Winning the Civil War the American Civil

Winning the Civil War

The American Civil War is considered the most costly of all the wars fought by this nation in terms of the human lives that were lost and the casualties which left young men mutilated, amputated, and barely able to carry on. Approximately 750,000 young men died by the war's end either from wounds inflicted in battle or from infection and lack of sanitation in hospitals.[footnoteRef:1] At the end, to warring sides were once again united as a single nation rather than two countries torn apart by ideological differences. Four years of bloodshed and violence officially ended at Appomattox Court House in Northern Virginia when Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered to Union General Ulysses S. Grant. It is believed that the Union won the war because the nation was reunified; however this assumption is based on the belief that there can ever be a winner in warfare. The ultimate winner of a war is judged by which side was able to return to their original positions of economic and political power which was not the case of the Confederacy who had to return to the flag of the United States. Looking back from more than a century, there is a degree of nostalgia for the Confederacy, particularly in the American South. Before and during the war, it was believed by the southerners that they would be able to fight the northerners back in a month and to retain their economic and social system of slavery and plantations. Based on sheer military acumen it can be argued that had it not been for a few strategic victories won by the union, the south may very well have been the ultimate victors of the American Civil War. [1: J. David Hacker, "A Consensus-Based Count of the Civil War Dead," Civil War History, 57, no. 4 (2012): 307-48,]

Militaristically, the Union and Confederate armies were similar in that both their leaders had been trained by what had then been the United States of America's military training school at West Point. When the schism occurred many of the greatest American military minds actually defected to the south. This helped to bolster the southern belief in their cause. Indeed it was because of the brilliant military minds that led the Confederate army which allowed them to win battles and to survive for as long as they did against their enemy. Confederate General Robert E. Lee was a major asset for his side. It was said that his battle tactics were solely responsible for Confederate victories, but that his insistence on solely using frontal assaults in warfare led to the Confederate's eventual defeat.[footnoteRef:2] At the outset of the war, President Abraham Lincoln had offered Lee the position as head of the Union army. However, Lee declined stating that he could not fight against his own people, referring to the state of Virginia his home state which had already seceded from the Union.[footnoteRef:3] What might have been a resounding victory for the heavily outnumbering north was instead a veritable stalemate for years because of Lee's determination to keep the war on northern soil for as much time as possible. His leadership led to the defeat of the union in several battles, most importantly at the Battle of Chancellorville, which gave both him and his troops the courage to engage in the Battle at Gettysburg.[footnoteRef:4] [2: Bevin Alexander, How the South Could Have Won the Civil War: the Fatal Errors that Led to Confederate Defeat, (New York, NY: Crown, 2007).] [3: Civil War Trust, "Robert E. Lee." Last modified 2011. Accessed November 14, 2012. http://www.civilwar.org/education/history/biographies/robert-e-lee.html.] [4: Civil War Trust]

The great difference between the north and south was in their economic resources. The south was a heavily agricultural society wherein the wealth of a family was based upon acquisition of lands and the planting and subsequent harvesting of crops.[footnoteRef:5] This dependence on agriculture led to the need for a cheap labor source, or better yet a source of free labor which was the institution of slavery. Understanding the economic base of the southerners would be an important point in the Union military campaign. When William Tecumseh Sherman led his troops on a march through Atlanta, he devastated crops, burning whole plantations to the ground and denying the southern armies the means to support themselves, their horses, or the civilians living in the American South. In the north, the economy was based on industrialization rather than on agriculture. Consequently in the north they were able to produce large amounts of artillery while the south was dependent on taking over union armories or in cargo ships from Europe to replenish their supplies. Northern industry and railroads were of paramount importance to their success, as indicated by the Confederate focus on trying to destroy these venues.[footnoteRef:6] [5: Charles Sydnor, The Development of Southern Sectionalism 1819-1848, (1948).] [6: Bevin Alexander, How the South Could Have Won the Civil War: the Fatal Errors that Led to Confederate Defeat, (New York, NY: Crown, 2007).]

The Union military was comprised of some 2,000,000 soldiers whereas the southern army had only half that number of troops. Each side believed that they were in the moral right, fighting not only for the retention or establishing of a nation, but that they were doing what was religiously and ethically correct. This morale helped to boost northern numbers and to calm southern fears over their being outnumbered. One northern soldier wrote in a letter home:

God is chastising this nation very severely for its sins, but I hope this nation will see its error and do better. This had got to be a very wicked nation. I can't see why this Government should be allowed to be overthrown by a worse one. One that will be founded on one of the worst of sins, slavery.[footnoteRef:7] [7: Thomas M. Covert, 6th Ohio Volunteer Cavalry, Jan. 14, 1863; Stafford Court House, VA. ]

The northern numbers swelled further after the Emancipation Proclamation was issued, freeing all southern slaves. Many of these people then joined the union army to help keep their freedom and to avenge themselves from their white oppressive slave masters.[footnoteRef:8] For the southerners, slavery was one of the most important reasons why they were fighting the war. Not only did the white plantation owners and other white southerners need slavery to continue their agricultural practices but they were raised with the idea that white people were inherently superior to black people. Thereby continuation of slavery was actually a means of protecting these individuals from the ruin they would create if they were allowed power over their own fates. [8: Frank Williams, "Doing Less and Doing More: The President and the Proclamation - Legally, Militarily, and Politically," The Emancipation Proclamation (2006): 74-75,]