General Howard on who burned Columbia

I had gone on through the city and taken up my quarters at the College; but, noticing the extraordinary conduct of Stone's brigade, I quickly sent for an- other brigade to replace this, and then a little later for another. Finally, I had the whole of one division and a part of another guarding the city, and endeavoring to protect the inhabitants and save all that was possible from the flames. There were many imprisoned people — Negroes, Union prisoners of war, and State convicts — who were let loose by our men. There were also criminal classes and drunken soldiers. All these elements, doubtless, were soon engaged in making bad matters worse, against my wishes and the orders of the other commanders. The ensuing great damage was originally owing to the fires set by the Confederate authorities. I spoke of the depot being consumed. Near that was a magazine. The day before we entered some Confederates were said to be plundering there. They dropped a spark, perhaps from a cigar, where there was some powder upon the floor. This explosion, which was an accident, may have also been the cause of the burning of the railroad station.

It would be impossible to exaggerate the horrors of that long night between the 17th and 18th of February, 1865. Sherman, Logan, and myself, with all the officers under our command, worked faithfully to care for the people who were exposed, and we did save many houses in different parts of the city. The flames would lick up a house seemingly in an instant and shoot from house to house with incredible rapidity. The very heavens at times appeared on fire. A wide street was no barrier. Clusters of inhabitants would carry out all their valuables and sit upon them, and they were often guarded by faithful men. A large number of our men, who perhaps drank whisky for the first time when it was brought to them that day in buckets, became blindly drunk, and hundreds perished in the flames in spite of all the efforts of their comrades to save them.

 It was about three o'clock the morning of the 18th when the wind changed to the opposite quarter, and after that, with little effort, we were able to arrest the progress of the fire, so that more than one third of the beautiful city of Columbia was suffered to re main untouched. During the night I met Logan and Woods and other general officers, and they were taking every possible measure to stop the fire and prevent disorder. Nevertheless, some escaped prisoners, convicts from the penitentiary just broken open, army followers, and drunken soldiers ran through house after house and were doubtless guilty of all manner of villainies, and it was these men that, I presume, set new fires farther to the windward in the northern part of the city. 

-From the Autobiography of Gen. O. O. Howard: 

What else was destroyed at Columbia - Feb 1865

The following are the estimates of what were so destroyed [at Columbia]:

• 1,000 bales of cotton, 
• 19 locomotives,
•  20 box cars;
•  five tons of railroad machinery,
• 25 powder mills, the mills being destroyed by being blown up; 
• Armory near the Congaree River,
• 10 tons of machinery used by the Confederate army, 
• 43 cannon.
• 10,000 rounds artillery ammunition
• 500,000 rounds for small arms

From the Autobiography of O.O. Howard

A Refugee Train leaves Columbia - Feb 1865

From the Autobiography of Gen. O. O. Howard: 

My rear guard for February 20, 1865, the day of departure, consisted of two brigades, one from each corps. They were the two that were then guarding the town. Just in advance of these, who had brought out all the stragglers, was a new and remarkable accession to my columns, called a "refugee train." It consisted of thousands of people who wished to leave Columbia, mostly Negroes besides at least 800 Whites.' The refugees carried their luggage on pack horses, on their backs, or in vehicles of every conceivable description.

A variety of reasons caused this extraordinary exodus; for example, escaping prisoners feared re- incarceration  those who had betrayed their loyalty to the old flag, hitherto concealed, feared revenges; those who had been especially kind to the Yankees had signs of coming retribution, and many who had lost everything by the fire desired to escape extreme want - besides these, a number of traders, bent upon money- making, joined the procession with wagon loads of trunks and boxes. I may say that I was obliged to deal severely with the latter class, at least with the freightage, in order to reduce my refugee train within such limits that it could be protected and brought along without detriment or hindrance to the fighting force of the army.

In a letter written a little later, which I sent down the Cape Fear River for home consumption, I re marked that we brought from Columbia quite a number of men, women, and children who had trudged along in wagons, ambulances, on horses, or on foot. We had two families at our headquarters who had completely mastered all the discomforts of military life and enjoyed the novelty. A gentleman artist, by the name of Halpin, with his wife and daughter, and a Mr. Soule, a telegraph operator, with his bride, were our guests.