Trails sign located in the town park at South Main and Church streets. "As Wilmington was threatened in early 1865, some of its railroad facilities and citizens relocated here, a stop on the Wilmington, Charlotte and Rutherford Railroad. Sherman's forces entered the town on March 7 and destroyed the depot, shops and other railroad facilities.
After making his famous "March to the Sea" to Savannah, Ga., in late 1864, Union Gen. William T. Sherman cast his eyes northward toward the Carolinas and a possible link-up with Gen. U.S. Grant, who then was tightening his noose around Gen. Robert E. Lee at Petersburg, Va.
TrailsSherman's army of 60,000 entered South Carolina in February 1865 and moved quickly north, burning the capital at Columbia and destroying and looting countless civilian farms and plantations.
Entering North Carolina the first week in March, Sherman marched toward Goldsboro, an important railroad junction sitting on what had been "Lee's Lifeline." Union forces quickly captured Fayetteville and burned the arsenal there. Confederate resistance at Averasboro was swept aside.
Confederate commander Gen. Joseph Johnston managed to assemble a force large enough to put up a fight at Bentonville March 19–21, but the weight of Sherman's advance eventually overwhelmed him.
Johnston withdrew, his army ending up west of Raleigh. After more than a week of negotiation near Durham, Johnston surrendered his troops April 26, 1865.
More reading
Last Stand in the Carolinas: The Battle of Bentonville by Mark Bradley, published by DaCapo Press 1996
This Astounding Close, The Road to Bennett Place by Mark Bradley, published by the University of North Carolina Press 2000
Sherman's March through North Carolina by Angley, Cross and Hill, published by Division of Archives and History, North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources
Map / Brochures
Free, full-color map/brochures are available from the following sources:
* Fill out our Free Info form for the map plus information about more Civil War sites in Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina and West Virginia
* Call 800-VISIT-NC
* Visit www.visitnc.com
* Download a PDF version [612K]."
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