The great army of the West, commanded by General William T. Sherman, enters Savannah, Georgia, at Christmas of 1864. They have just come on their march to the sea, starting out in Atlanta. They have marched through the heart of Georgia... They have destroyed everything in their path that could be of use to the Confederacy: railroad tracks, they have burned plantations. They have liberated tens of thousands of slaves, enforcing the Emancipation Proclamation of President Lincoln... Sherman says when he starts out on the march, "I can make Georgia howl." He's bringing the war to the civilian population. He doesn't kill civilians. He doesn't attack them, but he destroys property; he destroys their livelihoods and he liberates their slaves.
He's trying to demonstrate that the South has no power that can prevent the North from prevailing in this war. If he can march right through the heart of one of the most important Southern states without any opposition even, wreaking devastation and liberating the slaves... And for generations afterward, the name Sherman will be a byword for cruelty in the minds of white Southerners and white Georgians who experience this.
