General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, April 1, 1888

NEW YORK,                

Fifth Avenue Hotel, April 1, 1888.

Dear Brother: . . . This morning at breakfast I received a note from Gen. B. F. Butler, asking me to say when he could see me. I supposed it was about a son of his nephew George and Rose Eytinge, about whom I had written him two months ago. After breakfast I went to the office and found that he was in Room 1, on the ground floor, so I went there. He was alone, and asked me to be seated. I commenced to speak of his grand-nephew, when he said that was not the reason of his call. He then took up the conversation, and said that the country was in real danger, revealed by the death of the Chief Justice, that there was a purpose clearly revealed for the old rebels to capture the Supreme Court, as shown by the appointment of Lamar and the equal certainty of Waite being succeeded by a Copperhead or out and out rebel; that in the next four years Miller and Bradley would create vacancies to be filled in like manner, thus giving the majority in that court to a party which fought to destroy the Government, thereby giving those we beat in battle the sacred fruits of victory. That is a real danger.

Affectionately yours,

W. T. SHERMAN.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 378

Senator John Sherman to General William T. Sherman, November 9, 1889

1319 K ST., WASHINGTON, D.C.,        

Nov. 9, 1889.

Dear Brother: . . . The coming session of Congress is to be an important one, not in a political sense but in a business sense. The tariff, commercial relations with American States, and differences with Canada are likely to occupy a good deal of time, and in all of these I shall have to take a part. What is worse, we will have the distribution of many offices. Harrison holds on to this dangerous power, and is likely to distribute it during his entire term. If so, he will not have another. Cleveland did the same and lost. A President should, within the first few months of his term, fill all the most important appointments, and then he may hope to recover from the effect before his term closes. But I suppose you are not interested in these things, and I begin to regard myself as a spectator rather than an actor. It is not at all likely that I shall ever seek or accept an office again. . . .

Affectionately yours,

JOHN SHERMAN.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, pp. 378-9

General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, November 12, 1889

NEW YORK, Νον. 12, 1889.

Dear Brother: . . . I was very glad to receive your full letter of November 9th, to hear that you are safely back at your Washington home, and take the recent election so philosophically. I wanted Foraker to succeed, because he was one of my young soldiers. He cannot be suppressed, and will turn up again. I think you are also wise in your conclusion to retire gracefully at the end of your present term. To be a President for four years is not much of an honor, but to have been senator continuously from 1861 to 1892 - less the four years as Secretary of the Treasury - is an honor. Webster and Clay are better known to the world than Polk and Pierce. As to myself, I continue pretty much as always in universal demand for soldiers' meetings, college commencements, and such like things - always with a promise that I will not be called on to speak, which is always broken worse still, generally exaggerated by reporters. . . .

Affectionately,

W. T. SHERMAN.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, pp. 379-80

Senator John Sherman to General William T. Sherman, July 21, 1890

SENATE CHAMBER,            

WASHINGTON, D.C., July 21, 1890.

Dear Brother: . . . You are living the life proper for your position and services, — everywhere welcome, all you say and do applauded, and secure in a competence and independent in all things. I will deliver your message¹ to Edmunds, but you will not probably find him at Burlington, August 20th. We are to have important questions before us, but I mean to act not as a laborer but as an umpire. I am for peace at home and abroad, and if I cannot do much that is actively good I will try and prevent harm, and if possible will tranquilly glide down the rest of the road of life, enjoying all I can and helping those who deserve help.

Affectionately yours,

JOHN SHERMAN.

_______________

¹ Hoping to meet Mr. Edmunds at Burlington, Vt., at that date.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 380

General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, July 22, 1890

NEW YORK, July 22, 1890.

Dear Brother: I was gratified by the general tone and spirit of your letter of yesterday, just received. You surely in the past have achieved as much success in civil affairs as my most partial friends claim for me in military affairs. It is now demonstrated that with universal suffrage and the organization of political parties no man of supreme ability can be President, and that our President with only four years is only a chip on the surface. Not a single person has been President in our time without having been, in his own judgment, the most abused, if not the most miserable, man in the whole community. Your experience has simply been with nominating conventions. It would have been tenfold worse had you succeeded in obtaining the nomination and election.

*          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *

I had a letter from General Alger yesterday, asking me to ride in the procession at Boston, August 12th, in full uniform, to which I answered No with an emphasis. I will attend as a delegate from Missouri, as a private, and will not form in any procession, horseback or otherwise. It is cruel to march old veterans five miles, like a circus, under a mid-day sun for the gratification of a Boston audience. . . .

Affectionately yours,

W. T. SHERMAN.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, pp. 380-1

General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, Tuesday, February 3, 1891

NEW YORK, Tuesday, Feb. 3, 1891.

Dear Brother: I am drifting along in the old rut in good strength, attending to about four dinners a week at public or private houses, and generally wind up for gossip at the Union League Club. Last night, discussing the effect of Mr. Windom's death and funeral, several prominent gentlemen remarked that Windom's fine speech just preceding his death was in line with yours on the silver question in the Senate, and also with a carefully prepared interview with you by George Alfred Townsend, which I had not seen. I have ordered of my book-man the New York "Sun" of Sunday, February 1st, which contains the interview.

You sent me a copy of your bill in pamphlet form, which was begged from me, and as others naturally apply for copies I wish you would have your secretary send me a dozen, that I may distribute them.

All well here and send love.

Your affectionate brother,

W. T. SHERMAN.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, pp. 381-2

Diary of George Templeton Strong: February 2, 1860

After dinner with Ellie to No. 24, where I left her, and then seeing a glow in the southern sky over the roof of the Union Place Hotel, I started in pursuit of the fire. I dog-trotted to Grand Street before I found it. A great tenement house in Elm Street near Grand burning fiercely. Scores of families had been turned out of it into the icy streets and bitter weather. Celtic and Teutonic fathers and mothers were rushing about through the dense crowd in quest of missing children. A quiet, respectable German was looking for his two (the elder "was eight years old and could take care of himself, but the younger had only nine months and couldn’t well do so”). I thought of poor little Johnny frightened and unprotected in a strange scene of uproar and dark night and the glare of conflagration and piercing cold, and of Babbins, and tried to help the man but without success. There were stories current in the crowd of lives lost in the burning house; some said thirty, others two. The latter statement probably nearer the truth. Steam fire engines are a new element in our conflagrations and an effective one, contributing to the tout ensemble a column of smoke and sparks, and a low shuddering, throbbing bass note, more impressive than the clank of the old-fashioned machines. . . .

There is a Speaker at last. Sherman withdrew, and the Republicans elected Pennington of New Jersey (Bill Pennington’s father), who seems a very fit man for the place. Reading Agassiz’s Essay on Classification. Rather hard reading for anyone not thoroughly learned in a score of -ologies. But I can see and appreciate its general scope and hold it to be a very profound and valuable book.

SOURCE: Allan Nevins and Milton Halset Thomas, Editors, Diary of George Templeton Strong, Vol. 3, p. 6

General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, June 26, 1887

NEW YORK, FIFTH AVENUE, June 26, 1887.

Dear Brother: I have just returned from Saratoga and Lake George, and am now arranging for Providence, R.I., where on the Fourth of July there is to be inaugurated an equestrian statue of General Burnside. I was always one of Burnside's personal friends, but after the battle of Chattanooga or Missionary Ridge, and after I had forced my Army of the Tennessee to march by land 450 miles in October, November, 1863, from Memphis to Chattanooga, General Grant, finding the Fourth Corps General Gordon Granger — moving too slow, called on me to go to his relief at Knoxville, which I did effectually and conclusively. Burnside in Knoxville reporting to Mr. Lincoln direct, treated his siege as a question of supplies, viz., that his supplies would be exhausted about December 3d, when want would compel him to surrender. I was therefore forced to march my already weary Army of the Tennessee near 136 miles in four days, or be held responsible for the terrible consequences of his surrender. I forced my men at twenty-six miles a day, and when I got to Knoxville I found inside a fine pen of cattle, and was invited to dine with Burnside at a dinner with a roast turkey, tablecloth, knives, forks, and spoons, which I had not seen for years. My Memoirs described the literal truth, but Burnside's friends thought it hard on him, and now I shall go to the dedication of his monument to apologize for telling the truth. Others may orate, I will not. I will simply assert a personal friendship. Burnside was not a combative man. He was kind, good, and patriotic, as you saw him in the Senate, but he did not come up to the occasion. In war we must use all forces, and now when we look back we recognize the qualities of each. Burnside was a good man, but he was not a war soldier.

The New York papers make out that you and I differ. Of course, we all differ. I stand by the authorities. . . . Mr. Cleveland is President, so recognized by Congress, Supreme Court, and the world. Now, by the Fifth Article of War, made the law before you were born, every officer of the Army of the United States who speaks disrespectfully of the President of the United States becomes a felon the same as one who has committed murder, felony, forgery, treason, or any crime, and could be punished at the discretion of a court-martial. I am still an officer of the army, and cannot violate this law. Of course I know Drum, the Adjutant-General. He has no sympathy with the army which fought. He was a non-combatant. He never captured a flag, and values it only at its commercial value. He did not think of the blood and torture of battle; nor can Endicott, the Secretary of War, or Mr. Cleveland. . . . Still, in Republics majorities govern, and since only one in sixteen go to war, non-combatants always govern. The soldier who fights must take a back seat and apologize for his vehemence in action. Grant had to apologize, Sheridan to shelter himself behind his most proper orders to devastate the Valley of the Shenandoah, and Sherman to be abused and assailed for the accidental burning of Columbia in the day of Republican rule. . . . In 1861-65 we fought for union and right. The soldiers restored to Congress full power, and returned to their civil vocations. Congress surrendered the country to the non-combatants, and now it is questionable whether Lincoln or Jeff Davis was the Union man. Jeff now says he never meant war. He thought that they would be allowed to do as they pleased without war. Lincoln was the assailant, Davis only on the "defensive-offensive."

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 374-6

Senator John Sherman to General William T. Sherman, September 3, 1887

MANSFIELD, OHIO, Sept. 3, 1887.

Dear Brother: Your letter of the 27th came as I was starting for the Ohio Fair. From thence I went to Lancaster, and found all well. . . My trip to the Pacific over the Canadian Railroad was a great success. We travelled 7000 miles without fatigue, accident, or detention. We stopped over at the chief points of interest, such as Toronto, Montreal, Sudbury, Port Arthur, Winnipeg, Calgary, Banff, Donald, Glacier House, Vancouver, Victoria, Seattle, and Tacoma, and yet made the round trip within the four weeks allowed. We did not go to Alaska, because of the fogs and for want of time. The trip was very instructive, giving me an inside view of many questions that may be important in the future. The country did not impress me as a desirable acquisition, though it would not be a bad one. The people are hardy and industrious. If they had free commercial intercourse with the United States, their farms, forests, and mines would become more valuable, but at the expense of the manufactures. If the population of Mexico and Canada were homogeneous with ours, the union of the three countries would make the whole the most powerful nation in the world. I am not so sure but this would be a good thing to do. . . .

Affectionately yours,

JOHN SHERMAN.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 376-7

General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, September 6, 1887

NEW YORK, Sept. 6, 1887.

Dear Brother: I am sorry you lost the trip to Alaska, but it will give you an excuse for making it at some future time. I have never been there, and feel little curiosity about it. My judgment at present is that we want no more territory. If we could take in the territory of Ontario it would make a good State, but the vast hyperborean region of the North would embarrass us with inchoate States and Territories without a corresponding revenue. I am dead opposed to any more of Mexico. All the northern part is desert, like the worst parts of Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. Further south the population is mixed Spanish and Indian, who never can be harmonized with our race. Eight millions of such people would endanger our institutions. We have already enough disturbing influences.

Affectionately yours,

W. T. SHERMAN.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 377

General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, October 1887

Dear Brother: I am perfectly content to have retired when I did, as the present régime makes Sheridan's command of the army a farce. The army is drifting back into the same old condition, when Jeff Davis was Secretary of War, when secretaries and other clerks gave military orders to General Scott and those under him. In case of a new war, army commanders will be hampered just as we were in 1861.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 377-8

Senator John Sherman to General William T. Sherman, January 16, 1885

[January 16, 1885.]

. . . My re-election to the Senate for the fifth time is unprecedented in the history of Ohio, and for this I am indebted to the difficulty of selecting from among younger men of equal claims and calibre. . . .

I also feel that it is the highest point of my political life, for if I live to the end of my term I shall be seventy years old. I have had enough of the contentions of political life and wish now to take a tranquil and moderate course, which, indeed, is the best for the country, now that we have no great, exciting questions to decide. The view expressed in my speech (a well-printed copy of which I will try to send you) is my sincere view of the situation. The dangers before us are election frauds and labor difficulties. These will be local at the beginning, but may involve the whole country.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 366-7

General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, after January 16, 1885

I have received your letter of the 16th, and somehow felt unusually gratified that you had been elected senator for the fifth time in the State of Ohio. This is a great honor, and I feel my full share of satisfaction. I believe the Senate of the United States to be the equal in intellectual capacity of any deliberative body on earth….

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 367

General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, October 1885

[St. Louis, October 1885.]

The newspapers here now state that the Ohio election has gone fairly and conclusively to the Republicans, and pronounce you as the cause. So, apart from the immediate results and the influence it may have on other elections, it will introduce the "Bloody Shirt" as a part of the Republican doctrine. Of course the name "Bloody Shirt" is pure bosh, like the old political cries of "Black Republicans," "Niggers," etc., etc., so familiar to us in 1860-61. I understand your position to be that by Section 2, Article 14, Amendments of the Constitution, by which Representatives in Congress are apportioned, the South gained in numbers, and yet practically have defeated the main purpose of the Amendment. Now, as Congress had the power to enforce that Section by the Fifth Section, I am asked why it was not done when the Republicans had the Government. So far as I can learn the negroes at the South are protected and encouraged in gaining property and education; also in voting when their vote does not affect the result. But the feeling is universal against their "ruling white men." How force or law can be brought to bear is the most difficult problem I can conceive of, and I think you are perfectly right in making the issue; a good result will follow from its fair, open discussion. My notion is that the negro himself will have to fight for his right of suffrage, but the laws of the United States for electing Members of the House should be made as strong as possible, to encourage the negroes in voting for their candidates, and, if need be, fighting for their right when they have an undoubted majority. . . .

Affectionately yours,

W. T. SHERMAN.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 367-8

General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, November 8, 1885

ST. LOUIS, Nov. 8, 1885.

Dear Brother: . . . I have been importuned from every quarter to write or say something about the "Depew" revelations,¹ but have steadily refused anything for publication. But a few days ago Blaine wrote me confidentially, as he wanted information in the preparation of his second volume. I have answered him, sending copies of letters and papers from my private files, which I believe established these points. The attempt to send General Grant along with Lew Campbell to Mexico in October, 1866, had no connection with Congress's final quarrel with President Johnson, which did not happen till after January 14, 1865, and then only because Grant allowed Stanton to regain his office as Secretary of War, after forcing him to contend for it in the courts. Indeed, Grant served in Johnson's Cabinet during Stanton's suspension, viz., from August, 1867, to January, 1868, and was, to my personal knowledge, on friendly terms with Johnson. The real cause for their quarrel was that article in the "National Intelligencer," January 14, 1868, when four members of the Cabinet accused Grant of prevaricating and deceiving the President. I was present when Grant made his explanation of the whole case to Johnson, and I understood the latter to express himself as satisfied. But the newspapers kept it up, and made the breach final and angry.

I do not believe that Johnson ever contemplated the use of force against Congress, and am equally sure that Grant, at the time, had no fear or apprehension of such a thing....

Affectionately yours,

W. T. SHERMAN.

_______________

¹ This refers to an interview with Mr. Depew referring to the Johnson-Grant difficulty at the end of the war.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 368-9

General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, February 23, 1886

ST. LOUIS, Feb. 23, 1886.

Dear Brother: I owe you a personal explanation as to why I did not come to Washington during my last visit East. After positively refusing to attend the banquet to the Loyal Legion at Cincinnati (President Hayes the Commander), I was persuaded at the last minute that I ought to go. After I had packed my valise, I heard of General Hancock's death, made one or two despatches to General Whipple as Adjutant-General, my former Aide, asking him to communicate with me at the Burnet House.¹ On arrival, I was met by President Hayes and General Cox and others, who explained that [by] the death of General Hancock, the president of the Order of the Loyal Legion, they had been forced to modify their programme, and that I must respond to the memory of General Hancock. I was kept busy all that day by a stream of visitors, and when the company had assembled for the banquet, full four hundred in the room, without notes or memoranda, I spoke for about ten minutes. My words were taken down and sent off without a chance of revision, but I afterwards learned that Mrs. Hancock was especially pleased. At the Burnet House I got all the notices of the funeral, which compelled me to travel to New York. En route was delayed a couple of hours by the flood in Delaware. It was two o'clock at night before I could lie down, and I had to be up at six to go down to the Battery, where the funeral was to commence. We were kept busy till night, when Miles and I went to Elly's² for dinner, and it was midnight when we got to the Fifth Avenue Hotel....

Affectionately yours,

W. T. SHERMAN.

_______________

¹ Cincinnati.

² His daughter’s.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 369-70

General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, April 3, 1886

ST. LOUIS, April 3, 1886.

Dear Brother: . . . I shall go to California to be in San Francisco August 3d-5th for the Encampment of the G. A. R., when, of course, I shall be forced to say something. It occurs to me that I should say something about the annexation of California to the Union. I know that Webster advised a friend of his as early as 1843-44 to go to California, because it surely would on the first pretext be captured and held by the United States.

I have all the executive documents for 1847, also the special Mexican War correspondence, but I fail to find Corwin's speech where he used the expression that were he a Mexican he would welcome the enemy (the Americans) "with bloody hands to hospitable graves." Can you get this speech for me, or an extract? I know that General Taylor believed that Texas did not reach the Rio Grande but was bordered by the River Nueces, and that the proclamation of war was based on an error that "American blood had been shed on American soil," and now comes Grant, who expresses more than a doubt if the first blood shed—Palo Alto—was not on "Mexican soil." Notwithstanding this, I believe the annexation of California was essential to the world's progress at that date. The Mexicans had held it for a hundred years without material improvement, whereas under our domination it at once began that wonderful development which we now experience. . . .

Affectionately yours,

W. T. SHERMAN.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 370-1

Senator John Sherman to General William T. Sherman, April 6, 1886

SENATE CHAMBER,        

WASHINGTON, D.C., April 6, 1886.

Dear Brother: Yours of the 3d is received. The speech of Mr. Corwin, to which you refer, was made in the United States Senate on the 11th of February, 1847, on the Mexican War. It is a very long speech, and is to be found on pages 211-218. Enclosed is the extract you refer to:

"If I were a Mexican I would tell you, 'Have you no room in our own country to bury your dead men?' If you come into mine we will greet you with bloody hands, and welcome you to hospitable graves." . . . .

The speech of Corwin's is worth reading through, as it gives fully his idea of the injustice of the war with Mexico, which I think was shared by the great body of intelligent people in the North, but was opposed by the cry "Our country, right or wrong!" which perhaps after war commences is the best public policy. . . .

Affectionately yours,

JOHN SHERMAN.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 371-2

General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, April 13, 1886

ST. LOUIS, April 13, 1886.

Dear Brother: Your letter was duly received, and the quotation from Corwin's speech will be all I want. I remember the fact that when General Taylor's army marched from Corpus Christi, Texas, to Matamoras, it was generally noted that what few people were encountered south of the Nueces were all Mexicans. Their (Mexican) maps made Texas cease at that line, and our only title to that part of the country was Texas' claim to the Rio Grande as the boundary, so that the army officers, notably General Taylor, always ridiculed the action of the President and Congress—“whereas American blood has been shed on American soil," etc., etc.

Nevertheless war did exist and did continue till we had acquired California, New Mexico, etc. Our payment to Mexico of $15,000,000 at the end of the war was an act of generosity, and made our title one of purchase rather than conquest. Mexico never could have developed California as we did, and without California we could not have filled up the intervening space. . . .

Affectionately,

W. T. SHERMAN.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 372

Senator John Sherman to General William T. Sherman, June 1886

. . . . It is well, too, that the drift of events brings you eastward. You must be aware that the wonder has been that, having the whole country to choose as a home, you should settle upon St. Louis. I could understand it, but many others do not. Almost daily I am asked when the General is coming back to Washington, and always with the earnest hope that it will be soon and to stay. . . .

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 373