Dennis L. Peterson

Overwhelming Eyewitness Testimony

Revisado: 07-30-19

A war crime is "a crime committed in wartime in violation of the accepted rules and customs of war." This has traditionally included prohibitions against targeting civilian populations and noncombatants, especially women, children, the feeble, and the aged, and avoiding, as much as possible, doing damage to homes, nonmilitary businesses, and places of worship.

Denial of war crimes is a characteristic of societies that, for ulterior motives, want to rewrite history by covering up the truth about their past. Such is the case with the record of William T. Sherman's infamous march through Georgia and the Carolinas and especially with the destruction of Columbia, S.C.

Karen Stokes has masterfully compiled and thoroughly documented the case for war crimes against the civilians of South Carolina by Sherman and his troops. She has done so using, not the opinions of politically correct modern revisionist historians and Lincoln apologists, but firsthand accounts of eyewitnesses to the atrocities as recorded in journals, diaries, sworn affidavits, and other reputable primary sources. No surprise there, considering that Stokes is an archivist for the South Carolina Historical Society.

Her stream of credible eyewitnesses includes not only the residents one might expect to hear but also--and most notably--many Union soldiers and even foreign diplomats, who had no ax to grind for either side. The result is a convincing case against Sherman and his troops. It reveals Sherman's tendency to deny, to shift blame, to look the other way, and to rationalize the committing of war crimes. He first denied any involvement by Yankee soldiers, blaming instead the troops of Wade Hampton (for allegedly firing bales of cotton) and the citizens of Columbia (for allegedly giving liquor to Yankee troops). Then he acknowledged his troops' involvement but denied that he had ordered the firing, blaming instead a handful of unruly (drunk) soldiers. The evidence, however, clearly indicates otherwise and indicts him for at least tacit approval by his failure to end it when he became aware of it and at worst actually ordering it. Even if he did not provide a written order for the burning of the city, his attitude toward the city and the South generally was widely known and acted upon. It also shows his unblinking ability to meet with civilian leaders of the city, promise them peace and safety and protection from property destruction, and then to do nothing to prevent the opposite when it happened.

This book chronicles Sherman's campaign of wanton hatred and destruction against not armies of belligerents (Hampton's army consisted of not more than about 400 at the time, a negligible number and certainly no threat to Sherman's thousands) but against innocent civilians, both black and white, male and female, young and old, and against property regardless of its use, including houses of worship. It reveals the outworking of the Union army's General Orders No. 100 (see Lincoln's Code by John Fabian Witt). It is a must-read source for everyone who wants to know the truth about Sherman's march through the Southern states.

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