Quotes by William Tecumseh Sherman

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

“I beg to present you as a Christmas gift the city of Savannah.”

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

“My aim then was to whip the rebels, to humble their pride, to follow them to their inmost recesses, and make them fear and dread us.”

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

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

“If nominated, I will not run; if elected, I will not serve.”

“But, my dear sirs, when peace does come, you may call on me for any thing. Then will I share with you the last cracker, and watch with you to shield your homes and families against danger from ever...”

“If forced to choose between the penitentiary and the White House for four years I would say the penitentiary thank you.”

“If nominated I will not accept if elected I will not serve.”

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

“War is cruelty. There is no use trying to reform it. The crueler it is, the sooner it will be over.”

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

“War is too serious a matter to leave to soldiers.”

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

“You cannot qualify war in harsher terms than I will.”

“The scenes on this field would have cured anybody of war.”

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

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

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