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U.S. Civil War
Battles & Events
Election of 1860
Fort Sumter
• By Lincoln’s inauguration, March 4, 1862, seven
southern states had seceded.
– Confederate States of America
• Jefferson Davis of Mississippi – President
– The stated issue became the sovereign right of states
to secede from the Union
• The South seized every federal building, fort, and
arsenal except two:
– Fort Pickens, Florida
– Fort Sumter, Charleston Harbor
• Lincoln informs S. Carolina officials he intends to resupply
the fort
• Confederate forces shell the fort for nearly two days
• Major Robert Anderson is forced to surrender
Fort Sumter
Effects of Fort Sumter
• South
– Shows southern resolve to fight for their belief
– Boosts morale as it is a Southern Victory
• North
– Stirs outrage in the North; a “slap in the face” to
every loyal American
– Creates an “enthusiasm of patriotism”
• Volunteers readily start enlisting in the army to fight
First Battle of Bull Run
• Known as the First Battle of Manassas in the South
• July 21, 1861 – First major land engagement of the Civil War
– General Irvin McDowell (U) – 35,000 troops
• Hounded by Washington politicians & Lincoln to rush into battle, get to
Richmond and end the war quickly
• Troops were raw and undisciplined:
– “…they stopped every moment to pick blackberries or get water. They would not
keep ranks, order as much as you pleased.”
– P.T. Beauregard & Joe Johnston (C) – 25,000 troops
• Washington sightseers set up picnics nearby to watch the
battle
• Union army initially gains the upper hand, but the
Confederate line holds and forces a Union retreat
– ‘Stonewall’ Jackson gets his name
• Union Army & sightseers crowd the roads back to Washington
in a panic
Bull Run
Bull Run
Effects of Bull Run
• Victory for the South
– Fits their strategy of fighting a defensive battle
• Hold on until Northerners get sick of the war & quit
• Shows that this will not be a short, easily won war.
• War will require a ‘real’ army to be recruited and
properly trained
• Lincoln appoints General George B. McClellan to
raise & train a new Army of the Potomac
– He will work all through the winter of 1861-62 to
prepare his 150,000 troops for battle
Emancipation Proclamation
• Northern Strategy
– Based on “preserving the Union”
• Economic = Blockade southern ports
– No cotton exports / no weapons & supplies imports
• Military = Divide the South in two
– West – Seize the Mississippi River Valley, cutting off communications &
use of the river
» U. S. Grant’s Union forces will nearly accomplish this by the
summer of 1862
– East – Drive toward Richmond, VA & destroy the government
» McClellan is reluctant to engage in battle
» “My dear McClellan: If you don’t want to use the army, I should
like to borrow it for awhile. Yours respectfully, A. Lincoln”
» Sept. 17, 1862 – Antietam: McClellan ‘defeats’ Lee’s invading
forces which is enough of a ‘victory’ for Lincoln to issue a slavery
statement.
Emancipation Proclamation cont.
• Issued, in part, to mobilize support from Britain and
France toward the Union and away from the
Confederacy
• In actuality, it “frees” no one, but:
– Turns the struggle into a “crusade for freedom”
– Makes it know that the nation will never again be halfslave & half free
– Recruiters are ordered to accept African-Americans into
the army
• 215,000 will serve during the course of the war
– 54th Massachusetts (movie Glory)
Gettysburg
• July 1-3, 1863
– Lee leads 75,000 troops into Pennsylvania
– Union Major Gen. George Meade led 90,000 troops
• Main line was at Cemetery Ridge
• On Day 3 of the battle the Confederates stage “Pickett’s
Charge” trying to break the lines of the Union
– 12,500 Confederate soldiers march across ¾ mile of open field to
attack the Union lines
» They are virtually wiped out
» “We could not help hitting them with every shot.”; “men going
down on hands and knees, spinning round like tops, throwing out
their arms, gulping blood, falling; legless, armless, headless. There
are ghastly heaps of dead men.”
– Casualties: North = 23,000; South = 28,000
Gettysburg
Impact of Gettysburg
• Loss removes any hope for the south that any
European countries will come to their aid.
• The south will never go on the offensive again,
fighting simply for some small hope of
preserving their way of life via a truce.
• Gettysburg Address – just over 2 minutes and
272 words in length
– Lincoln called it a “flat failure”
Sherman’s ‘March to the Sea’
• William Tecumseh Sherman
– Captures Atlanta on Sept. 1, 1864
• Much of the city is burned to the ground
• Vows to “Make Georgia howl”
– Carries out “total war” – crush the will of the civilians who sustained
the enemy fighting force.
» Passes through 425 miles of enemy territory causing $100 million
in damage (burning, looting, etc.)
» Reaches coastal Savannah, GA on December 22nd and Raleigh, NC
on April 26, 1865
• Boosts Lincoln’s 1864 reelection (which he wins with 54% of
the vote
• Special Field Orders, No. 15 – provides freed slaves with land
taken from white plantation owners (later repealed by
President Johnson)
Sherman’s march
Appomattox Courthouse
Southern Surrender
• April 1, 1865 – Union forces break the Confederate
lines outside Petersburg
– By April 4 the Union captures Richmond as Gen. Lee &
the Confederates flee
– April 9, 1865 – Lee surrenders to Grant at Appomattox
Courthouse in Virginia
• Terms:
– Soldiers could return home with personal possessions & horses
– Grant provides 25,000 ration kits to Lee’s army
– April 14, 1865 – Lincoln is assassinated by John Wilkes
Booth at Ford’s Theater
1861
Abraham Lincoln
1865
Effects of the War
• Ends the institution of slavery in the US
• Boosts the industrial economy of the North
• Subjects the South to years of “third world”
poverty and economic dependence
• ‘The United States is…’
Reconstruction
• January 1, 1865 – Congress passes the 13th
Amendment ending slavery
– Plantation whites see their lifestyle come to an end
– Poor whites face competition for jobs from 4 million
former slaves
• Many slave remain on their plantations
• Thousands begin traveling
– Looking for loved ones
– Seeking jobs
Freedman’s Bureau
• Establish by Congress in March 1865
– Immediate intent was aiding former slaves with
food, medical attention and housing
• 21 million rations over 5 years
– Aid was also given to poor whites
– Established 4,000 schools and 100 hospitals
– Later focused on helping former slaves with work
opportunities
• Negotiated labor contracts
Presidential Reconstruction
• President Andrew Johnson
– A former Confederate state could rejoin the Union when
it:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Wrote a new state constitution
Elected a new state government
Repealed its act of secession
Agreed not to repay Confederate war debts
Ratified the 13th Amendment
– Johnson refused to included black suffrage as a
requirement which put him at odds with Congressional
Republicans
– Many former Confederate officeholders are reelected
to their old office
President Johnson
“Black Codes”
• As Southern states elect new legislatures they begin
passing “black codes”
– Gave freedmen the right to:
• Hold property, marry, sue/be sued in court
– Denied freedmen the right to:
• Vote, serve on juries, bear arms
– Drove many back to the farms by requiring freedmen to
find ‘steady’ work and limiting other labor opportunities
– Northerners see this as ‘quasi-slavery’
• In 1866 the new Congress will place the south under military
rule, hold new elections (including black suffrage) and repeal
the ‘black codes’ via 1866 Civil Rights Act
Radical Reconstruction (1866-73)
• 14th Amendment – African-Americans are citizens with “equal
protection of the laws”
– Blocks any Supreme Court challenge to the Civil Rights Act via the
Dred Scott decision
• 15th Amendment – guarantees a citizens right to vote
• March 1867 – Congress militarizes the South
– Disbands sitting governments
– Creates 5 military districts
– Only ‘loyal’ Southerners who had not participated in the
‘rebellion’ could register to vote
– In order to rejoin the union:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Adopt a new state constitution that supported black suffrage
Elect a new government
Ratify the 14th amendment
Apply to Congress for readmission
Failures of Reconstruction
• Black codes
• “Secret Societies” – harass black voters & white supporters
– Ku Klux Klan / Knights of the White Camelia
– Favored the democratic party
• Intimidation at voting booths
• ‘stuffing’ ballot boxes
– Vote early, vote often
• ‘Solid South’ – vote Democratic for next 100+ years
– Leads to segregation policies by the 1870s
» Poll taxes, separate schools, etc.
» Jim Crow Laws
• Slow to industrialize – poor economy
• Continued bitterness over northern interference
– Carpetbaggers
• Northerners who came south to take advantage of the situation
– Scalawags
• White Southerners who joined the Republican party
• Worked along side freedmen and carpetbaggers