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Ft. Sumter:
Seven Southern states have seceded from the Union over the issues of slavery and states rights. They have formed their own government, called the Confederacy, and raised an army. In March, the Confederate army attacks and seizes Fort Sumter, a Union stronghold in South Carolina. President Lincoln responds by issuing a call for volun- teers to serve in the Union army. -
Emancipation Proclamation
Shortly after the Civil War began, William Yancey of Alabama and
two other Confederate diplomats asked Britain—a major importer
of Southern cotton—to formally recognize the Confederacy as an
independent nation. The British Secretary of State for Foreign
Affairs met with them twice, but in May 1861, Britain announced
its neutrality. Insulted, Yancey returned home and told his fellow
Southerners not to hope for British aid. -
Battle at Shiloh
Shiloh also demon-strated how bloody the war might become, as nearly one-fourth
of the battle’s 100,000 troops were killed, wounded, or captured.
Although the battle seemed to be a draw, it had a long-range
impact on the war. The Confederate failure to hold on to its Ohio-
Kentucky frontier showed that at least part of the Union’s three-
way strategy, the drive to take the Mississippi and split the
Confederacy, might succeed. -
Period: to
Secession of Virginia:
FIRST SHOTS Lincoln executed a clever political maneuver. He would not aban-don Fort Sumter.
Now it was Jefferson Davis who faced a dilemma. On the other hand, if he ordered an attack on Fort Sumter, he would turn peaceful seces-sion into war. Davis chose war. At 4:30 A.M. on April 12, Confederate battery. Charleston’s citizens watched and cheered as though itwere a fireworks display. The South Carolinians bombarded the fort with more than 4,000 rounds before Anderson surrendered. -
Battle at Bull Run:
BULL RUN The first major bloodshed occurred on July 21,
about three months after Fort Sumter fell. An army of
30,000 inexperienced Union soldiers on its way toward the
Confederate capital at Richmond, only 100 miles from
Washington, D.C., came upon an equally inexperienced
Confederate army encamped near the little creek of Bull
Run, just 25 miles from the Union capital. Lincoln com-
manded General Irvin McDowell to attack, noting, “You are
green, it is true, but they are green also.” -
Battle at Richmond
“ON TO RICHMOND” After dawdling all winter, McClellan
finally got under way in the spring of 1862. He transported
the Army of the Potomac slowly toward the Confederate
capital. On the way he encountered a Confederate army
commanded by General Joseph E. Johnston. After a series of
battles, Johnston was wounded, and command of the army
passed to Robert E. Lee. -
Battle at Gettysburg:
Shortly after three o’clock on theafternoon of July 3, 1863, frombehind a stone wall on a ridge southof the little town of Gettysburg,Pennsylvania, Union troops watchedthousands of Confederate soldiersadvance toward them across an openfield. Union officer Frank AretasHaskell described the scene.An hour later, half of the Confederate force lay dead or wounded, cut downby crossfire from massed Union guns. -
Battle at Antietam:
For once McClellan acted
aggressively and ordered his men
forward after Lee. The two armies
fought on September 17 beside
a sluggish creek called the
Antietam (Bn-tCPtEm). The clash
proved to be the bloodiest single-
day battle in American history.
Casualties totaled more than
26,000, as many as in the War of
1812 and the war with Mexico
combined.
