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WE HAVE BEEN discussing
One point I did not mention in the earlier column was the role Gen. Ulysses Grant played in these battles: As victor at Vicksburg, he was again thrust into the national spotlight, and President Lincoln became convinced that in Grant he had his man to lead the federal armies to victory. Grant was not named general in chief until March 1864, but the wheels were set in motion by Vicksburg. (In truth, Grant became a national figure in spring 1862, after the battles at Fort Henry and Fort Donelson, but that is the subject of my next column.)
I consider Antietam, fought Sept. 17, 1862, to be the second-most-important battle of the Civil War. Consider what was at stake: This was a Confederate States of America military invasion of a foreign power. Bring it off and you proclaim to the world that not only can you defend your own borders, but you have the power to invade an onerous enemy to extract revenge and possibly add territory and manpower to the Southern nation.
Success could bring world (meaning British and French) recognition as a viable nation, worthy of commerce and loans. With success, it was also possible to envision a Republican defeat in national elections, with the probability of a Democratic administration taking charge in Washington; could a negotiated peace not be on the horizon?
Though the stakes were enormous, the South failed to win a victory. Actually, Antietam was a draw, but according to the rules of the day, the army that withdrew from the battlefield was declared to have lost the battle. The losses on both sides were tragic. It was the largest single day for casualties in the war, and no general who fought that day could ever say that his leadership was exemplary.
But after 13,724 casualties, the South withdrew back to Virginia. Union losses were 12,410, which allowed Lincoln to claim victory and issue the Emancipation Proclamation on Jan. 1, 1863. This changed the entire reason for the war: No longer was the war being fought to preserve the Union; the goal was now freedom from slavery, a moral issue. Europe had declared slavery to be an abomination; could it ever recognize a nation which endorsed slavery and used it as its economic foundation?
The Antietam CampaignThe battles preceding Antietam were some of the most crucial of the entire war.
Second Bull Run (Aug. 29-30, 1862) was clearly a Confederate victory. Soon after the Peninsula Campaign, President Lincoln wanted to consolidate Union armies in Virginia. He gave command of these forces to Gen. John Pope. Gen. Robert E. Lee decided to attack Pope's army before it could be joined by the retreating Peninsula army under command of Gen. George McClellan.
Second Bull Run was Gen. Lee at his best. He outmaneuvered Pope and suffered roughly half the casualties he inflicted (15,000 Union, 8,000 Southern casualties). In addition, bedraggled Southern armies raided the huge Federal supply station at Manassas.
Harpers Ferry (Sept. 12-15, 1862) was another rout by Confederate armies. Gen. Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson attacked the federal garrison at Harpers Ferry, and all 14,000 Union soldiers were either casualties or became prisoners. Confederate losses were under 300.
In addition, the South took much-needed guns and cannons. The timing of Harpers Ferry even allowed Gen. Jackson to reach Antietam in time to be the deciding factor in forcing a draw at Antietam.
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Steven Edmondson of Virginia's Prince George County e-mailed me about a column in which I discussed how western Virginia became a state. He claims that I "made it clear that eastern VA was for slavery and western VA was not." Edmondson suggests that I "write a short note stating how WVA was the last slave state admitted into the Union."
In the column, I noted that both politics and geography were major parts of the picture. I wrote that the "eastern part of the state with its gently rolling landscape and mild climate was well-suited to an agrarian slave economy. The western part of the state had swift-flowing streams and rugged hills and hollows, a poor fit for labor-intensive large-scale slave agriculture."
But I also noted that the main reason for the divide between eastern and western Virginia was geography: Wheeling in western Virginia was 330 miles from Richmond but only 60 miles from Pittsburgh. It was "an era when travel was a chore [so that] much of the economy and trade and relationships in western Virginia had been oriented toward Ohio and Pennsylvania." Further, those living in the western counties felt that they "had suffered more from [their] eastern brethren than ever the Cotton States all put together have suffered from the North."
Edmondson added that he was writing because he wanted to show "just how complex the war really was." I thank him for discussing the ramifications of the war and for bringing up something that I had never realized. I e-mailed him back that on June 20, 1863, when West Virginia was admitted into the Union as a state, it indeed was "admitted as a temporary slave state, because the state constitution had a provision for gradual emancipation (future children of slaves would be born free, and slaves under 21 freed at ages 21 or 25). This provision was added at the insistence of Congress. The original proposed constitution's only provision dealing with slavery (Article 9, Section 7) said, 'No slave shall be brought, or free person of color be permitted to come into this State for permanent residence.' Congressional insistence on the gradual emancipation provision seems strange because the U.S. government at the time supposedly had a policy of not interfering with slavery in the states."
In fact, the Emancipation Proclamation of Jan. 1, 1863, specifically freed only those slaves in states then in rebellion against the government; all other slaves remained slaves.
As you can see, I have some very sharp readers.
Added facts: West Virginia abolished slavery within the state on Feb. 3, 1865; by 1872, it had voted to allow people of color to vote and hold public office.
NED HARRISON is a Greensboro, N.C., writer who specializes in military history. His columns about the Civil War appear regularly in North Carolina, Maryland and Virginia newspapers. Write Ned Harrison, News & Record/T&C. Box 20848, Greensboro, N. C. 27420. E-mail him at n-b-
Email: h@mindspring.com
