Civil War General William T. Sherman’s sword and other relics to be auctioned off in Ohio
Columbus, Ohio — Bidders will fight with their dollars next week at an Ohio auction house for the sword of the Civil War Union general who led a scorched earth campaign across Georgia and coined the phrase “War is hell.”
Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman’s war sword, likely used between 1861 and 1863, is among the items open to bidders Tuesday at Fleischer’s Auctions in Columbus.
Other items to be auctioned include the insignia of Sherman’s uniform worn during the Civil War, a family Bible and his personal, annotated copy of Ulysses S. Grant’s memoirs.
Sherman, a West Point graduate, was superintendent of a military school in Louisiana when South Carolina seceded in 1861 and initiated the war. His capture of Atlanta in September 1864 helped President Abraham Lincoln win a second term in November of that year, continuing his fight to preserve the Union.
After capturing Atlanta, Sherman then led his famous “March to the Sea,” culminating in the capture of Savannah in December 1864, which dealt a huge blow to Confederate morale.
“If it had not been for William Tecumseh Sherman, it is conceivable that the North would not have won the Civil War and the Union would not have been preserved,” said Adam Fleischer, chairman of the auction house.
Fleischer said a “conservative” estimated sales price for the saber is between $40,000 and $60,000 and that an estimated sale of Sherman’s entire collection could fetch as much as $300,000.
“As Americans, we live with the consequences of the Civil War whether we know it or not,” Fleischer said, “and if you remove William Tecumseh Sherman from history, the war could have ended very differently.”
According to Fleischer, Sherman’s relics were provided to the auction house by his direct descendants.
The auction also includes relics such as a 1733 document signed by Benjamin Franklin, the 11th known 1790 “free” badge issued to a formerly enslaved person, the scrapbook of a Tuskegee aviator and other effects, according to a press release from Fleischer’s Auctions .