The American Civil War: History In An Hour Kat Smutz
‘… the Confederate states can no longer delay assuming actual possession of a fortification commanding the entrance of one of their harbors …’ Brigadier General P.G.T. Beauregard, CSA, to Major Robert Anderson, Charleston, South Carolina, 11 April 1861
It was early on a Friday morning in the spring of 1861 that the American Civil War began. At 4.30 a.m. on 12 April, Confederate forces in Charleston Harbor, South Carolina, were ordered to open fire on Fort Sumter where Union forces were entrenched. The next day, a Saturday, the Union commander, Major Robert Anderson, knew that he was outnumbered, out of food and out of options. The first engagement of the American Civil War had been fought, and the Confederate States of America was the victor. More than 40,000 shells had been dropped on the fort that sat on a spit of land in the harbor, and yet there were few wounded and no casualties.
The bombardment of Fort Sumter is considered the official beginning of the American Civil War. However, the storm clouds of conflict had been gathering for some time before those first shots were fired. When the first Continental Congress presented their Declaration of Independence to the country in 1776, it included the promise of ‘life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.’ They neglected to mention that the promise was limited to white males. But it didn’t go unnoticed. It was a
consciousness that would grow and spread until it began to meet with resistance.
But, despite the resistance to the inequality inherent in the declaration, the US president, Abraham Lincoln, went to war not for the benefit of slaves or in support of the cause of abolitionism, but for the preservation of the Union.
Four years later, the war was won, the Confederate States of America had ceased to exist, and through Lincoln’s Proclamation of Emancipation, slaves were free. But peace had come at a high cost and to this day the American Civil War remains the bloodiest conflict in America’s history. And with the end of the war came the difficult years of Reconstruction. Lincoln was dead, felled by an assassin’s bullet, the south lay in ruins and the legacy of conflict would affect the US for decades to come.
This, in an hour, is the American Civil War.
From One Revolution to Another After the American Revolution ended in 1883, there were those who took notice that slaves had no rights at all, much less freedom. A war had been fought with the intent of liberty for all, and yet women, Africans, African-Americans, and Native Americans still had no voice and no rights in the governing and development of the nation that had just been born. They had all done their part in the fight for freedom, only to be excluded once the fight was done. And so the first seeds of dissent were sown, and the growing discontent would end with the American Civil War.
But the country was divided. In the north, slave labour (pictured above) was used, but it was not as crucial to industrial growth as it was in the south, where the economy was based upon agriculture. In the north, the State of Pennsylvania was the first to enact a plan that would gradually set free their slaves, with the aim of eventually abolishing slavery. But as other states in the north began to follow the growing anti-slavery movement, the south felt threatened by the possibility that abolition would spread until it was illegal to own slaves at all.
Then, as the nation began to expand westwards across the continent, a new cause for concern arose. How to determine whether each new state that entered the Union was free or slave? It could mean upsetting the balance of power in the new government, and neither side would stand for the other to have more power and influence. Level-headed statesmen, who could see the threat of war and the potential destruction of the new nation, worked to maintain that delicate balance and keep both in check. But tension continued to build.
The United States was still an infant nation, still learning to walk and still growing. As it developed, legislation was a matter of trial and error in an effort to meet its changing needs. With every new piece of legislation seemed to arise the question of how slavery fitted into the picture. And once again, tempers flared as each side tried
to maintain at least an equal – if not greater – influence in the governing of the country.
Controversy between anti-slavery supporters in the north and slaveholders in the south slowly grew into animosity and resentment, and violence flared. Each side fought hard for political control in order to protect their rights and beliefs and the relations between the two regions of the new nation finally reached breaking point.
A series of events that seemed to fall like dominos led up to that fateful April day in Charleston Harbor. A politician from Illinois, Abraham Lincoln, a man known for his opposition to slavery, was nominated as the Republican candidate for president. The southern members of Congress declared they would not stand for it if he was elected. But, in November 1860, that was exactly what happened.
The first domino had fallen. South Carolina was the first state to opt to secede, to severe ties to the Union and strike out as a country on its own. That was in
December 1860. Other states followed, then a ship attempting to resupply Federal forces in Charleston was fired upon and the dominoes began to fall faster. The seceding states held a convention, wrote their own constitution, set up their own provisional government and elected a provisional president. By the time those first fateful shots were fired upon Fort Sumter, the controversy over slavery had already given birth to the Confederate States of America.
Outline of the War The official beginning of the American Civil War is regarded as 12 April 1861, when Confederate forces fired on the southern-based Union headquarters at Fort Sumter, Charleston Harbor.
In response, President Lincoln called for 75,000 volunteers to suppress the rebellion. But four more southern states (Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Arkansas) opted instead to join the Confederacy, bringing the number of Confederate states to eleven.
In the spring of 1861 the
Confederacy moved its capital from Montgomery, Alabama to Richmond, Virginia, just one hundred miles away from Washington DC. Confident of a quick win, Union forces marched on Richmond, but were repulsed at First Battle of Bull Run (also known as the Battles of Manassas) on 21 July 1861 (pictured above). This was the first major battle of the civil war.
In February 1862, the Union army of General Ulysses S. Grant captured Forts Henry and Donelson, and two months later, in April 1862, defeated a Confederate army at Shiloh, Tennessee. That same month, the Union navy captured New Orleans, the Confederacy’s largest port, leaving them only Vicksburg and Port Hudson on the Mississippi. Grant, focusing on Vicksburg, sailed up the Mississippi and laid siege to the town on 18 May 1863.
In March 1862, General George B. McClellan, the newly appointed commander of the Army of the Potomac, also tried to attack Richmond and got to within five miles of the capital. But, following the Seven Days Battles, his army was defeated by General Robert E. Lee’s Confederate army and forced to retreat.
The Confederates now had the upper hand. Lee moved north and defeated another Union force at the Second Battle of Bull Run, which ran from 28–30 August 1862. Buoyed by his success, Lee crossed the Potomac into the State of Maryland, taking the war further into the north, and in September 1862, fought McClellan at Antietam (also known as the Battle of Sharpsburg). Lee lost a quarter of his men and was forced back to Virginia, but McClellan’s victory was far from decisive. Nonetheless,
following the win in Antietam, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, freeing slaves in the south.
In November Lincoln replaced McClellan with General Ambrose Burnside who, only a month later, in December, lost the Battle of Fredericksburg and was in turn replaced by General Joseph Hooker. In May 1863, Hooker met Lee at Chancellorsville. Although outnumbered two to one, Lee outthought Hooker, forcing the Union forces to retreat. But in winning, Lee lost his most able general, Thomas ‘Stonewall’ Jackson, who was accidentally killed by his own side.
In June 1863, Lee invaded the north for the second time, crossing the border into Pennsylvania. Following the defeat at Chancellorsville, Lincoln had replaced Hooker with General George Meade. On 1 July, Lee’s army came across Union forces at Gettysburg and the following three days saw the most famous battle of the war, which ended with Lee’s defeat. The following day, 4 July, General Ulysses S. Grant finally ended the siege of Vicksburg and captured the town. Port Hudson, the last Confederate port on the Mississippi, fell within a matter of days. The whole of the State of Mississippi now lay in Union hands and the Confederacy had been cut into two.
On 31 January 1865, the US House of Representatives passed the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, with a vote of 119 to 56, officially abolishing slavery throughout the United States and all of her territories.
Grant then moved south, gradually forcing Lee further back, winning battles at Spotsylvania and Cold Harbor, until the Confederate forces had retreated to Petersburg, south of Richmond. Grant laid siege to Lee’s forces in Richmond (pictured below). With provisions down to nothing, Lee evacuated the city on 2 April 1865, allowing the Confederate capital to fall into Union hands, and the next day President Lincoln visited the city that had been the Confederate capital. Lee retreated westwards but a week later, on 9 April, at the Appomattox Courthouse in southern Virginia, Lee finally surrendered to Grant.
Meanwhile, General William Sherman, also advancing south and destroying everything in his wake, took Atlanta, Georgia on 1 September 1864, and then headed towards Savannah, his ‘March to the Sea’, taking the city on 10 December 1864. Then, having reached the Atlantic, Sherman marched north through the Carolinas, pushing back Confederate forces. Unable to sustain the fight, the Confederate commander, General Joseph Johnston, surrendered at Durham, North Carolina, on 26 April 1865. The Confederate States of America was no more.
On 14 April, whilst attending the theatre in Washington DC, President Lincoln was shot by a southern sympathizer, John Wilkes Booth, and died the following morning.
Although isolated skirmishes continued until June 1865, the American Civil War was over. Estimates vary but the conflict had cost about 620,000 lives (517,000 Americans lost their lives in the two world wars). The Union lost over 360,000 lives (250,000 in battle and 110,000 to disease, wounds and other causes); and the Confederacy lost approximately 258,000 (94,000 in battle and 164,000 to disease). It remains the bloodiest conflict in America’s history.
Read more in The American Civil War: History In An Hour published by Harper Press History In An Hour