Head-Quarters, Camp of
Instruction,
Benton Barracks, (near
St. Louis, Mo.,) Jan. 4, 1862
Dear Brother,
I am so sensible now to my disgrace from having exaggerated
to force of our enemy in Kentucky that I do think I should have committed suicide
were it not for my children. I do not
think that I can again be entrusted with a command—Buell remarked to me in
Kentucky that I should be Qr. Mr. genl.—this I do not think though I do believe
myself better qualified for a Disbursing Department—Suppose you see McClellan
and ask him if I could not serve the Government better in such a capacity than
the one I now hold. I do not feel
confident at all in Volunteers. Their
want of organization, the necessity to flatter them &c. is such that I cannot
prosper with them Telegraph me what you think and would do—
Affectionately
W. T. Sherman
SOURCES: Sherman,
William T. William T. Sherman Papers: General Correspondence, -1891; 1861,
Dec. 12-1862, Mar. 5. 1861. Manuscript/Mixed Material. https://www.loc.gov/item/mss398000011/,
image no. 45, Library of Congress, Washington D.C.; Brooks D. Simpson,
Jean V. Berlin, Editors, Sherman's Civil War: Selected Correspondence
of William T. Sherman, 1860-1865, p. 174;
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