The Indianapolis Journal

GENERAL SHERMAN.
He Again States that He Had No Intention of Disparaging General Grant.

PITTSBURG, Feb. 18.-Gen. W. T. Sherman arrived in the city, to-day, from the funeral of General Hancock. In speaking of the newspaper extracts on his reference to Generals Grant and Smith, he said: "The sentence occurs in a letter written by me to Lieutenant Scott, having charge of the records at Washington. I know that I could not have written anything intended as a disparagement of General Grant. General Smith was a brave officer. When he found he was unable to take charge of the forces he sent for General Grant. In writing that sentence I meant that Grant had gone down, down, down, and now the opportunity had presented itself which gave him a chance to rise by his own merits. If Smith had lived, it is questionable whether the opportunity would have come to Grant by which he was enabled to bring into play the forces of his character. Fry never made a record. He was never in North Carolina. His record is on paper, and to keep that up he must seek notoriety. It is ridiculous to suppose that I meant to detract from Grant's fame. The sentence occurs in a letter written to Lieutenant Scott to obtain some records which I desired to use in preparing a eulogy of General Grant, which I delivered before his old comrades of the Army of the Tennessee at their reunion in Chicago, on Sept. 9 and 10, 1883. This letter was written three days before, on Sept. 6, as it was necessary that I should have some data."

General Sherman insists that many things that he says are distorted, and frequently appear in the newspapers in an entirely different form from his own expressions or thoughts.