CHAPTER XX1

THE CIVIL WAR

The North and the South at War.-In his inaugural address President Lincoln declared that "no state upon its own mere motion, can lawfully get out of the Union"; and added, "I shall Lincoln's take care that the laws of the Union be faithfully executed in appeal for all the states." Lincoln closed this noble address with a touching appeal for peace. "We are not enemies," he said, "but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained,

peace

"The attack on Fort Sumter roused and united the North like a bugle call." it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic cords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature."

But the Confederate leaders were in no mood to listen to this appeal. It was evident that any attempt to enforce the laws of the United States in the seceded states would mean The attack war. The first blow was struck at Fort Sumter in Charleston upon Fort harbor. The Confederacy was eager to possess the forts and

Sumter

The call to

arms

The border

states are kept in the Union

It

other property of the United States within its borders. occupied some of them, but Fort Sumter was still held by United States troops under Major Robert Anderson. It was known that Major Anderson could not hold out much longer without supplies. When they heard that the government at Washington was sending these supplies the Confederates opened fire on Fort Sumter. For thirty-four hours a hail of shot and shell fell upon the doomed stronghold. With the fort in ruins and his ammunition exhausted, Major Anderson surrendered and was permitted to withdraw with his men.

The attack on Fort Sumter roused and united the North like a bugle call. On April 15th Lincoln asked for seventy-five thousand men to maintain the Union. It would have been quite as easy to enlist several times that number. Soon the land was filled with the sound of preparation for war. The call of President Davis for one hundred thousand volunteers to defend the South met the same eager response. Compelled to choose between fighting for or against their southern neighbors, Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Arkansas quickly seceded and joined the Confederacy. The southern capital was then moved from Montgomery to Richmond.

The border slave states of Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri halted between two opinions. Delaware's business relations were chiefly with the North and she had little inclination to leave the Union. Eastern Maryland, like Virginia in its life and industry, sympathized with the South, but the western part of that state, like Pennsylvania in its physical geography, had no desire to secede. As Maryland was early occupied by Union troops hurrying to the defense of Washington she had no opportunity to withdraw from the Union even if a majority of her people had favored such a course. The western counties of Virginia were far more like the neighboring section of Ohio than they were like Virginia east of the mountains, and their people refused to follow the rest of the Virginians into the Confederacy. During the summer of 1861 the Confederates were driven from this region by Union forces under General McClellan, and two years later it was made the state of West Virginia. Eastern Kentucky, with its rugged country, small farms, and few slaves, was loyal to the Union. Western Kentucky with its tobacco plantations worked by slave labor,

inclined toward the Confederacy. In the end a majority of the Kentuckians decided against secession. Missouri was also divided in sentiment and both factions took up arms. After some hard fighting, the Union element prevailed and drove the Confederate forces from the state. While the border states were thus all held in the Union, it must not be overlooked that many of their citizens served in the southern armies.

Neither side was prepared for war in 1861, but the North possessed certain marked advantages over the South. There

were four times as many white men in the states that were loyal The North

to the Union as in those

that formed the Confeder-
acy. The South was largely
dependent upon agricul-
ture, and the prosperity of
its agriculture was chiefly
due to the cotton crop. It
possessed few mills and
factories and imported
nearly all its manufactured
goods from the North or
from Europe. The North
was rich in corn, wheat,
coal, and iron. It pos-
sessed a highly developed
industrial life. It was a
land of farms, mills, and
factories; and it numbered
among its inhabitants a
multitude of skilled workmen. The North had more and better
railroads than the South and was in control of nearly all the
shipping of the nation. These advantages of the North were
offset in some measure by the facts that the larger part of the
men of the South were accustomed to the use of firearms and
to living an outdoor life, and that they were fighting near home
upon ground with which they were familiar. The fact that the
work of the South was done by slaves enabled the Confederacy
to put nearly all its white men of military age into the army,
while in the North large numbers of men must stay at home to
work the farms, mines, and factories. But where both sides were

A Confederate Flag

and the South compared