Winter Auction 2015 closing February 7
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 2/8/2015
General William Tecumseh Sherman is best known for Atlanta Campaign and the March to the Sea that hastened the of the Civil War but Uncle Billy steadfast and unrelenting approach to war has lead many historians to refer to him as the father of modern warfare. Sherman understood , as perhaps his contemporaries did, that the desire to wage war started with the people and that by destroying the desire of the people would end the war faster than countless thousands of dead soldiers. Sherman succeed US Grant as Commanding General of the Army until 1883 and continued to spur any politics for the rest of his life. In this January 27, 1873 letter to Joseph Sheppard, Sherman rejects the idea of a inland canal that would connect the Rio Grande River to Port Royal, SC. Sherman realized the folly in a inland canal in the age of the railroad, as the Transcontinental Railroad had recently been completed. Sherman writes, "I would rather you should approach Congress through some other person than me because I know that members are very jealous of the Military authorities, and any grand project would rather be damaged than advanced by our advocacy." Scrolled in black ink on a 5" by 8" folded letterhead from the Headquarters Army of the United States, the letter fills (3) pages with the signature of the great General penned nicely at the end. The letter has tape repair along a 3" portion of the centerfold but is otherwise in excellent condition. The item comes with a JSA LOA.