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The Civil War
The First Battles
Fort Sumter
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South seized federal property
as they seceded
Lincoln could have sent
reinforcements and supplies or
surrender the fort
He informed the south he was
sending in food and other
supplies but not troops or arms
and ammunition
In response South Carolina
attacked the fort and the Union
surrendered the fort
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Sent the North into a fighting
frenzy
Lincoln calls for 75,000
volunteers
3 other states secede
Diplomacy Problems
• Trent Affair
– Union warship stopped a British ship
carrying 2 Confederate diplomats and took
them prisoner
• The British built and sold the
Confederates ships to raid and attack
the Union navy, Alabama sunk more
than 40 Union ships before being sunk
itself
Bull Run Ends the Ninety Day War
Both sides thought the war would be very short
Bull Run July 21, 1861
• Raw Union recruits unprepared for battle ran into
Stonewall Jackson who held until Confederate forces
arrived
• Union troops fled all the way back to D.C.
• Psychological and political consequences—South was
over confident, many of their soldiers deserted thinking
the war was over, Southern enlistments fell, defeat
helped the Union dispelled illusions of a short war
“Tardy George” McClellan and the
Peninsula Campaign
• McClellan given command of the Army of the
Potomac in 1861
– Talented, West Point, Mexican American War,
Crimean War, over cautious, was idolized by his men,
always thought he was outnumbered
– Peninsula Campaign
• Lincoln forced McClellan to advance
• 100,000 troops within sight of Richmond
• Lincoln sent the reinforcements to chase Jackson in the
Shenandoah Valley which was a crucial food supply to either
side
• Seven Days’ Battles
– Union forces were driven back to the ocean
– 20,000 Confederate 10,000 Union casualties
– Lincoln fired McClellan
Anaconda Plan
Suffocate the South by
blockade, liberate the
slaves undermining
the economic footing,
cut South in half by
taking the Mississippi
River, in half again by
sending troops
through Georgia and
the Carolinas, take the
capital, grind the
enemy into submission
The War at Sea
• The blockade started out
very inefficiently
– Blockade running was very
profitable in the South
– Usually traded cotton for
arms
– Union Navy got bigger and
more effective even started
seizing British ships armed
with war goods heading for
the halfway stations in the
Caribbean or Halifax
– The Merrimack vs. The
Monitor
Monitor Video
Antietam
• Lee moved North after Seven Days’ Battles and defeated Pope at
the Second Battle of Bull Run August 29-30, 1862
– Headed to Maryland to get convince her to secede and get
foreign intervention on behalf of the South
– Maryland didn’t rise up to help
• Antietam September 17, 1862 with McClellan back in charge
– Union soldiers found a copy of Lee’s plan of attack which
allowed McClellan to win
– Bloodiest day of the whole war
– Militarily a draw but Lee abandoned the field and his attack
northward
– McClellan fired for the final time for not chasing Lee
– Possibly the most decisive in the war—kept the French and
British out, emancipation proclamation followed, kept the border
states
Antietam Video
• Antietam Video
Emancipation Proclamation
-Declared the slaves free in the Confederate States that
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were still in rebellion, not in the Border States that
Lincoln controlled
Many slaves heard of the Proclamation and ran away
to the Union Army
• One in seven slaves ran away
Gave the Union a moral cause to fight for
Ended the chance of a negotiated settlement
Was opposition in the North to an abolition war
Forced Europe to stay out of the war
Blacks Battle Bondage
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Union army slowly began to accept black volunteers in their
ranks
 Originally due to the lack of manpower
 180,000 served by war’s end
Black service
 Won 22 Congressional Medals of Honor
 Very heavy casualties
 If captured they were put to death
South
 Didn’t allow blacks to serve until the war’s end
 Hurt the South, needed home guards, fear of rebellions,
slowed down, sabotaged, served as Union spies, etc
Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, and
Gettysburg
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Burnside attacked Lee at Fredericksburg in December
1862
 Union army looses 10,000 + troops in a frontal assault
Hooker attacked Lee at Chancellorsville in 1863
 Lee divided his army and half attacked the flank
 Stonewall Jackson was killed by his own men
Meade vs. Lee Gettysburg July 1-3 1863
 Meade had high ground and was attacked by the
Confederates
 Confederates failed to take Little Round Top and later
the failure of Pickett’s Charge marked their defeat
 Meade failed to give chase and was fired
The War in the West
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Introduces Ulysses S. Grant
 Mediocre West Point Graduate, fought well in
Mexican-American War, had a drinking problem,
failed farmer and businessman
Fort Henry and Fort Donelson February 1862
 Secured Kentucky and opened Tennessee
Shiloh April 6-7, 1862
 Very bloody, terrible loss of life, showed the war in
the West wouldn’t be quick
 Of the 77,000 that fought there 23,000 were
casualties including Albert Sydney Johnston
War in the West cont.
Vicksburg, Mississippi July 4, 1863
 Gave the Union control of the Mississippi
River, split the Confederacy,
 The twin victories (Vicksburg and Gettysburg)
 Helped put down antiwar efforts in the
Butternut Region of the Ohio River Valley
 Opened the Mississippi River to trade again
 Effectively ended any chance for foreign
help for the South
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Sherman’s March to the Sea
• November 1863 there was a series of Union victories including
Chattanooga
• Opened Georgia for invasion and moved Grant to general in chief in
charge of the Army of the Potomac
• Sherman Marched to Atlanta, captured it, then burned it in 1864
• Marched 250 miles living off the land and ended up in Savannah on
the coast
• Along the way his army left a 60 mile wide swath of destruction, in it
they burned everything of value, $100 million worth
• Destroyed supplies that would end up helping the Southern army
• “Total War”
• Then he headed north to South Carolina where the war started, here
the destruction was even worse, it seemed he was diffusing
punishment for South Carolina starting the war
William Tecumseh Sherman
• “War is Cruelty and
you cannot refine it.
Those who brought
war into our country
deserve all the curses
and maledictions a
people can pour out.”
•
William
Tecumseh Sherman
Grant outlasts Lee
• Wilderness Campaign May-June 1864
– 118,000 Union vs. 64,000 Confederate
– Union had over 50,000 casualties
• Cold Harbor June 3, 1864
• 7,000 Union soldiers died in an hour
• Instead of retreating like the other Union generals
Grant pushed forward
Shenandoah Valley
• Lee sent General Jubal Early into the valley on raids to
gather food for the Confederate army in Petersburg
• Grant sent in Sheridan to confront Early and control the
valley
• Sheridan laid it to waste so it was worthless to the South
as a source of food
Petersburg 1864-1865
• Defensive war for
the South
• Trench Warfare
• Lasts over six
months
• Tens of thousands
of casualties on
both sides
Appomattox Courthouse April 9, 1865
• Lee tried to escape
Petersburg but Grant
captured Richmond
and cornered Lee
• Lee surrenders his
entire army and ends
the war
Assassination of President
Lincoln
• April 14.1865 in Ford’s
Theater John Wilkes
Booth shot Lincoln in the
head
• Perfect timing for his
death
• Bad for the South
• He was willing to let the
South back on kinder
terms, his assassination
caused bitterness and a
need for revenge
The Aftermath of the Nightmare
• 600,000 men died, almost as many as all
the following wars combined
• Lost young men, best leaders, unborn
children, etc.
• $15 billion in total war costs
• Crushed states’ rights, nullification and
secession were dead issues
• Slavery was also dead