The Yankees Are Coming!

Wake Up! Wake Up! The Yankees are coming! The Yankees are coming!

That would have been the cries of Monticelloians 150 years ago this coming Monday and Tuesday as General Sherman came a callin’.

Depending on which eye witness accounts and autobiography you may have read, Sherman actually stayed and slept near Monticello.

One source said that he spent the night at the Ezell Home Hotel in Shadydale, another says he and his troops made camp and enjoyed a delicious meal thanks to the town people. Still others…

Myth. rumor and time have erased the horror of the March to the Sea. Holdouts and those who could never fathom the idea that the South would not win the Civil War faced reality on November 17 and 18th, 1864.

From the North, General Sherman and some 30,000 troops approached from towards Covington. From the South, Commander Osterhaus marched his 15,000 troops across the Ocmulgee River at Seven Islands, then up the old stage coach road towards Monticello. All were heading to the then state capitol of Georgia, Milledgeville. By November 23rd, the capitol was home to Sherman and his troops if only for a few days.

William Tecumseh Sherman said it best, “War is hell!” If history can teach us anything, it is this truth.