Civil War

Civil war???

I am doing a report on the civil war and i need to know EVERYTHING!!! What were both sides about, which side are you on and why, and tell me everything i will need to know or give me a website

1. True, the original focus of the war was NOT on slavery. But anyone who tries to argue that slavery was dying out or that slavery was not a huge factor in driving the war is engaging in revisionist history:
–the States Rights argument (which was a huge focus issue for many seccesionists) was in part about slavery, the argument that future states added to the US should be slave states or should not be banned from holding slaves.
–look up “Bleeding Kansas”. Right before the civil war started, that bloodshed between the Bushwackers and Jayhawkers was completely about slavery.
–Yep, slavery had been abolished in Europe. But the number of slaves (as total numbers in the population) grew every year in the South from 1845-1860. Slavery was GROWING, not dying away. And the richest individuals in the south and the prime industries (cotton and tobacco) were dependent on slavery at that time.

2. Wow, the claim that the South had the best soldiers, the best shots, inflicted significantly more casualties, the best generals and the worst camp was in the North…again, that’s a bit over the top.
–The South lost or drew every single major battle in the Western Theater in 4 years of war except for Chickamauga. That’s a stunning record of military incompetence. Throughout the war in the over 300 military engagements of consequence, the North won 2/3rds of them. Make a list of great Southern Army or Corps commanders and you come up with Cleburne, Lee and Jackson (maybe Longstreet–though he was unimpressive in the West). Make a list of impressive Union Army commanders and you’d have: Grant, Thomas, Sheridan, Sherman, Meade, Hancock, Sedgwick, and Reynolds (peers who knew them both regarded John Reynolds as Lee’s equal). Look at it this way, the South couldn’t replace Jackson, Cleburne, Turner Ashby or Jeb Stuart when they died but the North had no problem replacing Sedgwick, Reynolds, Richardson or other good senior officers. That’s because they had a lot more good officers than the Confederacy did. As for casualties, Union battlefield deaths came to about 110,070. Confederate battlefield deaths came to about 94,000. That’s not much of a difference in total numbers. As for your claim that Southerners were better shots, the reality is that the Union (because of industry) had more rifled guns (with too many Southern boys depended on their own smoothbore muskets they brought from home). Accurate killing range of a smoothbore muzzle loader would be about 100 yards (48 of 50 shots in a test at the time) but at 200 yards only 24 of 50 and at 300 yards only 7 out of 50 shots. Using a rifled musket on the same range with the same marksmen the results were….50 of 50 at 100 yards, 41 of 50 at 200 yards (double the muzzleloader accuracy), 29 of 50 at 300 yards (4x the accuracy of a muzzleloader) and 7 of 50 at 500 yards (the smoothbores made no attempt to fire at 400 or 500 yards). Well, the Union (because of industry and better supplies) had far more rifled muskets and were far more accurate and at greater distances too.

3. Camp Douglas vs. Andersonville. Yes, both were terrible prisons and the records for BOTH sides during the war was terrible. Camp administration at both camps was inexcusable and criminal. More than 6,000 Confederates died at Camp Douglas. 26,000 were held there (80 acres of ground) but the most at one time was 12,000. More than 13,000 Union prisoners died at Andersonville with as many as 32,000 crowded into the camp at one time (26 acres of ground). Additionally, while both sides did some terrible things, the Confederal execution of prisoners (because they were black) at the Crater and Ft. Sill is also embarassing, especially for those who want to argue that the only reason slavery came up was due to manipulation by Lincoln.

4. A very quick summary of the war:
–The southern states seceded. Forces fired on Union troops at Ft. Sumter in Charleston SC harbor. Newly elected US President Lincoln insisted that he would crush the rebellion and force the Southern states back into the Union.
–In the East, the initial conflicts were mixed with the South nearly losing First Manassas (until troops arrived by train to turn the day and make it a rout). Other early battles led to Confederate losses until Joe Johnston was replaced by E.C. Smith who was then replaced by Robert E. Lee. That led to a series of Confederate defensive successes in the East. In the West, the Confederacy failed at all strategic efforts. The Union engaged in a strategy of blockading the South (so they couldn’t trade) and succeeded at this. They also adopted a strategy of cutting the South in half (by seizing the Mississippi river)–a strategy that would prove successful and doom the Confederacy. The ineptitude of the Confederate Navy and their inability to defend the Mississippi cost the South the war.

Every time the Confederates tried to go on the offense, they failed either tactically, strategically or both. Shiloh led to massive casualties, a strategic failure and a retreat. Stones River led to the loss of vital agricultural support and two states. Antietam failed to gain any new recruits from Maryland and virtually destroyed Lee’s two best units: the Stonewall Brigade and the 1st Texas Brigade. After Gettysburg the South was incapable of offensive warfare any longer. Think of it this way: in the West, the major Southern offensives were at Shiloh and Stone’s River and both led to defeats and withdrawals with loss of critical territory while failing to accomplish the initial objectives. In the East, Lee’s two offensives were Antietam and Gettysburg. Both failed to accomplish their objectives and both crippled his army in terms of casualties (manpower and generalship).

In the West, the Union was dominate, pretty much running the table against the Confederacy. Vicksburg was probably the single most important battle of the Civil War–once Vicksburg fell, the Union controlled the Mississipi which meant that moving troops and supplies was nearly impossible for the South. In the East, once generals such as Hancock and Meade gained more responsibility, the South started to have problems. When Grant was shifted East, Lee was forced to basically fight just to buy time–trading lives for a few more weeks or a month–the end was pretty much never in doubt at that point.

Grant began to seek out Lee and destroy his army. In a series of engagements in the East, Grant continued to try and circle Lee or beat him to a crucial crossroads in order to get to Richmond. Lee was forced to play reactively and in a totally defensive role. In the West, Sherman led his army through the South, into Georgia and then cut to the East Coast and headed North through the Carolinas, anhialiating every force he faced. Grant continued to stretch his lines knowing that Lee didn’t have the manpower to match him. Eventually, Lee conceeded Richmond (so the South’s capital fell to the North) and tried to manuever away from Grant but failed, surrendering his forces at Appomattax Court House in Virginia, effectively ending the Civil War (fighting continued but it was inconsequential in terms of impact or numbers of casualties).

With hindsight, it’s amazing that the Confederacy ever thought they had a chance. They failed to win a single naval engagement during the war. The Union consistently had more and better artillery that was better organized (and this played a decisive role at the 3rd day of Gettysburg, Shiloh and Stones River–probably deciding all 3 battles). They inherited more outstanding officers from the regular army. They had more industry, more people, more agriculture (south produced more cotton and tobacco but the north produced more fruit, corn, wheat, cattle and horses), infrastructure (so supplies were always a problem). Plus after 2 years of fighting, the Union suddenly added 200,000 fresh and highly motivated soldiers (the US Colored Infantry). By the end of the war, every major Confederate city and industrial center had fallen. Every competent or outstanding Confederate senior officer other than Lee had been killed or wounded. As noted historian (and MIssissipi native) Shelby Foote liked to say, the North fought the entire war with one hand behind their back.

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