Sherman's Atlanta campaign and march to the sea

              General Grant, now with a foothold and supply line in Georgia, decided to send in his friend General Sherman to ravage all of Georgia and South Carolina. This new battle tactic was to burn and destroy cities, towns, and houses in in order to demoralize southerners, and want for the war to stop. Not only this, but it would take away one of the South's crown jewels, Atlanta. They would tear up the confederate rail lines in Atlanta, and effectively ruin the South’s rail road complexes. This campaign would also secure Lincoln's reelection coming up in 1864. After General Sherman secured Atlanta, he burned 30% of it to stop it from being reused for military purposes, and went away. He continued this tactic, now called total war, throughout his long march to Savanna. He claimed Savanna peacefully, only because it immediately surrendered. After taking Savanna, he continued north into South Carolina, where his men were even more brutal in his new total warfare tactic.

http://people.cohums.ohio-state.edu/grimsley1/dialogue/long_shadow.htm