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Somewhere Toward Freedom: Sherman's March and the Story of America's Largest Emancipation
A groundbreaking account of Sherman’s March to the Sea—the critical Civil War campaign that destroyed the Confederacy—told for the first time from the perspective of the tens of thousands of enslaved people who fled to the Union lines and transformed Sherman’s march into the biggest liberation event in American history.
In the fall of 1864, Gen. William T. Sherman led his army through Atlanta, Georgia, burning buildings of military significance—and ultimately most of the city—along the way. From Atlanta, they marched across the state to the most important city at the Savannah.
Mired in the deep of the South with no reliable supply lines, Sherman’s army had to live off the land and the provisions on the plantations they seized along the way. As the army marched to the east, plantation owners fled, but even before they did so, slaves self-emancipated to Union lines. By the time the army seized Savannah in December, as many as 20,000 enslaved people had attached themselves to Sherman’s army. They endured hardships, marching as much as twenty miles a day—often without food or shelter from the winter weather—and at times Union commanders discouraged and even prevented the self-emancipated from staying with the army. Racism was not confined to the Confederacy.
In Somewhere Toward Freedom, historian Bennett Parten brilliantly reframes this seminal episode in Civil War history. He not only helps us understand how Sherman’s March impacted the war, and what it meant to the enslaved, but also reveals how it laid the foundation for the fledging efforts of Reconstruction. When the war ended, Sherman and various government and private aid agencies seized plantation lands—particularly in the sea islands off the Georgia and South Carolina coasts—in order to resettle the newly emancipated. They were fed, housed, and in some instances, taught to read and write. This first real effort at Reconstruction was short-lived, however. As federal troops withdrew to the north, Confederate sympathizers and Southern landowners eventually brought about the downfall of this program.
Sherman’s march has remained controversial to this day. But as Parten reveals, it played a significant role in ending the Civil War, due in no small part to the efforts of the tens of thousands of enslaved people who became a part of it. In Somewhere Toward Freedom, this critical moment in American history has finally been given the attention it deserves.
In the fall of 1864, Gen. William T. Sherman led his army through Atlanta, Georgia, burning buildings of military significance—and ultimately most of the city—along the way. From Atlanta, they marched across the state to the most important city at the Savannah.
Mired in the deep of the South with no reliable supply lines, Sherman’s army had to live off the land and the provisions on the plantations they seized along the way. As the army marched to the east, plantation owners fled, but even before they did so, slaves self-emancipated to Union lines. By the time the army seized Savannah in December, as many as 20,000 enslaved people had attached themselves to Sherman’s army. They endured hardships, marching as much as twenty miles a day—often without food or shelter from the winter weather—and at times Union commanders discouraged and even prevented the self-emancipated from staying with the army. Racism was not confined to the Confederacy.
In Somewhere Toward Freedom, historian Bennett Parten brilliantly reframes this seminal episode in Civil War history. He not only helps us understand how Sherman’s March impacted the war, and what it meant to the enslaved, but also reveals how it laid the foundation for the fledging efforts of Reconstruction. When the war ended, Sherman and various government and private aid agencies seized plantation lands—particularly in the sea islands off the Georgia and South Carolina coasts—in order to resettle the newly emancipated. They were fed, housed, and in some instances, taught to read and write. This first real effort at Reconstruction was short-lived, however. As federal troops withdrew to the north, Confederate sympathizers and Southern landowners eventually brought about the downfall of this program.
Sherman’s march has remained controversial to this day. But as Parten reveals, it played a significant role in ending the Civil War, due in no small part to the efforts of the tens of thousands of enslaved people who became a part of it. In Somewhere Toward Freedom, this critical moment in American history has finally been given the attention it deserves.
270 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 21, 2025
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January 20, 2025
I love historical context! Bennett Parten's Somewhere Toward Freedom is a wonderful example of taking a deeper look at a mostly unexplored history event. In this case, Parten is looking at the mass emancipation which happened as General William T. Sherman marched to the sea. This event is certainly not overlooked, but the mass of people who followed Sherman are usually not the focus of the narrative. Parten spends a couple of chapters explaining how the march affected these newly free people and then the aftermath of which I knew very little.
I should mention that I have read a lot about the American Civil War. As such, I didn't need a lot of backstory for Sherman and other major players. I think the book stands perfectly well on its own, but it is worth mentioning that it may lose a little bit for readers who don't have background for the overall war.
Otherwise, Parten's book is truly exceptional. I especially appreciated the fact that Parten lets the reader feel a bit of pride and hope just like the newly emancipated people of the story. However, Parten also doesn't dispense with nuance or the darker parts of the aftermath. The Union leadership could be just as cold and calculating as any Confederate. Thankfully, there are real heroes to root for including a Union officer who shouldered the responsibility of the Port Royal Experiment. This book has it all and I highly recommend it.
(This book was provided as an advance reader copy from Netgalley and Simon & Schuster.)
I should mention that I have read a lot about the American Civil War. As such, I didn't need a lot of backstory for Sherman and other major players. I think the book stands perfectly well on its own, but it is worth mentioning that it may lose a little bit for readers who don't have background for the overall war.
Otherwise, Parten's book is truly exceptional. I especially appreciated the fact that Parten lets the reader feel a bit of pride and hope just like the newly emancipated people of the story. However, Parten also doesn't dispense with nuance or the darker parts of the aftermath. The Union leadership could be just as cold and calculating as any Confederate. Thankfully, there are real heroes to root for including a Union officer who shouldered the responsibility of the Port Royal Experiment. This book has it all and I highly recommend it.
(This book was provided as an advance reader copy from Netgalley and Simon & Schuster.)
January 30, 2025
“The army’s movements from Atlanta to Savannah channeled enormous forces, enough to destroy Georgia’s slave system, the planter class, and bring freedom to some untold thousands of enslaved people.”
“Though we’ve typically looked at Sherman‘s March only as one of the last campaigns of the Civil War, it was also an early battle of Reconstruction, a wartime crucible that went on shaping American society long after the marching stopped, and the campaign came to a close.”
“….. once emancipation was broached and begun at Port Royal, there was no bottling it up again. The changes would only accelerate, not slow down. Its very existence forced Lincoln, his party, and the War Department to take stock of what was happening and forced the government into seeing emancipation as a natural outcome of the war, which helped prepare the way for a full evolution from a limited, restrained war to a war that would destroy slavery.”
Sherman’s March through Georgia was pivotal in ending the Civil War. However, this book does not focus on the destruction that the army left in its wake. Instead the focus is on the enslaved people who took the opportunity to self-emancipate and follow the army. In reality, they didn’t have a lot of choice since their previous lives were no longer available. Sherman was not an abolitionist, and he didn’t really want the thousands of former slaves to follow his army. For one thing, there wasn’t enough food (the former slaves had to teach the soldiers how to make rice edible). So a lot of the followers were moved to a location near Savannah that came to be known as the Port Royal Experiment.
I had not read about the Port Royal Experiment before, but it was fascinating. It provided education and attempted to turn the formerly enslaved into wage earners on plantations. The Experiment did not achieve what the formerly enslaved wanted - to become landowners themselves. However, the project did develop concepts that were incorporated in Reconstruction. There is a very brief discussion of Reconstruction.
I thought that the book was well researched and the author did an excellent job explaining the various points of view and motivations. This is his first book, but I hope that he writes more.
I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.
“Though we’ve typically looked at Sherman‘s March only as one of the last campaigns of the Civil War, it was also an early battle of Reconstruction, a wartime crucible that went on shaping American society long after the marching stopped, and the campaign came to a close.”
“….. once emancipation was broached and begun at Port Royal, there was no bottling it up again. The changes would only accelerate, not slow down. Its very existence forced Lincoln, his party, and the War Department to take stock of what was happening and forced the government into seeing emancipation as a natural outcome of the war, which helped prepare the way for a full evolution from a limited, restrained war to a war that would destroy slavery.”
Sherman’s March through Georgia was pivotal in ending the Civil War. However, this book does not focus on the destruction that the army left in its wake. Instead the focus is on the enslaved people who took the opportunity to self-emancipate and follow the army. In reality, they didn’t have a lot of choice since their previous lives were no longer available. Sherman was not an abolitionist, and he didn’t really want the thousands of former slaves to follow his army. For one thing, there wasn’t enough food (the former slaves had to teach the soldiers how to make rice edible). So a lot of the followers were moved to a location near Savannah that came to be known as the Port Royal Experiment.
I had not read about the Port Royal Experiment before, but it was fascinating. It provided education and attempted to turn the formerly enslaved into wage earners on plantations. The Experiment did not achieve what the formerly enslaved wanted - to become landowners themselves. However, the project did develop concepts that were incorporated in Reconstruction. There is a very brief discussion of Reconstruction.
I thought that the book was well researched and the author did an excellent job explaining the various points of view and motivations. This is his first book, but I hope that he writes more.
I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.
November 10, 2024
An excellent debut book that frames Gen. Sherman’s famous March to the Sea in a new and engaging way.
The March is generally written about in the context of its destruction - of property, infrastructure and the Southern ability and will to fight. But as white Georgians fled ahead of Sherman’s advancing army, the enslaved people who were left behind moved toward the army, and moved with it. And the Southern system of slavery slowly disintegrated with every step taken by the soldiers and their growing group of followers. “Sherman's March has been remembered mostly as the campaign that conquered the South,” Parten writes. But “at some point, the March ceased to be a standard military campaign and took on all the attributes of a social convulsion.”
The March, in effect, was a large-scale fulfillment of the promises of the Emancipation Proclamation. Wherever the army went, the dozens, then hundreds, then thousands of enslaved people who joined their march became free. Some merely followed, others helped the soldiers along the way by working, cooking, cleaning, even providing entertainment in the evenings. But all are given credit here for taking the initiative, for self-emancipating, rather than being portrayed as passive recipients of their freedom.
They had to self-emancipate, after all, because Sherman didn’t necessarily want them tagging along. Among his soldiers and officers, attitudes toward the refugees varied from welcoming to indifferent to outright cruel, such as when soldiers would erect temporary bridges to cross a waterway, then pull them up before their followers could cross, leaving them to fend for themselves, sometimes with tragic results.
What makes this book stand out is that the formerly enslaved who joined the March are the centerpiece of the story and not a mere sidebar as they often are. And while the writing remains accessible without getting abstract or philosophical, Parten also manages to muse on the very meaning of freedom. To those joining the March, the act of moving, of no longer being physically and geographically contained, represented freedom. Where exactly they were headed was not so important, as long as they were headed “somewhere toward freedom.”
For most of them, that “somewhere” ended up being Savannah. That’s where the March to the Sea ended, but for the refugees who arrived along with the army, Savannah represented “not the end but only the end of the beginning.”
That’s because, once there, Sherman determined that his followers could not be allowed to follow him any further. So here, Parten faces somewhat of a narrative challenge, as the book’s protagonists part ways. Do you follow Sherman's army as it heads into the Carolinas, or do you stay with those who followed him to Savannah? He chooses the latter, which is certainly the correct choice in that it allows him to focus on what became of their quest for freedom as Sherman leaves them behind. But the narrative does, as a result, lose some forward momentum, as Sherman moves on and the focus turns to the aims, and ultimate failures, of Reconstruction.
It’s an important focus, though, beginning with some good background on the Port Royal Experiment, initiated years earlier to help set up former slaves to work the coastal South Carolina land that had been abandoned by planters. By the time of Sherman’s March, the experiment was already waning and would soon be overwhelmed by new arrivals when these plantations seemed a natural place to send Sherman’s former followers. This all gave way to the Freedmen’s Bureau, which similarly aimed to help freed slaves help themselves, only to end disappointingly, sending the freedmen and women back inland, searching anew for freedom.
So was their march all for nothing? Once again, the narrative circles back to the question of what exactly constituted freedom and what freedom meant to those who sought it. Was it freedom of movement, freedom of self-determination, equality of opportunity? The title of the book hints at the ambiguity, as the formerly enslaved searched for something, somewhere, hoping for a better life while moving toward an uncertain future.
The rest of Sherman's campaign, and the fact that enslaved people similarly flocked to his lines as he moved through South Carolina, is briefly mentioned in the book’s epilogue, with the tantalizing observation that this lesser-known march may have been “an emancipation event as large as, if not larger than, the March through Georgia,” with no hint as to whatever happened to those involved. So I wish we could have learned a little more about that part of the story.
But overall, I must say that I’ve read a lot of dissertations-published-in-book-form, and many of them tend to be earnest, dryly academic and of little apparent interest to a mainstream readership. This is a welcome exception. It’s extremely readable, well-written, with an occasional casual word or phrase thrown in to keep it from sounding stuffy, and with good character sketches that bring the book’s personalities to life. It’s thoughtful without being ponderous, it has something to say without becoming a screed, and it gives you something to think about without telling you how to think. I believe Parten is one to watch and I look forward to whatever he comes out with next.
Thanks to NetGalley and publisher Simon & Schuster for providing an advance copy of this book for review, ahead of its January 21st release.
The March is generally written about in the context of its destruction - of property, infrastructure and the Southern ability and will to fight. But as white Georgians fled ahead of Sherman’s advancing army, the enslaved people who were left behind moved toward the army, and moved with it. And the Southern system of slavery slowly disintegrated with every step taken by the soldiers and their growing group of followers. “Sherman's March has been remembered mostly as the campaign that conquered the South,” Parten writes. But “at some point, the March ceased to be a standard military campaign and took on all the attributes of a social convulsion.”
The March, in effect, was a large-scale fulfillment of the promises of the Emancipation Proclamation. Wherever the army went, the dozens, then hundreds, then thousands of enslaved people who joined their march became free. Some merely followed, others helped the soldiers along the way by working, cooking, cleaning, even providing entertainment in the evenings. But all are given credit here for taking the initiative, for self-emancipating, rather than being portrayed as passive recipients of their freedom.
They had to self-emancipate, after all, because Sherman didn’t necessarily want them tagging along. Among his soldiers and officers, attitudes toward the refugees varied from welcoming to indifferent to outright cruel, such as when soldiers would erect temporary bridges to cross a waterway, then pull them up before their followers could cross, leaving them to fend for themselves, sometimes with tragic results.
What makes this book stand out is that the formerly enslaved who joined the March are the centerpiece of the story and not a mere sidebar as they often are. And while the writing remains accessible without getting abstract or philosophical, Parten also manages to muse on the very meaning of freedom. To those joining the March, the act of moving, of no longer being physically and geographically contained, represented freedom. Where exactly they were headed was not so important, as long as they were headed “somewhere toward freedom.”
For most of them, that “somewhere” ended up being Savannah. That’s where the March to the Sea ended, but for the refugees who arrived along with the army, Savannah represented “not the end but only the end of the beginning.”
That’s because, once there, Sherman determined that his followers could not be allowed to follow him any further. So here, Parten faces somewhat of a narrative challenge, as the book’s protagonists part ways. Do you follow Sherman's army as it heads into the Carolinas, or do you stay with those who followed him to Savannah? He chooses the latter, which is certainly the correct choice in that it allows him to focus on what became of their quest for freedom as Sherman leaves them behind. But the narrative does, as a result, lose some forward momentum, as Sherman moves on and the focus turns to the aims, and ultimate failures, of Reconstruction.
It’s an important focus, though, beginning with some good background on the Port Royal Experiment, initiated years earlier to help set up former slaves to work the coastal South Carolina land that had been abandoned by planters. By the time of Sherman’s March, the experiment was already waning and would soon be overwhelmed by new arrivals when these plantations seemed a natural place to send Sherman’s former followers. This all gave way to the Freedmen’s Bureau, which similarly aimed to help freed slaves help themselves, only to end disappointingly, sending the freedmen and women back inland, searching anew for freedom.
So was their march all for nothing? Once again, the narrative circles back to the question of what exactly constituted freedom and what freedom meant to those who sought it. Was it freedom of movement, freedom of self-determination, equality of opportunity? The title of the book hints at the ambiguity, as the formerly enslaved searched for something, somewhere, hoping for a better life while moving toward an uncertain future.
The rest of Sherman's campaign, and the fact that enslaved people similarly flocked to his lines as he moved through South Carolina, is briefly mentioned in the book’s epilogue, with the tantalizing observation that this lesser-known march may have been “an emancipation event as large as, if not larger than, the March through Georgia,” with no hint as to whatever happened to those involved. So I wish we could have learned a little more about that part of the story.
But overall, I must say that I’ve read a lot of dissertations-published-in-book-form, and many of them tend to be earnest, dryly academic and of little apparent interest to a mainstream readership. This is a welcome exception. It’s extremely readable, well-written, with an occasional casual word or phrase thrown in to keep it from sounding stuffy, and with good character sketches that bring the book’s personalities to life. It’s thoughtful without being ponderous, it has something to say without becoming a screed, and it gives you something to think about without telling you how to think. I believe Parten is one to watch and I look forward to whatever he comes out with next.
Thanks to NetGalley and publisher Simon & Schuster for providing an advance copy of this book for review, ahead of its January 21st release.
June 20, 2025
5 stars. Absolutely captivating.
March 17, 2025
The book was actually the author's phD dissertation. I guess it was a highly anticipated book for 2025, but I didn't learn much from it. I am probably an outlier though; I have a personal library of over 6,500 books, so the odds of me stumbling across new material are pretty remote. The narrative was brisk and lively, and for only the second time this year, I was impressed to read a book with no typos in the text. Overall, a worthy effort.
July 19, 2025
Fantastic book. Parten argues that Sherman's march should be seen, in addition to the great generalship and successful military strategy, as a refugee crisis and missed opportunity. The African Americans who followed the march, who were freed by the march, could have been the instigation of a post-war reconstruction, that could have started earlier and been so much better and been codified by the time the Confederates surrendered, but Sherman and his generals whiffed it. Lincoln and his people encouraged Sherman to handle it better but had little direct control over the situation, and they were invested more in investigating the atrocities committed by certain Union generals, specifically the other Jefferson Davis, in an incident where Union troops pulled up bridges in front of the formerly enslaved and left hundreds of African-Americans to drown or be recaptured.
The Carolina sea islands were going to be a place where everybody received forty acres and possibly a mule, but abject mishandling: disease, lack of supplies, occupancy title instead of land title, lack of transportation, overwhelming of established communities, total lack of shelter; it was a good plan that was mishandled about as badly as a plan can be mishandled. And then Andrew Jackson came along.
Great book about emancipation.
The Carolina sea islands were going to be a place where everybody received forty acres and possibly a mule, but abject mishandling: disease, lack of supplies, occupancy title instead of land title, lack of transportation, overwhelming of established communities, total lack of shelter; it was a good plan that was mishandled about as badly as a plan can be mishandled. And then Andrew Jackson came along.
Great book about emancipation.
February 18, 2025
Three cheers for Bennett Parten!
HIP, HIP, HOORAY!
I grew up in Newnan, GA, hearing stories about how Sherman had “spared” the hospital city of Newnan (not quite accurate). I teach 8th Grade Georgia Studies, including the standard “SS8H5 Analyze the impact of the Civil War on Georgia. b. Explain Georgia's role in the Civil War; include . . . Sherman's Atlanta Campaign, Sherman's March to the Sea . . . .”. I live in 0.5 miles from historical marker about Sherman’s March through Covington. I’ve even retraced the left wing of Sherman’s March from Stone Mountain to Savannah on the winter solstice of winter 2023. Despite all of that, I’ve never quite thought about Sherman’s March to the Sea in the way that Bennett Parten has framed it in Somewhere Toward Freedom.
Academia and the general populace has engaged in questions such as “Was Sherman insane?”, “Did he command his troops to burn Atlanta?”, “Did he burn all of Atlanta?”, and “Did he target the civilians in an all-out war?” Parten sidesteps all of those questions. Those are questions of the past. He reframes Sherman’s March to the Sea as the largest emancipation event in the United States’ history (despite Sherman and his troops who weren’t really all that different from the Confederates).
Things I learned (or relearned or had driven home by this book)
• Sherman was an ass. He did not want emancipation. He did not foresee his march as the end of slavery.
• Despite the above-mentioned statement, he did seem to change by the end of the march (seeing himself as a modern day Moses or Aaron). Maybe this was out of self-interest, but it’s still important to note.
• Tens of thousands of formerly enslaved flocked to Sherman’s troops. They served as scouts, cooks, servants, etc.
• Jefferson C. Davis was a Union general. At Ebenezer Creek (and numerous other sites) he had the bridge over the creek burned so as to cut off the former enslaved from freedom
• Despite Sherman, Davis, et. al’s views, the former enslaved saw Sherman’s march as an apocalyptic Jubilee.
• I had no clue how many formerly enslaved people joined Sherman’s March. Tens of thousands!
• I’ve been to the National Park Site at Beaufort commemorating the “Port Royal Experiment.” The importance of this community was driven home to me by this book.
• I knew that Sherman captured Savannah after overtaking Fort McAllister around Christmas time and there was a huge surplus of cotton bales in the city. However, I didn’t know that it created a refugee crisis for the former enslaved and a political crisis for Sherman.
I could go on, but let it suffice to say that this an eye-opening book and a worthy read for students of American history.
HIP, HIP, HOORAY!
I grew up in Newnan, GA, hearing stories about how Sherman had “spared” the hospital city of Newnan (not quite accurate). I teach 8th Grade Georgia Studies, including the standard “SS8H5 Analyze the impact of the Civil War on Georgia. b. Explain Georgia's role in the Civil War; include . . . Sherman's Atlanta Campaign, Sherman's March to the Sea . . . .”. I live in 0.5 miles from historical marker about Sherman’s March through Covington. I’ve even retraced the left wing of Sherman’s March from Stone Mountain to Savannah on the winter solstice of winter 2023. Despite all of that, I’ve never quite thought about Sherman’s March to the Sea in the way that Bennett Parten has framed it in Somewhere Toward Freedom.
Academia and the general populace has engaged in questions such as “Was Sherman insane?”, “Did he command his troops to burn Atlanta?”, “Did he burn all of Atlanta?”, and “Did he target the civilians in an all-out war?” Parten sidesteps all of those questions. Those are questions of the past. He reframes Sherman’s March to the Sea as the largest emancipation event in the United States’ history (despite Sherman and his troops who weren’t really all that different from the Confederates).
Things I learned (or relearned or had driven home by this book)
• Sherman was an ass. He did not want emancipation. He did not foresee his march as the end of slavery.
• Despite the above-mentioned statement, he did seem to change by the end of the march (seeing himself as a modern day Moses or Aaron). Maybe this was out of self-interest, but it’s still important to note.
• Tens of thousands of formerly enslaved flocked to Sherman’s troops. They served as scouts, cooks, servants, etc.
• Jefferson C. Davis was a Union general. At Ebenezer Creek (and numerous other sites) he had the bridge over the creek burned so as to cut off the former enslaved from freedom
• Despite Sherman, Davis, et. al’s views, the former enslaved saw Sherman’s march as an apocalyptic Jubilee.
• I had no clue how many formerly enslaved people joined Sherman’s March. Tens of thousands!
• I’ve been to the National Park Site at Beaufort commemorating the “Port Royal Experiment.” The importance of this community was driven home to me by this book.
• I knew that Sherman captured Savannah after overtaking Fort McAllister around Christmas time and there was a huge surplus of cotton bales in the city. However, I didn’t know that it created a refugee crisis for the former enslaved and a political crisis for Sherman.
I could go on, but let it suffice to say that this an eye-opening book and a worthy read for students of American history.
May 14, 2025
Somewhere Toward Freedom is a beautifully written and deeply researched exploration of the lives of enslaved people who escaped the South and what freedom actually looked like for them. Bennet Parten doesn’t just focus on the act of escape—he explores the messy, difficult, and often incomplete journey toward freedom, and what that word truly meant to those who risked everything to reach it.
One concept that really stuck with me was the idea of jubilee—not just as a moment of celebration, but as a symbol of hope and renewal for newly freed people. It was moving and powerful to see how that hope carried people forward even when the reality of freedom was anything but simple.
On the flip side, I was honestly disappointed (though not surprised) by how little support President Andrew Johnson gave to the newly freed slaves, especially when it came to land rights. Parten doesn’t shy away from those hard truths, and that honesty makes the book even more impactful.
I also loved how much care the author put into his research. He didn’t just rely on the usual archives—he dug into lesser-used sources like the Lincoln Museum and Library, which made the book feel fresh and full of voices we don’t usually get to hear.
Overall, this is a moving and important read. It’s not just history—it’s a reminder of how fragile and unfinished freedom really was (and in many ways, still is). Highly recommend it for anyone interested in U.S. history, African American studies, or just powerful storytelling rooted in truth.
Rating: 5/5
One concept that really stuck with me was the idea of jubilee—not just as a moment of celebration, but as a symbol of hope and renewal for newly freed people. It was moving and powerful to see how that hope carried people forward even when the reality of freedom was anything but simple.
On the flip side, I was honestly disappointed (though not surprised) by how little support President Andrew Johnson gave to the newly freed slaves, especially when it came to land rights. Parten doesn’t shy away from those hard truths, and that honesty makes the book even more impactful.
I also loved how much care the author put into his research. He didn’t just rely on the usual archives—he dug into lesser-used sources like the Lincoln Museum and Library, which made the book feel fresh and full of voices we don’t usually get to hear.
Overall, this is a moving and important read. It’s not just history—it’s a reminder of how fragile and unfinished freedom really was (and in many ways, still is). Highly recommend it for anyone interested in U.S. history, African American studies, or just powerful storytelling rooted in truth.
Rating: 5/5
March 16, 2025
An interesting perspective and re-interpretation of Sherman's March but not always as well told as I might have liked and I was not completely convinced.
Bennett Parten sets out to "place the campaign into this context is to finally understand the March for what it was: one of the most active, concentrated, and robust reimaginings of freedom in all of American history." He argues that as Sherman's army marched through Georgia and South Carolina enslaved people fled to the army and to freedom--doing jobs that helped it along the way. In the process it convinced Sherman and the soldiers that the war really was about slavery and could not end until slavery was ended. But that tragedy is that Sherman still only wanted to go so far, even though he freed people and set up an order that gave them confiscated plantations totally 40 acres and a mule each, this was really just a military necessity to avoid having to care for a large and growing population and it ended up not being sustained after Johnson became President.
I appreciated that this was like an enslaved people's history of the march rather than a military history. But also found enslaved people's voices more lacking than I would have liked, I suspect because they left less of a record than the soldiers than because they were neglected by Parten. Not that there aren't lots of quotes there are just few characters who are sustained or repeating or develop as the story unfolds. Moreover, I found this convincingly and effectively added to the familiar story but I wasn't convinced that re-centering the story was correct or just wishful thinking on the part of the author.
All that said, it is a short and relatively interesting read.
Bennett Parten sets out to "place the campaign into this context is to finally understand the March for what it was: one of the most active, concentrated, and robust reimaginings of freedom in all of American history." He argues that as Sherman's army marched through Georgia and South Carolina enslaved people fled to the army and to freedom--doing jobs that helped it along the way. In the process it convinced Sherman and the soldiers that the war really was about slavery and could not end until slavery was ended. But that tragedy is that Sherman still only wanted to go so far, even though he freed people and set up an order that gave them confiscated plantations totally 40 acres and a mule each, this was really just a military necessity to avoid having to care for a large and growing population and it ended up not being sustained after Johnson became President.
I appreciated that this was like an enslaved people's history of the march rather than a military history. But also found enslaved people's voices more lacking than I would have liked, I suspect because they left less of a record than the soldiers than because they were neglected by Parten. Not that there aren't lots of quotes there are just few characters who are sustained or repeating or develop as the story unfolds. Moreover, I found this convincingly and effectively added to the familiar story but I wasn't convinced that re-centering the story was correct or just wishful thinking on the part of the author.
All that said, it is a short and relatively interesting read.
March 25, 2025
Interesting topic but directionless writing
May 2, 2025
Too much repetition in the writing for me.
June 17, 2025
The Georgia campaign of the American Civil War lead by William Tecumseh Sherman - often called Sherman's March to the Sea - is typically studied as military history. Bennett Parten reevaluates the campaign as an emancipation event with 20,000 enslaved people liberating themselves from slavery to join the campaign. Sherman had no interest in liberating the enslaved, and furthermore was reluctant to follow the orders to recruit Black men for the army.
Sherman's prejudiced view was that Black people were only good for manual labor and had them work as foragers, earthworks builders, trench diggers, cooks, launderers, and even entertainers for the white troops. Recently emancipated Blacks also proved valuable in providing intelligence regarding Confederate troops and sympathizers as well as secret stashes of supplies. White troops witnessing the severity of slavery and hearing stories from the newly liberated Black people were also radicalized to become more fervently abolitionist.
Nevertheless, the logistics of supplying 20,000 people following the army while maintaining the troops were a challenge and one that Sherman and his officers did not always meet. In one horrible incident, General Jefferson C. Davis (yes, same name as the Confederate president), ordered bridges destroyed at Ebeneezer Creek after the army crossed, stranding thousands of Black people who were then massacred by the Confederate cavalry. Upon reaching Savannah, Sherman's settled Black refugees on land abandoned by white Southerners, considered the origin of "40 acres and a mule," although Sherman's main goal was to rid himself of the Blacks following the troops. The Black refugees faced more suffering as they had no time to prepare their new farms for winter, and without the protection of the army they were targeted by Southern whites.
This book is a fascinating look at a part of history not so much forgotten as deliberately overlooked.
Sherman's prejudiced view was that Black people were only good for manual labor and had them work as foragers, earthworks builders, trench diggers, cooks, launderers, and even entertainers for the white troops. Recently emancipated Blacks also proved valuable in providing intelligence regarding Confederate troops and sympathizers as well as secret stashes of supplies. White troops witnessing the severity of slavery and hearing stories from the newly liberated Black people were also radicalized to become more fervently abolitionist.
Nevertheless, the logistics of supplying 20,000 people following the army while maintaining the troops were a challenge and one that Sherman and his officers did not always meet. In one horrible incident, General Jefferson C. Davis (yes, same name as the Confederate president), ordered bridges destroyed at Ebeneezer Creek after the army crossed, stranding thousands of Black people who were then massacred by the Confederate cavalry. Upon reaching Savannah, Sherman's settled Black refugees on land abandoned by white Southerners, considered the origin of "40 acres and a mule," although Sherman's main goal was to rid himself of the Blacks following the troops. The Black refugees faced more suffering as they had no time to prepare their new farms for winter, and without the protection of the army they were targeted by Southern whites.
This book is a fascinating look at a part of history not so much forgotten as deliberately overlooked.
May 1, 2025
Mr. Parten looks at this short period of time from a different view than most, from the eyes of the "freed slave", not the military conquest. No doubt, Sherman's march to the sea broke the back of the South and quickened the end of the war, but at a great cost, a lot of broken promises.
After leaving Atlanta, Sherman had an ever-increasing following of "freed slaves", who were not yet legally free. They were used in support of the soldiers doing laundry, cooking, driving wagons, and repairing roads. Every new success on the battlefield, there was an increased following to a point that it became a distraction. By the time Savannah fell, the following os ex-slaves was so large, a national solution was needed. Most ex-slaved viewed themselves as free and citizens of the Union, but all that was yet to be decided.
The coastal islands of South Carolina were seen as a possible place to "give to" the "freed" slaves. This was done without much forethought; many of these followers had ZERO possessions with which to start the farm life. The army had to continue the war effort, and the agents assigned to handle the problem had to beg for food and gifts from the North for basic survival. When the war did end, the new president "broke" all previous promises made by the generals, and another major people's movement had to occur.
War is never fair, and the decisions made at the end, we are still living with in a conflicted South.
This is an excellent read, and I think it is fairly presented.
After leaving Atlanta, Sherman had an ever-increasing following of "freed slaves", who were not yet legally free. They were used in support of the soldiers doing laundry, cooking, driving wagons, and repairing roads. Every new success on the battlefield, there was an increased following to a point that it became a distraction. By the time Savannah fell, the following os ex-slaves was so large, a national solution was needed. Most ex-slaved viewed themselves as free and citizens of the Union, but all that was yet to be decided.
The coastal islands of South Carolina were seen as a possible place to "give to" the "freed" slaves. This was done without much forethought; many of these followers had ZERO possessions with which to start the farm life. The army had to continue the war effort, and the agents assigned to handle the problem had to beg for food and gifts from the North for basic survival. When the war did end, the new president "broke" all previous promises made by the generals, and another major people's movement had to occur.
War is never fair, and the decisions made at the end, we are still living with in a conflicted South.
This is an excellent read, and I think it is fairly presented.
March 3, 2025
(Audiobook) A solid overview that looks to offer context into the final months of the Civil War, and in particular, the impact of Sherman’s march on Atlanta and the Georgia/South Carolina coast. As ruthless as it could be, Sherman’s offensive was not meant to be the modern American barbarian hordes sacking Rome. Sherman did intend for damage to key military and economic areas, but wasn’t deliberately targeting civilian property. That it happened didn’t seem to upset him, but it wasn’t part of the strategy. Also, a big part of the work focuses on the freed slaves and how they tried to manage the joy of freedom with the challenges of trying to live their lives in the final weeks of the war as well as the immediate aftermath. Much of the focus of the book leaves the actual military actions and focuses more on the lot of the freed African-Americans. It is both a interesting and infuriating read (especially how many of them would get screwed over in the subsequent post-war years).
The rating is the same regardless of format. At least this one will show that Sherman was not a monster. He wasn’t perfect, but not the beast that the Lost Cause makes him out to be. It is also instructive to show how the initial realization of freedom for those slaves in that part of the world was dealt with and how everyone in that part of the world tried to move forward (for better or worse).
The rating is the same regardless of format. At least this one will show that Sherman was not a monster. He wasn’t perfect, but not the beast that the Lost Cause makes him out to be. It is also instructive to show how the initial realization of freedom for those slaves in that part of the world was dealt with and how everyone in that part of the world tried to move forward (for better or worse).
April 1, 2025
I knew very little about General Sherman and his march [except that he marched and then torched Georgia] before going into this book and so it was a treat to learn more about the man and his men and their famous march. I also didn't know about the freed slaves that followed him [after they were freed at the end of each battle Gen. Sherman won; by the end, there was quite a contingent of people, both working with the soldiers and the rest just following] "all the way to the Sea" - this was some truly fascinating history [not all of it good; many mistakes were made, especially by Sherman and several of his men] and I am really glad that I finally got to read this [the wait for the audiobook was L O N G and I am so glad it was very much worth the wait]. I recommend this book to any history buff and anyone who studies Civil War history.
I was invited to read/review this by the publisher [Simon & Schuster] and I thank them, Bennett Parten, and NetGalley for providing the ARC in exchange for an honest review.
I was invited to read/review this by the publisher [Simon & Schuster] and I thank them, Bennett Parten, and NetGalley for providing the ARC in exchange for an honest review.
July 10, 2025
So this is another book that I purchased after our trip to Savannah. This book focused primarily on the slaves that trailed along on Sherman’s March and what happened to them once he reached Savannah and they were shipped to Port Royal. In all fairness, I gave this book 5 stars because I never read any material that presented the importance of Sherman‘s march from this angle. (My rating may be high because of my ignorance in the subject matter, but hey, I loved the book!) The book was well written and an easy read, he did not get bogged down in any military details 9troop tactics) and rather focused on political events and actions that were a result of Sherman‘s March. Just a great book.
February 14, 2025
Very interesting book. Most people have heard of Sherman's "March to the Sea." This is where General William Tecumseh Sherman marched through Georgia and the Carolinas, capturing Atlanta and Savannah, and helping to secure the North's victory in the Civil War. Although I heard about this, an interesting aspect of this event that I was not aware of was how thousands of freed people followed Sherman's army as they marched through Georgia. Many of them joined the army in various capacities, such as cooks and laborers. Once they got to Savannah it became a problem for Sherman as to how to handle all of these thousands of freed people, how to feed and shelter all of them. Good read for anyone interested in Civil War history.
February 17, 2025
Well researched and thorough story of Sherman’s march to the sea from the viewpoint of Black people freed by the Union army. This freedom helped many former slaves but much progress was peeled back by racism and returning southerners Lots of good explanations
September 3, 2025
We were not nearly tough enough on the south during reconstruction and it shows.
January 25, 2025
This outstanding new look at Sherman’s campaign from Atlanta to Savannah in late 1864 and its aftermath is told from the perspective of what happened to the self-emancipating slaves who attached themselves to Sherman’s army. The march, which became the biggest liberation event in American history, was, Parten maintains, a watershed moment in shaping the meaning of freedom in the country.
I have read a number of accounts of Sherman’s march, but all were focused on Sherman’s strategy and tactics and military encounters. In this book I learned so much new, interesting, and important about the history of emancipation and Reconstruction that I constantly plagued everyone around me reading out excerpts.
Parten begins by informing us: “By the time Sherman’s army arrived on the coast, as many as twenty thousand freed people followed - all marching, one soldier would write, ‘somewhere toward freedom.’” These self-liberated slaves acted in a number of helpful capacities for the army, including scouting, intelligence, and performing manual labor - the latter often involuntarily. (They were also frequently forced to entertain the troops at night by singing and dancing.) They served as cooks, laundresses, valets, and teamsters. They dug trenches, constructed earthworks, built roads, and felled trees. Moreover, their knowledge of the landscape proved invaluable to the soldiers.
Sherman and the members of his army had to respond to all those extra bodies in their camps, and the results ranged from salutary to horrifying, as with the massacre of the Black refugees at Ebenezer Creek on December 9, 1864 at the direction of one of Sherman’s unfortunantly but appropriately-named generals, Jefferson C. Davis. At Ebenezer Creek, the rebel cavalry was hard in pursuit, and Davis ordered the bridges destroyed before the Blacks could get across the icy water. All of those at the back of the lines, mainly women, children, and older men, were shot by the Rebels or drowned trying to escape. Col. Charles Kerr of the 16th Illinois Cavalry said in a speech 20 years after the incident, ”As soon as we were over the creek, orders were given to the engineers to take up the pontoons and not let a negro cross. . . . I sat upon my horse then and witnessed a scene the like of which I pray my eyes may never see again." How many women, children, and older men were stranded cannot be determined precisely, but 5,000 is a conservative estimate.
While not as extreme as Davis, Sherman himself was not happy about the extra numbers of Black refugees, seeing them as an impediment to his movements (except of course for the work they did to free up white soldiers from having to moonlight as workmen.) Many of his soldiers as well worried about having to share supplies (in spite of the fact that in many cases they would not have even found them without the help of the former slaves), and others worried that “the collective force of an army that size moving at that [slower] speed made it impossible to police or contain.”
Nevertheless, Parten observed:
“Amid all the threats and shouts, the fear and uncertainty, as if standing in the eye of a storm, freed men and women retained a focused, clear-eyed view of what freedom meant to them.”
He explained that “their vision of freedom centered on things we might take for granted today,” such as the freedom to move from place to place, determining where and how they wanted to live, and possibly finding their family members from whom they were forcibly separated. That basic freedom to move, not constrained by a “master,” was everything to them. But they also realized that this freedom depended on their proximity to the army.
After the march was over upon reaching Savannah, settling the refugees became critical. The task was beset by political as well as logistical problems. Many whites were interested in offering the Blacks nothing more than work on gangs as had been done during slavery. Wages for such work were often withheld, delayed, or lower than promised. Schedules were similar to those used by plantation overseers. As Parten notes, “That was never how freed people had imagined freedom.” They wanted their own homesteads, but whites saw that as a “handout.” (How these people were supposed to get the land on their own was not really considered.) Black advocates tried to explain to the Lincoln government that land was the key to how freedmen could take care of themselves. Not only did it mean autonomy. Importantly, land was inheritable, which meant it had generational value.
Initially, Sherman set aside some 400,000 acres to be distributed to the freedman in equal plots of about forty acres apiece. (His motive was not enlightened; rather, he sought to disencumber his army of the refugees.). But Sherman’s order granted only possessory claims to the land, not a full legal title. Northern free Black leaders and abolitionists therefore saw it as “a naked attempt to ‘colonize’ freed people.”
Nevertheless, some 40,000 people eventually settled on that land. . . . for a while. In April, 1865, when the Civil War ended, former slaveholders began returning to their old plantations. Returning planters, Parten points out, “had a powerful friend in the new president,” Andrew Johnson. When Johnson took office, he not only pardoned Confederate planters, but gave them back their land. In September, 1865, freed families were told that the land was no longer theirs. Johnson, Parten avers, “was dead set on rolling back the repercussions of the war and thwarting the pace of change.”
With the army gone, local whites felt they could do what they pleased, and they did. In addition, Union soldiers who were still in the area didn’t like the new status of Blacks vis-a-vis whites, and abuses and even assaults against the freedmen often ensued. The constant influx of refugees, especially during the cold weather, also heralded starvation and disease. But white overseers of relief felt that, as Parten summarized, “to eliminate hardship with too much charity or relief was to undermine the basic market logic on which the project had been based.”
Thus many of the refugees who first joined with Sherman on his march and remained on the coast when he left ended up sick or dead or empty-handed, far from home, and uncertain of freedom.
Those who stayed with Sherman until the end, until his army’s triumphal march in Washington on May 23, 1865, said Sherman’s army was the turning point for them, making all the difference between slavery and freedom.
Alas, as Parten laments in his Epilogue, then came the 1870s, when ex-Confederates, determined to roll back Reconstruction, initiated torrents of violence, personified most memorably by night-riding vigilantes wearing white sheets, burning crosses, and lynching Blacks who tried to exercise their new rights.
Still, Parten avers the legacy of Sherman’s March should rightfully be the redefinition of freedom in America, however unfulfilled its promises came to be.
Evaluation: This is an excellent history that will add a whole different dimension to any library’s Civil War collection, and is also important for the history of race in America. Highly recommended.
I have read a number of accounts of Sherman’s march, but all were focused on Sherman’s strategy and tactics and military encounters. In this book I learned so much new, interesting, and important about the history of emancipation and Reconstruction that I constantly plagued everyone around me reading out excerpts.
Parten begins by informing us: “By the time Sherman’s army arrived on the coast, as many as twenty thousand freed people followed - all marching, one soldier would write, ‘somewhere toward freedom.’” These self-liberated slaves acted in a number of helpful capacities for the army, including scouting, intelligence, and performing manual labor - the latter often involuntarily. (They were also frequently forced to entertain the troops at night by singing and dancing.) They served as cooks, laundresses, valets, and teamsters. They dug trenches, constructed earthworks, built roads, and felled trees. Moreover, their knowledge of the landscape proved invaluable to the soldiers.
Sherman and the members of his army had to respond to all those extra bodies in their camps, and the results ranged from salutary to horrifying, as with the massacre of the Black refugees at Ebenezer Creek on December 9, 1864 at the direction of one of Sherman’s unfortunantly but appropriately-named generals, Jefferson C. Davis. At Ebenezer Creek, the rebel cavalry was hard in pursuit, and Davis ordered the bridges destroyed before the Blacks could get across the icy water. All of those at the back of the lines, mainly women, children, and older men, were shot by the Rebels or drowned trying to escape. Col. Charles Kerr of the 16th Illinois Cavalry said in a speech 20 years after the incident, ”As soon as we were over the creek, orders were given to the engineers to take up the pontoons and not let a negro cross. . . . I sat upon my horse then and witnessed a scene the like of which I pray my eyes may never see again." How many women, children, and older men were stranded cannot be determined precisely, but 5,000 is a conservative estimate.
While not as extreme as Davis, Sherman himself was not happy about the extra numbers of Black refugees, seeing them as an impediment to his movements (except of course for the work they did to free up white soldiers from having to moonlight as workmen.) Many of his soldiers as well worried about having to share supplies (in spite of the fact that in many cases they would not have even found them without the help of the former slaves), and others worried that “the collective force of an army that size moving at that [slower] speed made it impossible to police or contain.”
Nevertheless, Parten observed:
“Amid all the threats and shouts, the fear and uncertainty, as if standing in the eye of a storm, freed men and women retained a focused, clear-eyed view of what freedom meant to them.”
He explained that “their vision of freedom centered on things we might take for granted today,” such as the freedom to move from place to place, determining where and how they wanted to live, and possibly finding their family members from whom they were forcibly separated. That basic freedom to move, not constrained by a “master,” was everything to them. But they also realized that this freedom depended on their proximity to the army.
After the march was over upon reaching Savannah, settling the refugees became critical. The task was beset by political as well as logistical problems. Many whites were interested in offering the Blacks nothing more than work on gangs as had been done during slavery. Wages for such work were often withheld, delayed, or lower than promised. Schedules were similar to those used by plantation overseers. As Parten notes, “That was never how freed people had imagined freedom.” They wanted their own homesteads, but whites saw that as a “handout.” (How these people were supposed to get the land on their own was not really considered.) Black advocates tried to explain to the Lincoln government that land was the key to how freedmen could take care of themselves. Not only did it mean autonomy. Importantly, land was inheritable, which meant it had generational value.
Initially, Sherman set aside some 400,000 acres to be distributed to the freedman in equal plots of about forty acres apiece. (His motive was not enlightened; rather, he sought to disencumber his army of the refugees.). But Sherman’s order granted only possessory claims to the land, not a full legal title. Northern free Black leaders and abolitionists therefore saw it as “a naked attempt to ‘colonize’ freed people.”
Nevertheless, some 40,000 people eventually settled on that land. . . . for a while. In April, 1865, when the Civil War ended, former slaveholders began returning to their old plantations. Returning planters, Parten points out, “had a powerful friend in the new president,” Andrew Johnson. When Johnson took office, he not only pardoned Confederate planters, but gave them back their land. In September, 1865, freed families were told that the land was no longer theirs. Johnson, Parten avers, “was dead set on rolling back the repercussions of the war and thwarting the pace of change.”
With the army gone, local whites felt they could do what they pleased, and they did. In addition, Union soldiers who were still in the area didn’t like the new status of Blacks vis-a-vis whites, and abuses and even assaults against the freedmen often ensued. The constant influx of refugees, especially during the cold weather, also heralded starvation and disease. But white overseers of relief felt that, as Parten summarized, “to eliminate hardship with too much charity or relief was to undermine the basic market logic on which the project had been based.”
Thus many of the refugees who first joined with Sherman on his march and remained on the coast when he left ended up sick or dead or empty-handed, far from home, and uncertain of freedom.
Those who stayed with Sherman until the end, until his army’s triumphal march in Washington on May 23, 1865, said Sherman’s army was the turning point for them, making all the difference between slavery and freedom.
Alas, as Parten laments in his Epilogue, then came the 1870s, when ex-Confederates, determined to roll back Reconstruction, initiated torrents of violence, personified most memorably by night-riding vigilantes wearing white sheets, burning crosses, and lynching Blacks who tried to exercise their new rights.
Still, Parten avers the legacy of Sherman’s March should rightfully be the redefinition of freedom in America, however unfulfilled its promises came to be.
Evaluation: This is an excellent history that will add a whole different dimension to any library’s Civil War collection, and is also important for the history of race in America. Highly recommended.
June 13, 2025
In Somewhere Towards Freedom, Bennet Parten offers a compelling and unique perspective on Sherman’s March to the Sea, providing readers with valuable insight into how newly freed people navigated their transformed world. Parten skillfully draws from the scarce firsthand accounts of freed individuals, supplemented by other primary sources such as army journals, to create a vivid and distinctive portrayal of the march from Atlanta to Savannah through the eyes of the newly emancipated slaves.
Additionally, Parten delves into the perspectives of the Union Army and Sherman himself, arguing that the march symbolized freedom, regardless of Sherman’s personal intentions. The book also sheds light on the Port Royal experiment, the first Freedman’s settlement, and examines the pervasive racism and challenges faced by the freedmen.
Overall, Somewhere Towards Freedom is an enlightening and thought-provoking work, offering eye-opening arguments about the political and social dynamics surrounding Sherman’s March to the Sea. I thoroughly enjoyed its depth and the fresh perspective it brings to this pivotal historical event.
Additionally, Parten delves into the perspectives of the Union Army and Sherman himself, arguing that the march symbolized freedom, regardless of Sherman’s personal intentions. The book also sheds light on the Port Royal experiment, the first Freedman’s settlement, and examines the pervasive racism and challenges faced by the freedmen.
Overall, Somewhere Towards Freedom is an enlightening and thought-provoking work, offering eye-opening arguments about the political and social dynamics surrounding Sherman’s March to the Sea. I thoroughly enjoyed its depth and the fresh perspective it brings to this pivotal historical event.
January 29, 2025
Bennett Parten is a fine historical writer, and here he examines General William Sherman’s renowned march through Georgia during the American Civil War through the lens of the formerly enslaved people that followed him. It’s a job that needed doing, and I’m glad that Parten was the one to do it. My thanks go to Simon and Schuster and NetGalley for the review copy. This book is for sale now.
The Union’s approach to formerly enslaved people evolved considerably over the course of the war. (This is your reviewer talking, not Parten.) In the beginning, when both North and South thought the conflict would be a brief one—ending, of course, in their own victories—anyone that left a plantation without permission to follow the Union army was promptly returned to their owner. But this was problematic from the start, if only logistically, as such practices slowed the army’s pace and drained resources from it, all in service to the enemy. For a while, then, everything was unofficial, as gradually, the formerly enslaved were sometimes folded into the army as support staff, helping cook, set up camps, pave roads, and whatever other noncombat roles needed to be filled. Eventually the practice was codified, not because slaves were declared free—not yet—but as “contrabands” of war. The idea was that by taking the enemy’s property that one runs across, be it livestock, crops, or (wince!) human beings, one’s own forces were strengthened, the enemy’s weakened. And after the Emancipation Proclamation, the formerly enslaved could theoretically go wherever they chose, but since guns and dogs can render such a proclamation from a far away and often unrecognized authority, it seemed like a wise plan for the formerly enslaved to follow the Union army.
Prior to reading this book, I was unaware of the relative size of the crowd of followers as opposed to the army itself. As Sherman’s forces made their way through Georgia waging total war, razing fields and burning cities, the crowd behind it grew from hundreds, to thousands, to tens of thousands!
Sherman’s first obligation, as he saw it, was to win this war. The army had to be his focus. Yet, as enthusiastic followers swarmed, they needed food, shelter, and sometimes other assistance. Initially, the troops were instructed not to give food to anyone other than those followers tapped to serve the army, but it proved difficult to enforce. There were children there, and they might well starve if not fed. The army had, as an intentional strategy, denuded the farms and villages of food and other necessary resources, so telling the followers to go find their own food was disingenuous. The army had nearly all the food there was; unfortunately, it wasn’t enough for thousands of extra mouths. And at times, Sherman and his generals made an effort to prevent, or to at least not help, the followers from remaining with them.
The greatest scandal was the one at Ebenezer Creek. (Sherman himself was not physically present for this, but what happened was consistent with his policies.) Georgia was full of rivers, swamps, creeks, and bogs, and in order to cross them, sometimes the engineers constructed bridges, and then either burned them behind themselves to prevent the enemy from following, or retrieved them for later use. In this instance, the enemy was close at the rear, and the order was given to pull up the bridges just as soon as the last soldier was across. The result was horrifying: with the hounds baying behind them, the desperate followers used every possible means to try to stay with the army. Some drowned; others were captured and either returned to slavery or killed. Women and children perished in those muddy waters, and later, the Federals launched an investigation.
There were other less dramatic, yet still tragic, incidents of the same sort.
In order to solve this conundrum, Sherman ordered a series of abandoned plantations in Port Royal, an island in South Carolina, to be turned over for the use of the freedmen and women. The book goes into a fair amount of detail about how these were run, with a fierce competition between two sides for control. Despite an overly colonial administration, formerly enslaved people were able to farm for themselves, and in some cases were able to buy land with the money they earned. It was a sound, if flawed program that was ultimately destroyed when Lincoln was murdered and Andrew Johnson, a sympathizer of the South, became president and gave the plantations back to their original owners, making no provision whatsoever for the farmers that now worked them.
It is this aspect of which I knew nearly nothing. Part of this is because I am a coward; I have a dozen or more books about Reconstruction that I say I will read, but then I don’t, and that is because I know the ending will be heartbreaking. But there’s also this: conventional histories of the Civil War tend to follow one or another army, general, and so forth, and very few tell the story of what happens after the army marches onward. And so I learned a good deal from this portion of the book; and yes, my heart broke, but not as much as those of the people that were first assisted, and then abandoned by the U.S. government.
Finally, I want to comment on the notes and sources used here. They are beyond reproach, with many primary sources used, multiple sources per endnote in most cases, and well-integrated. I particularly appreciated the quotations of the followers themselves.
I highly recommend this book to all that are interested in the American Civil War, Reconstruction, and the many social and racial problems that have continued to weigh on American society ever since.
The Union’s approach to formerly enslaved people evolved considerably over the course of the war. (This is your reviewer talking, not Parten.) In the beginning, when both North and South thought the conflict would be a brief one—ending, of course, in their own victories—anyone that left a plantation without permission to follow the Union army was promptly returned to their owner. But this was problematic from the start, if only logistically, as such practices slowed the army’s pace and drained resources from it, all in service to the enemy. For a while, then, everything was unofficial, as gradually, the formerly enslaved were sometimes folded into the army as support staff, helping cook, set up camps, pave roads, and whatever other noncombat roles needed to be filled. Eventually the practice was codified, not because slaves were declared free—not yet—but as “contrabands” of war. The idea was that by taking the enemy’s property that one runs across, be it livestock, crops, or (wince!) human beings, one’s own forces were strengthened, the enemy’s weakened. And after the Emancipation Proclamation, the formerly enslaved could theoretically go wherever they chose, but since guns and dogs can render such a proclamation from a far away and often unrecognized authority, it seemed like a wise plan for the formerly enslaved to follow the Union army.
Prior to reading this book, I was unaware of the relative size of the crowd of followers as opposed to the army itself. As Sherman’s forces made their way through Georgia waging total war, razing fields and burning cities, the crowd behind it grew from hundreds, to thousands, to tens of thousands!
Sherman’s first obligation, as he saw it, was to win this war. The army had to be his focus. Yet, as enthusiastic followers swarmed, they needed food, shelter, and sometimes other assistance. Initially, the troops were instructed not to give food to anyone other than those followers tapped to serve the army, but it proved difficult to enforce. There were children there, and they might well starve if not fed. The army had, as an intentional strategy, denuded the farms and villages of food and other necessary resources, so telling the followers to go find their own food was disingenuous. The army had nearly all the food there was; unfortunately, it wasn’t enough for thousands of extra mouths. And at times, Sherman and his generals made an effort to prevent, or to at least not help, the followers from remaining with them.
The greatest scandal was the one at Ebenezer Creek. (Sherman himself was not physically present for this, but what happened was consistent with his policies.) Georgia was full of rivers, swamps, creeks, and bogs, and in order to cross them, sometimes the engineers constructed bridges, and then either burned them behind themselves to prevent the enemy from following, or retrieved them for later use. In this instance, the enemy was close at the rear, and the order was given to pull up the bridges just as soon as the last soldier was across. The result was horrifying: with the hounds baying behind them, the desperate followers used every possible means to try to stay with the army. Some drowned; others were captured and either returned to slavery or killed. Women and children perished in those muddy waters, and later, the Federals launched an investigation.
There were other less dramatic, yet still tragic, incidents of the same sort.
In order to solve this conundrum, Sherman ordered a series of abandoned plantations in Port Royal, an island in South Carolina, to be turned over for the use of the freedmen and women. The book goes into a fair amount of detail about how these were run, with a fierce competition between two sides for control. Despite an overly colonial administration, formerly enslaved people were able to farm for themselves, and in some cases were able to buy land with the money they earned. It was a sound, if flawed program that was ultimately destroyed when Lincoln was murdered and Andrew Johnson, a sympathizer of the South, became president and gave the plantations back to their original owners, making no provision whatsoever for the farmers that now worked them.
It is this aspect of which I knew nearly nothing. Part of this is because I am a coward; I have a dozen or more books about Reconstruction that I say I will read, but then I don’t, and that is because I know the ending will be heartbreaking. But there’s also this: conventional histories of the Civil War tend to follow one or another army, general, and so forth, and very few tell the story of what happens after the army marches onward. And so I learned a good deal from this portion of the book; and yes, my heart broke, but not as much as those of the people that were first assisted, and then abandoned by the U.S. government.
Finally, I want to comment on the notes and sources used here. They are beyond reproach, with many primary sources used, multiple sources per endnote in most cases, and well-integrated. I particularly appreciated the quotations of the followers themselves.
I highly recommend this book to all that are interested in the American Civil War, Reconstruction, and the many social and racial problems that have continued to weigh on American society ever since.
May 17, 2025
I just couldn't get into this one. The subject matter was interesting, but the writer's style was not for me, and the book felt rather disjointed and scattered.
August 19, 2025
This was just so interesting. I listened to the audiobook, which was good, but I'm thinking of getting my hands on the book version because I feel as if I need to go back through the print edition in order to re-read some parts of it just to make sure the information sticks in my mind.
Of course I'd heard of Sherman's March through Georgia near the end of the Civil War, but I'd never heard the part of the story that Parten writes about, including the Port Royal Experiment. a movement that began well before the war's end, wherein newly freed people were given an education, and the chance to work land that Confederate citizens had abandoned. there was also a move to give land - or sell it - to formerly enslaved people, but that went away after Lincoln's assassination and the presidency of Andrew Johnson. It was supposed to be a model for Reconstruction, but had no backing from Johnson's Administration.
But the bulk of the story is taken up with Sherman's March itself, but told, as much as possible, from the perspective of the formerly enslaved people who spontaneously began following the soldiers as they marched to the sea. For the first time in their lives they had the freedom to go, and thousands of them did just that. The Union soldiers represented the promise of freedom and Jubilee (which the author explains, but I don't have the book in front of me so I can't quote it), and these newly-freed people were inspired to follow them "Somewhere toward freedom."
Having thousand of refugees following Sherman's Army of course created logistical problems. The army was not expecting to have a trailing group of men, women, children who basically had nothing but what they could carry. But many of these people were able to assist the Union Army by doing the more menial tasks of feeding the army, washing clothes, etc. Even more critically, these refugees knew where cattle were being held, where food and other items were hidden, and where the secret trails through the woods were that could get the Union soldiers where they needed to be more quickly and more stealthily. They did many important services for the Union Army, and so, for the Union. I had to wonder: how did the exposure to, and memory of, these resourceful, resilient, brave, hopeful former slaves affect those Union soldiers when they went back to their civilian lives? It had to have been for the good, right? I hope so.
The author told this story as much as he could from the freedmen's point of view, but he had to do it mostly through the diary entries of those soldiers who kept journals during the March, or who wrote memoirs after. But he makes the case - as if it were ever in doubt - how longed for, and how precious, the idea of freedom was for these people.
There's a lot more to this book. If you're at all interested in United States history, read it.
Of course I'd heard of Sherman's March through Georgia near the end of the Civil War, but I'd never heard the part of the story that Parten writes about, including the Port Royal Experiment. a movement that began well before the war's end, wherein newly freed people were given an education, and the chance to work land that Confederate citizens had abandoned. there was also a move to give land - or sell it - to formerly enslaved people, but that went away after Lincoln's assassination and the presidency of Andrew Johnson. It was supposed to be a model for Reconstruction, but had no backing from Johnson's Administration.
But the bulk of the story is taken up with Sherman's March itself, but told, as much as possible, from the perspective of the formerly enslaved people who spontaneously began following the soldiers as they marched to the sea. For the first time in their lives they had the freedom to go, and thousands of them did just that. The Union soldiers represented the promise of freedom and Jubilee (which the author explains, but I don't have the book in front of me so I can't quote it), and these newly-freed people were inspired to follow them "Somewhere toward freedom."
Having thousand of refugees following Sherman's Army of course created logistical problems. The army was not expecting to have a trailing group of men, women, children who basically had nothing but what they could carry. But many of these people were able to assist the Union Army by doing the more menial tasks of feeding the army, washing clothes, etc. Even more critically, these refugees knew where cattle were being held, where food and other items were hidden, and where the secret trails through the woods were that could get the Union soldiers where they needed to be more quickly and more stealthily. They did many important services for the Union Army, and so, for the Union. I had to wonder: how did the exposure to, and memory of, these resourceful, resilient, brave, hopeful former slaves affect those Union soldiers when they went back to their civilian lives? It had to have been for the good, right? I hope so.
The author told this story as much as he could from the freedmen's point of view, but he had to do it mostly through the diary entries of those soldiers who kept journals during the March, or who wrote memoirs after. But he makes the case - as if it were ever in doubt - how longed for, and how precious, the idea of freedom was for these people.
There's a lot more to this book. If you're at all interested in United States history, read it.
September 1, 2025
"I was born a slave and became free after Sherman's army came through". These are the words of many of the 20,000 former slaves who left their respective plantations and followed William Tecumseh Sherman on his march from Atlanta to the sea. This book details a nuanced history of the "total war" interpretation of the Union's brutal "invasion" of the south. Following the burning of Atlanta, this Army of the West headed through the cotton fields of north Georgia to the rice plantations of southern and eastern Georgia, with Sherman's proclamation to President Lincoln, "For Christmas, I give you Savannah". The March continued north to coastal South Carolina and the burning of Columbia, a revenge for the first state to secede from the Union. The March was made with the assistance of the freemen and women who served in various capacities: scouts, foragers, cooks, in building and clearing roads. But not all former slaves were so employed; those who were incapable of work or who had become part of the ever growing march were abandoned, in horrors such as the one at Ebenezer Creek. Sherman's March met its challenge with the arrival of resettling refugees in Savannah, and an investigation by the Department of War about reported atrocities. Several attempts at resettlement in a former colony at Port Royal on Carolina's coastal island met with occasional success but more often failure. The project may be considered an early attempt at Reconstruction with a more pronounced development at the Savannah Summit. Here, clergy met with Sherman and other Department of War officials. When asked how to resolve the resettlement issue, clergy members said,"Land" which eventually became a path to citizenship. Hence, Sherman's Special Field Order # 15, a Homesteading Act reserving coastal lands from Charleston, SC to the St. John's River in Florida for the former slaves was enacted. While Sherman's initial concept of his March was to restore the Union, its evolution became one of freedom or "Jubilee" in the minds of the slaves. This book is meticulously researched with eye witness accounts in writings of army scribes, through diaries, observations of Union officer Joshua Chamberlain among others, and secondary commentaries of Civil War historians. Somewhere Toward Freedom is a book for those interested in historical events which are legacy building as Sherman's was. The author states, "As a matter of sheer force, Sherman's March through Georgia made the redefinition of American freedom possible". I agree with him especially in Sherman's hero's welcome to Washington, DC in May, 1865: the celebratory March included many of the slaves it brought to freedom.
December 19, 2024
In the American Civil War, General Tecumseh Sherman’s march through the South is nothing short of legendary. Growing up in South Carolina, I heard about and witnessed the effects of how he set the secessionist state ablaze in retribution. The fall of Atlanta also carries a special place in history: It was a major victory on Lincoln’s resume before the midterm elections, and Gone with the Wind forever dramatized (albeit in a biased manner) how the city became decimated. I knew both these events well, but I did not know much about the history in between. Historian Bennett Parten revised and published his doctoral dissertation to explain this timespan to the wider public. He conveys important history about how emancipation snowballed into a refugee crisis that foreshadowed Reconstruction’s difficulties.
When in graduate school in Charleston, South Carolina, my wife and I often vacationed along the South Carolina and Georgia coasts. We visited places like Beaufort, Port Royal, Savannah, Edisto Island, and Sapelo Island. This story features those areas prominently – a primary reason I picked up this book. While the Lowcountry knows this history intimately, I find that most of the rest of the country instead shares a whitewashed tale devoid of many racial injustices. Studying this history can remind us of how we can and must do better to achieve America’s promised freedom.
Until I vacationed in Beaufort, I did not know much about the Port Royal Experiment, but then I saw the Penn Center firsthand and read other historical plaques on the island. This book filled those outlines in with details, including how it sparked a public education system and how it fell apart due to a refugee crisis involving Georgia’s newly emancipated ex-slaves. I gained a deeper understanding of that harrowing story and frankly wish even more that more Americans would learn about it. Thankfully, several chapters describe those events.
With recent interest in black civil rights and renewed concerns about racial injustices, the reading public should welcome a book like this. As with any good history, it’s not a tale told with passion, but it gently enlightened me about how we arrived to where we are. It also showed me human nature more acutely that enables a hope of a better tomorrow. This work simultaneously moved me by the emancipation’s hope and saddened me by the persistent structural inequities. Those twin themes remain when I read today’s newspapers. This book enriched my understanding of emancipation’s dramas – and can enrich the understanding of many other people, too.
When in graduate school in Charleston, South Carolina, my wife and I often vacationed along the South Carolina and Georgia coasts. We visited places like Beaufort, Port Royal, Savannah, Edisto Island, and Sapelo Island. This story features those areas prominently – a primary reason I picked up this book. While the Lowcountry knows this history intimately, I find that most of the rest of the country instead shares a whitewashed tale devoid of many racial injustices. Studying this history can remind us of how we can and must do better to achieve America’s promised freedom.
Until I vacationed in Beaufort, I did not know much about the Port Royal Experiment, but then I saw the Penn Center firsthand and read other historical plaques on the island. This book filled those outlines in with details, including how it sparked a public education system and how it fell apart due to a refugee crisis involving Georgia’s newly emancipated ex-slaves. I gained a deeper understanding of that harrowing story and frankly wish even more that more Americans would learn about it. Thankfully, several chapters describe those events.
With recent interest in black civil rights and renewed concerns about racial injustices, the reading public should welcome a book like this. As with any good history, it’s not a tale told with passion, but it gently enlightened me about how we arrived to where we are. It also showed me human nature more acutely that enables a hope of a better tomorrow. This work simultaneously moved me by the emancipation’s hope and saddened me by the persistent structural inequities. Those twin themes remain when I read today’s newspapers. This book enriched my understanding of emancipation’s dramas – and can enrich the understanding of many other people, too.
November 27, 2025
Adapted from the author's PhD dissertation, this is a solid to very good look not primarily at Sherman's March to the Sea from Atlanta to Savannah as a military matter, but at America's largest emancipation, the thousands, nay tens of thousands of enslaved black Americans largely freeing themselves, assisting the army, especially the foragers, aka Sherman's Bummers, and more.
Second, it's the story of the attitudes of many of the US Army of this time on racist. Although not as much or as severely expressed a racist as a Southern plantation owner, William T. Sherman was a racist — and one who, unlike a Grant, saw little evolution in his attitudes during the war, and resisted civilian efforts in Washington, including from his official boss, Secretary of War Stanton, to find some greater degree of enlightenment. Many of his officers were worse, above all Jefferson C. Davis (the other Jeff Davis), one of his corps commanders.
After Sherman reached Savannah, he wanted to ditch these refugees before going into the Carolinas. With an experiment in freedman settlement at Port Royal, South Carolina, he had his option, pawning them off on its military governor. He expanded the land Rufus Saxon would govern, with his Special Order 15, source of the famous "40 acres and a mule."
And, from interactions with Saxon, the commander of Sherman's right wing, Gen.O.O. Howard would rise to lead the newly formed Freedman's Bureau later in 1865, only to see new president Andrew Johnson gut it in general and Order 15 in particular.
At the same time, the freedmen following Sherman weren't passive bystanders. To the degree he can, Parten details their agency in trying to control their own futures.
Also included is a good look, at Port Royal level, of conflicts between government agents trying to do best by the freedmen and capitalist exploiters wanting to get freedmen back to picking cotton in quasi-sharecropping arrangements. (Well beyond the scope of this book? This happened elsewhere at the edges of in-Civil War reconstruction. Even the relatively benighted like Secretary of the Treasury Chase wanted cotton for federal war financing money, if nothing else. Exploiters were also there, including grifters, including those with connections to A. Lincoln.)
4.5 stars rounded up.
Second, it's the story of the attitudes of many of the US Army of this time on racist. Although not as much or as severely expressed a racist as a Southern plantation owner, William T. Sherman was a racist — and one who, unlike a Grant, saw little evolution in his attitudes during the war, and resisted civilian efforts in Washington, including from his official boss, Secretary of War Stanton, to find some greater degree of enlightenment. Many of his officers were worse, above all Jefferson C. Davis (the other Jeff Davis), one of his corps commanders.
After Sherman reached Savannah, he wanted to ditch these refugees before going into the Carolinas. With an experiment in freedman settlement at Port Royal, South Carolina, he had his option, pawning them off on its military governor. He expanded the land Rufus Saxon would govern, with his Special Order 15, source of the famous "40 acres and a mule."
And, from interactions with Saxon, the commander of Sherman's right wing, Gen.O.O. Howard would rise to lead the newly formed Freedman's Bureau later in 1865, only to see new president Andrew Johnson gut it in general and Order 15 in particular.
At the same time, the freedmen following Sherman weren't passive bystanders. To the degree he can, Parten details their agency in trying to control their own futures.
Also included is a good look, at Port Royal level, of conflicts between government agents trying to do best by the freedmen and capitalist exploiters wanting to get freedmen back to picking cotton in quasi-sharecropping arrangements. (Well beyond the scope of this book? This happened elsewhere at the edges of in-Civil War reconstruction. Even the relatively benighted like Secretary of the Treasury Chase wanted cotton for federal war financing money, if nothing else. Exploiters were also there, including grifters, including those with connections to A. Lincoln.)
4.5 stars rounded up.
January 14, 2025
After Sherman took Atlanta, he had the choice of chasing Hood into Alabama or setting off on the offensive. He chose the latter- a March across Georgia. “I can make the march and make Georgia howl.” It also represented a change in tactics. Previously the Union generals had sought to capture key cities. Now, they would make it so the Confederates had nowhere to hide.
This total warfare, to bring the war directly to the south, not only gave the Confederates no rest, it laid waste to the fields of the rich planters and it took their manpower. Slaves had fled to the Union armies previously, but never in the sheer numbers as with this campaign. By the time Sherman reached Savannah, some 20,000 self-emancipated slaves followed the Union Army.
I was fascinated to learn that Sherman wasn’t a proponent of emancipation and had qualms about liberating slaves, except those that could be used to help the army. What he failed to see was that the slaves had plans of their own.
This book shows the dynamics at play during the march - the need to keep the army moving, limited resources and the sheer numbers of freed people (“the growing encumbrance”) vs. the knowledge of what would happen if the Confederates recaptured the freed people. General Jefferson C. Davis’s actions led to the calamity known as the Ebenezer Creek Massacre.
It also describes the Port Royal Experiment, which had started in 1862 but was greatly expanded once Sherman reached Savannah. The forty acres and a mule idea is thanks to Sherman. Of course, he was merely interested in putting a plan in place that would stop the freed people from following his army. It helped me understand how some of the beginning parts of Reconstruction came into being. It briefly tackles how Reconstruction failed. I would love to see Parten write a follow up book detailing Reconstruction - its beginning, middle and end.
This well researched and educational book reads well and kept me engaged. I appreciated that this was an in depth look at one aspect of the war, told not from a military viewpoint, but from the viewpoint of those who benefited the most from the war.
My thanks to Netgalley and Simon & Schuster for an advance copy of this book.
This total warfare, to bring the war directly to the south, not only gave the Confederates no rest, it laid waste to the fields of the rich planters and it took their manpower. Slaves had fled to the Union armies previously, but never in the sheer numbers as with this campaign. By the time Sherman reached Savannah, some 20,000 self-emancipated slaves followed the Union Army.
I was fascinated to learn that Sherman wasn’t a proponent of emancipation and had qualms about liberating slaves, except those that could be used to help the army. What he failed to see was that the slaves had plans of their own.
This book shows the dynamics at play during the march - the need to keep the army moving, limited resources and the sheer numbers of freed people (“the growing encumbrance”) vs. the knowledge of what would happen if the Confederates recaptured the freed people. General Jefferson C. Davis’s actions led to the calamity known as the Ebenezer Creek Massacre.
It also describes the Port Royal Experiment, which had started in 1862 but was greatly expanded once Sherman reached Savannah. The forty acres and a mule idea is thanks to Sherman. Of course, he was merely interested in putting a plan in place that would stop the freed people from following his army. It helped me understand how some of the beginning parts of Reconstruction came into being. It briefly tackles how Reconstruction failed. I would love to see Parten write a follow up book detailing Reconstruction - its beginning, middle and end.
This well researched and educational book reads well and kept me engaged. I appreciated that this was an in depth look at one aspect of the war, told not from a military viewpoint, but from the viewpoint of those who benefited the most from the war.
My thanks to Netgalley and Simon & Schuster for an advance copy of this book.
January 17, 2025
Any student of the American Civil War is familiar with Sherman's March to the Sea, where Sherman's army marched from Atlanta, Georgia to Savannah in 1864. What was less explored was Sherman's views on slavery and the popular perception of the Union army as a force for emancipation, especially by the enslaved people.
Across six chapters, Parten's Somewhere Toward Freedom: Sherman's March and the Story of America's Largest Emancipation details the Georgia campaign, biographies many of the key figures, gives the setting and context and also explores the Port Royal experiment in providing land and wages to the formerly enslaved.
It was a moment full of hope, and had the potential to be a a strong transitional stage, but Parten describes why this did not come to pass. As with most things, it came down to politics. Some Union generals were as racists as the Confederates, not interested in the enslaved leaving them to survive on their own, sometimes pulling up their bridges ahead of the enslaved crossing, while knowing the Union army was pursued by Confederate cavalry.
The Port Royal project that makes up the focus of the second half, seemed doomed to failure from its beginning, never given enough resources to accomplish what was needed. Many of the formerly enslaved arrived with just the cloths they were wearing with little to no infrastructure in place for them to live and work. The islands were also highly dependent on the army and navy for supplies and transport, that left them greatly troubled when the war theaters shifted.
Parten expands upon this well known event with a new perspective and details, highlighting the failures of Civil War and Reconstruction.
Recommended to readers of Civil War history, emancipation, American History or military history.
I received a free digital version of this book via NetGalley thanks to the publisher.
Across six chapters, Parten's Somewhere Toward Freedom: Sherman's March and the Story of America's Largest Emancipation details the Georgia campaign, biographies many of the key figures, gives the setting and context and also explores the Port Royal experiment in providing land and wages to the formerly enslaved.
It was a moment full of hope, and had the potential to be a a strong transitional stage, but Parten describes why this did not come to pass. As with most things, it came down to politics. Some Union generals were as racists as the Confederates, not interested in the enslaved leaving them to survive on their own, sometimes pulling up their bridges ahead of the enslaved crossing, while knowing the Union army was pursued by Confederate cavalry.
The Port Royal project that makes up the focus of the second half, seemed doomed to failure from its beginning, never given enough resources to accomplish what was needed. Many of the formerly enslaved arrived with just the cloths they were wearing with little to no infrastructure in place for them to live and work. The islands were also highly dependent on the army and navy for supplies and transport, that left them greatly troubled when the war theaters shifted.
Parten expands upon this well known event with a new perspective and details, highlighting the failures of Civil War and Reconstruction.
Recommended to readers of Civil War history, emancipation, American History or military history.
I received a free digital version of this book via NetGalley thanks to the publisher.
December 12, 2024
4. 5 stars rounded up for an excellent book on an overlooked aspect of Sherman's March to the sea from Atlanta. Most historians agree that Sherman's March through the heart of the Confederacy broke the back the the Confederate war effort. What has been overlooked was the effect of enslaved people leaving the plantations and self emancipating by attaching themselves to Sherman's army. By the time his army reached Savannah, Georgia, there were about 20,000 former slaves following him.
They played a vital role in helping Sherman's foragers to find hidden livestock and other food. They also deprived plantation owners of the forced labor needed to run the plantations. They also rescued Union soldiers behind enemy lines, in some cases hiding them for weeks.
But Sherman was opposed to having such large numbers of civilians following his army. He worried that they would slow him down, and he did not want the responsibility of feeding them. But they knew following him meant freedom. When he reached the coast of Georgia, he decided to settle them on the various islands along the coast. They were given 40 acres and leftover sick mules. But this was a temporary measure, to be overturned by President Johnson who pardoned the plantation owners and ordered the Army to return their land. I believe that this reversal was a travesty of justice.
I recommend this book to anyone interested in Civil War history and or African American history.
#SomewhereTowardFreedom #NetGalley. #SimonBooks
Thank You Simon & Schuster for sending me this eARC through NetGalley.
Pub Date Jan 21 2025
They played a vital role in helping Sherman's foragers to find hidden livestock and other food. They also deprived plantation owners of the forced labor needed to run the plantations. They also rescued Union soldiers behind enemy lines, in some cases hiding them for weeks.
But Sherman was opposed to having such large numbers of civilians following his army. He worried that they would slow him down, and he did not want the responsibility of feeding them. But they knew following him meant freedom. When he reached the coast of Georgia, he decided to settle them on the various islands along the coast. They were given 40 acres and leftover sick mules. But this was a temporary measure, to be overturned by President Johnson who pardoned the plantation owners and ordered the Army to return their land. I believe that this reversal was a travesty of justice.
I recommend this book to anyone interested in Civil War history and or African American history.
#SomewhereTowardFreedom #NetGalley. #SimonBooks
Thank You Simon & Schuster for sending me this eARC through NetGalley.
Pub Date Jan 21 2025
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