A Brief History of the United States

by John Bach McMaster

CHAPTER XXVIII

THE CIVIL WAR, 1861-1863

[Illustration: NEWSPAPER BULLETIN POSTED IN THE STREETS OF CHARLESTON.]

THE CONFEDERATE STATES OF AMERICA.—After Lincoln's election, the cotton states, one by one, passed ordinances declaring that they left the Union. First to go was South Carolina (December 20, 1860), and by February 1, 1861, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas had followed. On February 4 delegates from six of these seven states met at Montgomery, Alabama, framed, a constitution, [1] established the "Confederate States of America," and elected Jefferson Davis [2] and Alexander H. Stephens provisional President and Vice President. Later they were elected by the people.

[Illustration: ABRAHAM LINCOLN. Photograph of 1856.]

[Illustration: JEFFERSON DAVIS.]

LINCOLN'S POLICY.—President Buchanan did nothing to prevent all this, and such was the political situation when Lincoln was inaugurated (March 4, 1861). His views and his policy were clearly stated in his inaugural address: "I have no purpose directly or indirectly to interfere with the institution of slavery in the states where it exists…. No state on its own mere motion can lawfully get out of the Union…. The Union is unbroken, and to the extent of my ability I shall take care that the laws of the Union be faithfully executed in all the states…. In doing this there need be no bloodshed or violence, and there shall be none unless it be forced upon the national authority…. The power confided in me will be used to hold, occupy, and possess the property and places belonging to the government."

FORT SUMTER CAPTURED.—Almost all the "property and places" belonging to the United States government in the seven seceding states had been seized by the Confederates. [3] But Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor was still in Union hands, and to this, Lincoln notified the governor of South Carolina, supplies would be sent. Thereupon the Confederate army already gathered in Charleston bombarded the fort till Major Anderson surrendered it (April 14, 1861). [4]

[Illustration: ONE OF THE BATTERIES THAT BOMBARDED FORT SUMTER.]

THE WAR OPENS.—With the capture of Fort Sumter the war for the Union opened in earnest. On April 15 Lincoln called for seventy-five thousand militia to serve for three months. [5] Thereupon Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Arkansas seceded and joined the Confederacy. The capital of the Confederacy was soon moved from Montgomery to Richmond, Virginia.

In the slave-holding states of Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri
the Union men outnumbered the secessionists and held these states in the
Union. When Virginia seceded, the western counties refused to leave the
Union, and in 1863 were admitted into the Union as the state of West
Virginia.

THE DIVIDING LINE.—The first call for troops was soon followed by a second. The responses to both were so prompt that by July 1, 1861, more than one hundred and eighty thousand Union soldiers were under arms. They were stationed at various points along a line that stretched from Norfolk in Virginia up the Chesapeake Bay and Potomac River to Harpers Ferry, and then across western Virginia, Kentucky, and Missouri. South of this dividing line were the Confederate armies. [6]

Geographically this line was cut into three sections: that in Virginia, that in Kentucky, and that in Missouri,

[Illustration: STONE BRIDGE OVER BULL RUN. Crossed by many fleeing Union men.]

BULL RUN.—General Winfield Scott was in command of the Union army. Under him and in command of the troops about Washington was General McDowell, who in July, 1861, was sent to drive back the Confederate line in Virginia. Marching a few miles southwest, McDowell met General Beauregard near Manassas, and on the field of Bull Run was beaten and his army put to flight. [7] The battle taught the North that the war would not end in three months; that an army of raw troops was no better than a mob; that discipline was as necessary as patriotism. Thereafter men were enlisted for three years or for the war.

General George B. McClellan [8] was now put in command of the Union Army of the Potomac, and spent the rest of 1861, and the early months of 1862, in drilling his raw volunteers.

[Illustration: DRIVING BACK THE CONFEDERATE LINE IN THE WEST.]

CONFEDERATE LINE IN KENTUCKY DRIVEN BACK, 1862.—In Kentucky the Confederate line stretched across the southern part of the state as shown on the map. Against this General Thomas was sent in January, 1862. He defeated the Confederates at Mill Springs near the eastern end. In February General U. S. Grant and Flag-Officer Foote were sent to attack, by land and water, Forts Donelson and Henry near the western end of the line. Foote arrived first at Fort Henry on the Tennessee and captured it. Thereupon Grant marched across country to Fort Donelson on the Cumberland, and after three days' sharp fighting forced General Buckner to surrender. [9]

[Illustration: ULYSSES S. GRANT.]

SHILOH OR PITTSBURG LANDING.—The Confederate line was now broken, and abandoning Nashville and Columbus, the Confederates fell back toward Corinth in Mississippi. The Union army followed in three parts.

1. One under General Curtis moved to southwestern Missouri and won a battle at Pea Ridge (Arkansas).

2. Another under General Pope on the banks of the Mississippi aided Flag- Officer Foote in the capture of Island No. 10. [10] The fleet then passed down the river and took Fort Pillow.

3. The third part under Grant took position very near Pittsburg Landing, at Shiloh, [11] where it was attacked and driven back. But the next day, being strongly reënforced, General Grant beat the Confederates, who retreated to Corinth. General Halleck now took command, and having united the second and third parts of the army, took Corinth and cut off Memphis, which then surrendered to the fleet in the river.

BRAGG'S RAID.—And now the Confederates turned furiously. Their army under General Bragg, starting from Chattanooga, rushed across Tennessee and Kentucky toward Louisville, but after a hot fight with General Buell's army at Perryville was forced to turn back, and went into winter quarters at Murfreesboro. [12]

[Illustration: NORTHERN CAVALRYMAN. A war-time drawing published in 1869.]

There Bragg was attacked by the Union forces, now under General Rosecrans, was beaten in one of the most bloody battles of the war (December 31, 1862, and January 2, 1863), and was forced to retreat further south.

NEW ORLEANS, 1862.—Both banks of the Mississippi as far south as the Arkansas were by this time in Union hands. [13] South of that river on the east bank of the Mississippi the Confederates still held Vicksburg and Port Hudson (maps, pp. 353, 368). But New Orleans had been captured in April, 1862, by a naval expedition under Farragut; [14] and the city was occupied by a Union army under General Butler. [15]

[Illustration: WAR IN THE EAST, 1862.]

THE PENINSULAR CAMPAIGN, 1862.—In the East the year opened with great preparation for the capture of Richmond, the Confederate capital.

1. Armies under Fremont and Banks in the Shenandoah valley were to prevent an attack on Washington from the west.

2. An army under McDowell was to be ready to march from Fredericksburg to Richmond, when the proper time came.

3. McClellan was to take the largest army by water from Washington to Fort Monroe, and then march up the peninsula formed by the York and James rivers to the neighborhood of Richmond, where McDowell was to join him.

Landing at the lower end of the peninsula early in April, McClellan moved northward to Yorktown, and captured it after a long siege. McClellan then hurried up the peninsula after the retreating enemy, and on the way fought and won a battle at Williamsburg. [16]

THE SHENANDOAH CAMPAIGN, 1862.—It was now expected that McDowell, who had been guarding Washington, would join McClellan, but General T. J. Jackson [17] (Stonewall Jackson), who commanded the Confederate forces in the Shenandoah, rushed down the valley and drove Banks across the Potomac into Maryland. This success alarmed the authorities at Washington, and McDowell was held in northern Virginia to protect the capital. Part of his troops, with those of Banks and Fremont, were dispatched against Jackson; but Jackson won several battles and made good his escape.

[Illustration: THOMAS J. JACKSON.]

END OF PENINSULAR CAMPAIGN.—Though deprived of the aid of McDowell, General McClellan moved westward to within eight or ten miles of Richmond; but the Confederate General J. E. Johnston now attacked him at Fair Oaks. A few weeks later General R. E. Lee, [18] who had succeeded Johnston in command, was joined by Jackson; the Confederates then attacked McClellan at Mechanicsville and Gaines Mill and forced him to retreat, fighting as he went (June 26 to July 1), to Harrisons Landing on the James River. There the Union army remained till August, when it went back by water to the Potomac.

[Illustration: ROBERT E. LEE.]

LEE'S RAID; BATTLE OF ANTIETAM, 1862.—The departure of the Union army from Harrisons Landing left General Lee free to do as he chose, and seizing the opportunity he turned against the Union forces under General Pope, whose army was drawn up between Cedar Mountain and Fredericksburg, on the Rappahannock River. Stonewall Jackson first attacked General Banks at the western end of the line at Cedar Mountain, and beat him. Jackson and Lee then fell upon General Pope on the old field of Bull Run, beat him, and forced him to fall back to Washington, where his army was united with that of McClellan. [19] This done, Lee crossed the Potomac and entered Maryland. McClellan attacked him at Antietam Creek (September, 1862), where a bloody battle was fought (sometimes called the battle of Sharpsburg). Lee was beaten; but McClellan did not prevent his recrossing the Potomac into Virginia. [20]

FREDERICKSBURG, 1862.—McClellan was now removed, and General A. E. Burnside put in command. The Confederates meantime had taken position on Marye's Heights on the south side of the Rappahannock, behind Fredericksburg. The position was impregnable; but in December Burnside attacked it and was repulsed with dreadful slaughter. The two armies then went into winter quarters with the Rappahannock between them.

THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION.—Ever since the opening of the year 1862, the question of slavery in the loyal states and in the territories had been constantly before Congress. In April Congress abolished slavery in the District of Columbia and set free the slaves there with compensation to the owners. In June it abolished slavery in the territories and freed the slaves there without compensation to the owners, and in July authorized the seizure of slaves of persons then in rebellion.

In March Lincoln had asked Congress to help pay for the slaves in the loyal slave states, if these states would abolish slavery; but neither Congress nor the states adopted the plan. [21] Lincoln now determined, as an act of war, to free the slaves in the Confederate states, and when the armies of Lee and McClellan stood face to face at Antietam, he decided, if Lee was beaten, to issue an emancipation proclamation. Lee was beaten, and on September 22, 1862, the proclamation came forth declaring that on January 1, 1863, "all persons held as slaves" in any state or part of a state then "in rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thenceforth, and forever free." The Confederate states did not return to their allegiance, and on January 1, 1863, a second proclamation was issued, declaring the slaves within the Confederate lines to be free men.

[Illustration: PART OF THE AUTOGRAPH COPY OF LINCOLN'S PROCLAMATION OF
JANUARY 1, 1863.]

1. Lincoln did not abolish slavery anywhere. He emancipated certain slaves.

2. His proclamation did not apply to the loyal slave states—Delaware, Maryland, West Virginia, Kentucky, Missouri.

3. It did not apply to such Confederate territory as the Union armies had conquered; namely, Tennessee, seven counties in Virginia, and thirteen parishes in Louisiana.

4. Lincoln freed the slaves by virtue of his authority as commander in chief of the Union armies, "and as a fit and necessary war measure."