CHARACTER OF GENERAL SHERMAN.
The character and ability of General Sherman were not fully appreciated until the second year of the war. He had not aimed to startle the country at the outset of his military career with any of the brilliant performances attempted by many officers who were heard of for a day and never afterwards. With the true instinct and discipline of a soldier, he faithfully and skillfully did the work assigned to him, and he gained steadily, rapidly, and enduringly on the confidence and admiration of the people. He shared in the successful campaigns of General Grant in the South-West, and earned his way to the great command with which he was now intrusted,—a command which in one sense involved the prompt success of all the military operations of the Government. Disaster for his army did not of course mean the triumph of the Rebellion, but it meant fresh levies of troops, the prolongation of the struggle, and a serious increase to the heavy task that General Grant had assumed in Virginia.
General Sherman was a graduate of West Point, and while still a young man had served with marked credit for some twelve years in the army. But he had more than a military education. Through a checkered career in civil life, he had enlarged his knowledge of the country, his acquaintance with men, his experience in affairs. He had been a banker in California, a lawyer in Kansas, President of a college in Louisiana, and, when the war began, he was about to take charge of a railroad in Missouri. It would be difficult, if not impossible to find a man who has so thorough, so minute a knowledge of every State and Territory of the Union. He has made a special study of the geography and products of the country. Some one has said of him, that if we should suddenly lose all the maps of the United States, we need not wait for fresh surveys to make new ones, because General Sherman could reproduce a perfect map in twenty-four hours. That this is a pardonable exaggeration would be admitted by any one who had conversed with General Sherman in regard to the topography and resources of the country from Maine to Arizona.
General Sherman's appearance is strongly indicative of his descent. Born in the West, he is altogether of Puritan stock, his father and mother having emigrated from Connecticut where his family resided for nearly two centuries. All the characteristics of that remarkable class of men re-appear in General Sherman. In grim, determined visage, in commanding courage, in mental grasp, in sternness of principle, he is an Ironside Officer of the Army of Cromwell, modified by the impulsive mercurial temperament which eight generations of American descent, with Western birth and rearing, have impressed upon his character.
[* The Italicized words were underscored in the original letters of the President.]
[** THIRTY-EIGHTH CONGRESS. REPUBLICANS IN ROMAN; DEMOCRATS IN ITALIC.
The Senate was composed of same members as in Thirty-seventh Congress
(given on pp. ——), with the following exceptions:—
ILLINOIS.—William A. Richardson succeeded O. H. Browning.
INDIANA.—Thomas A. Hendricks succeeded David Turpie.
MAINE.—Nathan A. Farwell succeeded William Pitt Fessenden.
MARYLAND.—Reverdy Johnson succeeded James Alfred Pearce.
MINNESOTA.—Alexander Ramsey succeeded Henry M. Rice.
MISSOURI.—B. Gratz Brown succeeded Robert Wilson.
NEW JERSEY.—William Wright succeeded James W. Wall.
NEW YORK.—Edwin D. Morgan succeeded Preston King.
PENNSYLVANIA.—Charles R. Buckalew succeeded David Wilmot.
RHODE ISLAND.—William Sprague succeeded Samuel G. Arnold.
»Waitman T. Willey and Peter G. Van Winkle were admitted as the
first senators from West Virginia. Lemuel J. Bowden took Mr.
Willey's place as senator from Virginia, and colleague of John
Carlile. The political power of West Virginia was thus actually
represented at one time by four senators.
»James W. Nye and William M. Stewart took their seats Feb. 1, 1865,
as senators from the new State of Nevada.
»Ten States were unrepresented.
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES.
CALIFORNIA.—Cornelius Cole, William Higby, Thomas B. Shannon.
CONNECTICUT.—Augustus Brandegee, Henry C. Deming, James E.
English, John H. Hubbard.
DELAWARE.—Nathaniel B. Smithers.
ILLINOIS.—James C. Allen; William J. Allen; Isaac N. Arnold;
John R. Eden; John F. Farnsworth; Charles M. Harris; Ebon C.
Ingersoll, elected in place of Owen Lovejoy, deceased; Anthony L.
Knapp; Owen Lovejoy, died March 25, 1864; William R. Morrison;
Jesse O. Norton; James C. Robinson; Lewis W. Ross; John T. Stuart;
Elihu B. Washburne.
INDIANA.—Schuyler Colfax, James A. Cravens, Ebenezer Dumont,
Joseph K. Edgerton, Henry W. Harrington, William S. Holman, George
W. Julian, John Law, James F. McDowell, Godlove S. Orth, Daniel
W. Voorhees.
IOWA.—William B. Allison, Joseph B. Grinnell, Asahel W. Hubbard,
John A. Kasson, Hiram Price, James F. Wilson.
KANSAS.—A. Carter Wilder.
KENTUCKY.—Lucien Anderson, Brutus J. Clay, Henry Grider, Aaron
Harding, Robert Mallory, William H. Randall, Green Clay Smith,
William H. Wadsworth, George H. Yeaman.
MAINE.—James G. Blaine, Sidney Perham, Frederick A. Pike, John H.
Rice, Lorenzo D. M. Sweat.
MARYLAND.—John A. J. Creswell, Henry Winter Davis, Benjamin G.
Harris, Francis Thomas, Edwin H. Webster.
MASSACHUSETTS.—John R. Alley, Oakes Ames, John D. Baldwin, George
S. Boutwell, Henry L. Dawes, Thomas D. Eliot, Daniel W. Gooch,
Samuel Hooper, Alexander H. Rice, William B. Washburn.
MICHIGAN.—Augustus C. Baldwin, Fernando C. Beaman, John F. Driggs,
Fracis W. Kellogg, John W. Longyear, Charles Upson.
MINNESOTA.—Ignatius Donnelly, William Windom.
MISSOURI.—Francis P. Blair, Jr., seat successfully contested by
Samuel Knox; Henry T. Blow, Sempronius H. Boyd; William A. Hall;
Austin A. King; Samuel Knox, seated in place of Mr. Blair, June
15, 1864; Benjamin Loan; Joseph W. McClurg; James S. Rollins, John
G. Scott.
NEVADA.—Henry G. Worthington, seated Dec. 21, 1864.
NEW HAMPSHIRE.—Daniel Marcy, James W. Patterson, Edward H.
Rollins.
NEW JERSEY.—George Middleton, Nehemiah Perry, Andrew J. Rogers,
John F. Starr, William G. Steele.
NEW YORK.—James Brooks; John W. Chanler; Ambrose W. Clark;
Freeman Clarke; Thomas T. Davis; Reuben E. Fenton, resigned Dec.
10, 1864; Augustus Frank; John Ganson; John A. Griswold; Anson
Herrick; Giles W. Hotchkiss; Calvin T. Hulburd; Martin Kalbfleisch;
Orlando Kellogg; Francis Kernan; De Witt C. Littlejohn; James M.
Marvin; Samuel F. Miller; Daniel Morris; Homer A. Nelson; Moses
F. Odell; Theodore M. Pomeroy; John V. L. Pruyn; William Radford;
Henry G. Stebbins, resigned 1864; John B. Steele; Dwight Townsend,
elected in place of Mr. Stebbins; Robert B. Van Valkenburgh; Elijah
Ward; Charles H. Winfield; Benjamin Wood; Fernando Wood.
OHIO.—James M. Ashley, George Bliss, Samuel S. Cox, Ephraim B.
Eckley, William E. Finck, James A. Garfield, Wells A. Hutchins,
William Johnson, Francis C. LeBlond, Alexander Long, John F.
McKinney, James R. Morris, Warren P. Noble, John O'Neill, George
H. Pendleton, Robert C. Schenck, Rufus P. Spaulding, Chilton A.
White, Joseph W. White.
OREGON.—John R. McBride.
PENNSYLVANIA.—Sydenham E. Ancona, Joseph Baily, John M. Broomall,
Alexander H. Coffroth, John L. Dawson, Charles Denison, James T.
Hale, Philip Johnson, William D. Kelley, Jesse Lazear, Archibald
McAllister, William H. Miller, James K. Moorhead, Amos Myers,
Leonard Myers, Charles O'Neill, Samuel J. Randall, Glenni W.
Scofield, Thaddeus Stevens, John D. Stiles, Myer Strouse, M.
Russell Thayer, Henry W. Tracy, Thomas Williams.
RHODE ISLAND.—Nathan F. Dixon, Thomas A. Jenckes.
VERMONT.—Portus Baxter, Justin S. Morrill, Fred. E. Woodbridge.
WEST VIRGINIA.—Jacob B. Blair, William G. Brown, Killian V. Whaley.
WISCONSIN.—James T. Brown, Amasa Cobb, Charles A. Eldridge,
Walter D. McIndoe, Ithamar C. Sloan, Ezra Wheeler.
TERRITORIAL DELEGATES.
ARIZONA.—Charles D. Poston.
COLORADO.—Hiram P. Bennett.
DAKOTA.—William Jayne, John B. S. Todd.
IDAHO.—William H. Wallace.
MONTANA.—Samuel McLean, seated June 6, 1865.
NEBRASKA.—Samuel G. Daily.
NEVADA.—Gordon N. Mott.
NEW MEXICO.—Francisco Perea.
UTAH.—John F. Kenney.
WASHINGTON.—George E. Cole.]