Fierce Patriot: The Tangled Lives of William Tecumseh Sherman

by Robert L. O'Connell

NATIONAL BESTSELLER

William Tecumseh Sherman was more than just one of our greatest generals. Fierce Patriot is a bold, revisionist portrait of how this iconic and enigmatic figure exerted an outsize impact on the American landscape—and the American character.
 
America’s first “celebrity” general, William Tecumseh Sherman was a man of many faces. Some were exalted in the public eye, others known only to his intimates. In this bold, revisionist portrait, Robert L. O’Connell captures the man in full for the first time. From his early exploits in Florida, through his brilliant but tempestuous generalship during the Civil War, to his postwar career as a key player in the building of the transcontinental railroad, Sherman was, as O’Connell puts it, the “human embodiment of Manifest Destiny.” Here is Sherman the military strategist, a master of logistics with an uncanny grasp of terrain and brilliant sense of timing. Then there is “Uncle Billy,” Sherman’s public persona, a charismatic hero to his troops and quotable catnip to the newspaper writers of his day. Here, too, is the private Sherman, whose appetite for women, parties, and the high life of the New York theater complicated his already turbulent marriage. Warrior, family man, American icon, William Tecumseh Sherman has finally found a biographer worthy of his protean gifts. A masterful character study whose myriad insights are leavened with its author’s trademark wit, Fierce Patriot will stand as the essential book on Sherman for decades to come.

Praise for Fierce Patriot
 
“A superb examination of the many facets of the iconic Union general.” —General David Petraeus
 
“Sherman’s standing in American history is formidable. . . . It is hard to imagine any other biography capturing it all in such a concise and enlightening fashion.” — National Review
 
“A sharply drawn and propulsive march through the tortured psyche of the man.” — The Wall Street Journal
 
“[O’Connell’s] narrative of the March to the Sea is perhaps the best I have ever read.” —Jonathan Yardley, The Washington Post
 
“A surprising, clever, wise, and powerful book.” —Evan Thomas, author of Ike’s Bluff

Genres: History, Biography, Civil War, Nonfiction, American History, American Civil War, Military Fiction

432 pages, Hardcover

First published May 6, 2014

About the author

Robert L. O'Connell is an American historian, intelligence analyst, and author known for his thought-provoking works on war, weaponry, and human aggression. With a career spanning both public service and academia, he spent three decades as an intelligence analyst at the National Ground Intelligence Center and later served as a visiting professor of defense analysis at the Naval Postgraduate School.
O'Connell's books blend historical insight with philosophical inquiry. His acclaimed works include Of Arms and Men, Sacred Vessels, and Ride of the Second Horseman, each exploring the evolution of warfare and its roots in human behavior. He also authored the illustrated volume Soul of the Sword and ventured into fiction with Fast Eddie: A Novel in Many Voices.
Driven by a lifelong passion for storytelling, O'Connell has described his writing process as a trance-like state where ideas seem to flow from an external source. Whether writing history or fiction, his work reflects a deep engagement with the human condition through the lens of conflict and creativity.

Reviews

[Jeffrey Keeten · Rating 4 out of 5]

”He stood by me when I was crazy and I stood by him when he was drunk; now, sir, we stand by each other always.”
---William Tecumseh Sherman on his relationship with Ulysses S. Grant


William Tecumseh Sherman

The importance of second-in-commands became very apparent to me while reading this book. If you think back to Alexander the Great and the close relationship he had with his friend/confidant/lover Hephaestion, he was never the same after Hephaestion’s death. Robert E. Lee struggled after the death of Stonewall Jackson. Jackson was a facilitator who didn’t question Lee, but merely did his best to give him what he wanted. At Gettysburg, Lee missed Jackson, but actually, James Longstreet, one of my favorite brooding generals of the Confederacy, gave Lee valuable advice, but it wasn’t what Lee wanted from him. He wanted him to be more like Jackson. The relationship between Longstreet and Lee could never be the same as the blind loyalty inspired by the Lee and Jackson’s friendship.

If Grant had not had Sherman, the war could have gone on for considerably longer. I could make the case that, if Sherman had been incapacitated, maybe a Philip Sheridan could have stepped up and made that famous March to the Sea, but would the same trust have existed? Would Sheridan have been able to burn Atlanta or make the decision to destroy as much of South Carolina as he could lay a torch to? Sherman and Grant were both flawed human beings, and each recognized those flaws in the other. This shared weakness formed a bond of trust which allowed Grant to feel comfortable letting Sherman have lots of loose rope to play with. Interestingly enough, when Sherman was given his own command with absolute power in the West, he was nearly incapacitated by crushing self doubts and depression. He discovered that he worked best as a general with enough power to realize his strategies, but with the strain buffered by someone above him with ultimate control and responsibility.


The Peacemakers (1868) by George P. A. Healy with Sherman, Grant, Lincoln, and Rear Admiral David Dixon Porter. Notice who is talking. Sherman was known for being a motor mouth.

Grant and Sherman were both fortunate that Abraham Lincoln, a man well documented for suffering from melancholy verging on madness, was the man making the decisions about who was in command. Lincoln trusted their flawed natures more than probably any other president would have had the foresight to do so.

It is almost impossible to talk about Grant without talking about Sherman or talking about Sherman without talking about Grant. Their ascensions were woven together like braided rope.


Ulysses S. Grant

The duo made mistakes when they were fighting out West, but they learned from them. When Lincoln lost patience with his generals in the East, it only made sense that he would go out West and bring those generals who were having success to the main event in the East. It took a special man to put thousands of men through a meat grinder, and Grant turned out to be the right man for the job. As Sherman made his March to the Sea, he avoided large skirmishes and became more concerned about his “boys” living to see their families again. He was a fiery man who may have been hated when he first took command, but it didn’t take long for his soldiers to learn to love him.

Sherman had this amazing gift for remembering vast stretches of terrain that was made possible by his photographic memory. ”Sherman was a prodigy of geography. During the Civil War, no matter how befuddled the swamp or forest or mountain range, if Sherman had been there, he remembered it exactly. And since he had seen so much of the South, he became a kind of human geolocation system. It was an awesome military talent, but at the time he was developing it, it was nearly invisible to those around him. It may not have even struck Sherman as that unusual; it was simply something he did and assumed others shared.” Could another general have been as effective making his way through the Southern terrain as Sherman?

He made sure that foragers or bummers, as they liked to call themselves, understood that they weren’t there to line up the population and shoot them or conduct mass rapes. He stressed to his men that these were Americans. Burn their houses, take their food, but do not kill them unless you have to. Part of how he insured that the men followed his instructions was to make sure there were plenty of officers overseeing the pillaging. This was commendable. The South still sees his March as one of the most vilifying moments of the war, which is perfectly understandable, but another general might have let his soldiers loose, and the destruction might have been far more insidious in nature.

After the war, Sherman was tasked with extending the railway lines West. Railway lines bisecting the United States from the East Coast to the West Coast would be the final nail in the coffin of the American Indian. Sherman was instrumental in the destruction of the buffalo herds as a means to take away the indigenous population’s ability to feed themselves. It was most effective.

”He shattered the South, bulldozed the Indians, and reduced the buffalo to scrap.” When I put all of these factors together, it is hard to think of a man who had a bigger impact on the 19th century in America or to consider anyone who was more directly responsible for so much destruction.

I had no idea.

Robert L. O’Connell does a wonderful job, not only bringing Sherman to life for me, but also revealing his tempestuous relationship with his wife Ellen. He had grown up with her in the Thomas Ewing household, so he literarily knew her for his entire life. She was a stringent Catholic, and he was ambivalent, at best, about religion. This caused much stress in their relationship as she wanted her children raised and taught in the best Catholic schools, and he wanted them to have a more secular upbringing. He lost those battles, as he did most of his disagreements with Ellen. The shadow of her powerful father, a man who served in more than one cabinet position for the federal government, had a hugely adverse impact on their relationship. Her allegiance was always to her father first and her husband second until Sherman rose to prominence after the war and became a more revered person in America than her father. It was an interesting backstory to see how their, at times, tormenting relationship impacted Sherman in various ways as he tried to make his way through war and life. Despite all that, he loved her, and certainly they had an amorous relationship whenever they were in close enough proximity to one another, corroborated by the arrival of eight children.


Vinnie Ream, the talented woman with the tresses and distresses.

Later in his life, there was a woman by the name of Vinnie Ream, a talented sculptor, who Sherman talked of ”Toying with your long tresses, and comforting your imaginary distresses.” I won’t say more about that. You will have to read the book to find out the salacious details.

Certainly, he was a flawed man and a ruthless man, willing to do what it takes to end the Civil War or end the war with the American Indians. Where you live probably determines a lot of how you feel about Sherman. I will say O’Connell revealed a man to me that was much different than the man I thought I knew. As politics splits this country down the middle, with the South becoming redder and New England becoming bluer, I can’t help but have the feeling that we’ve seen this all before.

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[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Not unexpectedly, Sherman’s final destination was St. Louis…[H]e was buried next to Ellen and Willy in Calvary Cemetery, a permanent resident at last… But he was America’s. He played a significant role in defining us – dimensionally, in the nature and spirit of our fighting forces, and our ethos, or at least the celebrity version of it. Historically, he was one of the ingredients for what we became. A continent for the taking brought forth people like Sherman, and they in turn produced us. Their energy, ambition, optimism, and pragmatism serves to explain our own, but so does their self-righteousness and proclivity for violence…”
- from Robert L. O’Connell’s Fierce Patriot: The Tangled Lives of William Tecumseh Sherman


The day we buried my brother-in-law in St. Louis’s Calvary Cemetery exists not so much as a linear memory than as a series of impressions. Mostly I recall the heat, the suffocating heat. It was June, and thus hot, still, and humid. One thing stands out, more than the rest. It was a conversation I had with one of my wife’s cousins. Well, not really a conversation. I stood there while he – in quintessential weird-cousin fashion – told me about all the luminaries buried in Calvary. Tennessee Williams. Dred Scott. William Tecumseh Sherman.

Strange to say, but on that terrible day, it was perhaps the sole comfort I had. It seemed a good thing to rest among such luminaries. I took some solace in that.

***

We visited my brother-in-law’s grave this past winter, on a blustery day quite unlike the one which saw him buried. Afterwards, I took Millie and Grace, my two oldest girls, to find William T. Sherman. Though Calvary is a large cemetery, I did not think this would be difficult. Sherman, after all, was one of America’s greatest soldiers. Along with Grant and Lincoln, he can honestly be said to have done the most to save the Union. My assumption was that Sherman would have a resting place akin to the tombs of those two contemporaries.

Turns out I was wrong. After a fruitless search, I finally consulted the cemetery map, only to discover that I’d wandered right past Sherman’s burial plot. As far as monuments go, his is endearingly humble. Sherman’s headstone has crossed flags and the epitaph “Faithful and Honorable.” There is a separate cross for Ellen, his ultra-Catholic wife, who saw her dreams fulfilled from beyond the grave when a dying Sherman submitted to Catholicism. Another tombstone with crossed flags and a drum belongs to thirteen year old Willie Sherman, an honorary sergeant with the Thirteenth Regulars, who died of typhus after visiting his father. An American flag flutters overhead.


The Sherman plot in Calvary Cemetery, St. Louis, Missouri. On the lower right, you can see Millie pointing out the grave of 13 year-old Willie Sherman, the honorary sergeant of the 13th Regulars. "Of all my children," Sherman would later write, "he seemed the most precious."

***

There is something to be said about being in the presence of the past. I felt a connection to Sherman, in this spot, more than I would have standing in the neoclassical shadow of Grant’s New York City tomb, or the granite obelisk and bronze bust that bedeck Lincoln’s Springfield grave. Here was Sherman, the prophet of modern war, the transcontinentalist, the General of the Armies, memorialized in the most unassuming manner possible.


Millie (L) and Gracie (R) at the gravestone of William Tecumseh Sherman, General U.S.A.

***

Shortly after that graveside visit, I decided I needed to read something more on Sherman. I didn't want the typical biography, though. I’ve been there. Not too long ago, I read John Marszalek’s Sherman: A Soldier’s Passion for Order, which ranks among the standard Sherman bios. It is thorough and comprehensive, and presents a nuanced portrait of Sherman the general, and Sherman the man. It is also written in a straight-down-the-middle style, without any ruffles or flourishes (which seems at odds with the subject, who had his share of ruffles and flourishes).

This time around, I wanted something more idiosyncratic. So I chose Robert O’Connell’s Fierce Patriot.

The first thing worth mentioning about Fierce Patriot is that it is not anywhere near your typical biography. O’Connell has eschewed chronology, and instead broken Sherman’s life into three different “lives”, which comprise the three sections of this 347-page book.

The first and largest section is devoted to Sherman the military strategist. It covers his prewar years in brisk fashion, and devotes most of its space to the American Civil War. O’Connell follows Sherman from a shaky, hesitant officer nearing a mental breakdown, to a competent “wingman” to the ascendant U.S. Grant, and finally to a superior military commander in his own right, as he captures Atlanta, marches through Georgia, and brings the war to South Carolina.

The second section is devoted to Sherman’s relationship with his soldiers, specifically the Army of the West. O’Connell traces Sherman’s evolution from a man who distrusted volunteer soldiers to Uncle Billy, the proud father-general who spent the rest of his life attending Grand Army of the Republic Reunions.

The final section covers Sherman’s family life, specifically his long, strained, successful marriage to Ellen Ewing. Here, O’Connell delves into the struggle between Sherman and his powerful foster father Thomas Ewing for Ellen’s soul. O'Connell also spends time on Sherman's extracurricular activities, such as an alleged affair with sculptor Vinnie Ream.

The most obvious consequence of O’Connell’s approach is that it jumps forwards and backwards through time. In the first section, you get a pretty sweeping look at Sherman’s career; in subsequent sections, O’Connell keeps returning to the places you’ve already been for amplification of different topics. You cannot completely partition a person’s life into discrete events. Accordingly, certain aspects – such as the strains in Sherman’s marriage – tend to get repeated, despite O’Connell’s attempts to separate the material.


Millie lays a "flower" on the gravestone of Charles Celestine Sherman, Sherman's infant son, who died of pneumonia, aged 6 months.

At less than 400 pages of text, this is a really slim, quick read. It has nowhere near the amount of information that Marszalek provides. This results in some gaps. For instance, you get only the briefest discussions on Sherman’s post-Civil War career, including his role in the pacification of the western Indian Tribes. If you want a full understanding of the whole breadth of Sherman’s career, this is probably not the place to start.

What Fierce Patriot does very well is entertain. O’Connell is a snappy and engaging writer. This is a book full of dad jokes and strange metaphors (at one point, O’Connell does an extended bit comparing generalship to surfing) and earthy descriptions (referring, for instance, to Ellen’s “horny” letters to Sherman). O’Connell’s purpose isn’t to describe every landmark along the timeline. Instead, he tries to bring Sherman to life. He personifies him. You get a very real sense, while reading Fierce Patriot, what it might have been like to be in a room with Sherman.

William Tecumseh Sherman is an imperfect hero. Though named for a famous Indian, he infamously wrote about the extermination of the western tribes. Though his armies helped destroy slavery, he was quite clearly a racist. There are times when O’Connell can be a bit glib about those imperfections. This is especially true with regards to Sherman’s views on race, which O’Connell does not give a serious airing.

Yet O’Connell’s ultimate conclusion is amply supported. Sherman is a great American, filled with all those quintessentially American contradictions. He was a ferocious defender of American government, though he hated politicians with a passion. He courted celebrity, though he despised the press as much as he did any enemy. He despised abolitionists, yet freed people by the thousands, and the tens of thousands.

Sherman’s is a life worth exploring from different angles. O’Connell’s is not the last word on this subject. As I mentioned above, I’m not sure it’s a great first word, either. Certainly, it achieves something rare: a vivid sense that you know what this person is like, even though you have never met, and never will.

[Douglas · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thanks to Goodreads and Random House for the advance copy. This one comes out July 1st, 2014, and I highly recommend.

More than a biography, Fierce Patriot is an historical account with a leading man, William T. Sherman. Instead of an exhaustive life story from beginning to end, O’Connell decides to dissect Sherman into sections:

Part 1: The Military Strategist – An outline of the strategy he used to terrorize and whip the South back into the Union.
Part 2: The General and His Army – How Sherman interacted with his army.
Part 3: The Man and His Families – The role his family played on his life and how he overcame the shadow of being adopted and marrying his adopted sister, Ellen. (Not as scandalous as you might think.)

A majority of the book outlines his role as a military strategist. I’ve never read much about the Civil War, so Sherman’s perspective was fascinating to me. If you’re a Civil War buff, perhaps there’s more details in Sherman’s own autobiography, Memoirs of General W.T. Sherman, or the thousands upon thousands of books written about this time period.

O’Connell sums up the importance of Sherman’s strategic leadership in the war, in particular his infamous March on the South:

“Like Napoleon, he dominated the script of war, and not just through sheer volume. He matched Grant, even surpassed him, in his capacity for the memorable phrase, the strategic one-line, once again critical in operations since you want subordinates to remember what you told them to do. But it also welded him to his men, who reveled in his rhetoric and traded aphorisms across their solider network until they all believed they knew him.”

I also found the second section about him and “his boys” interesting. Sherman, or "Uncle Billy" as he was affectionately known, was loyal to his soldiers to the end, even attending countless reunions, weddings, and ceremonies for his soldiers. He treated them all equally despite rank and did everything he could to prevent senseless death. He was known to retreat when victory was impossible, which was not an approach shared by others on both sides of the war.

The last section, though much shorter, sort of fizzled for me. Sherman was somewhat against religion, but his wife was a devout Catholic and raised the children this way. Sherman was obviously gone from the home for much of time, especially during the war, so this gave Ellen’s Catholic influence the upper hand. One of his beloved sons actually became a priest, to Sherman’s horror. I think much of this section could’ve been welded into the other sections and may have even given a bit of reprieve from some of the boring aspects of regiment life.

Remarkably, some of the best writing O’Connell provides is in the Author’s Notes at the end. Here’s what he says about history:

“Never a historically minded people, Americans seem even less interested in the past these days. Meanwhile, it remains unclear what history can do, whom it should serve, what it should be. Academics continue to doggedly address these issues, but in the process they produce much that is unreadable. Popular history is easier to consume but varies wildly in quality; the genre is largely the province of journalists, who often lack the background to see deep trends and long-term causation. The path forward remains cluttered with question marks.”

I agree, and that’s why books like this are so important. We can’t avoid conflict and war unless we know what it means and does. We have lots of examples at our fingertips, so there should be no excuses as to why we don’t avoid it at all cost.

[TXGAL1 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Difficult read; once put down, hard to pick up again. Not my definition of a history book.

[Phrodrick slowed his growing backlog · Rating 5 out of 5]

I think my last three biographies were of Republican presidents. All were friendly and all made the case that these were good patriotic men. However, stacked atop each other and turned on their side, they were collectively so shallow as to about disappear. Now comes Robert O’Connell’s Fierce Patriot: The Tangled Lives of William Tecumseh Sherman Hardcover – maybe the depth and originality of the book has me over rating it.
One other thought. I sorta come of age during the 100-year anniversary of the American Civil War. I was very young. In my home town of New Orleans, most of what was there for me to read and look at was written by southerners. My dad, native of New York felt I need some unionist outlook in my mix got me a good history from a “Yanque” but it lacked the pictures I still needed at that age.

What then do we make of New York Born and Virginia educated Robert O’ Connell. Mostly I think he writes what he thinks., He is clearly not pro slavery, but it leeks through that Sherman was about every kind of ‘ist’ we can condemn. Certainly, he helped to physically free a lot of slaves. It took him forever to begin to respect blacks as humans. Ultimately, he did in a very subtle way give them a special pride of place in his victory parade after the Civil war. Staying with his not exactly a 21st century hero statues. He was a disloyal, albeit loving husband, and if pressed hardly free of antisemitism. He commanded the American army in its destruction of the peoples of western first nations. This alone may make him worthy of any and all condemnations.

And yet, And yet. The ineludible fact is that he, by being a loyal American, loyal wing man to General, later President Grant brought about a faster and better end to The American Civil War. He was as critical, and less in the public eye for the success in planning and completing the trans-continental railroad.

His was a tangled life. Tangled in keeping America, America. Perpetuating its most serious and deadly flaws, especially racism. Warmly comfortable in his freedoms only available in a white Christian patrimony. Also, a promoter of female artists, so what if she was a mistress. Speaking of which he was just as fiercely dismissive of what would have been a certain career as an elected official. At a walk he could have been an American President. He had a well-placed brother to protect him from political attacks. Both President Lincoln and General, later President Grant added layers to that side of being a General Officer. Tangle personal life, tangled public life, tangled sex life. All that and a child of a family so impoverished he was raised in a relative’s house, also politically connected, and he married a younger cousin, from that same house hold. Dare I say it? Tangled.

Fierce Patriot tells a lot of story in not that many pages. The coverage of the Civil war is quickly handled with a minimum of military minutia. Of particular interest to me; O’Connell’s refusal to paint his march from Atlanta to the Sea as nearly as rapine as is most often painted. At that he make the point, usually ignored that Southern armies had long been taking what and whoever they wanted from among fellow southerners. Not specifically said, though clear to me from other sources; Tecumseh’s, out riders, took what they wanted, mostly from plantations. Meaning from those Southerners with the most and the most power in the old south. Southern raiding parties tended to specialize in lesser farms and less influential fellow southerners. All agree that his soldiers believed him when Sherman, “Uncle Billy” told them to go lightly, in North Carolina, and to have at em in South Carolina.

Almost all of the rest of the book. Sherman’s, post-Civil war life, and last, not first, his youth and home life, will come as news to many. O’Connell has a lot of respect for WTS. There is enough of a record for you to have your own opinion.

[Steven Z. · Rating 3 out of 5]

According to Robert L. O’Connell in his new book AMERICAN PATRIOT: THE TANGLED LIVES OF WILLIAM TECUMSEH SHERMAN, the life of the Civil War hero should not be portrayed in the traditional fashion by preparing a chronological narrative because its results would be too cumbersome. Instead, the author has produced a fascinating book that consists of three parts that add up to a biography, but is organized in a rather confusing manner. What the author has written is a “pseudo-biography” that covers Sherman’s life in excellent detail with a great deal of analysis. I understand that historians are always looking for a fresh approach toward their subjects that have been dealt with previously, but at times they should not try and reinvent the wheel. Again, let me reiterate, I enjoyed the book and took away a great deal, but at times I would have hoped the material in the last section of the narrative could have been included in the lengthy first section to form greater coherence.

O’Connell begins by arguing that Sherman’s life brings with it an enormous amount of documentary material stemming from his own writing, an extensive oral record of his statements, and the voluminous material produced by the Civil War. The author concludes that it is almost impossible to produce a definitive one volume biography of Sherman. In addition, the difficulty is enhanced because of the many myths associated with Sherman from the accusation of being a war criminal, a racist, and a very class conscious individual who supported the business classes. The author concludes that there is evidence for each of these myths, but there is also material that disproves them, particularly when we apply twenty-first century standards to nineteenth century figures. For O’Connell, Sherman falls into a category below Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and FDR as individuals who were responsible for furthering American growth and making transcontinental consolidation possible, and the author’s resulting effort accurately proves that point.
In preparing the book O’Connell has decided to portray three story lines. The first, “if Jefferson was the architect of continental expansion, Sherman would become his general contractor.” (xviii) By the time Sherman retired from the army in 1884, he “had become virtually a human embodiment of Manifest destiny. Florida, California, reclaiming the Confederacy, winning the west.” (xix) Second, the co-evolution of the army of the west and Sherman as its commander as he taught legions of men “the most valued of military skills: the ability to adapt,” and the ability to adjust on the fly after much trial and error. Thirdly, Sherman created a model “of how to grab and hold on to fame in America, one that still works today.” (xx) For O’Connell, Sherman’s life boils down to a three ring circus, each fascinating, but they must be dealt with separately or components of his life become too distracting. As a result he sticks to a section describing Sherman as a military strategist, another as a general, and he concludes with a section of Sherman as a human being after retirement. My problem is that these sections continuously overlap and there are parts of the book that the reader is told that what he is writing about will become much clearer later. I admire O’Connell’s effort, but John F. Marszalek’s SHERMAN: A SOLDIER’S PASSION FOR ORDER did an admirable job of creating what O’Connell discounts.

O’Connell begins by lecturing the reader on the concept of military strategy and concludes that Sherman’s ultimate career goal was national consolidation of the central bond of the North American continent and Manifest Destiny. He further concludes that he never wanted to be in total command during his military career, as it was difficult enough being in charge of strategy. These conclusions are well supported in the first two-thirds of the book that make up section one. O’Connell is on firm ground with his theme and goes on to support his argument as he takes the reader through Sherman’s career at West Point, the Second Seminole War of 1835-1842, a stint at on the Sullivan Islands across the harbor from Charleston, South Carolina, as a recruiting officer in the Pittsburgh region, a stationing in California, and investigating corruption in New Orleans. What should be apparent is that the most important activity of this time period was the Mexican War, which Sherman missed out on, while others from his graduating class at West Point began to earn their reputations. As a strategist what was most important for Sherman at this juncture of his life was his discovery of the importance of the Mississippi which fit his world view as he would describe the region as the “spinal column of America.” Sherman’s love for geography and topography was born at this time and along with a photographic memory for detail. This would allow him to remember almost every aspect from each area that he transverses in his career fostering the development of a data base that in part explains his success as a strategist during the Civil War.

It is O’Connell’s discussion of the Civil War that is the strongest part of the book. O’Connell does pepper this section with details concerning his upbringing, his relationship with the Ewing family, his marriage and raising a family all of which are important enough, but detail later in the book clarifies a great deal of what is discussed here. In a sense the Civil War saved Sherman’s career. By the early 1850s Sherman leaves the army and tries his hand in the private sector. His father-in-law, Thomas Ewing, a cabinet officer, politician, and wealthy individual wanted him to take over a Salt Mine he owned near his home in Lancaster, Ohio which became part of a tug of war between the Ewing family and his wife Ellen, and what Sherman wanted to do with his life. The Ewing-Sherman relationship at times dominates the narrative as Sherman tries to be his own man and continually win over his wife. The period preceding the Civil War was probably the worst period for Sherman. His career as a New York banker ended with the crash of 1857. He returned to California as a banker but due to the economy the venture was a failure. He finally gives into Thomas Ewing’s urging and runs one of the the family businesses in Leavenworth, Ka. It became increasingly clear to Sherman the only arena that he felt comfortable in was the military and after the election of Lincoln he rejoins the army and with secession his career is saved.

The author spends a prodigious amount of time discussing the major battles that Sherman was involved in. The reader witnesses how Sherman trains and develops the army of the west and making it into one of the best fighting forces in American history by the end of the war. We witness how Sherman cultivated his soldiers to believe in him and how he developed his command. The knowledge of American geography is applied and we see his strategy unfold. O’Connell delves into the egos of the period, be it Sherman, Henry Halleck, Simon Cameron, Edwin Stanton, Ulysses S. Grant and others and the personality conflicts that were readily apparent. Sherman’s logistical genius greatly assisted Grant in Tennessee resulting in the Sherman-Grant relationship that was based on mutual trust. Sherman was content to being Grant’s “wing man” or second in command and the relationship flourished. Sherman suffered from depression and Grant tended to imbibe a bit too much as Sherman described their relationship, “he stood by me when I was crazy and I stood by him when he was drunk, now sir we stand by each other always.” (95)

For Sherman the battle of Shiloh in April, 1862 was a major turning point. Shiloh was a success because Sherman was able to blunt the south’s effort to recover the initiative in the Mississippi Valley and opened the way for a rendering of the military balance in the west and securing Sherman’s reputation. The theme of securing the Mississippi so crucial to Sherman’s thinking is explored in the run up to and final battle at Vicksburg a year later, culminating in a union victory in July, 1863. Sherman’s audacious strategy was key and as 1864 approached Sherman was aware of the south’s tenacity so he convinced Grant that the best way to defeat the south was “to attack southern morale and its relationship to crushing the rebellion….Both understood the psychological effect of their blue-clad armies barging across the landscape, taking what they wanted, and wrecking anything that looked Confederate,” (132) they would engage the Confederate field armies and destroy them, killing rebels, and getting into their heads. Grant would be the battering ram in the East, and Sherman would employ his mastery of operations and strategy as he marched toward Atlanta. O’Connell’s discussion of the march to the sea is excellent. We are placed inside Sherman’s mind as well as the Confederates he fought. The detail is exquisite and is one of the major highlights of the book. The burning of Atlanta, the seizure of Savannah, and the march into South Carolina for revenge against the heart of the enemy as it burns Columbia rather than Charleston and the move into North Carolina where Sherman softens his approach are all described. The success was based on foraging and living off the land as well as engineering genius, but as with other topics there is greater detail about the “bummers” (foragers) in a later part of the book. The author concludes this section of the book with a discussion of Sherman’s post war role in implementing the transcontinental rail road, a goal that he had set earlier in his career and fit right in with his belief of continental expansion.

The final third of the book is broken down into two parts. The first explores Sherman’s soldiers and their relationship to him. O’Connell describes the intricacies of the army of the west and its conduct during the Civil War. We learn what fighting was like at Shiloh and Vicksburg. We learn what it was like marching 120 miles on the way to Atlanta, and fighting an insurgency through the eyes of the participants. Shiloh is explained through the vision of a seventeen year old drummer boy, and the life of a “bummer” is explored through their own eyes as they faced the difficulty of locating food for an entire army. The author also explains the role of the new technology developed during the war and how it affected Sherman’s strategy and how his soldiers adapted to it. Basically, this section is a history of the army of the west from its inception, training, skill set and application in battle, all information that could have been integrated more effectively in the first section of the book.

O’Connell brings his narrative to a close by describing the difficulties that marrying into the Ewing family presented. His wife Ellen’s constant pressure to have Sherman convert to Catholicism irked the general and made him feel as if there was a papist plot against him. Ellen’s need to spend meant that throughout their marriage there was always pressure on Sherman to make a great deal of money. The competition between the legacy of Thomas Ewing and Sherman’s career path is a key component as to what drove Sherman a good part of his life, when finally after the Civil War he could feel that he was finally the dominant figure in the eyes of his wife. O’Connell weaves in at least two of the affairs that Sherman was involved in during his marriage, but concludes the thirty year bond between Ellen and her husband always remained strong. The author closes with a discussion of Sherman’s “rock star” career after the Civil War and how the public fed his need for approval. There are components in the book that border on “psychohistory,” but the author’s conclusions in that area are a bit flimsy. Overall the book is quite interesting and if one can deal with its organizational flaws it is well worth reading.

[Louise · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a good book for those who (like me before reading it) know only a few facts about William Tecumseh Sherman. Robert O’Connell gives a good outline of his highly eventful life showing him to be a military man through and through. He likes people, theater, the Union and winning. He has a great sense of geography which enhances his strategic thinking. He knows how to cut losses and thereby save lives.

It is a book of surprises. The first one was on p. 5, a drawing Sherman made as a Cadet at West Point. Other surprises are Sherman’s banking career, his role in the discovery of CA gold, his marriage to his foster sister, his powerful political family (his brother is the Sherman of the anti-trust legislation), his leadership in a Louisiana military academy, his affair with Vinnie Ream, his son’s entry into the priesthood and more. The last surprise is General Joseph Johnston serving as a his pall bearer.

I appreciated the early discussion on the West Point curriculum, what it was and what it wasn’t. The professional relationships of Sherman and Henry Halleck and General Grant are well drawn. Sherman’s planning for and execution of the Atlanta Campaign and the March to the Sea it are good summaries for the general reader as are the occupations of Memphis and Savanah. The “March” was quite different than I envisioned it.

O’Connell shows a more enlightened man than the image of brutality that often surrounds his name. He is ferocious on behalf of the Union but when towns surrender, their people are treated as fellow citizens. His war is his passionate defense of the Union. His liberation of slaves is to strike at the plantation owners who tore the Union apart. Having newly freed men give him information and assist on campaigns, he gets to know them and understand their situation. He becomes ahead of his time on race and race relations. His marchers at the Grand Review include the Blacks who worked along with his troops.

The book is arranged such that the career history is separate from the personal life. This seemed to create two different Sherman’s. In the career part he is pictured as a “good” husband and family man (despite his wife Ellen’s father’s demands and her strong religious commitment) although his work keeps him many miles and many months away from the family. The second part shows the couple’s quarrels over money, religion and Sherman’s affairs making hard to imagine the marriage as portrayed in the parallel career chronology.

The author does not address Sherman’s middle name and it is not clear if Tecumseh was his first name, changed to his second by his foster father, Thomas Ewing. Whether it was his first or middle name, why would Charles Sherman name his son for a Shawnee leader (p.272) “determined to prevent white encroachment”? O’Connell calls Sherman (p.xix) “virtually a human embodiment of Manifest Destiny” without irony. Whatever the issues, Sherman must have been attached to this unusual name and gives it to his son, known as P. Tecumseh Sherman.

O’Connell succeeds in showing Sherman’s complexity, his major role in keeping the Union united and then tying it together via the railroad. You come to see Sherman without the war crimes baggage and think of him as O’Connell does: as one of the few historical figures who would fit right into the current age.

[robin friedman · Rating 4 out of 5]

A Lollapalooza Of A Life

In his new book, "Fierce Patriot: The Tangled Lives of William Tecumseh Sherman" (2014), Robert O'Connell writes of his subject: "Not unexpectedly, [Sherman] has already sired a string of biographies. All deserve some credit for having attempted to capture such a lollapalooza of a life. Yet many share a staccato, even frenetic quality as they jump from topic to topic, racing to keep up with one frenetic life story."

This brief quotation captures a great deal both about Sherman (1820 -- 1891) and about the book. O'Connell develops the paradoxes of Sherman's character which resist easy summation. O'Connell shows the "Uncle Billy" of popular renown, in his own time and ours, but he also shows how this character was a construct by a highly theatrical Sherman. His account is strongly but critically admiring of Sherman. O'Connell frequently refers to various of his actions as "good Billy, bad Billy". O'Connell also writes in a colloquial, punchy style that makes the book a delight to read and highly accessible for a complex subject.

In addition to the free-wheeling writing style, O'Connell's biography of Sherman is idiosyncratic in its organization. O'Connell concluded that writing a straightforward chronological biography of Sherman would be "bound to create confusion." He found that "three separate story lines, each deserving independent development" emerged from Sherman's life. Accordingly, O'Connell arranges his book topically rather than chronologically in three large sections. The organization produces a clear, well-flowing narrative of Sherman's accomplishments and life but at a cost. First, the book includes a substantial degree of repetition. Second, materials in the earlier parts of the book sometimes require information not presented until much later to be fully understood. Third, the final part of the book, which explores Sherman's private life, lags on occasion and is anti-climactic to what has come before.But even though the organization is not entirely successful, O'Connell has written a perceptive, engaging biography of Sherman. In what follows, I will look briefly at the three strands of O'Connell's story.

The first and by far the longest part is titled "The Military Strategist". O'Connell begins with Sherman's studies at West Point, covers his early military career, and his mixed effoirts as a civililan in California and St. Louis before the outbreak of the Civil War. He does an excellent job in tying in Sherman's early life, with its ups and downs, with the events which would make him famous. O'Connell develops what he calls Sherman's sense of himself as a "wingman", working as second in command to another person, most notably U.S.Grant in the Civil War. He also shows Sherman's slowly developing sense of strategy, as Sherman came to wage psychological as well as physical warfare on the South in his March to the Sea and subsequent march through the Carolinas. O'Connell also emphasizes Sherman's career following the Civil War which, he suggests in agreement with Sherman,may have overshadowed his Civil War achievements in importance. Sherman served as the commanding general of the United States and was instrumental in American expansionism, including the building of the transcontinental railroad, the extermination of the buffalo, and the wars against the plains Indians. These accomplishments came at high human cost. O'Connell is blunt and direct in concluding that much of the criticism of Sherman is misdirected.

The second part of the book, "The General and his Army" looks at Sherman's "boys" in the Civil War and how Sherman's relationship to his troops developed in the course of the Civil War. Sherman initially was skeptical of his volunteers. As he continued to lead the western armies, his relationship evolved to such an extent that his soldiers trusted him fully and would do the extraordinary things he asked of them in the latter part of the war. O'Connell finds that the Union Army of the West came together as a cohesive unit for Sherman after the Battle of Missionary Ridge in which, oddly, Sherman did not distinguish himself. Under Sherman's leadership, O'Connell argues, "the legions that marched through Georgia and the Carolinas had mastered one of the rarest and most valued of military skills: the ability to adapt." O'Connell writes:

"Sherman and his boys were a violent bunch, but they were also decent, idealistic, and inherently magnanimous, reflexively holding out a hand to defeated Southerners. This was easier because almost all believed they were fellow Americans. Yet it would remain true of subsequent American armies in some very far-off places where the people were decidedly not fellow Americans -- that is, when they weren't making the rubble bounce. Alternately devastating and benevolent, that's us, or at least our spear tip, and has been since Uncle Billy and his boys scared the hell out of the Confederacy."

In the final part of the book "The Man and his Families" O'Connell examines the frequently tortured course of Sherman's personal life beginning with his relationship to the powerful Ewing family. Sherman was raised by the Ewing's following his own father's death and married Ewing's daughter Ellen after a long courtship. The marriage was troubled by lengthy separations, by strong religious differences and by Sherman's affairs, yet it held. O'Connell offers a nuanced portrayal of Sherman's family life and of his later years when he participated regularly in veteran's reunions and acquired a reputation for sociability and public speaking among much else. The depiction of the intimate Sherman is insightful in many years, but it tends to lose focus by its placement late in the book and by its separation from the treatment of Sherman's many public accomplishments. O'Connell finds that Americans continue to be fascinated by Sherman because he is clearly one of us. He concludes:

"Sherman was all these things, a mixture of good and bad, but still a familiar and comfortable presence. It's hard to imagine a more American man than Sherman. And although he died over 120 years ago, it's a safe bet that should Uncle Billy be brought back to life tomorrow, after a short orientation with the requisite hardware and software, he'd find himself right at home."

O'Connell has written an excellent biography of Sherman and his "tangled lives". The book will appeal to readers interested in the Civil War and in the American experience.

Robin Friedman

[Charles · Rating 2 out of 5]

I pre-ordered this book the moment I saw it on amazon.com and began reading with great anticipation the day it arrived. Sherman is long overdue for a full-length biography and I hoped this would be it. So I wish I could write that FIERCE PATRIOT: THE TANGLED LIVES OF WILLIAM TECUMSEH SHERMAN, by Robert L. O’Connell met my expectations. It did not.

Those expectations were tempered even before I started reading. When the book arrived the first thing I noticed is how short it is. Mr. O’Connell explains in the introduction what wealth of primary sources he had to work with in choosing Sherman as his subject, yet he managed to produce a book of only 404 pages, 354 without the notes. Obviously this was not a serious biography, but I still managed to keep my expectations high.

Those wobbly expectations toppled over almost completely while reading the Introduction. Mr. O’Connell admits in the introduction, that not only did he not read all the primary sources dealing directly to Sherman, he did not even read all of Sherman’s writings. He writes, “So you plod on until finally you come to understand you will never get through all of Sherman, that you are drowning in Sherman,” (pg. xv). I found that startling, and as a reader a disheartening admission. Am I wrong ? Or should a biographer read, if not all of the primary sources, at least everything the subject wrote?

Mr. Connell then goes on to explain that Sherman is such a complex character that he cannot be dealt with as the subject of a biography traditionally would. He writes, “The more I studied the secondary literature and recalled my exhausting swim through the primary documents, the more I became convinced that any attempt to confine Sherman to a single chronological track was bound to create confusion,” (pg. xviii). Initially, I wondered if this approach demonstrated a lack if faith in the reader or an admission by Mr. O’Connell that he was not quite up to the task he had brought to hand. I have read more than a view biographies and do not enjoy those that are written this way. Biographies should reveal to the reader the life of the subject in the manner and chronology in which it was lived and experienced. Only in the rarest cases is this not possible. Sherman is not one of those cases

Obviously every human being and especially those worthy of a biography are more complex than they appear on the surface. But the idea that Sherman is so complex that to be understood his life has to be compartmentalized in three separate narratives seemed more of an indictment of Mr. O’Connell as a writer and historian than it did as any meaningful insight in to the life of William T. Sherman. After all, countless authors have written countless biographies of people infinitely more complex than Sherman. It seemed like O’Connell decided early just to schlock it together.

I frankly almost closed the book at that point, but resisting that urge, I soldiered on. It did not improve.

One of Mr. O’Connell’s theses is that Sherman is one of history’s great military strategist. I came to this book with a sympathetic view of Sherman and was prepared to agree with this thesis. Still I was not convinced by Mr. O’Connell’s arguments. His arguments are not well thought out; nor are they well supported and at more than a few points are best described as sophomoric.

Two flaws are typical of FIERCE PATRIOT. In the section of the book that is supposed to be about Sherman the Strategist, Mr. O’Connell manages to tell the whole story of the Vicksburg Campaign without explaining that Sherman disagreed with the strategy Grant devised and which ultimately led to the fall of Vicksburg. That, of course, doesn't necessarily make Sherman a bad strategist, but it would seem relevant to section off the book purporting to show Sherman’s development into a brilliant strategist.

The second deals more directly with Mr. O’Connell’s grasp of his subject. In writing about the first day at Shiloh, he writes, “It was probably (General Benjamin) Prentiss who saved the day,” (pg. 99). “Probably” saved the day? Without Prentiss reforming his routed troops and their stand in what is called the Hornets Nest the Union definitely loses Shilo; not probably, but definitely. Prentiss and his men eventually had to surrender themselves, but not before giving Grant several precious hours to reform the rest of the routed army and prepare a counter attack. There is no doubt that the Union forces would have been completely routed and defeated at Shiloh without Prentiss’s defense of the Hornets Nest, there really is no “probably” about it. Grant and Sherman readily acknowledge this fact and I have never heard or read any historian argue otherwise.

Mr. O’Connell did make one argument that I found persuasive and that is that Sherman knew and understood that he was better as chief subordinate than in command. Unlike most civil war generals Sherman did not seek or want an independent command or to be, as we might say today, in the center chair. The fact that he realized a subordinate role better suited his temperament and skill set is remarkable and Mr. O’Connell does a good job of arguing and supporting his argument.

I wanted to like and recommend FIERCE PATRIOT, but found I could not, it is simply too superficial and sprinkled throughout with under-supported and flawed historical judgements.

[Jean · Rating 4 out of 5]

William Tecumseh Sherman was born in 1820 in Ohio. His family nicknamed was “Cump”. He was the grandson of Roger Sherman of Connecticut a signer of the Declaration of Independence and one of the architects of the Constitution. WTS’s father moved to Ohio in 1811 and set up a legal practice. He fathered eleven children and died unexpectedly in 1829. WTC was adopted by Thomas Ewing a friend of his fathers and a wealthy lawyer and politician. Sherman’s brother John Sherman became a lawyer and politician. He was a U.S. Senator from Ohio during the Civil War and after.
The first part of the book covers Sherman’s early life, his time at West point (1836) and his career in the army. The section that covers the Civil War is extremely detailed. In the Civil War Sherman was assigned to serve under Major General Ulysses S. Grant, they fought together at Shiloh, Vicksburg and Chattanooga. Sherman was promoted to Major General and turned loose by Grant in 1864, with an independent command, to rip out the logistical innards of the Confederacy. O’Connell goes into meticulous detail in Sherman’s “March to the Sea”. This is the largest part of the book and the most through.
The middle of the book covers Sherman’s career from after the Civil war to retirement. WTS was made General in Chief of the Army when Grant became President. WTS over saw the Westward expansion of the Nation, including the building of infrastructure such as roads, railroads and protecting settlers.
The last part of the book covers WTS personal and family life. He married Ellen Ewing his adopted sister. They had seven children. His wife travel with him to some post but preferred to stay at her father’s home in Ohio most often. They had seven children, one son became a priest must to the dismay of Sherman. Ellen was a devoted catholic but Sherman was a Calvinist. Ellen died in 1888. O’Connell does cover some of the affairs and mistress of Sherman. No biographer, including O’Connell has made the marriage come fully to life, or his well known womanizing. This section of the book is under developed.
Robert L. O’Connell has a Ph.D. in History and spent thirty years as an analyst at the National Ground Intelligent Center. Currently he is a visiting Professor at the Naval Postgraduate School and author of numerous military books. O’Connell takes a fresh viewpoint from other writers I have read on Sherman to date. The book is well worth the read for those interested in Civil War history or in general history. I read this as an audio book downloaded from Audible. Andrew Garman did an excellent job narrating the book.

[Eric · Rating 4 out of 5]

"In the morning Sherman imposed full discipline, rounded up his stragglers, issued one hundred rifles to such civil authorities as remained, and marched on, to the next stop of what O’Connell aptly calls the 'roadshow' of emancipation. Sherman’s culminating performance was the Grand Review of the returning armies, May 23 and 24, 1865. Two hundred thousand troops paraded down Pennsylvania Avenue, past the boxed dignitaries of Washington and seventy-five thousand cheering citizens. Sherman’s forces marched on the second day. Whitman, then clerking at the Indian Bureau, noted that divisions were preceded by pioneer battalions of 'real Southern darkies, black as tar,' marching smartly with shouldered axes. They had felled forests and laid the log roads on which the army had crossed the Carolina swamps. And taking up the rear, the families of freed people who had followed Sherman’s army out of bondage, and into an uncertain future. Black residents of Washington would also trail President Grant’s second Inauguration Day parade, and be jeered. With Lincoln killed, these generals were their hope."

http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksda...

[Stephen · Rating 3 out of 5]

First of all, put aside the legends that have accrued to the name - The March to the Sea, the "War is all hell" quote - the man simply has one of the greatest faces in American history. Who but a Southerner, a Tea Party nut or a pacifist could fail to see the beauty of it?



Counter to the image of these steel eyes that seem to look directly into the terror of this nation's dilemma, I am very surprised to hear that when this redhead spoke he could be nervous and verbose. I had been under the impression he had been no-nonsense and reticent like U.S. Grant. In fact when he was stationed in Kentucky at the onset of the Civil War it was these qualities while planning out the western strategy that had caused journalists and those of the military hierarchy to deem him insane. But his stepfather Thomas Ewing had pull in Washington - never knew he had that kind of family backing - though I was aware blood brother John was an influential senator, rising in power as the Civil War rose. As a young man "Cump" missed out on being tested in war, which he needed and desired, working the country for opportunity in Florida during the Second Seminole War, next in undeveloped, golden, Spanish California as the Gold Rush broke out, St. Louis too, a few stints leading banks that brought him good income but hardly a career.

An excellent un-rooted 19th century American life this unsuccessful man nevertheless was able to receive two audiences with two different presidents, thanks to those connections, before finally realizing his talents at the brutal battle of Shiloh. Despite Sherman's volubility, his thoroughness and energy brought to any new venture that invariably led him to bad luck, Lincoln was able to look past the reputation of insanity and failure for the quality of the man. Today Lincoln, Grant and Sherman would be categorized as depressives, men whose psychologies were in need of help, but back in the 19th century they left them alone and simply called them leaders.

Sherman married his foster sister Ellen at a time when he was struggling with a military career that gave him no battles or promotion, hopeful all the same. She preferred home in Ohio. He kept having to come back to her from some far flung adventure, usually in banking. They stuck together; her Roman Catholicism turned him into an agnostic. Post-Civil War he apparently had an eye for young women, including a Washington sculptor named Vinnie Ream (whose bust of Lincoln sits in the Capitol rotunda today). This facet of the man, and a closer look at the path he cut from Atlanta in flames, through Georgia in rebellion, onward to the sea and Savannah I look forward to taking up with some other writer, one who has as strong an eye for analysis as Cump did war.

[Sherri · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading this book very much. I'm not one for military biographies in general. My husband is very knowledgeable in the Civil War and Napoleonic history, and was quite surprised to find me reading this book. Sherman was obviously one of our country's greatest generals. This I knew before reading the book. However, where O'Connell drew me in was in his early, pre-military career days. I found it fascinating that he had a varied, and moderately successful career in banking and engineering. I had no idea that his wife was actually his foster sister whose family took him in after his father passed away. And it wasn't until that fateful joining of him and U.S. Grant in the Civil War that made him the legend he is today. A great man can get people to follow him through hell and back without question; and he did this. He took uneducated, undisciplined and often unwilling men and turned them into first-rate soldiers who became a formidable fighting machine in the war. The chapter called, "The March," was one of my favorites in the book. Taking the men from Atlanta up into North Carolina, and inevitably to the end of the war. They won every battle unflinchingly, never went hungry, and always out-numbered the enemy they encountered along the way. His men were willing to die for him, under any circumstances. There was one difference in him and other generals, aside from his brilliance in strategic thinking and planning, and almost photographic memory of terrain, and that was his caring about the welfare of his men. He never recklessly put them in harm's way, and always thought of the consequences of any commands he gave. After the war ended, these men (including Sherman) would reunite every year faithfully. Always their "Uncle Billy" to the day they died. I had also forgotten what a significant part he played in building and completing the Transcontinental railroad. Which without question changed the course of America. He was truly a complex figure in our history. I'm very glad I had the opportunity to read this account from Robert O'Connell.

[Bonnie_blu · Rating 2 out of 5]

I found the book superficial, oddly segmented, and full of statements that are not supported in the text. O'Connell either gave up trying to write a perspicacious biography about Sherman or perhaps was not up to the task. Yes, Sherman was a very complex character living in a very complex time, but historical biographers have been revealing such characters for years (for example, Adrian Goldsworthy's "Caesar: Life of a Colossus"). How can a biographer expect to accurately reveal his/her subject without reading all of the documents produced by the subject? O'Connell admits to this in the introduction, which immediately made me concerned about the book. I could go on in great detail; however, I don't want to devote any more time to this book. I had high hopes for the book, but was greatly disappointed, and cannot recommend it to anyone who truly wants to understand Sherman. NOTE: If you want to read a detailed review of the problems with this book, I recommend E. Evans review on Amazon.

[Debbie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I won my copy of this book in the goodreads first read giveaway. I'd like to thank the author and publisher for giving me a chance to read this fascinating biography. I appreciated how down to earth and readable this book was. The author goes into depth about Sherman's time at West Point, his fatherless childhood, and his life during and after the Civil War. At all times the book was engaging and interesting. The balance was good and I never found the narrative boring. O'Connell actually compares military strategists to break surfers and explains the analogy well. He documents Sherman's difficult marriage to Ellen who he felt was spendthrift even though she probably wasn't. He speaks of his affairs with two other women and his adjustment to retirement after the war. He also outlines Sherman's interesting relationship with his stepfather. I'm not a huge civil war buff and yet I'm still glad that I read this book. I learned so much of the time period, Lincoln, the Civil War, West Point, military strategy that I stayed interested throughout the book.

[Colleen Browne · Rating 2 out of 5]

The title makes you think this is going to be a complex, fascinating book and I wanted it to be. Unfortunately, I found it disjointed, under researched, and a disappointment. I would love to read a good biography of Sherman but this is not it.

[Betsy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is divided into three parts with the most interesting section being the first since it deals with the pre-Civil War years as well as the bloody conflict itself. Interestingly enough, sometimes Sherman was at war with himself which led to periods of depression and loss of self-confidence, especially after failures in business. The author clearly appreciates Sherman the warrior, pointing out his strengths as a strategist, however, he also points out his weaknesses when it comes to his less-than-stellar relationship with the blacks who looked to Sherman's army as their hoped-for-rescuers.

The author ably describes the relationship between Grant and Sherman, which held true until Grant ran for President. It was only then that politics opened a wedge between the two men. Sherman preferred to stay with the army although he also encouraged the building of the transcontinental railroad. The second section of the book deals with this period. It is also the most difficult part to read since it reflects Sherman's (and others) implacable nature toward the American Indians who were trying to preserve their way of life.

The final section deals with his family life. He married his foster sister, Ellen, who had a politically influential family. This relationship, along with that of his politically astute brother, John, who eventally became a senator, helped Sherman's career at opportune times. Unfortunately, the marriage was not always a happy one.

The author ends the book with a visit to the huge statue of Sherman in Central Park. It is covered in gilt and rather relects the fiery man who brought such terror to the South. Some miles away on Manhattan's Upper West Side is Grant's tomb. Grant was not as flashy as Sherman, but together they forged a partnership which brought victory.

[Jerome Otte · Rating 3 out of 5]

An insightful and mostly well-written work. O’Connell looks at how Sherman contributed to preserving and expanding America, how he contributed to America’s strategic and tactical thought, and Sherman’s personal life.

The narrative is readable and engaging. O’Connell’s Sherman comes off as not too self-aware, perceptive, or empathetic in general, but writes how these could be manifested in his military career anyway. He also devotes more attention than usual to Sherman’s banking career, the California gold discoveries, and his time at the Louisiana military academy.

The section on Sherman’s March seems a bit too brief. It also seems like O’Connell at times tries a bit too hard to credit Sherman with the Union’s strategic and tactical innovations (such as marching away from your own supply lines to live off the land) The narrative itself is a bit disjointed and repetitive at times, jumps around quite a bit, and not all of its arguments seem well supported. The section on Sherman’s possible affairs seemed speculative. O’Connell also accuses Grant of being an unfeeling butcher, attributing to him a “lack of concern that the agents of his will were made of flesh and blood...at this level of engagement casualties were just numbers.”

O’Connell also frequently uses some jarring modern-day language; Sherman gives a performance “worthy of Daffy Duck (or, given the hair color, perhaps Woody Woodpecker)." Sherman also has a “personal geo-spatial database,” was a “visual vacuum cleaner” and a “regular army kind of guy,” shares “the same high-frequency wavelength” as his peers, is skilled at “networking,” served as Grant’s “wingman,” was married to a “Catholic tiger-mom,” and there’s some annoying references to things like Monty Python and a “yuppie pioneer.”At one point Grant, Sherman and Sheridan are called the “three amigos,” O'Connell creates a “Team Ewing” and a “Team Sherman,” and in one bizarre tangent O’Connell compares military strategy to surfing. Even more awkwardly, he calls Ellen Sherman “warm, affectionate, and at times even horny,” and at one point “the strategic Sherman saw one shot left in his reproductive revolver.”

A clear, vivid but breezy biography.

[Noah Goats · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m not sure what Robert O’Connell was thinking when he devised the structure of this book. He divides the life of Sherman into three sections, one covering Sherman as a soldier and strategist, one covering his relationship with his soldiers, and a final section covering his relationships with his family. This organization causes him to go over the same events three times in some cases, and by finishing with the family relationship chapter he makes sure he ends with the most boring part. As a result, even though I liked this book, I had trouble finishing it. Organization seems to be a chronic problem with O’Connell; I also did not care for the way he organized his book about the Battle of Cannae.

But the author has a good subject in Sherman, who was not only one of the greatest generals of the war, be was also one of the most colorful. O’Connell is an admirer of Sherman and paints him as one of the great heroes of American history. Despite his conduct of the Indian wars, I’m inclined to agree.

[Nolan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an excellent biography of a man you and I think we know reasonably well. A few minutes with this book, however, and the first thing we grasp is that we don't know the guy nearly as well as we thought we did. Even the casual student of the Civil War has some vague idea that General Sherman fought on the side of the union and engaged in thoughtless destruction during his march to the sea. Granted, his forces humbled those areas through which they marched, but he seems to have issued guidelines that strove for some humanity in the process, although South Carolina took a particular beating, since it was the birth place of the rebellion.

Sherman was verbose and expansive. He was a celebrity general by every measure.

To his troops, he was Uncle Billy. To the native Americans, he was someone to be hated and feared--a killer of their buffalo. He believed that destroying the buffalo would reduce the harassment railroad workers would endure at their hand.

You'll read about Sherman the womanizer, the partier, the lover of the New York theater scene. This is the story of a marriage forged early in his life and troubled often by his behavior. It's the story of a family man whose lack of enthusiasm for organized religion tore at the fabric of his family.

The book points out that Sherman was more of a success as a second in command than he would have been had he been fully in charge. O'Connell points out that Shern's successes stem from his encyclopedic knowledge of the terrain on which he fought, his background in engineering gained at West Point, and his knowledge of the Mississippi River.

While O'Connell doesn't provide much information on the friendship with Grant, you get a glimpse of it at least. You see its strength during the war and watch with sorrow as it weakens after. Sherman said of Grant, "He stood by me when I was crazy and I stood by him when he was drunk; now sir, we stand by each other always." The book does mention Sherman's efforts in Grant's final year of life helping him restructure his debt.

This was a fascinating biography made more readable by the fact that it isn't chronological nor does it bog down by giving a blow-by-blow account of the battles Sherman presided over during the Civil War.

[Mike · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had never read much about Sherman and this was a good book for that.

The book is divided into two parts. The first is a biography and the second more about the man and his life during pivotal periods after the Civil War up to his death--including all his affairs and his lifelong love and marriage with his step sister. It was very much a marriage of equals.

He was a complex person as you would expect and a Westerner who ramrodded the transcontinental railroad after the Civil War. The book covers much more than just the war. He changed the military and put it on the path to the modern world. Tens of thousands of spectators watched 30,000 troops march in his New York funeral and thousands came out for the burial inSt. Louis. He was living in New York after his wife's death and an avid theater person at the time.

I would have liked more of the military tactics and battle reports, but the author does a good job painting the military aspect of his life and for the general reader it is enough.

It is interesting to read about the Presidents through this book. They are not mythological figures of unlimited power and control that many think they are. They come across as politicians and people who landed in a particular place in a new nation with no rules except money and connections. The post-WWII imperial Presidency of 2016 could use more the reality from Sherman's time.

The nation is changing in the early 21st century and the America and American psyche that Sherman helped shape for the 20th century is becoming something else again in the next.

[Steven Peterson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a terrific biography of William Tecumseh Sherman. If one wishes to read of his military success, you will get some satisfaction. However, this is not primarily an analysis of his generalship. It is a biography--covering Sherman's life from cradle to grave, with an in-depth examination of him as a person.

In that sense, we learn a great deal about him. His complex family environment provided him with great support. He was raised by Thomas Ewing, his foster father. Later he courted Ewing;s daughter, Ellen, to the not altogether delight of her father. The book notes that he was a motormouth, wandered from subject to subject, and so on. ADHD? I don't know but descriptions of him at least make one wonder.

The chronology of his life takes him from West Point to the "old Army" to his marriage to Ellen to his financial career (he served as a banker for awhile) to his return to the military as the Civil War began to his rise in the ranks (and his breathtaking decline and rise after the War began) to becoming the key leader in the West to his succession of Ulysses Grant as chief military commander of the Army to his post-retirement career.

He was a complex individual and not always a sympathetic figure. He was sometimes disloyal to his wife; his views on slavery were not greatly progressive during the Civil War.

But what this book excels at is giving us an in depth treatment of a complex human being--and one of the more visible and important persons of his era.

[Kusaimamekirai · Rating 3 out of 5]

For those looking for an in depth look at this fascinating character, this is probably not the right book.
The author says in his preface that he considers 3 parts of Sherman's life to be significant. His time as a general, his family, and his relationship with women.
He addresses all these in non chronological order which I found slightly distracting. Perhaps the length of the book is to blame as well but I never felt like I really came to know Sherman. Much time is spent talking about battles and Sherman's men (perhaps 3/4 of the book) but less about Sherman himself.
I've always considered the best biographers to be those whose hand you don't notice. The author does frequently make psychological judgements about Sherman as well as often interjecting his opinion. This often pulled me out of the narrative which was disappointing.
All that said, the author clearly spent a great deal of time real searching Sherman and there are more than a fair share of interesting historical notes to be had.
A good read but somehow left me feeling it could've been even better

[David Eppenstein · Rating 4 out of 5]

While I am a voracious reader of history I can't say that the Civil War has much appeal to me. Like WWII the Civil War has been done to death and it is rare to find anything new to discover about either. Nevertheless, I purchased this book on impulse and to satisfy a needed history fix. I am not only not disappointed but actually very satisfied. The book differs from other biographies in that it deals more about the man than his military exploits. When it does delve into his military accomplishments it does so to illustrate the nature of the man and not his deeds. A very good and readable biography.

[Alan Tomkins · Rating 4 out of 5]

Overall a good biography. The subject matter is oddly organized and presented, but it seems to work. Also unusual is that the book doesn't seem to contain all that many quotes from someone who was a very talkative and quotable historical figure. But it is a concise and readable presentation of General Sherman.

[Tony and Leslee · Rating 4 out of 5]

An Australian perspective of an American legend

Although I have a keen interest in the causes, intricacies, battles, brutalities and the multi-layered characters of the American Civil War, my knowledge of William Tecumseh Sherman is somewhat limited. Before reading this book I was aware of Sherman's scorched earth purge of Georgia and the Carolinas - his greatest claim to fame.

Robert L O'Connell has delved into the complex relationships between Sherman and his family, friends and the Washington elite and the leadership of and the reassurance he gave to his loyal soldiers of his Army of the West. To his family he was 'Cump'; to his troops he was 'Uncle Billy'.

The relationships I found most intriguing were those with military supremo Ulysses S Grant and Sherman's forthright wife, Ellen. 'Billy' didn't want ultimate responsibility of the Union's military strength, but rather, was happy to Grant's 'wingman'. He believed that he and Grant were compatible in a contradictory sort of way. When speaking about his commander Sherman said 'He stood by me when I was crazy and I stood by him when he was drunk...'

But Sherman's biggest battles didn't involve the logistics and physicalities of Shiloh or Chickamauga, it was his secularity up against the strident Catholicism of the fiercely religious Ellen. There were many times he thought he was losing his children to the church and its constricting dogma on the living and the afterlife.

The author has also explored Sherman's attitudes to slaves and indigenous Americans. It is easy enough to employ modern ethics when trying to understand how and why he treated those without status and representation, especially when one considers how he saw to the slaughter and near extinction of the bison in order to sever the food supply of the Plains Indians to make them more compliant and be compelled to move to reservations. Yet, quite simply, his actions reflected the prevailing attitudes of those times.

Although he had a good start in life by being well-connected with those in high places, Sherman achieved fame and celebrity by being a brilliant military and civilian strategist and leader of others.

This book is likely to be more appealing to those with an interest in American history and its chief protagonists. It was that interest that drew me to this biography, and I enjoyed reading about the colourful life of a man with many salutary statues as tangible edifices of remembrance and veneration.

There is one matter I found curious and that was the name of the book itself, 'Fierce Patriot'. That appellation does not seem fitting for a person who was not the fire and brimstone type the title suggests. Doesn't matter. It is a fine read that author O'Connell has certainly researched in depth and written with great affection for one of the lions of the United States military during the 19th century.

[Adam · Rating 3 out of 5]

In the afterword to Fierce Patriot, his book on William Tecumseh Sherman, Robert O’Connell acknowledges a necessity at the heart of writing nonfiction: to research a subject is to devote years to them, rearrange your life around them, and become obsessed with their every decision. Sometimes this requirement comes to define a writer’s entire career. Shelby Foote spent more than twenty years researching and writing about the Civil War, and the resulting trilogy spanned nearly 3000 tightly-knit pages. Robert Caro has spent almost twice as much time completing a five-volume biography of Lyndon Johnson, which has won him two Pulitzer Prizes but also meant he’s been able to publish little else; in other words, his legacy will forever be intertwined with that of his subject. In both instances, Foote and Caro’s devotion resulted in critically acclaimed, interesting, and lasting histories. Sometimes, however, the devotion isn’t reflected in the final product, and strangely enough, the proof of this is O’Connell’s own book.

Fierce Patriot is really three books in one. The first, which spans the first 200 pages, is a biography of Sherman himself, complete with a rundown of his involvement in the Civil War and special emphasis on how our modern characterizations of him do not match the reality. The second, which is a comparatively short fifty-some pages, concerns the men who made up Sherman's famous--and infamous--army during the Civil War, which was responsible for the burning of Atlanta along its 600-mile march through the South, which has itself become distorted in the decades since. And the final seventy pages concern Sherman's private life, especially his dalliances with other women, and the miserable existence of his wife. By definition, a biography of any historical military figure would touch on a multitude of topics; the difference between the definition and Fierce Patriot is that O'Connell seems eager to "untangle" all three facets of Sherman's life for closer study, which makes the entire endeavor seem hurried and incomplete, as though it were rushed to print before O'Connell could reintegrate the latter two portions into the overall narrative.

Because it is that overall narrative--that first part of the book--that is by far its best, as O'Connell works to demystify not only Sherman but his legendary march through the South. The great irony is that this one event, for which Sherman is most known and most infamous, was one of the most peaceful events of his entire career. His men were stripped extraneous possessions, including most of their firearms, and were strictly warned away from the marauding ways associated with military invaders. Instead, they harassed those who supported the South's secession, burned down buildings that were representative of the Confederacy and its fighting power--railroad tracks, gun manufacturing plants, stashes of ammunition--but never killed unless in self-defense. They established order in the small towns and large cities they occupied, and they even amassed a large and loyal following of freed slaves--a sizable group that also helped Sherman navigate the wild and otherworldly landscape of the South with veritable ease. (As O'Connell lays out, freedmen were also vital to the North's military progress, providing valuable information about troop location and backcountry pathways without being recognized as potential spies by their owners--a resource that went unappreciated then and have been largely forgotten since.) One of the most nonviolent decision Sherman made in his life, to lead tens of thousands of men across 600 miles of his enemy's backyard, has since become a symbol of the Civil War's brutality and aggression--a version of history that, while inconsistent with what actually occurred, is pretty consistent with Sherman's personality.

Within every volume of American history there is at least one chapter written in blood: the blood of those who were subjugated, slaughtered, sacrificed, or outright killed. But rarely can we find a chapter written almost entirely by a single person. This is the truth of Sherman beyond his exploits during the Civil War. After the peace agreements were signed and politicos began debating Reconstruction--a tumultuous and long-lasting problem on its own, especially after Lincoln's assassination--Sherman accepted a largely symbolic post with the federal government, then departed for the West to oversee the construction of a transcontinental railroad, which would connect the Atlantic and Pacific coasts for the first time in the nation's history. It was a monumental task for any one person to undertake, and Sherman embraced the task with gusto--a decision that would paradoxically advance the nation's expansion while also devastating its indigenous people, landscape, and wildlife. This, not his march through the South, is Sherman's true legacy: a multi-year, multi-state project that leveled valuable landscapes, led the exploitation of natural resources, displaced thousands of Native American and their tribes, instigated wars, and almost caused the American buffalo to go extinct. (Even today, more than a century later, the buffalo has yet to recover.) And throughout it all, Sherman remained keenly aware of the devastation he was causing, even encouraging much of the conflict with displaced tribes and the elimination of wildlife, because he lived his life devoted to The Cause, whatever that happened to be at the moment, and he ran down anything--or anyone--that stood in his way.

O'Connell closes his afterword with a strange commentary on his subject's "tangled" lives and how we as readers perceive them: "I think my time with [Sherman] was well spent. I liked him, he was never dull, and he grew into a make-believe friend, sitting in a recliner in his rumpled uniform, watching me compose, accompanying me on long walks--but never saying a word. That's the past for you: a pale echo of what actually happened, a bunch of factual remains of what were once human lives, and for that reason always subject to reinterpretation. So if you don't like this Sherman, wait a while, there's bound to be another. He's too important to forget." This personification of Sherman as the author's quiet companion is admittedly cute, and probably not that far from reality when taken at its most basic figurative sense, but it's demonstrative of the problem with O'Connell's book, not to mention his attitude towards history itself. It's perfectly fine to believe a subject's life requires more than one volume, or "interpretation," because history is complicated and always revealing more of itself; but to essentially admit that your own history is incomplete is to betray the contract with your readers, who come into a book looking for answers...and answers can only come when an author knows their subject, seeks out the truth, and presents it to us without opinion. By splitting Sherman's life into parts, you're saying you don't understand how it all fits together, regardless of how much clearer it becomes when partitioned out. It means that, in trying to "untangle" the life and experiences of one man, you find yourself unable to see how all the pieces connected in the first place, and all you have to present to your readers are pieces to a puzzle you're unable--or unwilling--to put back together.


This review was originally published at There Will Be Books Galore.

[Christopher Hughes · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Fierce Patriot: The Tangled Lives of William Tecumseh Sherman” by Robert L. O’Connell was a good introduction for anyone seeking to know this old Civil War general. Having grown up in Georgia, I only knew Sherman as the man who burned our state to the ground. That may be exaggerating his March to the Sea, but for many Georgians, it might as well be the case. For a few years now, I’ve wanted to know more about this man. Now that I live in the St. Louis area, where he is buried, my curiosity became an itch that needed to be scratched. I initially picked up a different biography (which shall remain nameless) and it seemed so convoluted and boring that I ended up giving up on it. Reading “Fierce Patriot,” I understood a little bit why the other book was convoluted, but not why it was boring. There is a reason that O’Connell wrote about Sherman the way he did and why the subtitle “The Tangled Lives of William Tecumseh Sherman” is what it is. Sherman had an extremely complex and complicated life and O’Connell gets that across well. He divided the book into three parts: Sherman as a military strategist (by far the best and most exciting part of the book), Sherman as the general with his troops (interesting, but a bit redundant of the first part), and Sherman with his families (the least interesting of all).
O’Connell is a great author who can often make events come alive. He is certainly passionate about Sherman and seeking to portray an accurate biography. However, with that being said, I found that there was too much speculation in the book. Perhaps it is me, but when an author begins to use the words, “probably,” “perhaps,” “may have,” “possibly,” etc. a biography becomes less accurate. It either displays an author’s imagination or betrays an author’s lack of research. That’s why I gave the book only four stars. I thoroughly enjoyed the entire book, except for the speculation portions.
Even with the speculation, I would highly recommend anyone looking for any interesting biography, a book on the Civil War era, or a starter guide to understanding who William Tecumseh Sherman was. If you are a Sherman buff, this is not the biography for you. Maybe you will enjoy that other book I tried.

[Julian Douglass · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful Biography of William Sheerman. Mr. O'Connell does his research and paints Mr. Sherman as a well rounded individual, known more as a master strategist and devoted man to his country than popular myth tells us. Biographies that do this are better in my book because it shows us the man, and not the memory. Great analysiis on some his more controversial views as well. He does not use the lame historans excuse of "Well, he didn't mean what he said, he just said it to fit in". Great job on a great individual.

[Julia Eskew · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this book to learn more about Sherman's march through the South during the Civil War - and the book delivered. But the book had many other details - Sherman's unsuccessful career before that point, his role in the Native American genocide in the West, his "Uncle Billy" persona, his contentious marriage - that, while somewhat interesting, I struggled to finish reading.