Confederate soldiers fired on Fort Sumter April 12, 1861.
Boom!
At 4:30 in the morning April 12, 1861, residents of Charleston, South Carolina, awoke to the sound of cannons. The cannons in Charleston Harbor were firing upon a U.S. Army fort. But the attack on Fort Sumter didn’t come from a foreign country. The soldiers firing the cannons were Americans—U.S. citizens who had left their country to found another one. The attack continued for 34 hours before the U.S. soldiers at the fort surrendered. The United States was now involved in a civil war.
Upon winning independence from Great Britain in 1783, the United States became one country. But that didn’t mean that everyone in the nation agreed on important issues. By 1860 issues concerning the spread of slavery into the western territories of the country divided the northern and southern states.
The nation’s 34 states were more different than similar. The South’s dependence on slave labor caused political, economic, social, and cultural disagreements that tore the country apart.
The northern economy was based on industry, although it also outproduced the South in agriculture. There were more than five times as many factories in the North than in the South. The North also boasted a growing population, thanks to the constant addition of European immigrants. The economy did not rely on slave labor, and it was outlawed in many places. People in the North didn’t want slavery spreading to new states as they were added to the Union.
Southern states had talked about secession for years. The Republican political party was determined to stop the spread of slavery. When northern Republican candidate Abraham Lincoln won the presidential election in November 1860, the die was cast. South Carolina left the Union before the year was over.
By the time Lincoln was inaugurated March 4, 1861, six more states had seceded to form the Confederate States of America: Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas. Jefferson Davis was named president of the Confederacy.
Lincoln tried to reassure those angered by his election. In his inaugural address, he stated that he would not endanger “their property, and their peace and personal security.”1 But he also made it clear that he would not accept dissolution of the Union.
Within a week after the attack on Fort Sumter, Virginia seceded from the Union. Arkansas, North Carolina, and Tennessee soon followed Virginia.
SETTING THE STAGE FOR WAR
After the attack on Fort Sumter, Lincoln called for 75,000 volunteers to put down the insurrection. Those who answered the call felt a patriotic duty to protect their country and preserve the Union. Most were not fighting to end slavery.
In May Richmond, Virginia, was named the Confederate capital. Northerners urged Lincoln to strike Richmond immediately to crush the rebellion. Though his troops weren’t ready, Lincoln attempted to do just that.
When General Irvin McDowell explained that the army wasn’t prepared, Lincoln responded, “Your men are green, it is true, but they (the Confederates) are green also; you are all green alike.”2 There had been minor skirmishes during the first three months of the war. Now McDowell was about to lead his inexperienced men into their first major battle.
THE FIRST BATTLE OF BULL RUN
In mid-July McDowell began moving his troops from Alexandria, Virginia, toward the railroad junction at the town of Manassas, the best overland route into the Confederate capital. On July 18 McDowell reached Centreville, about 5 miles (8 kilometers) from a little stream called Bull Run. He knew he would have to cross the stream, but it was guarded by Confederate troops under the command of General Pierre G.T. Beauregard.
Union soldiers, wearing the red uniforms of their regiment, fought the Confederate cavalry at Bull Run.
Union troops attacked the Confederates but were soon driven back. When the main battle occurred July 21, the Union army at first managed to push back the enemy troops. Southern soldiers were fleeing in confusion when Confederate General Thomas Jackson and his troops joined the fight. Their support helped the Confederates regain their position and earned Jackson and his brigade the nickname of “Stonewall.”
Late in the day the Confederates made a counterattack that sent the Union troops running from the field. People who had come to watch the fight—northern politicians and civilians who treated the spectacle as a picnic—fled in panic and confusion. The Union army lost the battle and about 2,900 men who were killed, wounded, or missing. For the first time people realized there would not be a quick end to the war.
Soon after the defeat at Bull Run, Lincoln replaced McDowell with General George McClellan. The president would eventually regret his choice.
BULL RUN VS. MANASSAS
The Union usually named battles after the closest river or stream. The Confederates usually named battles after railroad junctions or towns. That’s why the North refers to this battle as Bull Run, and in the South it is known as Manassas. Other Civil War battles went by different names in the North and South. They included Antietam, called Sharpsburg in the South, and Shiloh, known as Pittsburg Landing in the North.
