I have often seen (on discussion websites, including recently on this one) people try to compare the destruction by Northern and Southern armies during offensive campaigns. Most often we see Lee's move into Pennsylvania in 1863 compared to Sherman's "March through Georgia." These comparisons are most often brought up in these cases not for any actual study of military tactics or strategy, but part of a long-running effort to villainize Union soldiers like Sherman and virtually canonize Confederate soldiers, like Lee.

This certainly is, or can be, valuable in some ways. For instance, one may investigate discipline within the army, and study how well the rank and file followed orders in the "enemy's" country.

But, anyone interested in accurate historical study cannot make such comparisons so loosely. The objectives, strategies, and tactics embraced by the two competing military forces were often quite different. These differences can explain much of the disparity we may find in destruction during offensive campaigns. This post will briefly look at the Lee versus Sherman comparison and its problems.

First, let us analyze the basic objectives for Lee as a commanding general of a large Confederate army. The overall objective, of course, was to secure Confederate independence. Such goal required only recognition by the US government. The term "only" is not meant to denote an ease of success, but the basic element of the CSA's objective. Lee did not need to actually destroy all the Union armies (he couldn't have anyway), capture Washington, or conquer the northern states. What was required was to either scare the federal government into acquiescence or otherwise convince the North to let the South go or that the war was not worth the cost. In short, the Confederacy had to play defense and survive until the other side gave up.

Strategically, Lee primarily used an aggressive defense to try to achieve this objective. By defeating federal armies in the field, he hoped to protect major Virginia cities and grind down Union forces. His two attempts to go on the offensive were meant to spare Virginia for a time and to perhaps bolster the Confederate cause by positioning himself in a strategically vital place in the North.

Tactically, Lee did rely upon traditional military maneuvers and fighting. His main targets were opposing armies. Lee did not target civilians for a few reasons. First, most of the civilians he encountered during his two campaigns were Marylanders, who he hoped would support his cause. Second, destruction of northern property could very well be counter-productive for the Confederate cause. The destruction his men could have wrought during their brief stay in Pennsylvania would have made no practical contribution to the Confederate cause, and may have only ignited a weary northern war effort into stiffer opposition. Finally, Lee's reliance upon traditional military doctrine likely did dictate his army's behavior.

We find a much different situation with Sherman and the Northern war effort.

The basic objectives of the Union was to stamp out secession, or resistance to federal authority. This was not something that could be accomplished through military victory alone. Secessionist sentiment permeated the South, and Sherman and the Union armies faced a hostile population in their effort to reassert federal authority.

Strategically, the Union had to carry out an offensive war. Union armies had to obviously destroy Confederate armies, which remained in the Southern states on the defensive. But an offensive strategy was also necessary to reassert federal authority by removing rebel governments and reestablishing a US presence. Time, overall, was not on the Union's side, and thus an aggressive offense was needed.

Sherman recognized the three tiers of a war within a democratic society: the military; the leadership; the population. While many people assume the population is somehow exempt from modern warfare, that is not the case at all. A democracy (or democratic republic) is founded on the will of the people. Armies and governments within democracies are constructed by the people. Secession was clearly an action not only of the leaders but of the people. To stamp out secession, the Confederate armies had to be destroyed...but that would not necessarily end rebellion. Leaders could be captured or killed, but that too did not guarantee an end of secession sentiment, as leaders could be replaced. Furthermore, the Union had fought Confederate armies for three years with some success, but not overall victory in sight. Sherman believed that the Southern population was the vital and perhaps most important link in the chain. The Southern population not only provided supply and logistic support for the Confederate war effort, but the morale and political support for the fight. Without Southern popular support, the leaders could not or would not back the war and the armies would disintegrate. Thus, he saw destruction of Southern property as a valuable means of undermining the ability of the Confederacy to survive materially and psychologically.

In review, Lee's army spent little time in enemy territory, and sought victory through a definitive clash of arms. He and his men largely left the northern civilian population alone because destruction of civilian property played no practical effect in Confederate success. Sherman's army, on the other hand, spent a great deal of time in enemy territory, and sought victory through the destruction of opposing military forces AND by crushing popular Southern morale and support for the war. He and his men destroyed large amounts of Southern property because it had a direct effect on Union success.

Of course, this is just a brief description of the differences, but one I think outlines many of the absolutely necessary issues one needs to consider when trying to compare tactical differences during the war.

Obviously some men in Sherman's army committed actual crimes outside of the accepted manner of destruction(although these actions have long been exaggerated), as did some Southern in Lee's army and other Confederate armies. But we should also look at these crimes as somewhat separate from the actual tactical and strategic actions of the armies in question (unless one can definitively link certain crimes to specific leaders and/or policies).