Transcript Turning Point

Tides are a 'changing
First African American Regiment
High Water Mark
Capture the Mississippi
Storming of Fort
Wagner (SC)
July 18, 1863
• 54th Massachusetts
Regiment (African
American) led an
assault to capture the
fort from Confederates
• Initial strike was
unsuccessful; however,
recruit of African
American soldiers
increased for the
desperate Union Army
• 60 days later the fort
was captured
Turning Point
(East)
Battle of Gettysburg (PA)
• July 1-3, 1863
• Robert E. Lee vs. George
Meade (“old snapping turtle”)
• Attempt to break the Union
back (win in the north)
• Confederate loss (~30% casualties)
• Union fails to pursue Lee
following his retreat
• Nov. 19 1863 – Gettysburg
Address (dedication to lost lives
and reasserting why the Union must
continue to fight)
Battle of Gettysburg
Day 1
July 1, 1863
• Confederates take over
town of Gettysburg (why
important? – shelter,
supplies, take cover)
• Union pushed back to
Cemetery Hill
Battle of Gettysburg
Day 2
(July 2, 1863)
• Union holds on at Little
Round Top and Culp’s Hill
– Preventing the Confederates
from surrounding the Union
• 20th Maine under Col.
Joshua L. Chamberlain
Battle of Gettysburg
Day 3
July 3, 1863
• George Pickett (C) leads a
charge with 12,000 men
across an open field
- attempt to
break through
the Union line
• Confederacy
retreats to the
South (July 4, 1863)
with no pursuit by
Meade
Turning Point (West)
Battle of Vicksburg (MS)
• May 1863
• John C. Pemberton vs.
U.S. Grant
• Grant lay siege
(surrounding a city
– nothing in,
nothing out) on
Vicksburg, MS
•
“We are utterly cut off
from the world,
surrounded by a circle
of fire.”
• “People do nothing but eat what they can get (horses,
dogs, rats), sleep when they can, and dodge the shells.”
Turning Point (West)
Battle of Vicksburg (MS)
• Pemberton surrenders July
4, 1863
• Mississippi River is now
controlled by the Union
– Movement of Union troops
and supplies
• U.S. Grant is commissioned
to lead the Army of the
Potomac as Lt. General
Ulysses S. Grant
Ulysses S. Grant
• Last Union General for the
Army of the Potomac
• Employed a total war
strategy
– Destroy everything of value
• Houses, farms, livestock,
fields, railroads, etc.
• Keep the pressure on Lee
– Keep Lee on the move
• Petersburg to Richmond (from
the north - Grant)
• Atlanta to Savannah (from the
south - Sherman)
William T. Sherman (U)
• Nov. 1864 – April 1865
March to Sea
http://www.history.com/topics/willia
m-t-sherman/videos#shermansterrifying-tactics (movie clip)
http://www.history.com/topics/willia
m-t-sherman/interactives/shermansmarch (map)
• Ordered by Grant to
employ total war
– Live off the land and destroy
the rest
• Marched from Atlanta to
Savannah (towards the
Atlantic Ocean); then north
to meet up with Grant in
VA
Ulysses S. Grant
• Trapped the Confederate
army in Richmond
• “There is nothing left for
me to do but go and see
General Grant,” Lee said,
“and I would rather die a
thousand deaths.”
• April 9, 1865: Lee
surrendered to Grant in
Appomattox Courthouse,
VA –ending the Civil War