Top 68 Quotes About William T. Sherman

#1. War is the remedy that our enemies have chosen, and I say let us give them
all they want.

William T. Sherman

#2. The only good Indian is a dead Indian

William Tecumseh Sherman

#3. War is at its best barbarism.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#4. Wagons to move the camp of a regiment from one place to another, and some of the camps had bakeries and cooking establishments that would have done credit to Delmonico.

William T. Sherman

#5. I beg to present you as a Christmas gift the city of Savannah.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#6. Wars are not all evil, they are part of the grand machinery by which this world is governed.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#7. You might as well appeal against a thunderstorm as against these terrible hardships of war. War is cruelty, there is no use trying to reform it; the crueler it is, the sooner it will be over.

William T. Sherman

#8. War is cruelty. You can't refine it.

William T. Sherman

#9. Then, as now, neatness in dress and form, with a strict conformity to the rules, were the qualifications required for office, and I suppose I was found not to excel in any of these.

William T. Sherman

#10. Courage - a perfect sensibility of the measure of danger, and a mental willingness to endure it.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#11. If I had my choice I would kill every reporter in the world, but I am sure we would be getting reports from Hell before breakfast.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#12. It's a disagreeable thing to be whipped.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#13. This war differs from other wars, in this particular. We are not fighting armies but a hostile people, and must make old and young, rich and poor, feel the hard hand of war.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#14. I see every chance of a long, confused and disorganizing civil war, and I feel no desire to take a hand therein.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#15. The whole army is burning with an insatiable desire to wreak violence upon South Carolina. I almost tremble for her fate.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#16. I am tired and sick of war. Its glory is all moonshine. It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, for vengeance, for desolation. War is hell.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#17. There is many a boy here today who looks on war as all glory, but, boys, it is all hell.

William T. Sherman

#18. The way to success is strategically along the way of least expectation and tactically along the line of least resistance.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#19. Every attempt to make war easy and safe will result in humiliation and disaster.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#20. Though I never ordered it, and never wished for it, I have never shed any tears over the event, because I believe that it hastened what we all fought for, the end of the war.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#21. An army to be useful must be a unit, and out of this has grown the saying, attributed to Napoleon, but doubtless spoken before the days of Alexander, that an army with an inefficient commander was better than one with two able heads.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#22. I think I know what military fame is; to be killed on the field of battle and have your name misspelled in the newspapers.

William T. Sherman

#23. The voice of the people is the voice of humbug.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#24. I hereby state, and mean all that I say, that I never have been and never will be a candidate for President; that if nominated by either party, I should peremptorily decline; and even if unanimously elected I should decline to serve.

William T. Sherman

#25. You mistake, too, the people of the North. They are a peaceable people but an earnest people, and they will fight, too. They are not going to let this country be destroyed without a mighty effort to save it ... Besides, where are your men and appliances of war to contend against them?

William Tecumseh Sherman

#26. If forced to choose between the penitentiary and the White House for four years, I would say the penitentiary, thank you.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#27. There's many a boy here today who looks on war as all glory but it is all hell.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#28. Many and many a person in Georgia asked me why we did not go to South Carolina; and, when I answered that we were en route for that State, the invariable reply was, - Well, if you will make those people feel the utmost severities of war, we will pardon you for your desolation of Georgia.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#29. I intend to make Georgia howl.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#30. The American press is a shame and a reproach to a civilized people. When a man is too lazy to work and too cowardly to steal, he becomes an editor and manufactures public opinion.

William T. Sherman

#31. He belonged to that army known as invincible in peace, invisible in war.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#32. War is cruel and you cannot refine it.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#33. General Polk, who was dignified and corpulent, walked back slowly, not wishing to appear too hurried or cautious in the presence of the men, and was struck across the breast by an unexploded shell, which killed him instantly.

William T. Sherman

#34. We can make war so terrible and make them so sick of war that generations pass away before they again appeal to it.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#35. You people speak so lightly of war; you don't know what you're talking about. War is a terrible thing!

William Tecumseh Sherman

#36. [We] must stop these swarms of Jews who are trading, bartering and robbing.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#37. I begin to regard the death and mangling of a couple thousand men as a small affair, a kind of morning dash-and it may be well that we become so hardened.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#38. There's many a boy here today that looks on war as all glory, but boys, it is all hell.

General William T. Sherman, Address, 1880

John Podlaski

#39. If the people raise a great howl against my barbarity and cruelty, I will answer that war is war, and not popularity seeking.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#40. I make up my opinions from facts and reasoning, and not to suit any body but myself. If people don't like my opinions, it makes little difference as I don't solicit their opinions or votes.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#41. You may as well say, 'That's a valiant flea that dare eat his breakfast on the lip of a lion.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#42. War is too serious a matter to leave to soldiers.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#43. I want peace, and believe it can only be reached through union and war, and I will ever conduct war with a view to perfect an early success.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#44. Never give reasons for what you think or do until you must. Maybe after a while, a better reason will pop into your head.

William T. Sherman

#45. An Army is a collection of armed men obliged to obey one man. Every change in the rules which impairs the principle weakens the army.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#46. War is hell." - William Tecumseh Sherman "Sherman was totally my bitch." - War

Larissa Ione

#47. If you don't have my army supplied, and keep it supplied, we'll eat your mules up, sir.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#48. I hate newspapermen. They come into camp and pick up their camp rumors and print them as facts. I regard them as spies, which, in truth, they are.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#49. It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, more vengeance, more desolation. War is hell.

William T. Sherman

#50. You people of the South don't know what you are doing. This country will be drenched in blood, and God only knows how it will end.

William T. Sherman

#51. My aim, then, was to whip the rebels, to humble their pride, to follow them to their inmost recesses, and make them fear and dread us. Fear is the beginning of wisdom.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#52. War is Hell you can NOT refine it!

William Tecumseh Sherman

#53. At first you will make headway, but as your limited resources begin to fail, shut out from the markets of Europe as you will be, your cause will begin to wane. If your people will but stop and think, they must see that in the end you will surely fail.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#54. War's Legitimate Object Is More Perfect Peace.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#55. In our Country ... one class of men makes war and leaves another to fight it out.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#56. I knew wherever I was that you thought of me, and if I got in a tight place you would come-if alive.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#57. We cannot change the hearts of the people of the South, but we can make war so terrible that they will realize the fact that however brave and gallant and devoted to their country still they are mortal and should exhaust all peaceful remedies before they fly to war.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#58. War is at best barbarism.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#59. A battery of field artillery is worth a thousand muskets.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#60. I would make this war as severe as possible, and show no symptoms of tiring till the South begs for mercy.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#61. The scenes on this field would have cured anybody of war.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#62. The more Indians we can kill ... the less will have to be killed the next war, for the more I see of these Indians, the more convinced I am that they all have to be killed or be maintained as a species of paupers.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#63. Hold the fort! I am coming!

William Tecumseh Sherman

#64. If nominated, I will not run; if elected, I will not serve.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#65. War is at best barbarism. Its glory is all moonshine ... War is hell.

William Tecumseh Sherman

#66. In treading upon the ashes of dead men in Italy, Egypt - on the banks of the Bosphorus, one almost despairs to think how idle are the dreams and toils of this life, and were it not for the intellectual pleasure of knowing and learning, one would almost be damaged by travel in these historic lands.

William T. Sherman

#67. Grant stood by me when I was crazy, and I stood by him when he was drunk, and now we stand by each other.

William T. Sherman

#68. Oh, it is all folly, madness, a crime against civilization.

William Tecumseh Sherman

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