Download Chapter 22 Summary The Civil War took up where Napoleon and

Chapter 22 Summary
The Civil War took up where Napoleon and the Duke of Wellington had left off in 1815.
Commanders were willing to sustain high casualties if the objective of a battle was important enough. As
in the eighteenth century, however, the general who realized that he had been outfoxed was duty
bound to disengage so that his army could fight another day. Civil War armies were comprised of
cavalry, artillery, and infantry with support units. The cavalry’s principal job was reconnaissance. Before
an attacking army moved, its artillery slugged away at enemy positions with exploding shells. The
infantry was the backbone of the army. Except for special units of sharpshooters, there was not much
aiming. As always, the men who fought the Civil War were young, most between the ages of 17 and 25.
The burden fell more heavily on the poor because of legal ways to dodge the draft. Both Union and
Confederate armies were plagued by a high desertion rate. Most women who wanted to serve became
nurses.
Abraham Lincoln shared the illusion that the war would be short and almost painless. These
pleasant visions were blown away at the Battle of Bull Run, where Confederate Thomas Jackson earned
his reputation. Davis cautioned Richmond society that there was hard fighting to come, a lot of it.
Lincoln gave George McClellan command of what was named the Army of the Potomac. McClellan had
been a superb organizer and administrator, just what the Union needed. A three-part strategy Winfield
Scott had recommended became, with modifications, Union policy. First, Washington had to be
defended by the Army of the Potomac. Second, the Union would win complete control of the
Mississippi. Third, the Union would blockade the South. Southern chances of victory were, on the face
of it, pretty thin. Nevertheless, the southern cause was far from hopeless. Confederate leaders looked
for a foreign ally to help them. Both the British and French governments looked favorably on the
Confederate cause in 1861. For the British, the hang-up was slavery.
One of the president’s most controversial acts was his suspension of the ancient legal right of
habeas corpus. Defeatism was worrisome in the North. In 1861 and most of 1862, the Confederates
won all the battles in Virginia. Lincoln was no soldier, but he understood better than Lee the importance
of the war in the West. Indeed, Shiloh showed how bloody the war would be. The Confederacy came
close to breaking the blockade of the Chesapeake Bay in March 1862 with the ironclad, the Merrimack.
However, the Union responded with an ironclad of their own, the Monitor. McClellan's lack of
aggressiveness was partly a personality issue, but it was also a political one. His Peninsula Campaign
plan was ingenious, but his hesitation cost him his advantage. Antietam was the worst single day of the
war and a costly defeat for Lee. Lincoln, though, used the victory to issue his ultimatum on slavery. The
Emancipation Proclamation was a political master stroke.