(A) Atlanta was the capital of the Confederacy.
(B) ** Atlanta had become a big supply hub having lots of railroads.
(C) Atlanta was a Union supporting town.
(D) Sherman did not want Atlanta, he only wanted Savannah.
EXPLANATIONS BELOW
Concept note-1: -General Sherman’s troops captured Atlanta on September 2, 1864. This was an important triumph, because Atlanta was a railroad hub and the industrial center of the Confederacy: It had munitions factories, foundries and warehouses that kept the Confederate army supplied with food, weapons and other goods.
Concept note-2: -Given Atlanta’s position south of the Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia, capturing the city would severely threaten the stability of the Confederacy. If Atlanta fell, Union leadership hoped that it would bring the already bloody war to a swift end.
Concept note-3: -Siege and closure Sherman settled into a siege of Atlanta, shelling the city and sending raids west and south of the city to cut off the supply lines from Macon, Georgia. Both of Sherman’s cavalry raids including McCook’s raid and Stoneman’s Raid were defeated by Confederate cavalry collectively under General Wheeler.
Concept note-4: -William Tecumseh Sherman burned nearly all of the captured city of Atlanta, Georgia. This event occurred near the end of the U.S. Civil War during which 11 states in the American South seceded from the rest of the nation.
Concept note-5: -On August 28, 1864, Union Army General William Tecumseh Sherman lays siege to Atlanta, Georgia, a critical Confederate hub, shelling civilians and cutting off supply lines. The Confederates retreated, destroying the city’s munitions as they went.