Edward Alfred Pollard, The lost cause; a new Southern history of the War of the Confederates ... Drawn from official sources and approved by the most distinguished Confederate leaders.

The retreat was continued to the lower passes of the Blue Ridge. Gen. Early had lost half his army, and it was supposed that his career was now at an end. Sheridan pushed the pursuit to Staunton and the gaps of the Blue Ridge; but, before returning to Strasburg, and taking position on the north side of Cedar Creek, this Federal commander resolved upon an act of barbarism, competing with the worst reputations of the war. He determined to devastate the upper portion of the Valley as he abandoned it. This ruthless measure was not confined to the destruction of the crops, provisions, and forage; mills were burned, farming implements were destroyed, and a wanton vengeance was inflicted upon the country for many years to come. Gen. Sheridan wrote from Strasburg, as if he were commemorating a great deed, instead of writing down a record of imperishable infamy: “In moving back to this point, the whole country, from the Blue Ridge to the North Mountain, has been made entirely untenable for a rebel army. I have destroyed over two thousand barns filled with wheat and hay and farming implements; over seventy mills filled with flour and wheat; have driven in front of the army over four thousand head of stock, and have killed and issued to the troops not less than three thousand sheep This destruction embraces the Luray Valley and the Little Fort Valley, as well as the main valley.”

Of this and other like atrocities of the enemy, there has been attempted a very weak excuse, to the effect that if the private property of the inhabit ants of the Confederacy had not been destroyed, it might have been converted to the uses of the belligerent Government, and have helped to sustain it. Once for all, it may be said that this excuse excludes every sentiment of humanity in war, and may be logically carried to the last extremities of savage warfare. Some time ago a great indignation was awakened in Northern newspapers, when a Northern officer justified his putting to death some children belonging to a hostile Indian tribe on the ground that, if they had not been killed, they would have grown up to be men and chiefs, to fight the armies of the United States. But the logic of this was unimpeachable, quite as sound as that which:L justified the outrages of private property and deeds of devastation and horrour, committed by such men as Sheridan and Sherman. There are some things, even in war, which are to be done, or to be left undone, without regard to consequences. Modern war is not based upon logic; it is not merely a question of how much ruin may be done; it is not simple “cruelty,” as Sherman defined it to the mayor of Atlanta; it recognizes certain claims of humanity and indicates a class of outrages for which no selfish reason is commensurate A writer of authority, treating of the law of nations, says: “When the French armies desolated, with fire and sword, the Palatinate in 1674, and ”