Transcript The Civil War

Part 1.1
 Confederates started taking over Union forts that were on
their land
 Lincoln said secession was illegal
 Would not send army into the South
 He would not give up government property
 Sent a supply ship to restock Fort Sumter
 Upset the South Carolinians
 They took it as an act of war against Confederacy
 Confederates told Fort Sumter to surrender
 First shots fired upon Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861
 First shots of the war
 Attack lasted all day and night
 No one killed
 Fort Sumter ran out of ammo
 Surrendered the next day
 Lincoln asked for 75,000 volunteers to join US army
 VA would stay in union if Lincoln would leave
Confederacy alone
 Thought they had the right to secede
 VA seceded when they saw Lincoln raise an army
 Lincoln offered Robert E. Lee command of US army
 He was against slavery and secession
 He refused to fight against his home state
 Lee resigned from US army
 Led Confederate Army of Virigina
 Richmond became capitol of Confederacy
 Border states
 Some wanted to secede, some didn’t
 Missouri
 Union forces drove out pro-confederacy governor
 Kentucky
 Didn’t secede, but didn’t really support either side
 Lincoln kept Maryland in Union by using the army
 Arrested pro-southern state legislatures
 MD couldn’t vote for secession
 Important, because if MD fell then DC would be
surrounded by Confederate land
 Delaware
 North wanted to crush rebellion quickly
 One union army was led by Gen. George McClellan
 Quickly drove Lee out of Western Virginia
 Lincoln told Union Gen. Irvin McDowell to attack
Confederates quickly
 37,000 Union v. 22,000 Confederates
 A crowd showed up to watch the battle
 Picnic blankets
 Union Gen. McDowell led successful early charge
 Confederate Gen. Johnston sent for reinforcements
 Retreated until they reached the reinforcements
 Confederate Brigadier Gen. Thomas Jackson
 Held the line when the Union crashed upon it
 “Stonewall” Jackson
 Rebel Yell
 Went on the counter-attack
 Union lost and retreated
 Jackson wanted to press attack and capture Washington
 Johnston said no, that the Confederates weren’t yet ready for
that
 Lincoln upset at the public defeat
 Sent 100,000 fresh soldiers
 Removed McDowell from commanding Union army
 Army of the Potomac
 Replaced him with Gen. McClellan
 Gen. McClellan
 Trained army
 Filled it with confidence and pride
 Loved by his men
 Lincoln soon became impatient with McClellan
 He was always hesitant to attack
 Always said he didn’t have enough men
 Lincoln told him that he had to go on the offensive
 McClellan planned to capture Richmond and end the war
 Union Gen. Ulysses S. Grant
 Fought in the West
 Won a string of victories
 Union Commodore Andrew Foote was in charge of
steam-powered gunboats
 They would attack forts from multiple fronts
 Fort Donelson
 Tennessee
 Union attack couldn’t take it
 Union besieged it instead
 Confederates eventually surrendered it
 From there, the Union went on and took Nashville
 Union Generals Grant and Buell were going to join their armies
 Confederates wanted to attack Grant to stop this
 Confederates launched a sneak attack on Union
 Union was unready, just sitting in camp
 They fled
 Union Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman
 Formed defenses on Shiloh hill
 “Place of Peace”
 Union killed most of the 400 attacking Confederates
 Confederates still pushed through and took the hill
 The sunken road
 Another place where the Confederates sent round after round of
attackers against the Union defenses
 “The Hornet’s Nest”
 The peach orchard
 Confederates finally broke through and demolished the
Union line
 Confederates lost their general
 Night came
 Confederates couldn’t follow up the momentum of the
day
 That night, the Union got reinforcements
 Confederates couldn’t fight the new Union forces
 Confederates retreated from the battlefield
 Considered a victory for Union General Grant
 Confederates had no navy
 Wanted to develop a boat made of iron
 Thought it could easily beat the wooden boats of the Union
 They took the U.S.S. Merrimack and made it the C.S.S. Virginia
 The Virginia would ram into Union boats and then fire into
them
 Would sink them
 They couldn’t damage the Confederate ship back
 Union built their own ironclad
 U.S.S. Monitor
 The two did battle
 First ever battle of ironclad ships driven by coal instead of
wind
 Neither could destroy the other
 Battle ended when Virginia sailed away
 Union took over Corinth (Mississippi) and Memphis
(Tennessee)
 Flag Officer David Farragut
 Led 24 Union ships
 Wanted to capture New Orleans
 One of the South’s most important port cities
 New Orleans was defended by two forts
 Farragut spent 6 days trying to bombard them
 No progress
 Just sailed past them
 City didn’t fight back
 Union took New Orleans
 Vicksburg was the only city the Union still had to take in
order to control the Mississippi
 Which would split the Confederacy in half
 Union Gen. McClellan close to Richmond
 Had more men than the Confederate defenders
 He thought that there were more defenders than there
were
 Didn’t attack
 Fought small battle outside Williamsburg again
 Won
 Confederate Gen. Johnston attacked McClellan first
 May 31, 1862
 Bloody battle lost by the Confederates
 Johnston wounded
 Was replaced with Robert E. Lee
 Lee wanted to know where Union army was
 Sent James Ewell Brown Stuart to scout it out
 Along with 1,700 calvary men
 Jeb Stuart took 170 prisoners on his scouting mission
 Lee attacked McClellan
 Confederates nearly destroyed a whole part of the
Union army
 Confederates attacked each day for 7 days
 Pushed Union further and further back
 Union saved by warships on the York River
 Lincoln personally sailed out to speak with McClellan
 McClellan said he wouldn’t attack unless he received at
least 50,000 more men
 Lincoln took part of McClellan’s army and gave it to Gen.
John Pope
 Gen. Pope had been successful in the West
 Conf. Gen. Lee sent Gen. Stonewall Jackson to attack
Union Gen. Pope
 Jackson led his men around Pope into Manassas
 Gen. Pope thought that Gen. Jackson was retreating
 He attacked Jackson
 Both sides got reinforcements that night
 Gen. Lee sent Generals Jackson and Longstreet to attack
Gen. Pope the next morning
 He couldn’t hold off the attack of 30,000 people
 Confederates won
 Lincoln replaced Gen. Pope with Gen. McClellan again
 Union
 More food than Confederates
 Factory made uniforms and boots
 Confederates
 Ragged
 Barefoot soldiers with tattered uniforms
 Even wore discarded Union uniforms
 Hungry
 Conf. Gen. Lee wanted Union out of VA
 He headed north, hoping Union would follow
 Lee sent Jackson to capture garrison at Harper’s Ferry
 This left him with 18,000 men
 Union Gen. McClellan had 95,000
 Gen. McClellan found a copy of Lee’s battle plans
 Still didn’t attack Lee
 Hesitated
 His attack didn’t come until Jackson had returned with more
men
 Maryland
 Bloodiest day of Civil War
 Union Gen. McClellan attacked
 Sent Union Gen. Hooker to fight Gen. Stonewall Jackson
 8,000 combined men died in a cornfield in 4 hours
 Bloody Lane
 Another sunken road
 Union tried to drive the Confederates from the road
 Union eventually found a hill that they could fire down upon
the Confederates from
 Broke their ranks in the road
 Union did not follow up on this part of the battle
 Could possibly have destroyed this part of the Confederate army
 Union Gen. Ambrose Burnside led 12,500 Union
soldiers against 400 Confederates for control of a hill
by the stream
 Took four hours for the Union to capture it
 Conf. Gen. A.P. Hill came with reinforcements
 Beat back Gen. Burnside
 Burnside didn’t get the reinforcements he requested from
McClellan
 Lee returned to VA after the battle
 Didn’t win the battle, but he did save his army
 Losses
 Confederates: 10,318
 Union: 13,000
 Lincoln didn’t think federal (national) government
could stop states from having slavery
 He did think that the war might help end slavery
 Would also give northerners something to fight for
 He felt he could not free all slaves in the Union
 There were slave states that had not seceded
 Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri
 Thought they would leave Union if he ended slavery there
 Declared that all slaves in Confederate states were free
 Lincoln waited until victory at Antietam to issue it
 People would be more willing to accept the
Proclamation following a Union victory
 First issued the Preliminary Emancipation
Proclamation in Sept. 22, 1862
 Gave the seceded states the chance to end the war before
he would declare an end to slavery in those states
 South and Europe thought it would lead to violent
slave rebellions
 Some northerners weren’t abolitionists
 Even abolitionists weren’t necessarily pleased
 They didn’t like that slaves were only freed in rebellious
states
 Others saw the Civil War now as a war for human
rights
 Instead of just trying to stop the South from seceding