To quote a book I'm reading "though they (the Confederate States of America) had been given more than a month's warning by Sherman's passage through Georgia, neither civilian nor military authorities had made serious attempts to prepare for Sherman's coming into South Carolina".
That, coupled with the lack of a pitched battle during the March to the Sea itself, makes me wonder why the Confederate leadership never tried to stop the Union Army?
Given the numbers they were up against, I'm inclined to think they were simply incapable of doing anything worthwhile to such a force at that point in the war. But, if that was the case, it then seems odd that they continued to fight on (or not as the case may be) and allow themselves to be pillaged so viciously.
Very late response, but the Confederates only had a vague idea of what Sherman was going to do, and furthermore, he was going to march through some very hard to defend land. There was also a sense that Georgia was perhaps not worth defending any further.
Hence the Confederates decided to send all their forces up to Tennessee to draw Union forces away. With a victory, they would have room to fight their way over to Virginia and reinforce Lee’s army. Of course, none of this happened because Hood’s forces were destroyed at Franklin (along with Sailor’s Creek, probably the most dramatic defeat in entire Civil War) and Nashville.