Chapter 16 - The Civil War (1861 - 1865)

Section One - The War Begins

Lincoln Faces a Crisis

• By the time Lincoln took office, seven states had seceeded (left the Union)
• South ignores Lincoln's pleading for unity
• Fort Sumter - US fort located on an island off of Charleston, South Carolina
• Confederates attack Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861, starting the Civil War
• South takes over the fort after 34 hour battle
• Lincoln asks states for 75,000 militamen to stop the revolt

Choosing Sides

• Free northern states were solidly in the Union (US)
• Slaves states that had not joined the Confederacy had to choose a side
• North Carolina, Tennessee, Arkansas and Virginia join the Confederacy when Lincoln requests troops
• Richmond, Virginia becomes the capital of the Confederacy
• Border States - slave states who sided with the North - Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, and Missouri
• West Virginia splits from Virginia because they have very few slaves there

The Volunteer Spirit

• Niether side was ready for war, so both sides needed volunteer troops
• Union army only had 16,000 troops at the outset (beginning) of the war
• Many Southerns volunteer to fight because they feel they are being invaded by the Union army
• Many families had some members fighting for opposite sides, especially in border states
• Civilians (non-military personnel) helped both sides by raising money, running emergency hospitals, and providing troops with food

The North versus the South

• Northern Advantages - Larger population (more troops), most of factories and shipyards, 70% of railroads, easier to raise money
• Southern Advantages - Many skilled officers, defensive war (home field advantage)
• Northern Early Battle Plan - Blockade Southern ports and gain control of the Mississippi
• Southern Early Battle Plan - Defend it territory and make North come to South, Capture Washington, D.C., win foreign allies
• Cotton Diplomacy - Belief the British would support the Confederacy because Britian needed Southern cotton (did not work as Britain imported cotton from India and Egypt instead)

Section Two - The War in the East

Two Armies Meet (First Battle of Bull Run/Manassas) - July, 1861

• Lincoln orders an attack on Richmond, the captial of the Confederacy
• Manassas Junction, Virginia (Bull Run) - first meeting of the two armies in July, 1861
• 35,000 untrained Union troops meet 35,000 untrained Confederate troops 30 miles from Washington, D.C.
• General Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson - orders his Confederate troops to counter a Union attack
• Rebel Yell - piercing scream used by the Southern army before an attack to terrify the Union troops (very efffective)
• Fresh Confederate troops arrive in the middle of the battle, and chase off the Union
• Confederates might have captured Washington, D.C. if they chased the Union, but they wfere tired and too disorganized to do so

More Battles in Virginia

• General George Mc Clellan - Leader of the Union army at the beginning of the war, very cautious
• Union constantly outnumbers the South, but never is really sure how many troops the South has, so remains slow to attack, given the South time to organize itself
• Jefferson Davis - President of the Confederacy
• General Robert E. Lee - Leader of the Confederate army throughout the war, brillant leader (best general in either army and loved by his men)
• Second Battle of Bull Run - Lincoln orders another attack on Richmond, also a loss
• Lee decides to take the war into the North in August of 1862

The Battle of Antietam (September 17, 1862)

• September 4, 1862 - 40,000 Confederate troops enter Maryland
• Union soldiers find General Robert E. Lee's entire battle plan, but thinks it is a Southern trick
• Battle of Antietam - Single bloodiest day of the war - Union suffers 12,000 casualties to Coferderates 13,000 casualties
• Union manages to gain the victory, but allows Lee to retreat without an attack - might have ended the war by continuing the fight
• Lincoln fires Mc Clellan for not chasing Lee across the bridge into Virginia
• Photographer Matthew Brady shocks the world with pictures of the battlefield and casulties after the Battle of Antietam

The War at Sea

• Union controls the seas because of more ships and greater ship building capacity
• Blockade - Union surrounds the South at sea and allows no import or export in hopes of stopping foreign goods from aiding the Southern war effort (mixed success because of large area to cover)
• Ironclads - Confederacy creates ships first sided with iron over wood, and later entirely of metal. North follows this by doing the same thing
• Montior vs. Virginia - ironclads battle in which neither side could harm the other, but the Southern boat, Virginia, withdraws

Section Three - The War in the West

Western Strategy

• Union strategy focused on controlling the Mississippi Rive, which would cut supply routes to the Southr
• General Ulysses S. Grant - Overcomes personal issues to be the most important man in the Union army in the west
• Union army controls most of Kentucky and Tennessee by March, 1862
• Battle of Shiloh, TN (April 6-7, 1862) - General Grant's army was at first pushed back, but counerattacked and captured greater control of the Mississippi River Valley

Fighting for the Mississippi River (April, 1862 - July 4, 1863)

• New Orleans - located at the mouth of the Mississippi River, this city was key to Union control of the river. It was captured by the Union leader, David Farragut, on April 29, 1862
• Battle of Vicksburg, Mississippi - Vicksburg sits high on bluffs overlooking the river, providing the city control over river travel
• General Grant surrounded Vicksburg in spring of 1863 for six weeks, starving the residents
• Vicksburg surrenders on July 4, 1863, giving the Union control of the Mississippi River

Section Four - Life During the War (1861 - 1865)

Freeing the Slaves

• President Lincoln wanted to free the slaves if it would help the North win the war
• Lincoln faced two issues regarding emancipating (freeing) the slaves - 1) He feared northern prejudice against Blacks would harm the war effort if the slaves were freed; 2) He feared slave owners in the borderr states would result in those states leaving the Union and joining the Confederacy
• Emancipation Proclamation (September 22, 1862) - Lincoln called for all slaves in Confederate areas to be freed as of January 1, 1863(northern slaves would not be freed)
• Many northern democrats did not like the Emancipation Proclamation, saying Lincoln did not have the Constitutional right to do this (he didn't) and also saying the war was not about freeing slaves but saving the Union
• Abolitionists such as William Lloyd Garrison and Frederick Douglass loved it. Gave these people more motivation to fight

African Americans and the War

• Union army allows African Americans to sigh up for combat in July 1862 in all Black regiments because they needed more troops
• Contrabands - escaped slaves who also had the right to join the Union army
• 54th Massachusetts Infantry - most famous African AMerican unit of the war which helped capture South Carolina's Fort Wagner
• 180,000 African Americans served with the Union army during the war, all facing tough discrimination
• Blacks recieved less pay than whites, and had to be led by white officers
• Black troops taken prisoner were often killed or sold into slavery by Confederate troops

Problems in the North

• Northerners were upset by the length of the war and the large number of casualties
• Copperheads - Northern Democrats who spoke out against the war, objected to abolition, and sympathized with the South
• Lincoln suspended the right of habeas corpus (protection against unlawful imprisonment); this meant Union officials could put enemies in jail without evidence or a trial
• March, 1863 - Congress creates a draft system in the North in hopes of finding more soldiers. Wealthy could "buy out" of the draft for $300, or you could find someone to go in for you if you did not wish to serve in the army
• Copperheads complained
• Riots break out in New York City targeting draft officials and Blacks. Many rioters were poor immigrants who feared losing jobs to freed slaves - over 100 people were killed

Southern Struggles

• Confederate troops lacked supplies due to Union blockade
• Prices for food, clothing, and medicine shot up quickly (supply and demand)
• Food riots take place in several cities, including captial Richmond.
• President Jefferson Davis orders the newspapers not to print articles that would embarrass the South
• South issues a draft law, but it excludes people who own slaves from having to join the army (wealthy)

Life on the Home Front

• Both in the North and South, people from all parts of society pitched in to help the war effort
• Factories produced war goods, farms produced food for troops, and women took over farming responsiblities when their husbands and sons went away to war
• 3000 women served as paid Union nurses
• Clara Barton - works as a volunteer, organizing collections of medicine and supplies to help wounded, and later starts the American Red Cross because o her experiences during the Civil War
• Soldiers face bad weaher, disease, unsafe food, boredom, and lonliness
• Andersonville, Georgia - worst of the prisoner-of-war (POW) camps in which 150 men could die in a day from starvation, disease and lack of shelter

Section Five - The Tide of the War Turns

The Battle of Gettysburg (July 1-4, 1863)

• Stonewall Jackson was accidentally shot and killed by his own troops after a Confederate victory at Chancellorsville, VA
• Victories and Chancellorsville, VA and Fredericksburg, VA convince Lee to again invade the North in an attempt to capture much needed supplies and break the North's will to fight
• Battle of Gettysburg, PA - turning point of the Civil War
• 75,000 Confederate troops face 90,000 UNion troops
• New Union leader, General George Meade, places troops along a ridge, while, Lee's men align on another ridge about two miles away
• Pickett's Charge - Lee mistakely orders General George Pickett to lead 15,000 troops one mile over an unprotected cornfield, uphill, into the center of the Union line. It was a diaster that saw only 6500 return to the Confederate line after failing to move the Northerners from the ridge.

A Turning Point

• Lee retreated to Virginia on July 4 never to attack on Northern soil again
• Gettysburg is won by the Union the same day that Grant captured Vicksburg in Mississippi
• Gettysburg - Union casualties were 23,000 to 28,000 for the Confederacy (over 1/3 of the whole army)
• Gettysburg Address - Lincoln dedicates the National Cemetary at Gettysburg with a four and a half minute speech about liberty, equality, and never forgetting men who have died in battle to protect those American ideals

Grant's Drive to Richmond (Early 1864 - April 1865)

• Lincoln promotes General Ulysses S. Grant to the head of the Union army
• Grant decides to attck the Southerners, who are running out of supplies
• Despite losing the Wilderness Campaign and at Cold Harbor, Grant knew Lee was running out of soldiers and that the Union had more people who would still be entering the army because of the draft
• Grant was unable to capture Richmond after several attempts

Sherman Strikes the South (1864)

• Lincoln needed a victory to be assured of re-election in 1864
• General William Tecumseh Sherman gives Lincoln this victory
• Sherman's plan is to destroy Southern railroads and industries
• Spring 1864 - Sherman, with 100,000 troops marches south from Tennessee headed toward Atlanta, Georgia
• September 2, 1864 - Sherman attacks and destroys 80% of the city of Atlanta, a key railroad link in the South
• Lincoln wins re-election in a landslide
• Sherman's March to the Sea - Sherman creates a new plan to march from Atlanta to Savannah, Georgia and the Atlantic Ocean
• Total War - Sherman's 60,000 men destroyed military and civilian resources to crush the South's will to fight; bridges, RR tracks, crops and livestock were destroyed, and slaves were set free
• 250 miles of territory were destroyed in Sherman's March

The South Surrenders (April 9, 1865)

• April 2, 1865 - Lee is finally forced to retreat from Richmond
• Grant surrounds Lee's army in the second week of April at the small town of Appomattox Courthouse, VA
• Lee surrenders on Palm Sunday, April 9, 1865
• 620,000 people were killed in the Civil War in four years of fighting
• Now the North and South are all part of one country again - how will they heal the wounds of distrust and rebuild?