SHERMAN'S MARCH THROUGH THE CAROLINAS

This reads like a thesis for a doctorate -- not a book designed for popular consumption. In recapitulating step by step Sherman's march through Georgia and north again, the author follows a comparable literary tactic. Whatever interesting prospects may lure him, he hews undeviatingly to military, political, economic lines. He forages freely off pertinent facts. He avoids emotional or even human byways. Like Sherman's forward drive, his recounting advances like a piledriver, the pace has a kind of mental lockstep. The book may be bluntly summed up thus:- it is cold and exact, never warmed up by human bits concerning Sherman, his troops, or the victims. The result- the total impact fails to come through. The story has been better told.