"Atlanta was not destroyed by the army of the United States commanded by General Sherman. No private dwelling was destroyed by the United States army, but some were by that commanded by General Hood along his line of defense. The Court House still stands; all the buildings on that side of the railroad and all those along Peachtree street, the best street in the city, still remain. Nothing was destroyed by my orders but the depots, workshops, foundries, etc., close by the depots, and two blocks of mercantile stores also close to the depot took fire from the burning storehouse or foundry, and our troops were prevented from checking the spread of the fire by reason of concealed shells loaded and exploding in that old building. The railroad car and machine shops on the edge of the town toward Decatur street, were burned before we entered Atlanta, by General Hood's orders."
To the Hon. Henry W. Grady, a few days later, Sherman said personally:
"The city of Atlanta was never burned as a city. I notice that the headquarters I occupied, all the houses about it, and the headquarters of the other officers were all standing when I revisited the place a year or two since. The residence streets were not burned at all."
"It was your intention, then, to burn only the heart of the city?"
"My intention was clearly expressed in a written order to General Poe. It was simply to burn the buildings in which public stores had been placed or would likely be placed. This included only four buildings, as I recollect: not over five or six. One of these was a warehouse above the depot, in which or under which were a number of shells. From this building a block of business houses took fire and the destruction went beyond the limits intended. The old Trout House was burned by some of the men, who had some reason for burning it. I ordered the round house burned. I wanted to destroy the railroad so that it could not be used. I then wanted to destroy the public buildings, so that Atlanta could not be used as a depot of supplies. I ordered, as I say, four or five houses set on fire, but as far as burning the city in the sense of wanton destruction, I never thought of such a thing. I shirked no responsibility that war imposed, but I never went beyond my duty."
His kindly feeling toward the city and people with whom he once dealt so sternly was well shown in a letter which he wrote in 1879 to Captain E. P. Howell, of the Atlanta Constitution.
"My opportunities for studying the physical features of Georgia," he said, "have been large. In 1843–4 I went from Augusta to Marietta in a stage (when Atlanta had no existence); thence to Bellefonte, Alabama, on horseback, returning afterwards, all the way on horseback, to Augusta by a different road; again, in 1864, I conducted, as all the world knows, a vast army from Chattanooga to Atlanta and Savannah, and just now have passed over the same district in railway cars. Considering the history of this period of time (35 years), the development of the country has been great, but not comparable with California, Iowa, Wisconsin, or Kansas, in all which States I have had similar chances for observation. The reason why Georgia has not kept pace with the States I have named is beyond question that emigration would not go where slavery existed. Now that this cause is removed there is no longer any reason why Georgia, especially the northern part, should not rapidly regain her prominence among the great States of our Union. I know that no section is more favored in climate, health, soil, minerals, water, and everything which man needs for his material wants, and to contribute to his physical and intellectual development. Your railroads now finished give your people cheap supplies, and the means of sending in every section their surplus products of the soil or of manufactures. You have immense beds of iron and coal, besides inexhaustible quantities of timber, oak, hickory, beech, poplar, pine, etc., so necessary in modern factories, and which are becoming scarce in other sections of our busy country.
"I have crossed this continent many times, by almost every possible route, and I feel certain that at this time no single region holds out as strong inducements for industrious emigrants as that from Lynchburg, Virginia, to Huntsville, Alabama, right and left, embracing the mountain ranges and intervening valleys, especially East Tennessee, North Georgia and Alabama. I hope I will not give offence in saying that the present population has not done full justice to this naturally beautiful and most favored region of our country, and that two or three millions of people could be diverted from the great West to this region with profit and advantage to all concerned. This whole region, though called 'southern,' is in fact 'northern'—viz.: it is a wheat-growing country; has a climate in no sense tropical or southern, but was designed by nature for small farms and not for large plantations. In the region I have named North Georgia forms a most important part, and your city, Atlanta, is its natural centre or capital. It is admirably situated, a thousand feet above the sea, healthy, with abundance of the purest water and with granite, limestone, sandstone and clay convenient to build a second London. In 1864 my army, composed of near a hundred thousand men, all accustomed to a northern climate, were grouped about Atlanta from June to November without tents, and were as vigorous, healthy and strong as though they were in Ohio or New York. Indeed, the whole country from the Tennessee to the Ocmulgee is famous for health, pure water, abundant timber and with a large proportion of good soil, especially in the valleys, and all you need is more people of the right sort.
"I am satisfied, from my recent visit, that Northern professional men, manufacturers, mechanics and farmers may come to Atlanta, Rome and Chattanooga with a certainty of fair dealing and fair encouragement. Though I was personally regarded the bete-noir of the late war in your region, the author of all your woes, yet I admit that I have just passed over the very ground desolated by the Civil War, and have received everywhere nothing but kind and courteous treatment from the highest to the lowest, and I heard of no violence to others for opinions' sake. Some Union men spoke to me of social ostracism, but I saw nothing of it, and even if it do exist it must disappear with the present generation. Our whole framework of government and history is founded on the personal and political equality of citizens, and philosophy teaches that social distinctions can only rest on personal merit and corresponding intelligence, and if any part of a community clings to distinctions founded on past conditions, it will grow less and less with time and finally disappear. Any attempt to build up an aristocracy or a privileged class at the South, on the fact that their fathers or grandfathers once owned slaves, will result in a ridiculous failure and subject the authors to the laughter of mankind. I refer to this subject incidentally because others have argued the case with me, but whether attempted elsewhere in the South, I am certain it will not be attempted in Georgia.
"Therefore, I shall believe and maintain that north Georgia is now in a condition to invite emigration from the Northern States of our Union and from Europe, and all parties concerned should advertise widely the great inducements your region holds out to the industrious and frugal of all lands; agents should be appointed in New York to advise, and others at Knoxville, Chattanooga, Rome, Atlanta, etc., to receive emigrants and to point out to them on arrival where cheap lands may be had with reasonable credit, where companies may open coal and iron mines, where mills may be erected to grind wheat and corn, spin cotton, and to manufacture the thousand and one things you now buy from abroad; and more especially to make known that you are prepared to welcome and patronize men who will settle in your region and form a part of your community.