PERSONAL MEMOIRES OF P. H. SHERIDAN, VOLUME 1.

By Philip Henry Sheridan



PREFACE

When, yielding to the solicitations of my friends, I finally decided
to write these Memoirs, the greatest difficulty which confronted me
was that of recounting my share in the many notable events of the
last three decades, in which I played a part, without entering too
fully into the history of these years, and at the same time without
giving to my own acts an unmerited prominence. To what extent I have
overcome this difficulty I must leave the reader to judge.

In offering this record, penned by my own hand, of the events of my
life, and of my participation in our great struggle for national
existence, human liberty, and political equality, I make no
pretension to literary merit; the importance of the subject-matter of
my narrative is my only claim on the reader's attention.

Respectfully dedicating this work to my comrades in arms during the
War of the Rebellion, I leave it as a heritage to my children, and as
a source of information for the future historian.

P. H. SHERIDAN.

Nonguitt, Mass., August 2, 1888