The story of Abraham Lincoln

by Mary Agnes Hamilton

“Fourscore and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth a new nation upon this continent, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We meet to dedicate a portion of it as a final resting-place of those who here gave their lives that the nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it far above our power to add or detract. The world will take little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work that they have thus far so nobly carried on. It is rather for us to be dedicated here to the great task remaining before us: that from these honoured dead we take increased devotion for the cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion; that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain; that this nation shall, under God, have a new birth of freedom, and that the government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

In words like these, Lincoln inspired the people of the North to see the greatness of the cause for which they were fighting; they were fighting for liberty, for a free government of free men, for a United America that might be to the world a pattern of such a free government. If the South won, if America were a house divided for ever against itself, one half would have slavery; if the North won, and America were a whole again, slavery was gone; the Declaration of Independence, proclaiming the equal rights of all men to life and liberty, would be for the first time fully realised.

And encouragement came at last. On the Fourth of July, on Independence Day, Grant telegraphed to Lincoln the news of the capture of Vicksburg. In the beginning of May Grant had defeated Pemberton, the Confederate general, and shut him up in the town with his great army. After an unsuccessful assault in the end of May, he sat down patiently before the town, prepared to wear out its resistance. After great sufferings, the famishing garrison surrendered; Pemberton and 30,000 men, whom the South could but ill spare, were prisoners of war. Hundreds of cannon and thousands of muskets fell into the victor’s hands. Vicksburg was a position of importance, the key to the Mississippi. Lincoln could now say, “The Father of Waters again goes unvexed to the sea.”

The joy in the North over these two victories was intense. The drooping spirits began to rise again; and as things went better, men turned with new confidence to the patient man whose courage had never failed him. With renewed spirit the North set itself to the great task before it.

Lincoln now had men who were able to carry out great designs. By the end of 1863 things looked hopeful. The army had a nucleus of veterans who had received the best possible training, and a set of generals whose positions had been won not by political influence, but by hard work. Grant, Sherman, and Sheridan were men of ability, experience, and power.

Lincoln discussing the plan of campaign with General Grant

The plan of campaign for 1864, drawn up, under Lincoln’s advice, by Grant and Sherman, was masterly; carried out magnificently, it led to the complete triumph of the North. It was the complete development of Lincoln’s earlier plans. Grant, with the army of the west, was to face Lee in Virginia and drive him south; finally, to capture Richmond, the Confederate headquarters, and force Lee to yield. Sherman, marching south and east, was to carry the war into the heart of the Confederacy; to follow General Johnson, push him to the sea, and capture him. “We intend,” said Sherman, “to fight Joseph Johnson till he is satisfied.” Then Sherman, marching north, was to co-operate with Grant by cutting off Lee’s retreat. Meantime Sheridan was to deal with General Early in the Shenandoah valley, west and south of Washington.

By May 1864 Grant crossed the Potomac and entered the wild district, full of hills and woods and undergrowth, known as the Wilderness, where the Union armies had suffered so many defeats. Grant saw that the only thing was to wear the Southern army out by hard fighting; and he fought hard all summer. He lost some thirty thousand men in the Wilderness. His policy was to bear so continuously on the enemy that they, having fewer men, and less possibility of recruiting, must be worn out. Slowly, with an immense loss of life on both sides, Grant forced Lee south.

Sherman meantime was fighting his way to Georgia. His task was as difficult as Grant’s. The country was wild, and well adapted for concealing the enemy. It was impossible for him to communicate with the rest of the army.