Sherman's March to the Sea 471 man reproved the man as he did others when similar acts of law- lessness fell under his observation, explaining that "foraging must be limited to the regular parties properly detailed." Full of pride in his soldiers and elated at their manifestations of confidence in him, he gave when the march was completed this mild report of their infractions of discipline : " A little loose in foraging, ' they did some things they ought not to have done.' " A spirit of fun per- vaded the army which exhibited itself in innocent frolics, the most typical of which was the meeting of some of the officers in the Hall of Representatives at Milledgeville where they constituted them- selves the Legislature of the State of Georgia, elected a speaker, and after a formal debate repealed by a fair vote the Ordinance of Secession. Destruction was a part of the business of the march. Lee's army drew its supplies of provisions largely from Georgia. " The State of Georgia alone," said Jefferson Davis in his speech at Augusta, " produces food enough not only for her own people and the army within it, but feeds too the Army of Virginia." It became of the utmost importance to sever the railroad communication be- tween the Gulf States and Richmond and to this Sherman gave his personal attention. The bridges and trestles were burned, the masonry of the culverts was blown up. In the destruction of the iron rails mechanical skill vied with native ingenuity in doing the most effective work. The chief engineer designed a machine for twisting the rails after heating them in the fires made by burning the ties : this was used by the Michigan and Missouri engineers. But the infantry, with the mania for destruction which pervaded the army, joined in the work, carrying the rails, when they came to a red heat in the bonfires of the ties, to the nearest trees and twisting them about the trunks or warping them in some fantastic way so that they were useless except for old iron and the old iron even was in unmanageable shape for working in a mill. About 265 miles of railroad were thus destroyed. This in the heart of Jeff Davis's empire, as Sherman called it, was an almost irreparable damage owing to the lack of factories which could make rails for renewals and to the embargo on imports by the blockade of the Southern ports. Stations and machine-shops along the lines were burned. Many thousand bales of cotton, a large number of cotton- gins and presses were destroyed. At Milledgeville Sherman re- ports : " I burned the railroad buildings and the arsenal ; the State House and Governor's mansion I left unharmed." The penitentiary had been burned by the convicts before the arrival of the army. At Millen the soldiers by orders applied the torch to
