Miss Markie
Cadet
- Joined
- Mar 19, 2006
- Location
- Wisconsin
This book is by Jerry Ellis, and I picked it up last week at the bookstore on Jekyll Island, GA. The original publish date was 1993, with a reissued forward in 2001.
I really liked this book. It satisfied my curiosity of what it would be like NOW to walk this route. What would you see? Do people still talk of Sherman (indeed they do, I have visited Savannah often enough...). As a person who strains to see traces of Sherman's mark on the land every time I fly to Savannah, I was very intrigued that indeed one can still find debris left by the soldiers.
Ellis had two great-grandfathers fight in the WTBS, one of who switched from CSA to the Union, then just gave up and went home to "fight with his wife" for the rest of the war. Some interesting insights as to what it means to be southern, what people in Georgia still think about the war, and just danged interesting and unique folks. He starts at Margaret Mitchell's apartment in Atlanta, and ends up in a cemetery in Savannah.
Great sense of humor and history, a highly entertaining read. I read the 300+ pages in a couple of days. I got so caught up in his quest that I couldn't put the book down.
Take a break from troop placement and firearm caliber, and see what a modern day forager walking in Sherman's footsteps has to say about the lingering effect of the war we all can't get enough of.
BTW, the author also walked the entire Trail of Tears for another book, (he is part Cherokee) and rode bareback the entire Pony Express route. I liked this book well enough to get the other two.
And I did have a CW ancestor who made the march to the sea with the 101st Illinois. He was a young farm boy (19), entered the service and was immediately a seargent. He re-upped on September 1st of 1864, and made the march with Sherman all the way to the Grand Review. He left the army as a Captain, a rank that appears on his January 1866 wedding certificate.(Hope the rebs on this board don't hold this against me!)
I really liked this book. It satisfied my curiosity of what it would be like NOW to walk this route. What would you see? Do people still talk of Sherman (indeed they do, I have visited Savannah often enough...). As a person who strains to see traces of Sherman's mark on the land every time I fly to Savannah, I was very intrigued that indeed one can still find debris left by the soldiers.
Ellis had two great-grandfathers fight in the WTBS, one of who switched from CSA to the Union, then just gave up and went home to "fight with his wife" for the rest of the war. Some interesting insights as to what it means to be southern, what people in Georgia still think about the war, and just danged interesting and unique folks. He starts at Margaret Mitchell's apartment in Atlanta, and ends up in a cemetery in Savannah.
Great sense of humor and history, a highly entertaining read. I read the 300+ pages in a couple of days. I got so caught up in his quest that I couldn't put the book down.
Take a break from troop placement and firearm caliber, and see what a modern day forager walking in Sherman's footsteps has to say about the lingering effect of the war we all can't get enough of.
BTW, the author also walked the entire Trail of Tears for another book, (he is part Cherokee) and rode bareback the entire Pony Express route. I liked this book well enough to get the other two.
And I did have a CW ancestor who made the march to the sea with the 101st Illinois. He was a young farm boy (19), entered the service and was immediately a seargent. He re-upped on September 1st of 1864, and made the march with Sherman all the way to the Grand Review. He left the army as a Captain, a rank that appears on his January 1866 wedding certificate.(Hope the rebs on this board don't hold this against me!)