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Chapter 21
The Furnace of the Civil War
Bull Run Ends the “Ninety-Day War”
• When President Abraham Lincoln
called for 75,000 militiamen on
April 15, 1861, he and just about
everyone else in the North
expected a swift war lasting
about 90 days, with a quick
suppression of the South
to prove the North’s superiority
and end this foolishness.
• On July 21, 1861, ill-trained
Yankee recruits swaggered out
toward Bull Run to engage a
smaller Confederate unit. They
expected one big battle and a
quick victory for the war.
First Battle of Bull Run
First Battle of Bull Run
– The atmosphere was like that
of a sporting event, as
spectators gathered in picnics
to watch.
– However, after initial success
by the Union, Confederate
reinforcements arrived and,
coupled with Stonewall
Jackson’s line
holding , sent the Union
soldiers into disarray.
• The Battle of Bull Run
showed the North that this
would not be a short, easy
war and swelled the South’s
already too-large ego.
Stonewall
Jackson
“Tardy George” McClellan and the
Peninsula Campaign
• Later in 1861, command of the
Army of the Potomac (name of
the Union army) was given to
34 year old General George B.
McClellan, an excellent
drillmaster and organizer of
troops, but also a perfectionist
who constantly believed that
he was outnumbered, never
took risks, and held the army
without moving for months
before finally ordered by
Lincoln to advance.
George McClellan
Peninsula Campaign
• At Lincoln’s urging, he
finally decided upon a
water-borne approach
to Richmond (the
South’s capital), called
the Peninsula
Campaign, taking about
a month to capture
Yorktown before
coming to Richmond.
Peninsula Campaign
• At this moment, President
Lincoln took McClellan’s
expected reinforcements
and sent them chasing
Stonewall Jackson, and after
“Jeb” Stuart’s Confederate
cavalry rode completely
around McClellan’s army,
Southern General Robert E.
Lee launched a devastating
counterattack—the Seven
Days’ Battles—on June 26
to July 2 of 1862.
Lincoln’s first two Generals
General McClellan
General John Pope
Second Battle of Bull Run
• The Second Battle of Bull Run,
or, as it was called by the
Confederacy, the Battle of
Second Manassas, was fought
August 28–30, 1862. It was the
culmination of an offensive
campaign waged by
Confederate Gen. Robert E.
Lee's Army of Northern
Virginia against Union Maj.
Gen. John Pope's Army of
Virginia, and a battle of much
larger scale and numbers than
the First Battle of Bull Run
(First Manassas) fought in
1861 on the same ground.
Planning Total War
•
With the quick-strike plan a failure,
the Union strategy now turned
to total war. Summed up, the plan
was to blockade, divide, and conquer.
The plan included…
– Suffocate the South through an oceanic
blockade.
– Free the slaves to undermine the
South’s very economic foundations.
– Cut the Confederacy in half by seizing
control of the Mississippi River.
– Chop the Confederacy to pieces by
marching through Georgia and the
Carolinas.
– Capture its capital, Richmond, Virginia.
– Try everywhere to engage the enemy’s
main strength and grind it to
submission.
– This was essentially General Winfield
Scott’s “Anaconda Plan.”
The War at Sea
•
The Union blockade started with many leaks
at first, but it clamped down later.
•
Britain, who would ordinarily protest such
interference in the seas that she “owned,”
recognized the blockade as binding, since
Britain herself often used blockades in her
wars.
•
Blockade-running, or the process of
smuggling materials through the
blockade, was a risky but profitable business,
but the Union navy also seized British
freighters on the high seas, citing “ultimate
destination” (to the South) as their reasons;
the British relented, since they might have to
do the same thing in later wars (as
they did in World War I).
The War at Sea
•
The biggest Confederate threat to
the Union came in the form of an
old U.S. warship reconditioned and
plated with iron railroad rails: the
Virginia (formerly called the
Merrimack), which threatened to
break the
Union blockade, but fortunately,
the Monitor arrived just in time to
fight the Merrimack to a standstill,
and the Confederate ship was
destroyed later by the South to
save it from the North.
– The lessons of the Monitor vs. the
Merrimack were that boats needed
to be steam-powered and armored,
henceforth.
Bloody Antietam
•
•
In the Second Battle of Bull Run,
Robert E. Lee crushed the arrogant
General John Pope.
After this battle, Lee hoped to thrust
into the North and win,
hopefully persuading the Border
States to join the South and foreign
countries to intervene on behalf of
the South.
– At this time, Lincoln reinstated General
McClellan.
•
McClellan’s men found a copy of
Lee’s plans (as wrapping paper for
cigars) and were able to stop the
Southerners at Antietam Creek on
September 17, 1862 in one of the
bloodiest days of
the Civil War.
The Battle of Antietam
– Jefferson Davis was never so close to
victory as he was that day,
since European powers were very close
to helping the South, but after
the Union army displayed unexpected
power at Antietam, that help faded.
– Antietam was also the Union display of
power that Lincoln needed to
announce his Emancipation
Proclamation, which didn’t actually
free the slaves, but gave the general
idea; it was announced on January
1, 1863. Lincoln said the slaves would
be free in the seceded states
(but NOT the border states as doing so
might anger them into seceding
too).
•
•
Now, the war wasn’t just to save the
Union, it was to free the slaves a well.
This gave the war a moral purpose (end
slavery) to go with its political purpose
(restore the union).
A Proclamation Without Emancipation
• The Emancipation
Proclamation freed the
slaves in not-yet-conquered
Southern territories, but
slaves in the Border States
and the conquered
territories were not
liberated since doing so
might make them go to the
South; Lincoln freed the
slaves where he couldn’t
and wouldn’t free the slaves
where he could.
Blacks Battle Bondage
• At first, Blacks weren’t enlisted in
the army, but as men ran
low, these men were eventually
allowed in; by war’s end,
Black’s accounted for about 10%
of the Union army.
• Until 1864, Southerners refused
to recognize Black soldiers as
prisoners of war, and often
executed them as runaways and
rebels, and in one case, at Fort
Pillow, Tennessee, Blacks who had
surrendered were
massacred.
– Afterwards, vengeful Black units
swore to take no prisoners, crying,
“Remember Fort Pillow!”
54th Massachusetts
54th Massachusetts
•
Regiments of the Union Army were
overwhelmingly not Black, and this
was the case for a good part of the
war. This changed significantly with,
among other things, the
announcement of the Emancipation
Proclamation and the organization of
an "experimental" all-Black regiment,
the 54th Massachusetts. This
regiment was formed in March 1863,
nearly two full years into the war, and
organized by Robert Gould Shaw, a
young (white) abolitionist. Among
the recruits, who were mostly from
Massachusetts and Pennsylvania,
were Charles Douglass and Lewis N.
Douglass, sons of the former slave
and famous abolitionist Frederick
Douglass.
54th at Fort Wagner
•
•
After a few months of training exercises, the
54th Massachusetts got their orders: They
were to report to Hilton Head, South
Carolina, where they arrived in early June. A
month later, they saw their first combat
action in a skirmish on nearby James Island.
They saw the most severe action—and
earned most of their fame—from the part
they played in an attack on Fort Wagner,
Georgia, on July 18.
The fort was heavily defended, with both
cannons and sharpshooters. Nonetheless,
the order came for the 54th Massachusetts
to lead the way in storming the fort. They did
just that, advancing through a withering
storm of enemy fire. Many soldiers made it
over the wall and into the fort. The vast
majority, however, died in the attempt. That
day, 281 men died, among them Colonel
Shaw, who died urging his men to continue
the advance.
Sergeant William Carney
•
•
•
One member of the 54th Massachusetts who
survived that day was Sergeant William
Carney. He refused to let the flag of his
regiment fall to the ground or be captured by
the enemy. He was shot multiple times but
survived and was later awarded the
Congressional Medal of Honor.
The heroism of the Black men who fought
that day was relayed throughout the North
(and South). Recruiting of Blacks in the North
increased markedly. The 54th Massachusetts
was reinforced, and they fought several more
times during the war, mostly in the South.
One of their main successes was as part of
the siege of Charleston.
With the end of the Civil War, the 54th
Massachusetts was disbanded, in August
1865.
Massacre at Fort Pillow
•
According to Northern newspapers,
and according to a U.S. Congressional
hearing into the events, Confederate
troops continued to kill Union
soldiers as they attempted to
surrender -- especially the ones that
were black. "The blacks and their
officers were shot down, bayoneted
and put to the sword in cold blood -the helpless victims of the perfidy by
which they were overpowered," the
New York Times reported. Because of
such accounts, the incident became
known as the Fort Pillow Massacre.
"Remember Fort Pillow" thus became
a rallying cry for many in the North,
and for black Americans who heard
the story.
Battle of Fredericksburg
• After Antietam, A. E.
Burnside (known for his
sideburns) took over
the Union army, but he
lost badly after
launching a rash frontal
attack at
Fredericksburg, Virginia,
on Dec. 13, 1862.
Battle of Chancellorsville
• “Fighting Joe” Hooker
(known for his
prostitutes) was badly
beaten at
Chancellorsville, Virginia,
when Lee divided his
outnumbered army into
two and sent “Stonewall”
Jackson to attack the
Union flank, but later in
that battle, Jackson’s own
men mistakenly shot him
at dusk, and he died.
Battle of Gettysburg
•
Lee now prepared to invade the North
for the second and final time,
at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, but he was
met by new General George G.
Meade, who by accident took a stand
atop a low ridge flanking a shallow
valley and the Union and Confederate
armies fought a bloody and brutal
battle in which the North “won.”
–
In the Battle of Gettysburg (July 13,1863), General George
Pickett led a hopeless, bloody, and
pitiful charge across a field that
ended in the pig-slaughter of
Confederates.
Gettysburg Address
•
•
"Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new
nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are
created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that
nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met
on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field
as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that this nation might
live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate…we cannot consecrate…we cannot
hallow…this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have
consecrated it far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little
note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did
here. It is for us, the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work
which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to
be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us...that from these honored
dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full
measure of devotion, that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have
died in vain, that this nation, under God shall have a new birth of freedom, and
that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish
from the earth."
The Western Theater
• Lincoln finally found a good
general in Ulysses S. Grant, a
mediocre West Point graduate
who drank too much whiskey
and also fought under the
ideal of “immediate and
unconditional surrender.”
• Grant won at Fort Henry and
Fort Donelson, but then
lost a tough battle at Shiloh
(April 6-7, 1862), just over the
Tennessee border.
Battle of Shiloh
•
In February 1862, the Union Army captured Fort Henry on the Tennessee River.
This left the river undefended, and during the next few weeks the Union Army and
Navy began working their way upstream with little resistance. Eventually, the
commanders decided that they would try to take over Corinth, a small town in
northeast Mississippi where two railroads intersected.
The Union ground forces were divided into two parts. One, led by General Ulysses
S. Grant, set up camp across the river and nine miles upstream from Savannah,
Tennessee. There wasn't much there except for a few farms and a small church
called Shiloh (a Hebrew word that means place of peace). Grant's forces waited for
another army, led by General Don Carlos Buell, that was coming down from
Nashville. The plan was for the two armies to join, then march together on
Corinth.
By the way, General Grant had absolutely no idea that his troops might be attacked
while it camped near Shiloh. If he had, they would have dug trenches and gotten
ready for an attack. But he didn't, so they drilled and relaxed while they waited for
Buell.
Battle of Shiloh
• Confederate General Albert S. Johnston had other ideas. Knowing what
the Union generals had in mind, General Johnston decided to attack the
Union army before dawn on April 6.
It wasn't easy to move an army through the soggy marshes, thickets and
flooded streams near the river; because of this, it took longer for the
Confederate Army to attack than first planned. But they still had the
element of surprise, and in the early part of the battle they forced the
Union army back. Many Union soldiers were eating breakfast when the
attack came. After they abandoned their camps, many of the attacking
Confederates stopped to eat the food that the Union troops left behind.
The Confederate army earned every yard. One regiment from Mississippi
started across a valley with 425 men; by the time they reached the other
side they only had a little more than 100.
When General Grant arrived from Savannah, he found his troops
retreating and panicking. Some of them were cowering below a cliff on the
riverbank, having seen enough of a real battle.
Battle of Shiloh
• There was, however, one place where the Union
Army held fast. A Union general named Benjamin
Prentiss ordered his men to defend a sunken road
with a field in front of it. For nearly seven hours
Confederate soldiers came in waves to attack the
Union men along the road. The barrage of bullets
that they encountered was so great that the
attacking troops started calling the area the
"Hornet's Nest."
Battle of Shiloh
• There were eight separate Confederate charges over
the course of five hours, and it is believed that around
2,400 Confederates were killed or wounded in the
process. Then the Southern army set up big guns and
started firing those toward the Sunken Road. Finally, at
about 5:30 that afternoon, General Prentiss
surrendered his remaining 2,200 troops (about half the
ones he had started with). But in the process Prentiss's
men bought time for the larger Union force closer to
the Tennessee River, at a place called Pittsburg Landing.
They had time to regroup and reorganize.
Battle of Shiloh
• While the fighting at the "Hornet's Nest" was taking place,
something else occurred that may have turned the Battle of
Shiloh. General Johnston was shot in the leg by a musket
ball and bled to death. He almost certainly would have lived
had he had any medical attention, because a simple
tourniquet around his leg would have kept him alive. But
the men who were with the general at the time (which
included Tennessee Governor Isham Harris) didn't realize
that the general was hurt until several minutes after he was
shot, and they didn't know any first aid anyway. Johnston
thus became the highest ranking general from either army
killed during the Civil War.
Battle of Shiloh
• The night of April 6 was a sad
night. Thousands of soldiers from
both armies lay on the battlefield
dead or injured; there were so
many bodies that entire fields
were covered with them. There
is, on the battlefield, a small
pond. So many injured men
crawled here to drink from it that
night that the water turned red,
and it became forever known as
the Bloody Pond.
• Nightfall was, however, a good
thing for the Union Army. Here, at
Pittsburg Landing, the Union
Army received badly needed
reinforcements that night from
General Buell. And, by the way,
the arrival of troops by way of
boat brings up a rather important
point about the Battle of Shiloh.
The Union troops had gunboats
and troop ships to support them
with gunfire and bring them
reinforcements. The Confederate
troops had no naval presence
during this battle.
Battle of Shiloh
•
On the night of April 6 it rained and Grant
originally tried to spend that night in a cabin
by the river. But the cabin had been turned
into a field hospital, and the cries of the
wounded kept him awake, so the general
walked out and slept while leaning against an
oak tree that used to be here.
•
By the next morning, the reinforced Union
Army was a lot larger than the Confederate
Army. General Grant then ordered his troops
to advance and recapture the territory that
they had lost the day before. And they largely
did just that. By the middle of the day the
Confederate Army retreated back towards
the South, having lost thousands of their
comrades, but having gained a large number
of Union prisoners.
Sunken Road Hornet’s Nest
Graves at Shiloh
Capturing New Orleans
• In the spring of 1862, a
flotilla commanded by
David G. Farragut joined
with a Northern army to
seize New Orleans.
Twin Victories of Vicksburg and
Gettysburg
• At Vicksburg, Mississippi,
U.S. Grant besieged the city
and
captured it on July 4, 1863,
thus securing the important
Mississippi
River. Grant redeemed
himself here after
blundering at Shiloh.
– The Union victory at the
Battle of Vicksburg came the
day after the
Union victory at Gettysburg,
and afterwards, the
Confederate hope for
foreign intervention was lost.
Sherman’s March to Sea
• After Grant cleared out
Tennessee, General William
Tecumseh Sherman
was given command to march
through Georgia, and he
delivered, capturing
and burning down Atlanta
before completing his
infamous “March to
the Sea” at Savannah.
– His men cut a trail of
destruction one-mile wide,
waging
“total war” by cutting up
railroad tracks, burning fields
and crops, and destroying
everything.
Total War
The Politics of War
•
•
The “Congressional Committee on
the Conduct of the War”
was created in 1861 and was
dominated by “radical”
Republicans and gave Lincoln much
trouble.
The Northern Democrats split after
the death of Stephen Douglas, as
“War Democrats” supported Lincoln
while “Peace Democrats” did not.
– Copperheads were those who were
totally against the war, and
denounced the president (the “Illinois
Ape”) and his “nigger war.”
– The most famous of the Copperheads
was Clement L. Valandigham
1864 Presidential Election
•
In 1864, the Republicans joined the
War Democrats to form the Union
Party and re-nominated Abe Lincoln
despite a bit of opposition, while
the Copperheads and Peace
Democrats ran George McClellan.
– The Union Party chose Democrat
Andrew Johnson to ensure that the
War Democrats would vote for Lincoln,
and the campaign was once again
full of mudslinging.
– Near election day, the victories at New
Orleans and Atlanta
occurred, and the Northern soldiers
were pushed to vote, and Lincoln
smoked his opponent in the Electoral
College, 212-21.
• The popular vote was closer:
2.2 million to 1.8.
Grant’s Wilderness Campaign
•
Grant was a man who could send
thousands of men out to die just so
that the Confederates would lose,
because he knew that he could afford
to lose twice as many men while Lee
could not.
– In a series of wilderness encounters,
Grant fought Lee, with Grant losing
about 50,000 men.
– At Cold Harbor, the Union sent soldiers
to battle with papers
pinned on their backs showing their
names and addresses, and over 7,000
died in a few minutes.
– The public was outraged and shocked
over this kind of gore and
death, and demanded the relief of
General Grant, but U.S. Grant stayed.
Lincoln wanted somebody who’d keep
the “axe to the
grindstone,” and Grant was his man.
Southern Surrender
• Finally, Grant and his
men captured
Richmond, burnt it, and
cornered Lee at
Appomattox
Courthouse at Virginia
in April of 1865,
where Lee formally
surrendered; the war
was over.
The Death of a President
•
•
•
On April 14, 1865, Abraham Lincoln
was shot in the head by John Wilkes
Booth and died shortly after.
Before his death, few people had
suspected his greatness, but his
sudden and dramatic death erased
his shortcomings and made people
remember him for his good things.
The South cheered Lincoln’s death at
first, but later, his death proved to be
worse than if he had lived, because
he would have almost certainly
treated the South much better than
they were actually treated during
Reconstruction.
Death of the Great Emancipator
John Wilkes Booth
Booth Conspirators
The Aftermath of the War Between
the States
•
•
•
•
The Civil War cost 600,000 men, $15
billion, and wasted the cream of the
American crop.
However, it gave America a supreme
test of its existence, and the U.S.
survived, proving its strength and
further increasing its growing power
and reputation; plus, slavery was also
eradicated.
The war paved the way for the United
States’ fulfillment of
its destiny as the dominant republic
of the Western
Hemisphere—and later, the world.
Secession / compact theory /
nullification give way to supreme
federal government.