Women's Roles in the Civil War

Hello readers! I know I've been away for a while and haven't updated in weeks, but that's because I'm still on the journey to earning my Master's Degree in American History. I have a few days off before my third term of graduate school starts, so I thought I'd post a few entries to this blog to keep you guys on your toes and learning about this great country. One of the courses I just finished up was a course on the Civil War, which was appropriate since that's where we've been in this blog on the timeline of American history. To keep going with the Civil War, before we delve into Reconstruction as promised in the last post, I thought it would be beneficial to post about women's roles in the Civil War. This post is the bulk of my final paper for my Civil War, complete with citations of the sources I used. Enjoy!

From 1861 to 1865, a civil war ravaged the United States. The war would pit brother against brother, and neighbor against neighbor, as each side fought for what they believed in. As the battles raged in the South and in the mid-west, the home front was an active place as well, as women worked to move along their war efforts. Clara Barton, “the Angel of the Battlefield” and founder of the American Red Cross, is quoted as having said, “This conflict is one thing I’ve been waiting for. I’m well and strong and young—young enough to go to the front. If I can’t be a soldier, I’ll help soldiers” and that is what she and others have done. History tends to forget the actions of women, with many believing that the actions and sacrifices of women are lesser compared to those of their male counterparts. This historiographical account, “Women in War: The Varied Roles of Women in the Civil War” will seek to answer the following questions: What were the various roles women had to take on during the American Civil War? How did women, Union and Confederate, react to the war? What were women’s thoughts as they had to take on numerous roles during the war era? The Civil War effected different groups of women differently, and this paper will focus on the women of the Union and the Confederacy. Historiography on topics of women’s history need to be explored more, and it is my hope that this paper will assist in bringing insight into the lives of Union and Confederate women.  

As several states began to secede from the United States in late 1860, the tensions between the northern and southern states grew. Men prepared to go to war and women prepared to do what they needed to do—many followed men into battlefield, working as battlefield nurses and even as spies and soldiers; others stayed and ran their households, working the farms and plantations, taking care of livestock, taking care of children, and helping the war effort by making items to send to the soldiers on the warfront. Women on both sides of the conflict played major roles during this era, whether they followed the troops to battle or whether they remained at home. 

Women in the North mobilized for the war effort. “As most accounts went, brave women, having sent their husbands and sons to the war, scraped lint in church basements and scrimped on household necessities to produce socks, shirts, bedding, jams, and jellies for local soldiers’ aid societies. Society members carefully packed their gifts and forwarded them to the United States Sanitary Commission, the largest and best-known national war relief organization, which distributed them with utmost efficiency to grateful soldiers languishing in military hospitals…Other women left their cherished homes, venturing forth to nurse wounded soldiers in army hospitals or on hospital transports”1. This work, the household manufacturing of supplies for use in army hospitals, was the most vital of the work the women in the North were participating in. Without these actions, the Union army would have struggled greatly, as many of these items were not provided by the government or were in short supply. Northern women also worked to raise money by making and selling goods, allowing for monetary donations to be sent to the armies. Of the actions Northern women performed on the homefront, the most important of these was the farming; after the men left, the women were responsible for the farms, growing grain for the army. Historians estimate that half of the U.S. Army at this time was comprised of farmers or farm laborers2; at a time when the men had been called to war, women filled the void in order to ensure that the work the men left behind was still being completed. In 1863, two years into the Civil War, Isaac Newton, the commissioner of agriculture under Abraham Lincoln, made note that despite the war the productivity of Northern farms had not diminished, that “agricultural output remained high and employment in agriculture constant”3.  

However, Northern women began to challenge the gender roles in which they were thrust. At this time, it was believed that women were gentle, nurturing, and benevolent, and these gendered beliefs were responsible for making the voluntary giving to the army and to relief societies obligatory. “Though most middle-class women had been socialized to embrace charitable work as part of their duties, the value of such work rested on the premise that it was undertaken freely and with no constraints. But as the military conflict intensified and the commission’s demands for homefront donations escalated, women confronted, some for the first time, the consequences of a set of beliefs that deemed their benevolent and patriotic acts mere extensions of their biological nature. When the war placed heavy burdens on their household economies, many became resentful of these men’s assumptions about the ease with which they could continue to labor for the war”4. 

It was not merely through the manufacturing of goods for the war effort and the undertaking of women to become battlefield nurses that Northern women were able to mobilize for the war effort, women also went to war themselves. According to the Civil War Trust, estimates place female soldiers’ numbers between 400 and 7505 total between both sides of the conflict. The reasons why women joined the conflict as soldiers varied; for example, some women chose to follow their loved one into battle, others chose to fight because they believed in the cause(s) for which they were fighting and felt it was their patriotic duty to fight as well, and still others joined because of the promise of adventure and reliable wages6. One of the most famous female Union soldiers was Sarah Emma Edmonds Seelye, also known as Franklin Flint Thompson. Seelye, like others, disguised herself as a man and joined the Union Army. One would think that it would be difficult for women to disguise themselves and fight in the war, but on the contrary; with the Victorian era well under way, the prevailing sentiments of that era were that soldiers sleep clothed, bathe separately, avoid public latrines, and avoid form-fitting clothing; the lack of facial hair was attributed to youth7. Women also worked undercover as spies; due to the prescribed gender norms of the era, women were thought to be genteel, nurturers, and benevolent givers; these assumptions create a false sense of security around women, that because of their nature they would not collect information and pass it on to the side they aligned themselves with.  

Despite many women taking active roles as soldiers and spies, the most important role they played on the battlefield was as nurses and even doctors. The most famous of the Union battlefield nurses is Clara Barton, who would go on to found the American Red Cross, and organization still in operation today. In an 1892 poem titled “The Women Who Went to the Field”, Barton described what she and other women witnessed during their time as battlefield nurses. In her poem, Clara Barton states how people felt about women going to war as battlefield nurses—a lot of people disagreed with the actions of those women because thy did not believe that women were capable of having to witness fighting and to mend wounded soldiers; a lot of people believed that women were best remaining on the homefront where they could “pick some lint, and tear up some sheets, And make us some jellies, and send on their sweets, And knit some soft socks for Uncle Sam’s shoes, And write us some letters, and tell us the news”8; however, Barton also notes that things changed, but she was not sure how or why, just that countless women, many of whose names have been lost to history, decided to defy what men (and other women) had said about conforming to their gender roles.  

Although Clara Barton is the most famous of the battlefield nurses, there were others who sacrificed to tend to the wounded soldiers as well; one such woman was Mary Walker. Mary Walker became the first female surgeon during the Civil War. Walker was born and grew up in Oswego, New York and attended college at the Syracuse Medical College. Walker butted heads with numerous physicians who believed amputation to be a cure-all during the war, and believed that her duty was to do what was best for the soldiers, which was not always amputation9. In 1862, Walker boarded a train to Washington, DC with sick and injured soldiers so they could acquire better care; while there, she noticed that numerous women were arriving to try to find loved ones they had not heard from in quite some time. These women often had nowhere to go and had little money, so Walker asked for donations from a women’s suffrage group in order to establish a home where women could stay while in Washington, DC10. In 1865, Mary Walker was awarded the Medal of Honor for Meritorious Service, becoming the first, and only, woman to have received that honor.  

Northern women had done much for the war effort, but their Southern counterparts were not idle during the time of the war either. Southern women had to overcome numerous challenges just as women in the North had to overcome; but unlike the women of the North who fought for changes to society at the time of the fighting (and prior to the war as well), women in the South did their best to hold on to the traditions they had grown up with.  

In his book Civil Wars: Women and the Crisis of Southern Nationalism, George C. Rable explains just how Southern women were different from their Northern counterparts. Contrary to popular belief, the women of the South were educated, came from wealthier families, and did have feminist leanings although they were not interested in joining feminist organizations; women in the South were deeply concerned with the changing climate of the South at the time of the Civil War and were extremely interested in keeping the traditions they had grown up with instead of trying to change their positions in society like their sisters in the North. Throughout the book, Rable explains how the women of the South did much to uphold their virtues than to undermine them in the changing times. In the South, girls faced pressures to marry11; have an abundance of children whether they wanted to or not12; run the homes without the same ability to escape from the cult of domesticity that the Northern women had13; for wives who wanted to no longer be married and have to face their daily grind, divorce was rarely an option unless the wife was injured or if there was proof of adultery, cruelty, or desertion on the husband’s part14; and church membership, which was one of the very few public activities that was freely open to women, often spoke of women having to forfeit their own wants and comforts for others15. Due to these circumstances, many women in the South had feminist leanings, however they would keep their thoughts and beliefs to themselves, writing them down in their diaries for their eyes only, because they were not truly wanting to “rebel against [their] lot”16.  

As the Civil War began, Southern women had to take on numerous roles. One role the women took on was that of the patriot woman, seen as offering up her husband and sons to a just cause and regretting that they did not birth enough sons to give to their country17. Other women took efforts to advance the cause by creating sewing circles where they could talk politics while they sewed uniforms and other such clothing items the soldiers needed; still, other women joined the war by becoming battlefield nurses, where they traveled with the armies and took care of the wounded and eased the suffering of the dying. Like their sisters in the North, the women of the South mobilized for the war effort, and some would travel with their men to wherever they went over the course of the war. Two Confederate women of note who followed their husbands to war were Laetitia Lafon Ashmore Nutt and Sarah Jane Estes. These women are noteworthy to the history of the Civil War because of their honesty when it comes to how they felt about following their husbands off to war. Nutt followed her husband across the Deep South with their three daughters in tow and often struggled to find lodgings close to her husband’s areas of operation; she would go on to recount how she was often exhausted and should have left her daughters with her mother so she could focus her efforts to the sick and wounded soldiers18. Sarah Jane Estes did leave her children home when she left to follow her husband to war; however, she did not follow her husband completely on her own volition. Estes followed her husband in part because of her “women’s obligations”19; Confederate women felt the desire to hold on to their traditions, as previously stated in this paper, as opposed to using the changes during the war to bring on social changes of their own. It is fascinating to believe that women felt more of an obligation to their husbands than to their children, especially in this time period where women were seen as nurturers and the caretakers of the home. “…Estes could not reconcile herself to failing as either wife or mother”20, and was frustrated with the choice she was obligated to make.  

Although the sacrifices these two women made were difficult situations for both, other women had to find accommodations with family during the war, especially if they lived in the towns and cities where the battles grew particularly close. Many women found it difficult to live with their relatives, however, the situation allowed for women to enter roles within society while keeping their traditions alive and well, such as discussing politics in salons and attending women-only colleges. As a response to the war, there was a sort of homespun revolution within the South, with Confederate women having to learn to spin yarn and to weave using a loom in order to make clothing for themselves, their children, the soldiers, and their slaves because mass produced manufactured goods were becoming increasingly difficult to come by; sewing and knitting became popular in the South among the women for the same reasons.  

Women in the South also helped out the war effort by volunteering as soldiers—disguising themselves as men and enlisting under false names—just as women in the North had done as well. In a 2011 article with the Smithsonian, Bonnie Tsui, the author of She went to the Field: Women Soldiers in the Civil War, described how women were able to disguise themselves and pass the physical tests to become soldiers: “The Confederacy never actually established an age requirement. So [women] bound their breasts if they had to, and just kind of layered on clothes, wore loose clothing, cut their hair short and rubbed dirt on their faces. They also kind of kept to themselves. The evidence that survived often describes them as aloof. Keeping to themselves certainly helped maintain the secret”21.  

Life was not easy for the women in the Confederacy, and even Confederate women had to defend their property from the Confederate troops. In a 1907 book titled Confederate Women of Arkansas in the Civil War, Josephine Crump wrote a chapter titled “Two Brave Women”; in this chapter, Crump describes the hardships that Confederate women in the state of Arkansas endured during the war. Confederate women had to hide their stores of food so the Union soldiers, or event their own Confederate soldiers, would not take it, leaving the women with nothing. Crump wrote about a woman named Mrs. Parker who grew corn with the help of her son; during the war, food was scarce and Mrs. Parker knew that she had to hide the corn so others could not get to it and leave her with nothing, so she buried twelve bushels of corn on her property, only going into her stores once the men returned and would feed them with the corn22 

The roles of women in the South were just as varied as the roles women in the North had to take on, or chose to take on, during the war. At the time of the Civil War, women’s organization began to rise up, and these organizations would play a role during and after the war, particularly the organizations for abolition and women’s suffrage. 

Women’s organizations, particularly for abolition and suffrage, were very popular during the antebellum period and those efforts continued during and even after the Civil War as well. For many, joining these organizations was a way for the women’s voices to be heard in a time when they were still considered second-class citizens. Suffragettes utilized the heroic actions of women during the Civil War, those who fought, those who served as nurses and surgeons, and those who assisted in other ways, to highlight how women contributed much to the war effort and should be given full citizenship rights. In the book Neither Ballots Nor Bullets: Women Abolitionists and the Civil War, author Wendy Hamand Venet describes the ways women continued to fight for suffrage during the Civil War. Some of these women, such as Sarah Remond, would go on to write appeals to those living in England for sympathy for the North and for assistance in the war. “…Remond often appealed to the sensibilities of white women by discussing the emotional and sexual abuse of female slaves…She declared that slavery denied to black Americans the natural rights inherent in the Declaration of Independence and reminded her listeners that black people had never been allowed to test their real capabilities…she emphasized that slavery was the cause of the conflict; abolition was the only basis for peace and prosperity”23. The Civil War and the abolitionist movements paved the way for later feminist activities, such as suffrage for women, to flourish; it is important to highlight that the causes that women cared about were not placed on the backburner during the war, and that women on the homefront continued to fight for what they believed in in any capacity they could.  

As the Civil War came to an end, the women of the South were beginning to create ways in which they could preserve their traditions and way of life. One way in which they accomplished this feat was to ensure that no one forgot the war or its heroes.  

It was a goal of Southern women to memorialize the  Confederacy and the lost cause of the Confederacy, but no one individual did as much work to memorialize the Confederacy and the idealistic antebellum period than the group the United Daughters of the Confederacy. The United Daughters of the Confederacy, or UDC, was founded in 1894 to preserve Confederate culture. In Dixie’s Daughters: The United Daughters of the Confederacy and the Preservation of Confederate to preserve Confederate culture and tradition. The Lost Cause of the Confederacy romanticized the “Old South” and the Confederate war effort; there are six tenants of the Lost Cause, according to Caroline E. Janney, an assistant professor of history at Purdue University. Writing for the Encyclopedia Virginia in partnership with the Library of Virginia, Janney writes that the six tenants of the Lost Cause myth are: “1. Secession, not slavery, caused the Civil War. 2. African Americans were “faithful slaves”, loyal to their masters and the Confederate cause and unprepared for the responsibilities of freedom.  3. The Confederacy was defeated militarily only because of the Union's overwhelming advantages in men and resources. 4. Confederate soldiers were heroic and saintly. 5. The most heroic and saintly of all Confederates, perhaps of all Americans, was Robert E. Lee. 6. Southern women were loyal to the Confederate cause and sanctified by the sacrifice of their loved ones. The historical consensus, however, presents a picture that is far more complicated, one in which some tenets of the Lost Cause are obviously false and some are at least partly true”24. However, the women of the South were deeply involved in the perpetuation of this Lost Cause myth. In particular, the UDC were responsible for raising money in order for Confederate soldiers to have proper burials; the UDC also “successfully campaigned to build monuments in almost every city, town, and state in the former Confederacy…Monuments were central to the UDC’s campaign to vindicate Confederate men, just as they were part of an overall effort to preserve the values still revered by white southerners”25. The members of the UDC were educated upper-class Southern women, and a goal they established aside from fundraising for monuments and to ensure that the war dead received proper burials was education; to ensure that the younger generation and that future generations would know the causes for which the Confederacy fought during the Civil War, numerous women entered into the education profession. 

Although the Civil War remains one of the bloodiest conflicts in history, there were benefits that women achieved because of the war. In an 1894 speech titled “What women did for the war and what we did for women” given by Josiah H. Benton, Jr., the Civil War is described as the “father of all things” because from it women were able to compete with men in occupations they previously would not have been able to find employment, and women were able to gain a political voice because of the war as well.  

Civil War is a field that continues to grow in breadth and depth. The primary sources used in this paper highlight how far women were able to advance their social status at the time and the actions they took to accomplish those feats. The secondary sources used in this paper highlight just how Civil War historiography, particularly when it comes to the varies roles women played during this time, has grown in recent years, as the bulk of the secondary sources utilized in this paper were 30 years old or newer. With the continued racial tensions in the United States over the last 30 or so years, it is important to understand the causes of the Civil War and what the people who were involved accomplished. Women are half of the world’s population, yet they are often left out of the narrative of history because many people believed that their contributions were not to the extent of the men who fought and even made the ultimate sacrifice. In a time when history and historical memory are being altered or attempted to be eliminated, we must remember the causes of the Civil War and we must remember the actions everyone took in regards to the war.  

Bibliography

Primary Sources

Clara Barton, “The Women Who Went to the Field”, 1892,             www.civilwar.org/learn/primary-sources/women-who-went-field.

Josephine Crump, “Two Brave Women”, an excerpt from the book                                                 Confederate Women of Arkansas in the Civil War, 1907. Digital Public Library of         America. https://dp.la/primary-source-sets/sources/817.  

Josiah H. Benton, Jr. “What women did for the war and what we did for women”, excerpt from a             speech given in 1894. Digital Public Library of America.                             https://dp.la/primary-source-sets/sources/827.

Secondary Sources (books)

Jeanie Attie, Patriotic Toil: Northern Women and the American Civil War (Ithaca: Cornell                       University Press, 1998).

Judith Giesburg, Army at Home: Women and the Civil War on the Northern Home Front (Chapel            Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2009).

Elizabeth D. Leonard, Yankee Women: Gender Battles in the Civil War (New York: W.W. Norton          & Company, 1994).

George C. Rable, Civil Wars: Women and the Crisis of Southern Nationalism, (Urbana: University          of Illinois Press, 1989).

Drew Gilpin Faust, Mothers of Invention: Women of the Slaveholding South in the American Civil War                                                                                                                                              (Chapel Hill: North Carolina University Press, 1996).

Wendy Hamand Vent, Neither Ballots Nor Bullets: Women Abolitionists and the Civil War                     (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1991).

Secondary Sources (websites)

“Female Soldiers in the Civil War”, www.civilwar.org/learn/articles/female-soldiers-civil-war.

Jess Righthand, “The Women Who Fought in the Civil War”,  April 7, 2011,             http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-women-who-fought-in-the-civil-war-1402680/.

Caroline E. Janney, “The Lost Cause”, https://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Lost_Cause_The#contrib.

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[1] Jeanie Attie, Patriotic Toil: Northern Women and the American Civil War (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1998), pg. 2.

[2] Judith Giesburg, Army at Home: Women and the Civil War on the Northern Home Front (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2009), pg. 6.

[3] Ibid, pg. 1.

[4] Jeanie Attie, Patriotic Toil: Northern Women and the American Civil War (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1998), pg. 125.

[5] “Female Soldiers in the Civil War”, www.civilwar.org/learn/articles/female-soldiers-civil-war,  accessed 5/25/2017.

[6] Ibid.

[7] Ibid.

[8] Clara Barton, “The Women Who Went to the Field”, 1892, www.civilwar.org/learn/primary-sources/women-who-went-field, accessed 5/26/2017.

[9] Elizabeth D. Leonard, Yankee Women: Gender Battles in the Civil War (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1994), pg. 124.

[10] Ibid, pg. 125.

[11] George C. Rable, Civil Wars: Women and the Crisis of Southern Nationalism, (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1989), pg. 8.

[12] Ibid, pg. 9.

[13] Ibid, pg. 10.

[14] Ibid, pg. 11.

[15] Ibid, pg. 13.

[16] Ibid, pg. 16.

[17] Ibid, pg. 50.

[18] Drew Gilpin Faust, Mothers of Invention: Women of the Slaveholding South in the American Civil War (Chapel Hill: North Carolina University Press, 1996), pg. 35.

[19] Ibid.

[20] Ibid, p. 36.

[21] Jess Righthand, “The Women Who Fought in the Civil War”,  April 7, 2011, http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-women-who-fought-in-the-civil-war-1402680/, accessed 5/30/2017.

[22] Josephine Crump, “Two Brave Women”, an excerpt from the book Confederate Women of Arkansas in the Civil War, 1907. Digital Public Library of America. https://dp.la/primary-source-sets/sources/817, accessed 5/31/2017.

[23] Wendy Hamand Vent, Neither Ballots Nor Bullets: Women Abolitionists and the Civil War (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1991), pg. 66.

[24] Caroline E. Janney, “The Lost Cause”, https://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Lost_Cause_The#contrib, accessed 6/2/2017.

[25] Karen Cox, Dixie’s Daughters: The United Daughters of the Confederacy and the Preservation of Confederate Culture (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2003), pg. 49. 

The Civil War: Part III

Hello readers! I'm back with a full term of graduate school under my belt. It was an extremely busy ten weeks, but I managed to complete my classes with grades in the 90's! Now, I have some time off before I start my next term, and I'm going to spend some of that time posting here on the blog. After having to write discussion posts and papers, it's nice to be back here at the blog. I thought it was appropriate to update the layout of the blog; as I am growing up and maturing, I thought it was appropriate for the blog to do the same, especially after having the same layout for almost six years.

So, without further ado, let's pick up where we left off as we continue to discuss the Civil War.


The New York City Draft Riots

Shortly after the Battle of Gettysburg and the staggering loss of life during the battle, Congress passed a conscription law making all men between the ages of 20 and 45 liable for military service. On July 13, 1863, the government's attempt to enforce the draft in New York City led to the most destructive riot in the city's history.

A few different things sparked outrage that led to the breakout of the riot. First, New York City had a huge immigrant population, many of them Irish, who found themselves on the draft lists. The Irish and free blacks directly competed for jobs, and the Irish weren't about to fight and die in a war to bring an end to slavery, because they knew those free blacks would find their way to NYC and would be vying for the same jobs as the Irish. What also irked the Irish was that conscription could be avoided by a payment of $300, which workingmen wouldn't be able to afford.

The draft riots were brutal, with the destruction of private property, razing an African-American orphanage, and a staggering loss of life. Rioters torched government buildings, and even fought skirmishes with the Union army (some of the troops being re-routed to NYC). All in all, 300 people (half of them police and soldiers) were injured and 119 people were killed during the riots.

The draft riots didn't put an end to conscription, but they did allow the government to see just how unpopular the Civil War was, and among whom it was unpopular.




Battle of the Wilderness (Virginia)

The Battle of the Wilderness took place from May 5-6, 1864 and marked the first stage of a major Union offensive toward the Confederate capital of Richmond, ordered by Union General-in-Chief Ulysses S. Grant.

As the Army of the Potomac crossed the Rapidan River on May 4th, Confederate General Robert E. Lee determined that his Army of Northern Virginia would confront the Army of the Potomac in the dense Virginia woods aptly named the Wilderness. The Wilderness was familiar territory for the Confederates; and they knew that the dense woods and heavy undergrowth would negate the Union's huge numerical advantage (115,000 to Lee's 65,000) because it would be nearly impossible for a huge army to make an advance.

The Battle of the Wilderness began on May 5, 1864 when Confederate and Union troops clashed near the Orange Turnpike, the area's main east-west road. The fighting was chaotic as the trees and underbrush made it difficult to move and rendered cavalry and artillery useless. Men on both sides stumbled into enemy camps and were taken prisoner; and fires ignited the trees by rifle bursts and exploding shells, trapping and killing many of the wounded. The first day of battle was inconclusive, with neither army gaining or losing positions.

On May 6th, the Union attacked and were able to drive the Confederates back nearly a mile. Fighting was worse than on the previous day,  with stifling smoke and fog that forced the soldiers to shoot blond. Despite all this, the Union was able to stabilize its position.

On May 7th, the Union and Confederate troops were essentially where they had been two days prior. The battle ended inconclusively, but the Union army suffered more casualties. Grant refused to order a retreat, and ordered his men to march later that night, continuing south to Richmond. Lee's troops managed to cut them off, stalling the Union advance.



The Battle of Cold Harbor (Virginia)

The Battle of Cold Harbor took place about 10 miles northeast of Richmond, Virginia, the Confederate capital. The battle took place from May 31 to June 12, 1864 and was part of General Grant's Overland campaign to try to capture Richmond.

On May 30th, Grant's Army of the Potomac and Lee's Army of Northern Virginia clashed at Bethesda Hill, but the battle was inconclusive. The next day, the armies clashed at Cold Harbor, where a Union attack seized the intersection. Grant prepared for a major assault against the Confederate front, but his reinforcements were late in arriving. Grant finally gave the order for his men to attack on June 3rd, and the Army of the Potomac was met with heavy fire and suffered significant casualties--13,000 out of 108,000 troops to the Confederates' 2,500 out of 62,000 troops.



Sherman's March to the Sea

From November 15th to December 21, 1864, Union General William Tecumseh Sherman led 60,000 soldiers on a 285 mile march from Atlanta to Savannah, Georgia to frighten Georgia's citizens to abandon the Confederate cause. Sherman's soldiers didn't destroy any towns in their path like many believe, but they did steal food and livestock and burned houses and barns belonging to those who tried to fight back.

General Sherman's troops captured Atlanta on September 2, 1864. This was a huge success for the Union because Atlanta was a railroad hub and the industrial center of the Confederacy. Atlanta had munitions factories, foundries (factories that produce metal goods), and warehouses that supplied the Confederates with food and other goods. Atlanta was a symbol of Confederate pride and strength, and its fall made many Southerners doubt they could win the war.

After they lost Atlanta, the Confederate army headed into Tennessee and Alabama to attack Union supply lines. Sherman split his troops, sending 60,000 led by Major General George Thomas to meet the Confederates in Nashville while Sherman took 62,000 to Savannah "smashing things to the sea".

Sherman wanted to "smash things" because he believed that the Confederacy drew its strength from the material and moral support of sympathetic Southerners. He believed that if he could destroy factories, farms, and railroads that the Confederate war effort would collapse. Lastly, he believed that if his men could make life unbearably unpleasant for Georgia's citizens that they would call for an end to the war.

Sherman's troops marched toward Savannah in two columns 30 miles apart. On November 22nd, 3,500 Confederates began a skirmish with the Union soldiers, but it went so badly that Confederate troops didn't initiate anymore battles. As the Confederates fled, they wrecked railroads, burned farms and bridges, tore down telegraph wires, and chopped down trees in the path of the oncoming Union army before the Union army could reach them.

Sherman's troops arrived in Savannah on December 21st, about three weeks after they left Atlanta. The city was undefended as the Confederate troops who were supposed to be guarding the city had fled. Sherman gifted Savannah and 25,000 bales of cotton to President Lincoln for Christmas. Shortly after, Sherman and his men left Savannah where they pillaged and burned their way through South Carolina.



Surrender at Appomattox Court House (Virginia)

The aftermath of Sherman's march to the sea left the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia stripped of food and supplies. Retreating from previous smaller battles, the Confederates had lost a huge portion (about 6,000) of the troops to the Union, taken prisoner near Saylor's Creek. Desertions were mounting daily, and by April 8, 1865 the Confederates were surrounded. On April 9th, General Robert E. Lee sent General Ulysses S. Grant a message announcing the willingness of the Confederate army to surrender.

Upon meeting at the house owned by Wilmer McLean, Grant gave Lee the terms of surrender--all officers and men would be sent home with their private property (particularly their horses, which could be used to farm), officers would keep their side arms, and Lee's starving men would be given Union rations. Upon the agreement of the terms of surrender, Grant said, "The war is over. The rebels are our countrymen again."


The Civil War was a total war, meaning that it included "any and all civilian-associated resources and infrastructure as legitimate military targets, and typically involves the use of weapons and tactics that result in significant civilian or other non-combatant casualties, whether collateral damage or not" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_war).

The Civil War had a staggering body count, with 625,000 total lives lost (more than the American Revolution, World War I, World War II, and Vietnam combined). There was also a lot of destruction ass many battles took place on people's property, such as farms. Both sides would burn farms, pillage factories, tear up railroads, cut telegraph wires, steal food and supplies, and more as they wove a path of destruction through the South.

The Civil War: Part II

We're going to jump in right where we left off with the previous Civil War post.


The Battle of Fredericksburg (Virginia)

In November 1862, Major General Ambrose Burnside replaced Major General McClellan as the commander of the Army of the Potomac.

The Battle of Fredericksburg on December 13, 1862 involved nearly 200,000 combatants. Burnside led his more than 120,000 troops across the Rappahannock River, where they did a two-prong attack on the right and left flanks of Lee's 80,000 men army. On both ends, Lee's men turned back the Union assault with heavy casualties.

The Battle of Fredericksburg was a crushing defeat for the Union, and the Union morale plummeted. Burnside accepted blame for the defeat. The Battle led to an increase in morale for the Confederates.



Battle of Shiloh (Tennessee)

On April 6, 1863, 40,000 Confederate soldiers under the command of General Albert Sidney Johnston poured out of nearby woods and struck a line of Union soldiers occupying ground near Pittsburg Landing on the Tennessee River. The Union army was unprepared for the attack, but managed to wound Johnston. General Ulysses S. Grant, who commanded the Union army, received reinforcements and was able to overpower the Confederate forces, causing them to retreat.

The casualty totals of the Battle of Shiloh shocked Americans both North and South, with the two-day total exceeding that of all previous wars combined.



Battle of Vicksburg (Mississippi)

From the spring of 1862 until July 1863, Union forces were waging a campaign to capture Vicksburg, Mississippi, a Confederate stronghold on the east bank of the Mississippi River, with Memphis to the north and New Orleans to the south. If they were successful, the Union would capture Vicksburg and divide the Confederacy.

The Battle of Vicksburg was the second attempt to capture the city. The battle occurred on both and water. In early May, General Grant moved his Union troops down the west bank of the Mississippi River opposite Vicksburg, crossed back, and drove toward the city of Jackson (Mississippi's capital) while Admiral David Porter ran his flotilla past Vicksburg.

On May 16th, General Grant defeated a Confederate force under General John Pemberton at Champion Hill. Pemberton retreated to Vicksburg, and the Union troops had captured it by the end of May.

Grant and his 70,000 troops were successful in part because Pemberton was unable to get reinforcements. The siege of Vicksburg was so bad that residents of the city left and occupied tunnels and caves dug out from the hillsides to escape the constant bombardment.

Pemberton surrendered on July 4, 1963, and the city of Vicksburg wouldn't celebrate Independence Day for 81 years.

Battle of Gettysburg

 The Battle of Gettysburg (Pennsylvania)

When it comes to the Civil War, no battle is more renowned than the Battle of Gettysburg. This was the largest and bloodiest battle ever fought on the North American continent and was the turning point of the Civil War.

The Battle of Gettysburg, fought from July 1-3, 1863, is considered the most important engagement of the Civil War.

After another victory in the South, Confederate General Robert E. Lee marched his Army of Northern Virginia into Pennsylvania. On July 1st, the advancing Confederate clashed with the Union's Army of the Potomac, now commanded by General George Meade, at the town of Gettysburg. On July 2nd, the Confederates attacked the Union troops on both the left and right. On July 3rd, Lee ordered an attack on the Union's center at Cemetery Ridge. The assault, known as Pickett's Charge. managed to pierce the Union lines but ultimately failed. Lee was forced to withdraw his army toward Virginia on July 4th.

Gettysburg was a crushing defeat for the Confederacy. Union casualties numbered 23,000 to the Confederate's 28,000 (more than one-third of Lee's army). The failure of the Confederacy to "win" in Antietam and Gettysburg ruined any chance they had for foreign aid.



Gettysburg Address

The Gettysburg Address was, is, the most famous speech in American history. Lincoln delivered his famous Gettysburg Address on November 19, 1863, four months after the battle, at the dedication of the Soldier's National Cemetery in Gettysburg.

"Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we do this. But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate-we cannot consecrate-we cannot hollow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here have consecrated it far above our power to add or detract. The world will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us--that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last measure of devotion--that we here highly resolve that these dead should not have died in vain--that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom--and that a government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth."





This is where I'm going to stop today. Join me next time for part III, where we'll be finishing up the Civil War.

90,000 Views!

To celebrate this blog's monumental pageview amount, I thought I would take the time to answer the top five questions I'm asked whenever I mention in passing or in detail that I write an American history blog.


Question 1: Out of all of the topics I could have chosen to write about, why did I choose to write about American history?

To answer this question, we must travel back in time to 2011. I was in my sophomore year of college and one of the classes I was taking was called Educational Technology. In the Educational Technology class, education majors learned how to use various technologies and incorporate them into lessons. One of the assignments at the end of the semester was to start a blog. The blog could be about anything we wanted to write about--we weren't limited on the topic (as long as it was appropriate) and we weren't limited on the length, but the blog did have to be shared privately with the class through the college's website. Even though the blog could be written about anything we wanted, I thought about how some of my friends and classmates in high school struggled with history, and I decided that that was what my blog was going to be about. I love American history, and was studying to become a history teacher at the time, so it wasn't a surprise that this was the topic I chose. I got an A on the assignment, and decided that I should take my blog beyond my Educational Technology class, so I got a Blogger account and my first posts went live on May 17, 2011 and it's just expanded from there. My dad helped me come up with the name--become I'm short (I'm under 5 feet tall) and love to write about history...so, The Half-Pint Historian was born.


Question 2: What is the future of The Half-Pint Historian?

Over the years, this blog has suffered bouts of drought, meaning that there are long periods of time where I don't post because I'm busy with other things such as school or work. Well, this will be happening again in the very near future as I begin graduate school so I can earn a Masters degree in American history. The modules for my classes opened today, so I got to see what my course load will look like for the weeks ahead. It looks like time to blog will be extremely limited as I read, write papers, write research proposals, and participate in discussions. I want to assure you, readers, that although my posts will become limited the blog will go on because history goes on.


Question 3: Will you be incorporating other cultures and peoples into your blog posts?

Diversity is important when discussing history, especially American history, because America is the melting pot of cultures and peoples who have come here and established themselves over time. I find that when I teach, American history is fairly white-washed; Black history, Native Peoples histories, LGBTQIA+ history, and women's history are all very rarely discussed, and we also tend to forget about all of the various immigrant groups and their separate and combined histories unless we're talking about the Industrial Revolution. It is my goal with this blog to tell the stories of these peoples, because if historians won't, then who will? History becomes lost when we pretend entire groups of people didn't contribute to this ever-continuing story of the American past, present, and future.


Question 4: Will the readers be involved with the blog?

I hope so. Now that this blog is a few years old and has an established readership, I would like to involve the readers when it comes to the posts that will be on the blog. One of the things I do on the first day of each school year is I ask my students what they would like to learn about within the parameters of whatever time period I'm teaching. Students should be responsible for their learning as well, not just lectured to by the teacher, so I give them the opportunity to tell me what they want to know about. As an example, one of my students wanted to learn about pirates, so during the exploration and colonization unit, I taught about some of the famous pirates such as Blackbeard, Captain Morgan, William Kidd, Anne Bonny, and Mary Read. This is your blog as much as it is mine, and I want to ensure that everyone is getting out of it what they want/need to. So, in order to do this, I want readers to become more active on this blog, so if there's a topic you want me to expand upon just write a comment on this post, and I will do my best to ensure that each reader's comment is read and answered.


Question 5: Will you be bringing in guest bloggers?

I have been thinking about doing this for so long, but I've never gotten around to it. I would love to have some of my writer friends and former college professors write posts as guest bloggers to give their insights on the various topics covered within this blog. We'll see what the near-future brings with this.


So, there you have it. These are the top five questions I'm asked when I say I write a history blog. Now. let's see if we can reach 100,000 views soon!

The Civil War: Part I

Hello readers. Before I get into this blog post, I would like to wish everyone a happy new year! I would also like to say that posts on this blog may become few and far between again, but I'll try to post as often as I can, and in as much depth as I can. I found out recently that I got accepted to Southern New Hampshire University to pursue a Master's of Arts degree in American History. My classes start in a couple of weeks, and I'm super-excited for this opportunity and what this degree, and the knowledge earned along the way to achieving it, can mean for my future as a history teacher and for this blog. So, follow this blog, and the Facebook page associated with it here, and you'll get to continue to see what I post here and on the Facebook page!

Well, let's get on with today's post, shall we?

In mid-February 1861, Abraham Lincoln made his journey via train from Springfield, Illinois to Washington, DC for his presidential inauguration. With the outbreak of the Civil War imminent, Lincoln stated that he was "devoted to peace" but warned that "it may be necessary to put the foot down". In his inaugural address on March 4, Lincoln reiterated that he wouldn't interfere with slavery in the states where it already existed. Lincoln also stated that no state could legally leave the Union and he promised to defend federal forts in the South, collect taxes, and deliver the mail. Southerners were not impressed, and a North Carolina newspaper would go on to say that Lincoln's inauguration made the coming civil war evitable.

Fort Sumter

I'm not going to spend a lot of time covering this, since I did write about this in my last post, so here's just a brief summary: Lincoln began his first day in office by reading a letter from South Carolina stating that the fort was running out of supplies. Lincoln was urged by his cabinet to surrender the fort, but Lincoln believed that giving up Fort Sumter was the same as giving up the Union. Lincoln ordered for the fort to be re-supplied, and South Carolina responded by attacking the unarmed ships. On April 12, 1861 the first shots of the Civil War rang out, and a day later the Union surrendered the fort to the Confederates.

The Battle of Fort Sumter was short, but it led to the official start of the Civil War and upheaval that was felt all over the country. On April 15th, Lincoln ordered that the states loyal to the Union supply 75,000 militiamen to subdue the rebel states. Men from both sides flocked to join the military.

On April 19th, Lincoln issued a naval blockade of all southern ports including the Mississippi River and the Gulf of Mexico, which choked off Southern commercial activity and generated shortages of goods and inflation.

Both sides believed the war would be short, ending with either the capture of Washington, DC or the fall of Richmond, Virginia (the capital of the Confederate States, after it had been moved from Alabama), but neither side was fully prepared for the four years ahead of them.

General Winfield Scott of the Union came up with a three-pronged strategy to defeat the Confederates:

1. The Union Army of the Potomac would defend Washington, DC and exert constant pressure on Richmond
2. The Union navy would continue to blockade southern ports and cut off the Confederacy's access to foreign goods and weapons
3. Divide the Confederacy by invading the South along the main water routes (Mississippi, Tennessee, and Cumberland Rivers)

Jefferson Davis, the President of the Confederacy, had a much simpler plan for victory over the Union: stalemate with the Union and hope that Britain and France would send men and supplies in exchange for cotton.

Battles of the Civil War

The Civil war consisted of over 10,000 battles, engagements, skirmishes, and other military actions fought in 23 states and resulted in a loss of 650,000 casualties. For all intents and purposes, I'll only be writing about what I think are the most important battles of the Civil War because "ain't nobody got time fo'" writing about 10,000 military actions that occurred over a four year span.

The Battle of Philippi (West Virginia)

The Battle of Philippi was the first official battle of the Civil War, and occurred in and around Philippi, Virginia (now a part of West Virginia) on June 3, 1861.

After the unofficial Battle of Fort Sumter, Major General George B. McClellan returned to the US army and assumed the command of the Department of the Ohio, headquartered in the city of Cincinnati. He planned an offensive into what is now West Virginia, hoping this would lead to an offensive against Richmond and a quick Union victory.

The reasons behind the Battle of Philippi was to protect Union interests (bridges and railroads for travel and shipping), to protect the pro-Union people in the area, and to start an offensive that would lead to the aforementioned offensive against Richmond.

The Battle of Philippi was relatively bloodless and uneventful--4 Union deaths and 26 Confederate deaths marked the casualties for this particular battle--but this battle did show that the Union was more successful in planning for war than the Confederacy, and should be/should have been an indicator of what's to come for this war.

First Battle of Bull Run (Manassas, Virginia)

The First Battle of Bull Run was the first major confrontation of the Civil War. The Union army commander, Brigadier General Irvin McDowell of Washington was given pressure to begin his military campaigns before his men's enlistments were up (remember, both sides believed that the war would be over quickly, many even believed it would be over in three months or less, which caused both sides to have their soldiers enlistments at 90 days or so). McDowell didn't feel his men were properly trained but gave in to the pressure anyway.

On July 16, 1861 McDowell set out with the Army of Northeastern Virginia, about 28,400 men, from Washington to attack the Confederate forces at Manassas, just 25 miles away, to push the Confederates away from Washington. Brigadier General PTG Beauregard had been amassing the Confederate Army of the Potomac since the Battle of Fort Sumter and had about 21,800 soldiers. Beauregard was protecting a major rail station at Manassas Junction and stationed his troops along Bull Run.

Arriving in the Manassas area on July 18th, the Union army probed Bull Run and engaged in a skirmish. McDowell planned to use two columns to attack the Confederates' left flank while a third column circled to the right flank, providing a distraction and cutting the Confederates off from Richmond. McDowell's plan was to prevent reinforcements from reaching Beauregard's troops, but, unbeknownst to McDowell, Confederate troops began boarding the railroad at Piedmont Station on July 20th to reinforce Beauregard.

On July 21st, very early in the morning, McDowell sent two divisions north while another division was sent to create a diversion by attempting to cross Bull Run. Confederate Colonel Nathan Evans suspected, rightly, that the Union division crossing Bull Run was a diversion and routed his men north where they engaged at Matthews Hill. The Confederates were able to hold back the Union divisions for a time, but were eventually driven back.

Brigadier General Thomas Jackson's Virginia brigade, Colonel Wade Hampton and his legion, and Colonel JEB Stewart's cavalry arrived at Bull Run to reinforce the Confederates.

The battle was like a seesaw, with each side holding the upper hand for a time. Brigadier General Beauregard received more troops as reinforcements. The Union troops were attacked unexpectedly by these new troops and fled in an unorganized retreat.

The Southerners lost 20,000 men and the Northerners lost about 2,700.

At the conclusion of this battle, Brigadier General PGT Beauregard was promoted to full General on August 31, 1861; Brigadier General Irvin McDowell was blamed for the Union defeat and was replaced by Major General George B McClellan as Union Army Leader.

Shortly after this battle, Beauregard's Army of the Potomac combined forces with the Army of the Shenandoah and was renamed the Army of Northern Virginia and General Robert E. Lee was put in charge. McDowell's army, the Army of Northeastern Virginia, would be renamed the Army of the Potomac and Major General George McClellan would be put in charge.

Due to some issues with battles up to this point, the Confederacy would change the design of their flag after the First Battle of Bull Run; being so similar to the "stars and stripes" of the Union led to confusion on the battlefield on more than one occasion as neither side could figure out if reinforcements that were coming were there's or not. The "Southern Cross" design, a blue x with white stars on a red banner, was adopted as a battle flag.


The Seven Days Battle (Virginia)

As the war raged on and a new year came, both sides were holding fast to their goals to capture the other's capital, both coming close but not close enough.

The summer of 1862 saw the Union and the Confederates in Virginia after having engaged in several battles in the Carolinas and some of the western states (such as Kentucky, Missouri, and ands that were under Native American control); even Georgia and Florida had seen some fighting.

The Seven Days Battle, or Seven Days Campaign, lasted from June 25th to July 1st of 1862 with the goal of advancing on to Richmond to capture the Confederate capital and the counter-goal of pushing the Union forces away from Richmond.

At the start of the battle, the Union's Army of the Potomac under Major General McClellan was 103,000 strong compared to the Confederate's Army of Northern Virginia at 92,000. Despite the huge difference in numbers, the Union was steadily driven back away from Richmond.

After Jefferson Davis asked General Robert E Lee to take command of the army, Lee immediately set the men to work building defensive positions in and around Richmond. Lee knew his men wouldn't be successful against the large Union army and requested enforcements. Once General Thomas Jackson arrived with troops from Shenandoah Valley, Lee planned his strike against McClellan.

McClellan struck first, sending two divisions to secure the Richmond and York River Railroad. The next day, Lee assaulted Union positions along the waterways, resulting in a sort of two-pronged attack.

Surrounded on all sides,, McClellan couldn't keep up with the barrage of the Confederates, and McClellan and his army retreated. Richmond was saved and Lee became the hero of the South.



Second Battle of Bull Run (Virginia)

 The Second Battle of Bull Run was fought from August 28-30, 1862.

In March 1862, President Lincoln demoted Major General McClellan from overall command of Union armies, giving him command of just the Army of the Potomac. A new Army of Virginia was formed and Major General John Pope was chosen to lead it.

McClellan's plan was to advance with the Army of the Potomac against Richmond. Major General Pope would lead the Army of Virginia 65 miles northwest of Richmond to attack the Virginia Central Railroad, hopefully distracting General Lee and his Confederate troops.

On July 29th, Lee sent General Jackson and his men to defend the railroad from Pope. Pope withdrew and requested reinforcements, but his request went unmet.

On August 25th, Jackson and his men marched north to Manassas Junction, crossing the Bull Run Mountains where they raided a Union supply depot. The Confederates gained a large amount of necessary food and supplies...and they burned what they couldn't carry.

Upon hearing about the raid on the supply depot, Pope began to march his army north. He saw an opportunity to surrender Jackson's army at Manassas Junction as long as Jackson stayed where he was for a while and didn't receive reinforcements. Jackson didn't occupy Manassas Junction but moved to nearby Groveton where he decided to wait for Pope. Pope's army marched towards Manassas Junction, and were engaged in a skirmish. Now knowing for sure where Jackson was, Pope was prepared to launch a frontal assault on him on August 29th.

Believing they had the upper hand, Pope soon realized that the Confederate's artillery strength was beyond that of the Union's, and Pope began to retreat his men.

All of the Union officers were blamed for this second failed engagement at Manassas Junction/Bull Run, but Pope felt the brunt of the blame, being relieved of command on September 5th. Pope's Army of Virginia was absorbed into the Army of the Potomac, under command of McClellan.


Battle of Antietam (Maryland)

On September 17, 1862, Generals Robert E Lee and George B McClellan faced off near Antietam Creek in Sharpsburg, Maryland, the first battle to be fought on Northern soil.

Following the Second Battle of Bull Run, General Lee advanced into Maryland, wanting to get the Union army away from their crops and wanting to show Britain and France that they could win a battle in Northern territory. Lee's plan was to divide his outnumbered forces...but his plan was figured out when the last copy of the plan went missing and came to Union commander Major General McClellan.

The first four hours of the battle was indecisive. However, a series of bloody head-on attacks against Lee's center shook the Confederates, but was met with late-arriving reinforcements.

The battle ended in a draw, but the Union claimed it as a victory. This provided the Lincoln administration enough justification to issue the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation.


Emancipation Proclamation

Shortly after the Battle of Antietam, President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. The Emancipation Proclamation was an executive order issued on January 1, 1863. It was a war measure intended to cripple the Confederacy, as it only freed the slaves from the states that were in rebellion. The Emancipation Proclamation actively changed the focus of the war from preserving the Union to freedom for slaves. The Proclamation also led to more African-Americans joining the war and paved the way for total abolition of slavery.


With it being January 1st, it feels appropriate to end this blog post here, with the issuing of the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863. Upcoming posts on this blog will take us to the conclusion of the Civil War and into the Reconstruction Era. Keep coming back to the blog to see what I'll be posting soon!