Chapter Overview

The Civil War was the first total war in history, a war that depended on the mobilization of a society's human, economic, and intellectual resources. Before the first major battle, at Bull Run, neither side had anticipated the magnitude of the struggle ahead. The northern defeat at Bull Run forced members of Congress and other leaders to recognize that victory would not come easily or quickly. It would require total war, and it would transform society.

The Demands of Total War

At the outset, the North seemed to have overwhelming economic and military advantages. But the South, fighting for a cause on its own soil, had counterbalancing advantages. The North would have to rely on better technology -- and better leadership. The war's two political leaders were a study in contrasts. While hardworking, the Confederate President, Jefferson Davis, was a less effective leader than the Union's Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln ably persuaded northerners of American ideals. He also recognized the need to follow a strategy of isolation and invading the South. Concerned about the border states, Lincoln moved aggressively to hold them for the Union. In the process, a new border state, West Virginia, comprising counties with strong Unionist support, was admitted to the Union.

Opening Moves

The Union began a blockade of the southern coast and beefed up naval strength on the rivers. In addition, European powers refused to recognize the Confederacy or intervene militarily. The first Union combat successes occurred in the West, where Ulysses S. Grant invaded Tennessee. His drive south stalled after the fierce battle of Shiloh. In the East, the leading Union commander was George McClellan, whose well-drilled army was much larger than his opponent's but whose ingrained caution prevented him from using it aggressively. In Virginia, a stalemate quickly developed, as Robert E. Lee defeated a series of Union invasions yet was stalled himself at Antietam when he invaded Maryland. After a year and a half of hard fighting with heavy losses on both sides, no end to the war was in sight.

Emancipation

As the fighting dragged on, Lincoln -- whose announced priority was to save the Union -- came under mounting pressure to attack slavery as a way to win the war. Congress passed a series of laws that undermined slavery, and the Union refused to return runaway slaves to their owners. Believing that slavery should be abolished by state action, Lincoln at first tried to get the border states to adopt gradual emancipation. Rebuffed, he decided to act against slavery himself. Following the battle of Antietam, he announced a preliminary Emancipation Proclamation; the final Proclamation took effect on January 1, 1863, freeing the slaves in all areas under Confederate control. The war, as Europeans recognized, had been redefined into a crusade to revolutionize the nation.

A large number of slaves, perhaps as many as half a million, eventually fled to the Union lines and were freed. Many of these freed slaves were put to work at minimal wages on plantations in Union-controlled areas of the Mississippi Valley. Even those who remained in the Confederacy challenged white authority. The Union also accepted African-Americans into the army and navy. Most were former slaves. As soldiers, African-Americans impressed white comrades with their courage and fierce fighting.

The Confederate Home Front

War fundamentally transformed southern society. It brought increasing hardship and moral decay. With European exports severely cut by the blockade, the Confederacy attempted to build up its industry in order to become self-sufficient. With so many men mobilized into the army, it fell to women to run the farms and supply the necessary labor in factories. But inflation and food shortages became worse each year.

In an effort to win the war, Davis and his advisers concentrated power in the government at Richmond, provoking strong protests from many southerners who had gone to war to preserve states' rights. The draft -- first in American history -- was especially denounced. With tax revenues insufficient to finance the war, the Confederate population suffered from rampant inflation. Bread riots broke out in several cities. The moral tone of society plummeted, as gambling, drinking, speculation, and crime overran the South.

The Union Home Front

Civilians in the North suffered less. As it mobilized its economic resources, the Union prospered. Congress financed the war's costs through a combination of the first federal income tax, borrowing, and printing "greenbacks." These revenues were then spent on war materials. The economy boomed, but fraud plagued government purchases and workers saw their real wages decline. A speculative fever pervaded society, and Washington, D.C., no less than Richmond, sank in a swamp of moral decadence.

As in the South, women ran farms and took factory jobs to maintain war production. They soon came to dominate the formerly male professions of nursing and teaching. Much of the volunteer work in the Union to provide relief and medical supplies was done by women.

Lincoln cracked down on antiwar activities by suspending the writ of habeas corpus, an action that was quite controversial. He also authorized military trials of civilians, an action the Supreme Court declared illegal after the war. The draft, which allowed the wealthy to hire a substitute or pay 300 dollars for an exemption, also illustrated the expanded power of the federal government. Peace Democrats, labeled Copperheads by Republicans, vigorously protested the government's violations of personal liberty, and a major anti-draft riot erupted in New York City in 1863.

Gone to be a Soldier

Soldiers in both armies -- mostly young, mostly farmers -- soon discovered that war was much more tedious and far less glamorous than they had envisioned. Soldiers experienced great hardship from disease, poor food, and exposure, as well as risking life and limb in fighting. Traditional moral standards declined under the pressures of war. Paradoxically, both armies experienced religious revivals. Accustomed to the freedom of the farm, southern soldiers did not adjust as easily to military discipline, and southern individualism eventually weakened the army, especially as the Union war effort became increasingly organized. Most significantly, combat had become far more deadly than ever before. New technology, particularly the rifled musket and anti-personnel artillery, caused much higher numbers of battle casualties, as the defense became considerably stronger than the offense.

The Union's Triumph

The war's turning point came in 1863 when the Union won concurrent victories at Gettysburg and Vicksburg. Gettysburg destroyed Lee's offensive capabilities, while Grant's victories in the west that year led Lincoln to appoint him commanding general. With the Mississippi in Union hands, Grant instructed William Tecumseh Sherman to drive a diagonal wedge through the Confederacy from Tennessee through Georgia, while Grant himself fought a series of fierce battles with Lee in Virginia.

Grant was unable to break Lee's lines and, with Sherman bogged down in front of Atlanta, Lincoln seemed headed for defeat in the 1864 presidential election. Sherman's capture of Atlanta in September was the military breakthrough Lincoln needed, and he swept to victory. Lincoln's re-election made it clear that the Union would continue the war until reunion and abolition of slavery were achieved. Following the election, Congress approved the Thirteenth Amendment abolishing slavery; it was ratified by December 1865.

With the Confederacy's hopes flickering, Jefferson Davis offered to abolish slavery in a desperate and unsuccessful bid for British recognition. In the meantime, Sherman embarked on his destructive march through Georgia and then the Carolinas. Civilian morale collapsed in the Confederacy. In April, Grant forced Lee to surrender at Appomattox Court House. The rest of the Confederate armies soon did the same. But in the hour of Union victory, Lincoln was assassinated, the final tragedy in the conflict.

The Impact of War

The war profoundly changed the nation, altering its political institutions, its economy, and its values. Battle deaths nearly equaled the loss of life from all other wars combined. Secession was dead, and power was concentrated in the federal government. Slavery had been abolished, the South's wealth and political power destroyed. Industry was stimulated and, with the probusiness Republican party dominant, the government now played a much more active role in the economy. But the war had a high spiritual cost: sectional bitterness, a greater tolerance of corruption, moral complacency, and a loss of the crusading idealism that had characterized the nation before the war.