Abraham Lincoln’s "Gift" to Georgia–Sherman’s March, Part Two
By: Al Benson Jr.
Anti-Establishment History
The internationalist and dictatorial mindset of the Sherman brothers was clearly evident in the statement made by John Sherman, brother of William Tecumseh, when he said: "Nationalize as much as possible (and thereby) make men love their country before their states." This quote was in the book Donnie Kennedy and I wrote, (Red Republicans and Lincoln’s Marxists www.olesouthbooks.com on page 138). You have only to compare this quote with the rantings of recent presidential candidate John McCain when he shouted about "country first." It all sounds so patriotic until you stop and think about it. "Country first!" What about God? Is He supposed to take second place, or third? Seems that, if I recall correctly, that was the same tack that Hitler took.
However, any similarities between General Sherman and Hitler are more than coincidental. They were both endowed with the same mindset, as was the sainted Mr. Lincoln.
One thing most noteworthy of Sherman’s barbarian hordes was their attitude toward clergymen and toward Christians in general. In Sherman’s March Burke Davis noted: "The Reverend Mr. Connor, a Methodist minister whose parsonage was burned, emerged with a sick child wrapped in a blanket. A (Yankee) soldier seized the blanket. ‘No!’ Connor said, ‘he’s sick.’ The soldier tore off the blanket and threw it into the fire. ‘Damn you’ he said. ‘If you say one more word I’ll throw the child after it’." Yankee charity at its merciful best!
One thing you have to say about Sherman and his bummers though is that they were equal opportunity destroyers. They treated the Catholics no better than the Protestants. The account is given in Davis’ book about a Catholic convent destroyed when Atlanta was burning. According to Davis: "Father O’Connell led a final benediction. The schoolgirls were kneeling, reciting the rosary, when the chapel door was broken in by ‘the most unearthly battering…like the crash of doom. Drunken soldiers piled over each other, rushing for the sacred gold vessels of the alter…Father O’Connell led them (the girls) to a nearby church, from which they saw the burning convent roof collapse into a fiery grid of timbers. The sturdy building endured until long after nearby structures had burned to the ground, but at three in the morning its cross plunged earthward in a cascade of flames and embers. Laughing soldiers taunted the nuns and blew cigar smoke in their faces. ‘Oh holy! Yes,holy! We’re just as holy as you are!…Now, what do you think of God? Ain’t Sherman greater?’"
It seems that Sherman’s men had a real antipathy toward Christianity and Christians. Davis observed in his book also that: "Sergeant Fleharty watched as the village church was attacked: ‘First the pulpit and seats were torn out, then the siding and the blinds were ripped off. Many axes were at work. The corner posts were cut, the building tottered, the beautiful spire, up among the green trees, leaned…vibrating to and fro,…By the use of long poles the men increased the vibratory motion of the building, and soon, with a screeching groan the spire sunk down…and as the structure became a pile of rubbish, some of the most wicked of the raiders yelled out: ‘There goes your damned old gospel shop.’" With some exceptions this seems to have been the mindset of Sherman and the hordes he commanded. Again, if you will read the book Donnie Kennedy and I wrote you will see this illustrated. For many in the Northern armies, the communists, socialists, and freethinkers, Christianity was the enemy, especially Southern Christianity, and everything they could do to destroy it was applauded. Needless to say, your "history" books will never bother to mention this little fact. Better for all concerned if you don’t know!
And, in keeping with the Marxist mindset of many in the Union armies, Sherman was strongly inclined to a program of "land confiscation." He wanted to dispossess Confederate leadership from their property. Sherman’s beloved brother, John, mentioned earlier, had said: "If we can’t depend on the loyalty of the white men of the South, I would give the land to the blacks or colonize a new set (of northern whites)." Tecumseh Sherman himself, since 1862, had threatened to take the land away from Southerners and to redistribute it to Northern white colonists and in 1864 he wrote: "…it may be both politic and right that we should banish them and appropriate their lands to a more loyal and useful population…If they want eternal war, well and good; we will dispossess them and put our friends in their place…" This was the mindset of the Sherman brothers, both on the battlefield and in Washington. How different was this from what Karl Marx advocated; "Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels." That little gem was in The Communist Manifesto. You don’t suppose the Sherman brothers had been reading Marx do you?
It’s hard for them to grasp that their holy icon, Mr. Lincoln, was a friend to the Marxists
Most historians have yet to deal with the Marxist mindset of many Northern generals and politicians. It’s hard for them to grasp that their holy icon, Mr. Lincoln, was a friend to the Marxists and socialists and had no problem whatever with their mindset or with what they did in and to the South. Christians have almost no concept of the depredations perpetrated by Yankees against churches in the South during the war. That’s another whole subject in itself–one more subject that almost never gets touched upon. Christians have been bemused into thinking that Lincoln was truly a godly man because many pastors have told them this. No supporting evidence is necessarly, just anecdotes–so and so told so and so that Lincoln was converted in the White House! Evidence? There ain’t any! In fact the evidence concerning Mr. Lincoln’s religiosity mostly points to the fact, from primary sources, that Lincoln was anti-Christian in his outlook. But, then in our day, our Christian brethren are hardly noted for their aggressive search for truth, any truth that conflicts with the "cunningly devised fables" they have been fed, so they just go along to get along and don’t bother to question anything. Their concern for accurate historical truth is like the Platte River, "a mile wide and an inch deep."
It is rumored that the people of Georgia did not forget Sherman’s March for over 100 years after it happened. Who can blame them? Would you forget if an area of your state sixty miles wide had been devastated? I have touched upon a very few instances here. There were many more and some so horrendous as to be beyond description. Southern private property was to be destroyed as much as possible–per the Marxist mindset of many in the Union armies in command positions.Sheridan did the same in Virginia.
Until we begin to deal with the penetration of Marxists and socialists into Northern political and military life in the early 1860s and before, we will never truly understand the War of Northern Aggression and the part people like Sherman portrayed in the destruction of a Christian South. The war, from the perspective of many in the North was a Communist revolution. Think on that fact for awhile.
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