1864: ‘March to the Sea’ Ends with a Christmas Gift

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• Background Info
• Vocabulary

• On December 22, 1864, United States General William Tecumseh Sherman sent a message to President Abraham Lincoln: “I beg to present you, as a Christmas gift, the city of Savannah, with 150 heavy guns and plenty of ammunition, and also about 25,000 bales of cotton.”

   

  The capture of the rich port city of Savannah ended Sherman’s rampage through the state of Georgia, which began with the burning of Atlanta six weeks earlier. Sherman practiced a “scorched earth policy” on his campaign. “We are not only fighting hostile armies, but a hostile people, and must make old and young, rich and poor, feel the hard hand of war,” Sherman wrote. To force Georgians to feel the “hard hand of war,” Sherman and his troops destroyed hundreds of kilometers of railroads, bridges, and telegraph lines. They burned crops and confiscated livestock. 

   

  Sherman and his troops traveled east from Atlanta without secure supply lines or even reliable methods of communication. They were escorted by a cavalry unit made up of Southerners loyal to the Union, and were joined by thousands of refugees—most of them former slaves.

• Term	Part of Speech	Definition	Encyclopedic Entry
  ammunition	Noun	material fired, scattered, dropped, or detonated from a weapon, including bombs and bullets.
  bale	Noun	bundle of cotton weighing 227 kilograms (500 pounds).
  campaign	Noun	activities designed to achieve a social, political, or military goal.
  cavalry	Noun	military unit that serves on horseback.
  city	Noun	large settlement with a high population density.
  communication	Noun	sharing of information and ideas.
  confiscate	Verb	to take or seize by some authority.
  crop	Noun	agricultural produce.	Encyclopedic Entry: crop
  destroy	Verb	to ruin or make useless.
  disaster	Noun	terrible and damaging event.
  escort	Verb	to accompany or guide.
  hostile	Adjective	confrontational or unfriendly.
  livestock	noun, plural noun	animals raised for sale and profit.
  organize	Verb	to coordinate and give structure to.
  port	Noun	place on a body of water where ships can tie up or dock and load and unload cargo.	Encyclopedic Entry: port
  present	Verb	to formally offer or submit.
  railroad	Noun	road constructed with metal tracks on which trains travel.
  rampage	Noun	somewhat uncontrolled, violent behavior.
  refugee	Noun	person who flees their home, usually due to natural disaster or political upheaval.
  reliable	Adjective	dependable or consistent.
  scorched earth policy	Noun	a military strategy which involves destroying anything that might be useful to the enemy while advancing through or withdrawing from an area.
  secure	Verb	to guarantee, or make safe and certain.
  slave	Noun	person who is owned by another person or group of people.
  supply	Noun	amount of a product that is available to consumers.
  telegraph	Noun	system of communication involving devices connected through electrical wires.
  troop	Noun	a soldier.
  Union	Adjective	having to do with states supporting the United States (north) during the U.S. Civil War.
  war	Noun	large-scale armed conflict.