Since entering North Carolina, Major-General William T. Sherman had planned to lead his 60,000 men to Goldsboro, where they could be resupplied and united with Major-General John Schofield’s Army of North Carolina. Following the Battle of Bentonville, Sherman learned that General Joseph E. Johnston’s Confederate army was falling back northwest toward Smithfield. This left the northeastern path to Goldsboro open, and one of Schofield’s corps under Major-General Jacob D. Cox had entered the town on March 21.
Johnston’s Confederates, who had tried to block Sherman’s path, began withdrawing at 2 a.m. on the 22nd. The Federals pursued and skirmished with Johnston’s rear guard until Sherman ordered them to disengage. Sherman’s objective, after all, was not to destroy Johnston’s army but to get to Goldsboro so his men could rest and be resupplied.
Sherman’s left wing, commanded by Major-General Henry W. Slocum, took the lead on the march to Goldsboro. They were followed by the right wing, commanded by Major-General Oliver O. Howard. The Federals were slowed by sandy and muddy roads, but they reached the town later on the 22nd. Sherman issued a congratulatory order to his troops: “After a march of the most extraordinary character, nearly 500 miles over swamps and rivers deemed impassable to others, at the most inclement season of the year, and drawing our chief supplies from a poor and wasted country, we reach our destination in good health and condition.”
Sherman met with Major-General Alfred Terry, commanding the Tenth Corps in Schofield’s army. He also received a message from Federal General-in-Chief Ulysses S. Grant: “Although the Richmond papers do not communicate the fact, yet I saw enough in them to satisfy me that you occupied Goldsboro’ on the 19th inst. I congratulate you and the army on what may be regarded as the successful termination of the third campaign since leaving the Tennessee River, less than one year ago…”
Slocum’s Federals began entering Goldsboro on the 23rd. Grant, who was busy facing General-in-Chief Robert E. Lee’s Confederate army outside Petersburg and Richmond, wrote:
“Sherman was no longer in danger. He had Johnston confronting him; but with any army much inferior to his own, both in numbers and morale. He had Lee to the north of him with a force largely superior; but I was holding Lee with a still greater force, and had he made his escape and gotten down to reinforce Johnston, Sherman, with the reinforcements he now had from Schofield and Terry, would have been able to hold the Confederates at bay for an indefinite period. He was near the sea-shore with his back to it, and our navy occupied the harbors. He had a railroad to both Wilmington and New Bern, and his flanks were thoroughly protected by streams, which intersect that part of the country and deepen as they approach the sea. Then, too, Sherman knew that if Lee should escape me I would be on his heels, and he and Johnston together would be crushed in one blow if they attempted to make a stand.”
Sherman met with Schofield that same day, just three days behind the schedule they had drafted in January. Schofield’s Federals worked around the clock to restore the railroad line from Goldsboro to New Bern, thus assuring that the troops would be well supplied by the naval vessels on the Atlantic coast. The combined forces of Sherman and Schofield now dominated North Carolina.
In contrast, Johnston had no more than 20,000 men left in his makeshift Confederate army. Despite this, Johnston took the time to write to General-in-Chief Robert E. Lee to dispel rumors that the proud Army of Tennessee refused to fight any longer: “Troops of Tennessee army have fully disproved slanders that have been published against them.”
Johnston informed Lee that Sherman had linked with Schofield at Goldsboro, and then conceded, “Sherman’s course cannot be hindered by the small force I have. I can do no more than annoy him. I respectfully suggest that it is no longer a question of whether you leave present position; you have only to decide where to meet Sherman. I will be near him.”
Johnston’s Confederates crossed the Neuse River and took positions between the two roads that led to Raleigh and Weldon. Johnston expected Sherman to target one of those towns next on his way to join with Grant’s armies laying siege to Petersburg. These were also solid linkage points with Lee’s army if Lee abandoned Petersburg and Richmond. Weldon was particularly important because the railroad ran north from that town to Petersburg and, according to a Confederate deserter, “All of the forage for General Lee’s army passes through Weldon.”
Sherman seemed in no hurry to resume his advance. His exhausted men needed rest and supplies, and he needed time to plan his next move. Federal Major George Nicholls summed it up: “Our army (needs) not only to be reclothed, but to gain the repose it needs. Mind, as well as body, requires rest after the fatigues of rapid campaigns like these. These ragged, bareheaded, shoeless, brave, jolly fellows of Sherman’s legions, too, want covering for their naked limbs.”
With his planning still in the preliminary phase, Sherman wrote to Grant on the 24th: “I think I see pretty clearly how, in one more move, we can checkmate Lee, forcing him to unite Johnston with him in defense of Richmond, or, by leaving Richmond, to abandon the cause. I feel certain if he leaves Richmond, Virginia leaves the Confederacy.” Sherman assured Grant that he would be able to field “an army of 80,000 men by April 10. If I get the troops all well placed, and the supplies working well, I might run up to see you for a day or two before diving again into the bowels of the country.”
The next day, supplies began arriving in Goldsboro from the newly repaired railroad line to New Bern. This included much-needed new clothing and an abundance of foodstuffs; no more would the troops live off southern civilians. The men were particularly excited when over 500 bags of mail arrived for them, as many had not heard from their families at home in months. Sherman later wrote:
“Thus was concluded one of the longest and most important marches ever made by an organized army in a civilized country. The distance from Savannah to Goldsboro is four hundred and twenty-five miles, and the route traversed embraced five large navigable rivers, viz., the Edisto, Broad, Catawba, Pedee, and Cape Fear, at either of which a comparatively small force, well-handled, should have made the passage most difficult, if not impossible. The country generally was in a state of nature, with innumerable swamps, with simply mud roads, nearly every mile of which had to be corduroyed. In our route we had captured Columbia, Cheraw, and Fayetteville, important cities and depots of supplies, had compelled the evacuation of Charleston City and Harbor, had utterly broken up all the railroads of South Carolina, and had consumed a vast amount of food and forage, essential to the enemy for the support of his own armies. We had in mid-winter accomplished the whole journey of four hundred and twenty-five miles in fifty days, averaging ten miles per day, allowing ten lay-days, and had reached Goldsboro with the army in superb order, and the trains almost as fresh as when we had started from Atlanta.”
Sherman’s troops had cut a swath of destruction 45 miles wide between Savannah and Goldsboro, winning battles at Averasboro and Bentonville on the way. Sherman wrote, “Were I to express my measure of the relative importance of the march to the sea and of that from Savannah northward, I would place the former at one and the latter at 10 or the maximum.”
Near month’s end the three Federal armies around Goldsboro were reunited under Sherman’s overall command:
- Slocum’s Fourteenth and Twentieth corps remained the Army of Georgia
- Howard’s Fifteenth and Seventeenth corps remained the Army of the Tennessee
- Schofield’s force consisted of Cox’s Twenty-third Corps and Terry’s Tenth Corps, and became the new Army of the Ohio
The combined armies totaled 88,948 officers and men and 91 guns. Leaving the troops under Schofield’s command, Sherman left to meet with Grant in Virginia to discuss future military strategy. Both Sherman and Grant expressed confidence that the next big campaign could end the war.
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