[CHAPTER XXXIII.]
REMINISCENCES.
Life at the Fifth Avenue Hotel—Ex-President Hayes's Memories—General Meigs's Tribute—Professor Howe on Sherman's School Days—A Visit to the Catskills—Sherman and Joe Johnston—Telling about Resaca—Thinking of the Sea—Marvellous Versatility—General Rosecrans' Reminiscences of Sherman at West Point.
A pleasant view of General Sherman's life in New York was given by Mr. Hiram Hitchcock, of the Fifth Avenue Hotel, at which house Sherman lived before he purchased a home. "He was," said Mr. Hitchcock, "a guest of this house off and on for many years, and as such he naturally became very much beloved by our whole household. After General Grant's funeral was over I spent the evening with General Sherman and he told me of his plans for the future; that he wanted to move quietly from St. Louis and locate in New York. He said that he thought he should enjoy New York very much, and his youngest son was then finishing his course at Yale, and the change would bring him near to New Haven. After that the General arranged by correspondence for his rooms on the parlor floor, Twenty-fifth street side. He came here with Mrs. Sherman and the daughters, and the youngest son used to come in frequently from Yale. At his first after-dinner speech in New York—that at the New England Society dinner—General Sherman referred to having moved to New York, and said that he had gone into winter quarters down at the Fifth Avenue Hotel, where there was good grass and water.
"The General was very particular to have everything arranged to suit Mrs. Sherman. He said that as to himself it did not make very much difference. He was used to roughing it and he could take anything, but he wanted Mrs. Sherman to be very nicely fixed and to have things to her own mind. On the other hand Mrs. Sherman said to me: 'It doesn't make so very much difference about me, but I wish to have the General comfortable. Dear old fellow, he has seen a great deal of roughing it, and I want him to be entirely at ease.' They were very happy and comfortable here during their two years' stay, which began on September 1, 1886, and General Sherman's idea in having a house was mainly to make it pleasanter and more agreeable, if possible, for Mrs. Sherman and the daughters; to give Mrs. Sherman a little more quiet than she could have at a hotel, although she lived very quietly here.
"During the General's residence here he was, of course, a conspicuous figure. He was always genial and affable to every one, very easily approached, and he received and entertained a great many of his old army companions and aided a vast number of them. In fact, no one knows how many army men General Sherman has, first and last, assisted pecuniarily and in various ways, helping them to get positions and giving them advice and encouragement. He used to meet hosts of friends and acquaintances in the hotel. I remember his saying once that he would have to stop shaking hands, for he had lost one nail, and if he didn't quit soon he would lose them all. If he went to the dining-room, people from different parts of the country who knew him would get up and go over to his table and talk to him.
"It was a sort of a reception with him all the time—one continuous reception. He was very democratic in all his movements, and he always dined in the public room.
"The General kept one room for a regular working-room for himself. There he had his desk, a large library, scrap baskets, letter files, etc., and that is where he was in the habit of receiving his friends.
"As for the society side of his life here, Miss Sherman and her father had regular weekly receptions during the season, in the large drawing-room.