capture seem to Sherman so desirable: its strategic position as a
central point in the Far South.

Neither in Atlanta nor in any other part of Georgia is General Sherman
remembered with a feeling that can properly be described as
affectionate, though it may be added that Atlanta has good reason for
remembering him warmly. The burning of Atlanta by Sherman did not,
however, prove an unalloyed disaster, for the war came to an end soon
after, and the rebuilding of the city supplied work for thousands of
former Confederate soldiers, and also drew to Atlanta many of the strong
men who played leading parts in the subsequent commercial upbuilding of
the place: such men as the late General Alfred Austell, Captain James W.
English, and the three Inman brothers, Samuel, John, and Hugh--to
mention but a few names. The First National Bank, established by General
Austell, is, I believe, Atlanta's largest bank to-day, and was literally
the first national bank established in Georgia, if not in the whole
South, after the war.

Woodrow Wilson was admitted to the bar in Atlanta, and, if I mistake
not, practised law in an office not far from that meeting place of
highways called Five Points. Here, at Five Points, two important trails
crossed, long before there was any Atlanta: the north-and-south trail
between Savannah and Ross's Landing, and the east-and-west trail, which
followed the old Indian trails between Charleston and New Orleans. When
people from this part of the country wished to go to Ohio, Indiana, or
the Mississippi Valley, they would take the old north-and-south trail to
Ross's Landing, follow the Tennessee River to where it empties into the
Ohio, near Paducah, Kentucky, and proceed thence to Mississippi.

In the thirties, Atlanta--or rather the site of Atlanta, for the city