William Boynton, Sherman's Historical Raid

For his criticisms upon the latter, General Grant so far reprimanded him, as to formally suggest the modification of the report in which he reflected upon that officer. The letter upon this subject was as follows:

headquarters armies of the United States. Washington, D. C., May 25, 1865.
Major-General W. T. Sherman, Comd'g Military Division of the Mississippi.

General: General Grant directs me to call your attention to the part of your report in which the necessity of maintaining your truce, even at the expense of many lives, is spoken of. The General thinks that, in making a truce, the commander of an army can control only his own army, and that the hostile general must make his own arrangements with other armies acting against him.

Whilst independent generals, acting against a common foe, would naturally act in concert, the General deems that each must be the judge of his own duty, and responsible for its execution.

If you should wish, the report will be returned for any change you deem best.

Very respectfully your obedient servant,

T. S. Bowers, Assistant Adjutant-General.

The part of the report thus alluded to was as follows:

headquarters Military division of the Mississippi, in the field, City Point, Va., May 9, 1865.

General: * * * * It now becomes my duty to paint, in justly severe characters, the still more offensive and dangerous matter of General Halleck's dispatch of April 26th, to the Secretary of War, embodied in his to General Dix of April 27th.

General Halleck had been chief of staff of the army at Washington, in which capacity he must have received my official letter of April 18th, wherein I wrote clearly that if Johnston's army about Greensboro were ‘pushed’ it would ‘disperse,’ an event I wished to prevent. About that time he seems to have been sent from Washington to Richmond to command the new Military Division of the James, in assuming charge of which, on the 22d, he defines the limits of his authority to be the ‘Department of Virginia, the Army of the Potomac, and such part of North Carolina as may not be occupied by the command of Major-General Sherman.’ (See his General Orders No. 1.)