--- title: "This was General Sherman’s real method of clearing minefields" description: "Saying that General William T. Sherman was unforgiving to his enemies is the understatement of the 19th-Century. The man who burned Georgia to the ground was as tough as they come and in the South, he earned a reputation for…" date: "2021-06-03" modified: "2021-06-04" authors: - name: "Blake Stilwell" job_title: "Editor-In-Chief, Air Force Veteran" link: "https://www.wearethemighty.com/authors/blake/" url: "https://www.wearethemighty.com/mighty-history/general-shermans-method-clearing-minefields/" categories: - "Civil War" - "History" - "Tactical" - "War History" - "Weapons" --- # This was General Sherman’s real method of clearing minefields ![]() Saying that General William T. Sherman was unforgiving to his enemies is the understatement of the 19th-Century. The man who burned Georgia to the ground was as tough as they come and in the South, he earned a reputation for being particularly evil, even though the truth is much further than the Confederates would have you believe. --- There's no doubt Sherman was as destructive as he could be as he burned Atlanta and then marched to the sea, as history puts it, but some of his methods were [much more exaggerated than history remembers it](). ![]() And some of it wasn't exaggerated at all. One such exaggeration is how Sherman used Confederate prisoners of war to clear a confederate minefield near Sandersville, Ga. during his infamous "March to the Sea." Sherman is remembered to have seen one of his soldiers lose a leg to a land mine. In a rage, he tells a prisoner to deliver a message to Confederate leaders in Georgia: he is going to use POWs to clear every minefield in Georgia as he walked to Savannah, no matter how many it took to clear the mines. To read this, one would think Sherman is going to send a mass of men into a minefield to clear mines by setting them off, killing and maiming the POWs in the process. After all, this is the man known for saying, "War is cruel. The crueler it is, the sooner it will be over." ![]() This context would have you believe Sherman is the Confederacy's Attila the Hun, relentlessly destroying everything in his path with zero compassion. And while Sherman may have destroyed a lot of what he found in Georgia, he also fed citizens from his army's stores and allowed emancipated slaves to follow his army as it marched from Atlanta to Savannah. Sherman was very dedicated to the laws of war, even if he was pushing the envelope of those laws. He even challenged his critics to "see the books" of those laws for themselves. As for the POWs clearing mines, he did use the Confederates to clear minefields. His order was more than rushing them into the middle of the field to be blown up, however. His logic was that those troops had buried those mines near Sandersville and they should be the ones to dig them up. He did the same thing outside of Savannah later in the campaign. ## Author Blake Stilwell is We Are The Mighty's Editor-in-Chief, covering military news, entertainment, and history, along with veteran education, employment and entrepreneurship. He is a former U.S. Air Force combat cameraman with degrees in Graphic Design, Television and Film, International Relations, Public Relations, Business Management and Middle Eastern Affairs. After leaving the military, he began working in film and television production in New York and Los Angeles, work that included ABC News, NBC Olympics, and HBO Sports. He then spent two years in Washington with White House Communications, before joining the Near East Foundation. At NEF he served as an International Development Fellow, then Communications Officer, and finally, Media Officer for the Middle East and Africa. Based in the Palestinian Territory, he coordinated strategic communications between eight country offices, international media, and government and NGO partners. He began a career focused on writing and editing in 2015 with We Are The Mighty. He left in 2019 for Military.com, but returned as Editor-in-Chief in 2025. Blake’s work has been seen on CBS News, Fox News, CBC, The Chicago Tribune, Task & Purpose, Military Times, Recoil, Skillset, American History, and was shockingly even used in a Supreme Court argument. He is an avid traveler and small business owner in Ohio, where he spends most of his energy fixing up a very old house. ### Author social links [Facebook]() [Twitter]() [Instagram]() [LinkedIn]()