"They (the Southern people) have lost all title to property, and can lose nothing not already forfeited."
What, nothing? Not merely the houses we had built, the lands we had tilled, the churches we worshipped in--had we forfeited the right to drink of the streams, to behold the sun, to breathe the free air of heaven? What unheard of, what inconceivable crime had we committed that thus closed every gate of mercy and compassion against us, and provoked an utterance which has but one parallel--the death warrant signed by Philip II. against all Netherlanders? General Sherman has himself told us what it was: We had dared to act on the "truth that liberty and government are worth fighting for."
On March 15, he writes to General Gillmore, advising him to draw forces from Charleston and Savannah (both then in Federal hands) to destroy a railroad, etc. "As to the garrisons of those places I don't feel disposed to be over-generous, and should not hesitate to burn Savannah, Charleston and Wilmington, or either of them, if the garrisons were needed."
Such are some of the results of our gleanings in this field. Is it any wonder that after reading them we fervently echo General Sherman's devout aspiration: "I do wish the fine race of men that people the United States should rule and determine the future destiny of America."
(Reprinted by Permission of the Illustrator Company. From the April, 1896, Number of "The Illustrator." Copyrighted. All Rights Reserved.)
It is a proud thing for Americans to feel that there is little to bring the blush of shame to their cheeks in the contemplation of their country's history. It is a glorious thing for our young manhood to know that the annals of their race tell of the earnest and upward progress of a people, Christian from the first, toward an ever higher civilization. It is well to reflect that when the ruthless hand of war has turned American citizenship from the paths of peace it could do little more than array strong man against sturdy foeman in an honest battle for principle, and that outrage and pillage in our broad domain have been the almost undisputed heritage of the Aborigines.
Enduring with patient fortitude the raids of savage foes upon our early frontiers, meeting the armed invasion of foreign hosts with a resistance vigorous but manly, pressing our own victorious arms to the very citadel of our Mexican neighbors without spoliation or rapine, it is sad to realize that it remained for an internecine conflict, where brother stood against brother, for an invasion by an army void of pretext of reprisal or revenge, to write upon American warfare the stigma of vandalism, rapacity and theft.