of the American People” (Oxford University Press, USA, 1965)
(no author) “Cambridge Modern History-Volume VII” (Cambridge University Press, London, 1960)
(no author) “New Cambridge Modern History-Volume X” (Cambridge University Press, London, 1964)
Current R, Williams T, Freidel F “American History: A Survey” (Stratford Press, Philadelphia USA, 1961)
Reid, B “The American Civil War” (Cassell House, London, 1999)
(no author) “The Golden Book of The Civil War” (American Heritage Publishing Company, New York, 1961)
Ward, JC with Burns, R&K, “The Civil War” (American Documentaries, 1990, New York)
Websites:
Wikipedia Encyclopedia, , Date accessed: 16/02/04
Sherpa Guide-The Civil War, , Date accessed: 17/02/04
Georgia History-John Bell Hood, , Date accessed: 18/02/04
Source Page of Army of Cumberland-Battles Reports: Atlanta, , Date Accessed: 23/02/04
Video:
Burns, K “The Civil War-Volume 3: War is all Hell” (Magna Pacific Pty Ltd, 1990)