He wasn't popular in the South at the Civil War's end, and in many ways, he still isn't.
But that didn't keep Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman from returning to Louisiana after scorching a path through the South. He believed in leaving nothing in his wake, yet he still wanted to return to something in at least one Southern state.
That state was Louisiana, where he served as the first president of LSU when it opened as the Louisiana State Seminary of Learning and Military Academy in Pineville.
"He loved it here," said Gaines Foster, retired professor of history at LSU. "And he returned not once, but twice."
Which answers the question posed by Sharon Coldiron, who knew Sherman's history with LSU.
"I know he left the school to lead the Union Army at the outbreak of the Civil War, and I know there are no buildings named for him at LSU in Baton Rouge," the Deville resident said. "But did he ever come back to Louisiana?"
Well, Coldiron is in luck, because Foster has been researching this very subject in his retirement. Though he's in the early stages of this quest, he has confirmed two Sherman visits in 1869 and 1879.
LSU's first campus in Pineville, which opened as the Louisiana State Seminary of Learning and Military Academy, as it looked about 1868.
And here's an added extra — one of those visits involved the King of Carnival.
But first, it's necessary to backtrack as to how Sherman landed in Louisiana initially. The LSU Military Museum's website, olewarskule.lsu.edu offers this explanation from Walter L. Fleming's book, "General Sherman as College President."
"The leader of all matters relating to the Seminary from 1846 to 1860 was General George Mason Graham, and it was largely through his influence that William Tecumseh Sherman was elected superintendent of the Louisiana State Seminary of Learning."
But Sherman wasn't in the military when Mason brought him to the Bayou State. Despite having graduated West Point in 1840 and serving several years in Southern posts, the Ohio native had hung up his uniform and was practicing law in Leavenworth, Kansas, — after working as a banker in California and New York.
Still, it was his military service that forged his Louisiana connections.
Sherman was on staff service in California under Graham's half-brother, Gen. Roger B. Mason, before resigning from the Army in 1853. And it was through this connection that he met Graham, then landed the job at what would become LSU.
That was in 1859.
One of his first acts as the newly appointed superintendent of the Louisiana State Seminary of Learning was a visit to the Louisiana Legislature, where he gained passage of Act 98 of 1860, giving military status to the school and adding “Military Academy” to its name.
"With this single stroke, the future of LSU, the Ole War Skule, (the nickname that, according to LSU lore, was given to LSU by Sherman) was committed to the principles of tradition, honor and service — the same principles that guide the University’s military programs today," the LSU Military Museum's website states.
Sherman returned to Pineville and not only ran the school but, as pointed out by the website, served as an "instructor of engineering and military tactics for 125 cadets ... for an annual salary of $3,500. During the summer vacation period, Sherman procured 200 cadet muskets, powder and equipment, uniforms, books and other supplies. He returned to the school in October for the second term."
But, as English poet and author Geoffrey Chaucer famously said, "All good things must come to an end."
Sherman liked his job. He enjoyed running a school, and he liked its location.
"I think he was very happy at the seminary," Foster said.
A portrait of William T. Sherman, circa 1860, by Samuel H. Lockett, during the time he was superintendent of the Louisiana State Seminary of Learning and Military Academy Pineville, which eventually became LSU in Baton Rouge. Lockett is the namesake for Lockett Hall on campus and was assistant engineer on the construction of the pedestal for the Statue of Liberty. The painting, which hung in David Boyd Hall, went missing in 1987.
But the United States went to war against itself, which led Sherman to resign from his superintendent position in 1861 to serve as a Union general under Ulysses S. Grant, succeeding Grant as Commander of the Western Theater.
Then came his signature move — the "March to the Sea" through Georgia and the Carolinas, creating systematic destruction of civilian and military infrastructure to break the will of the Confederacy to continue fighting.
It worked, and when Grant was elected president after the war, Sherman was named Commanding General of the U.S. Army.
Union Civil War General William Tecumseh Sherman's 1873 portrait hangs in LSU's Hill Memorial Library. Sherman was the superintendent of LSU when it opened as the Louisiana State Seminary of Learning and Military Academy in Pineville.
He may have been popular in Washington, but he was loathed in the South. Even so, he still managed to maintain his Louisiana connections.
"He and David Boyd remained very good friends," Foster said.
Boyd taught mathematics at the seminary-military academy when Sherman headed the school. Boyd was named superintendent of the Pineville campus then served as the school's first president after it moved to Baton Rouge and changed its name to Louisiana State University in 1870.
"Sherman came back the first time in 1869," Foster said. "David Boyd wanted him to be the commencement speaker, but that didn't work out. So he, and I think his daughter and maybe an aide, came back and visited in Pineville. I think he made an address, and there was a party where he met the cadets."
That would have been Sherman's last visit the Pineville campus. The school's massive building burned months later in October 1869.
Sherman's focus during his second visit, 10 years later, was only something totally different.
"The second time he came was in 1879, and again, I think he made an address and met the cadets," Foster said. "But then he went to New Orleans, and Mardi Gras was going on at that time. So, he visits Mardi Gras, and there's an account where he does meet Rex, the King of Carnival. Then he goes to one of the Mardi Gras parties one night."
Gen. William Sherman, who was wounded at Shiloh while rallying Union forces under heavy attack. Sherman had been superintendent of Seminary of Learning of the State of Louisiana, which later became LSU. Later still, he became notorious for his destructive march across the South.
Through it all, Sherman maintained his friendship with Boyd, even during the war when they were fighting on opposite sides.
"He was frequently in contact with Boyd by letter, and he was always intervening in various ways to try and help LSU," Foster said. "David Boyd was in a prisoner of war camp. He was caught by some Jayhawkers and sold to the Union Army. They were going to ship him to a prison in the North. Boyd wrote a letter to Sherman, and Sherman intervened. So Boyd was sent to New Orleans."
Meanwhile, Sherman's reputation still stirs controversy, which is why there are no buildings named for him on LSU's campus. But two portraits of him once hung at the university.
One, a full-length portrait painted by faculty member Samuel H. Lockett when Sherman was superintendent in Pineville, once hung in David Boyd Hall. It went missing in 1980.
The other hangs in LSU's Hill Memorial Library as the only tribute to the school's first leader.
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