Ebenezer Creek

Ebenezer Creek is a location in Georgia where hundreds of freed black slaves were abandoned during General Sherman's march during the American Civil War.Fact|date=April 2007 After the army had crossed over on pontoons the commander in charge of the crossing, BG Jefferson C. Davis, cut them loose leaving the escaped slaves on the other side. Many drowned while trying to cross over.

The Tragedy of Ebenezer Creek happened on December 9, 1864. General Sherman was already towards the end of his March to the Sea, and was only twenty miles from his final destination of Savannah, Georgia. Slaves followed Sherman’s army through out his march from Atlanta despite the fact that Sherman’s army could not support a large following. One of the reasons for this following was the exchange of food for slaves for their servitude with the Union Army, which included cooking and manual labor. Due to the increasingly scarcity of food, Sherman urged the freed men to stay behind. Many freed slaves turned around. However at this particular day, estimates roughly 670 freed men, women and children were on the march with Sherman’s army, and were stranded.

Jefferson C. Davis of XIV Corps, made the decision to abandon the following. Davis’s units crossed the pontoons first, leaving the freed men on the otherside. Then the order was given, and Davis’s last regiment the 58th Indiana blocked the former slaves from getting on the pontoon. Davis tricked the former slaves into thinking that them being held back at first was for their own safety, making them think that they would be safe in the back in case a fight should happen in the front. It was under these pretenses when the line was cut and the pontoon made it to the otherside of the icey water about thirty to forty yards away. It was in this moment that cavalrymen of Major General Joseph Wheeler of the Confederates came to the side of the creek where the slaves were abandoned. Many dove into the river trying to swim across and drowned, others were shot in a brief attack. Davis’s men left as soon as Major General Wheeler’s men were in sight. After the initial attack, Confederate Calvrymen left to find another way around the river, they later came back to capture those who were left behind.

Many blamed the incident on Davis, however General Sherman stated in his Memoirs that Davis was just being a soldier. But at the same time General Sherman and other soldiers admitted to Davis’s hostility and apparent racism to the former slaves. The Tragedy at Ebenezer Creek would remain synonymous with Davis’s actions.

References

*cite book
last = Marszalek
first = John F.
authorlink = John F. Marszalek
title = Sherman's March to the Sea
publisher = Mcwiney Foundation Press
series = Civil War Campaigns and Commanders Series
year = 1939
isbn = 1-893114-16-3
*Sherman, William T., " [http://www.sonshi.com/sherman.html Memoirs of General W.T. Sherman] ", 2nd ed., D. Appleton & Co., 1913 (1889). Reprinted by the Library of America, 1990, ISBN 978-0-94045065-3.
*cite web |url=http://www.historynet.com/magazines/civil_war_times/3026396.html?page=1&c=y|title=Betrayal at Ebenezer Creek|accessdate=2007-10-15 |author= Edward M. Churchill |date=1998-10 |work=Civil War times|publisher= Weider History Group, Inc
*cite web |url= http://www.cviog.uga.edu/Projects/gainfo/tdgh-jan/jan11.htm|title=This Day in Georgia History |accessdate=2007-10-15 |last=Jackson |first=Ed |coauthors=Charly Pou |date=2007-01-11|publisher= Carl Vinson Institute of government,The University of Georgia