Brigadier-General Ellison Capers, Confederate Military History, a library of Confederate States Military History: Volume 5, South Carolina
Clement Anselm Evans, Ed.

A pontoon was built, on which Sherman crossed into Columbia on the 17th, and was met by the mayor, who surrendered the city and asked for its protection from pillage. The day, Sherman says, was clear, but a ‘perfect tempest of wind was raging.’ His orders to Howard were, he says, to burn all arsenals and public property not needed for army use, as well as all railroads and depots, but to spare dwellings and schools and charitable institutions; and he declares that before a single building was fired by his order, the city was in flames spread by cotton burning on the streets before he occupied the city; that the whole of Woods' division was brought in to fight the fire; that he was up nearly all night, and saw Generals Howard, Logan, Woods and others laboring to save houses and protect families. ‘Our officers and men on duty worked well to extinguish the flames; but others not on duty, including the officers who had long been imprisoned there, may have assisted in spreading the fire after it had once begun.’

General Hampton denies that any cotton was fired by his orders, also that any cotton was burning when the Federals entered the city. Abundant testimony has been given by the people of Columbia, both white and black, to the effect that the city was burned by the Federal soldiers. This is virtually admitted by General Slocum when he says: ‘I believe the immediate cause of the disaster was a free use of whisky (which was supplied to the soldiers by citizens with great liberality). A drunken soldier, with a musket in one hand and a match in the other, is not a pleasant visitor to have about the house on a dark, windy night.’ Sherman, in his Memoirs, says: ‘The army, having totally ruined Columbia, moved on toward Winnsboro.’ There can be no doubt