William Tecumseh Sherman

Slavery was the cause... [O]ur success was to be his freedom.

Every attempt to make war easy and safe will result in humiliation and disaster.

I assert that no army ever did more for that race than the one I commanded at Savannah.

An army to be useful must be a unit, and out of this has grown the saying, attributed to Napoleon, but doubtless spoken before the days of Alexander, that an army with an inefficient commander was better than one with two able heads.

It will be a thousand years before Grant's character is fully appreciated. Grant is the greatest soldier of our time if not all time.

I hereby state, and mean all I say, that I never have been and never will be a candidate for President; that if nominated by either party I should peremptorily decline; and even if unanimously elected I should decline to serve.

"As a rule don't borrow. 'Tis more honest to steal,"

the negro is free, and must be dealt with as such

I beg to present you as a Christmas gift the City of Savannah, with one hundred and fifty guns and plenty of ammunition, also about twenty-five thousand bales of cotton.

Hold the fort! I am coming!

But these comparisons are idle. I want peace, and believe it can only be reached through union and war, and I will ever conduct war with a view to perfect an early success.

You have heretofore read public sentiment in your newspapers, that live by falsehood and excitement; and the quicker you seek for truth in other quarters, the better.

We do want and will have a just obedience to the laws of the United States. That we will have, and, if it involves the destruction of your improvements, we cannot help it.

You might as well appeal against the thunder-storm as against these terrible hardships of war. They are inevitable, and the only way the people of Atlanta can hope once more to live in peace and quiet at home, is to stop the war, which can …

If the people raise a howl against my barbarity & cruelty, I will answer that War is War & not popularity seeking. If they want peace, they & their relations must stop War.

Atlanta is ours, and fairly won.

War is the remedy our enemies have chosen. Other simple remedies were within their choice. You know it and they know it, but they wanted war, and I say let us give them all they want; not a word of argument, not a sign of let up, no cave …

who made this war? Already we find ourselves drifting toward new issues, and are beginning to forget the strong facts of the beginning. You know and I know that long before the North, or the Federal Government, dreamed of war the South had …

A people who will persevere in war beyond a certain limit ought to know the consequences. Many, many peoples with less pertinacity have been wiped out of national existence.

Three years ago by a little reflection and patience they could have had a hundred years of peace and prosperity, but they preferred war; very well.

If they want eternal war, well and good; we accept the issue, and will dispossess them and put our friends in their place.

I'll tell you where he beats me though and where he beats the world. He doesn't give a damn about what the enemy does out of his sight, but it scares me like hell.

I am damned smarter man than Grant.

I can make this march, and I will make Georgia howl!