Download 1861

The War for the Union
The Improvised War, 1861
I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends.
We must not be enemies. Though passion may have
strained it must not break our bonds of affection. The
mystic chords of memory, stretching from every
battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and
hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the
chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely
they will be, by the better angels of our nature.
Opening Salvos
• Lincoln and the First Shot
• Lincoln calls for volunteers
• The secession of the Upper South
The Problem of Civil War Military
History
• Is God on the side of the strongest
battalions?
• Did the North win or the South loose?
• Sectional reconciliation and the problem of
memory.
Relative Advantages
North
• 3x military population
• Food
• Railroad mileage—
over 3x the CSA
• Productive capacity
• Industrial capacity
• finance
South
• Defensive war—a win
or a tie
• Interior Lines
• Slavery
• Rifle
• Knowledge of
landscape
Holding the Border
• Suspension of writ of Habeas Corpus
• John C. Fremont in Missouri; William
Clarke Quantrill in Missouri
• Battle of Wilson’s Creek (August 10, 1861)
• Kentucky neutrality
• Unionism? in East Tennessee
• Naval Blocade
Nathaniel Lyon (1818-1861)
Benjamin McCulloch (1811-1862)
William Clarke Quantrill, 1837-1865
John
Ericsson
1803-1889
Organization of CW Armies
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Company
Regiment
Brigade
Division
Corps
Armies
Company A, 9th Indiana Infantry
First Bull Run, July 21, 1861
Henry House Hill and Mighty Stonewall
Ball’s Bluff, Oct. 1861
• Col. and Senator Edward D. Baker was
killed; Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. was
critically wounded.
• 223 Federals killed, 226 wounded, 533
captured.
• Gen. Charles P. Stone was blamed for
debacle.
• Led to creation of Joint Committee on the
Conduct of the War
Ball’s Bluff—A Reverie
One noonday, at my window in the
town,
I saw a sight — saddest that
eyes can see —
Young soldiers marching lustily
Unto the wars,
With fifes, and flags in mottoed
pageantry;
While all the porches, walks,
and doors
Were rich with ladies cheering
royally.
They moved like Juny morning on
the wave,
Their hearts were fresh as
clover in its prime
(It was the breezy summer
time),
Life throbbed so strong,
How should they dream that
Death in rosy clime
Would come to thin their shining
throng?
Youth feels immortal, like the gods
sublime.
Weeks passed; and at my window,
leaving bed,
By nights I mused, of easeful
sleep bereft,
On those brave boys (Ah War!
thy theft);
Some marching feet
Found pause at last by cliffs
Potomac cleft;
Wakeful I mused, while in the
street
Far footfalls died away till none
were left. –Walt Whitman
Trent Affair (Nov. 8, 1861-Jan. 14, 1862
George B. McClellan
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Civil War “problem child”
“I can do it all”
Training the Army
Problems with “the Original Gorilla”, the
“Baboon.”