Introduction Civil War forms part of the Curriculum Connections series Each of the six volumes of the set covers a particular aspect of the conflict Home Front and the Economy Behind the Fighting Weapons Tactics and Strategy Politics Battles and Campaigns and People About this set Each volume in Civil War features illustrated chapters providing in-depth information about each subject The chapters are all listed in the contents pages of each book Each volume can be studied to provide a comprehensive understanding of all aspects of the conflict However each chapter may also be studied independently Within each chapter there are two key aids to learning that are to be found in color sidebars located in the margins of each page Curriculum Context sidebars indicate to the reader that a subject has a particular relevance to certain key state and national history guidelines and curricula They highlight essential information or suggest useful ways for students to consider a subject or to include it in their studies Glossary sidebars define key words within the text At the end of the book a summary Glossary lists the key terms defined in the volume There is also a list of further print and Web-based resources and a full volume index Fully captioned illustrations play an important role throughout the set including photographs and explanatory maps 4 Battles and Campaigns
About this book Battles and Campaigns uses photographs and detailed battle maps to describe all of the most important military engagements of the war from the First Battle of Bull Run Manassas in July 1861 to the surrender of the Confederate commander Robert E Lee to his Union counterpart Ulysses S Grant at Appomattox Court House on April 9 1865 While the South set out to invade the North the North imposed a naval blockade on Southern ports and attempted an advance on the Southern capital Richmond by fighting along the Virginia Peninsula In the early stages of the war both sides suffered from poor leadership in part due to the appointment of officers for their political loyalties rather than their military ability As the conflict went on so a generation of more able commanders emerged including Lee and Stonewall Jackson in the South and Grant and William T Sherman in the North The course of much of the fighting was dictated by the need to control vital railroad lines and rivers The North realized that it could cut the Confederacy in two by capturing the Mississippi Ohio and Tennessee Rivers and rail junctions at Chattanooga The Confederates meanwhile invaded the North on a number of occasions but reached their high-water mark at Gettysburg in July 1863 From then the South was on the back foot Lee fought a series of remarkable defensive battles while key Southern positions and cities were besieged The fall of Atlanta and Sherman’s March to the Sea in which Union troops devastated Southern territory brought the Confederacy to its end although as this book reveals some Southern commanders refused to lay down their arms for weeks after the surrender at Appomattox Court House Introduction 5
Anaconda Plan When war broke out on April 12 1861 the Union had no overall strategy for defeating the Confederacy The commander-in-chief of the U S Army Winfield Scott devised a plan that became known as the Anaconda Plan Scott outlined his strategy in a letter to Major General George B McClellan on May 3 1861 He did not propose an invasion of the South but a campaign to surround and isolate the Confederate states to deprive them of supplies and force a peace deal Naval blockade Part of Scott’s plan was already in action On April 19 President Lincoln had ordered a naval blockade of the major Confederate ports By the end of April the blockade was being established from Norfolk Virginia to Galveston Texas Scott proposed tightening the cordon to shut down the Confederacy’s Atlantic trade Control of the Mississippi Scott also proposed that the Union close off the western part of the Confederacy by gaining control of the Mississippi River This would be achieved by capturing the forts in the Mississippi Delta occupying New Orleans and sending gunboats and an army of 60,000 men down the river from Illinois Mastery of the river would cut off the Confederate states of Texas Arkansas and most of Louisiana from the rest of the South It was a cautious long-term strategy that relied for success on squeezing the South economically The thinking behind the plan Scott decided on his plan for two reasons He had a limited number of men the army he commanded was tiny with only 16,000 professional soldiers or regulars On April 15 Lincoln called on the Union states to recruit Curriculum Context The legality of Lincoln’s decision to order a naval blockade without the initial approval of Congress was later challenged in the Supreme Court Curriculum Context It might be useful to be able to describe the basic elements of the Union plan at the start of the war 6 Battles and Campaigns
75,000 volunteer militia but they were only to serve for three months Scott doubted whether these 90-day men could be relied on to fight a long campaign The government promised an extra 25,000 regulars and 60,000 volunteers to enlist for three years but that was not enough to defeat the Confederacy The other reason for Scott’s strategy was that he hoped to win the South back without destroying it He understood the depth of hatred a civil war would create War fever When the Northern press learned of Scott’s idea they ridiculed its caution dubbing it the Anaconda Plan for a river snake that coils around its prey and squeezes it to death The Anaconda Plan found little favor with Union politicians and army officers eager for a quick victory Scott had foreseen this in his letter to McClellan The greatest obstacle in the way of this plan is the impatience of our patriotic and loyal Union friends They will urge instant and vigorous action regardless I fear of the consequences Scott was right The North was gripped with war fever In May the Confederacy had established its capital in Richmond barely 100 miles 160 km from Washington and a Southern army was forming south of the Potomac at Manassas The North was eager to strike at the Confederacy On to Richmond was the popular cry By June 1861 the Anaconda Plan had been quietly dropped In November Winfield Scott retired from the army and was replaced by his protégé McClellan Scott’s plan to regain the Mississippi River was not rejected entirely The campaign began in February 1862 with the first attack by generals John Pope and Ulysses S Grant and the recapture of New Orleans in April 1862 by naval officer David G Farragut It proved a longer and bloodier business than Scott imagined but played a vital part in the Union’s final victory Enlist To join the military services Curriculum Context War fever in the Union came to an end after the shock of defeat in the First Battle of Bull Run Manassas in July 1861 Anaconda Plan 7
