Fort Sumter Surrenders! Civil War Begins!

13 April 1861:

When we last left our combatants at Fort Sumter, it was raining and the Union forces had ceased firing for the day.  But the Confederates kept-up a periodic barrage throughout the night.  Come dawn, all help breaks loose again.  The Charleston forces resumed their bombardment, while the Federals responded as best they could and waited for the promised relief.  Captain Fox, after having his ships driven back from the fort yesterday by artillery fire, found the seas too rough on the 13th and decided to wait until nightfall to carry out his resupply mission. 

Meanwhile, the "hot shot" rounds (cannonballs that had been heated in furnaces) of the Confederates were severely damaging the fort, with fires breaking out all over.

Fort Sumter giving and receiving fire, but also ON FIRE

In fact, by noon the main gate and most of the wooden structures were in flames.  As the flames moved closer and closer to where the garrison stored the 300 barrels of gunpowder it had left, Major Anderson and his men struggled to move the much needed powder to safety.  But 2/3 of Fort Sumter's powder was still left in the main ammunition magazine, when the Major ordered the building sealed and had the remaining barrels tied together and thrown into the sea (he was hoping to retrieve them later though), for safety's sake.  Both sides kept up their fire, but the advantage was all on the Confederate's side.

Confederate flag flying over Fort Sumter

Finally, at 1300, the fort's flagpole was knocked down, spurring several parties of men to initiate parleys with Major Anderson in the hopes of ending the conflict, by seeing the fort surrendered into Confederate hands.  Encouraged by the use of the word "evacuate" as opposed to "surrender" and faced with hungry and exhausted men, low ammunition and fires burning out of control, Major Anderson agreed to surrender the Federal installation known as Fort Sumter to Confederate forces under the command of General P. G. T. Beauregard.



 And so it was that at 1430, on 13 April 1861, the first battle of the Civil War was ended.  Major Anderson and his men gave a 50 gun salute and then the garrison marched out of Fort Sumter and onto the unused resupply vessels.  The flag that had flown over the gallant defenders, was saved by Major Anderson and became a rally point for supporters of the Union.

However, the lack of casualties on either side during this 34 hour conflict (no one had been so much as injured) belied the horrendous bloodshed that was to wash over this nation for the next four years.

At last the Sumter siege was over.......but the war was only just beginning.

Fort Sumter Attacked! Civil War Begins!

12 April 1861, found the United States in a precarious position. Seven Southern states had seceded from the Union and the eight slave-holding states were looking to the situation in Charleston to help determine their course of action: join the Confederacy or stay in the Union. The entire country seemed to be holding its breath, waiting for something......any little thing.......to break this tense waiting game, to make the country decide whether their issues were worth going to war about. The stage was set...... Fort Sumter was the moment of decision

For the site of such a monumental moment in history, it is a rather unknown place in American history today. Fort Sumter was a fort, an unfinished fort to be exact, situated in Charleston Harbor, SC, designed to protect the valuable harbor from foreign foes attempting to invade by sea. At this time though, it had yet to be completely finished and until the commander of Charleston Harbor, Major Robert Anderson, moved his forces there, it was only occupied by a lone soldier, who served as a lighthouse keeper. It was designed to be one of the strongest fortresses in the world,

but this was NOT where the Charleston garrison was stationed though. They were instead quartered on the far inferior Fort Moultrie, a feeble fort dating back to 1776, which had no real defense against land-based attacks (sand dunes had been piled up against the walls, making scaling them easy). However, before the actions of 12 April 1861, Major Anderson (perhaps sensing the secession in the wind) made the decision to move the entire garrison over to Ft. Sumter.

It was to here that Brig. General P. G. T. Beauregard, on 11 April 1861, delivered an ultimatum to Major Anderson, the man who had trained him in the art of artillery at West Point, to surrender Ft. Sumter or face bombardment. Major Anderson refused, saying to the officers that General Beauregard had sent to hear his reply, "If we never meet in this world again, God grant that we may meet in the next." Now the decision of war, would lie with Confederate General Beauregard.

And so it was, that in the darkness of 4:30 a.m., on 12 April 1861, Confederate batteries opened up on Fort Sumter. American guns, fired by American hands, were firing on an American fort, manned by American soldiers. To borrow from the British at Yorktown, "The World Turned Upside Down" 150 years ago this morning.

Major Anderson awaited until the light of morning, before returning fire. However, limited manpower (an already small garrison had been further reduced by sickness and weeks of half-rations) and the unfinished state of the fort itself prevented him from using all of his guns, only 21could be safely fired. The Confederates made a point of targeting the wooden portions of the fort, while the Sumter defenders were mostly ineffective against their Charleston adversaries.

Another issue, which may have helped to force Beauregard's hand, was the early morning arrival of a Union fleet there to resupply Fort Sumter. President Lincoln had previously stated publicly that the ships were only there for a resupply of supplies, that no manpower would be exchanged. However, since the Confederacy was demanding that the fort be handed over to them as property of the state of South Carolina, there was little chance that they would peacefully acquiesce to this federal request. But though the fleet had arrived before the opening Confederate bombardment, they had done nothing and would be able to do nothing all day.

As darkness fell, a light rain began falling, which extinguished the fires started by Confederate hot-shells and the fort ceased firing for the night. Though the Confederates reduced their rate of firing, they kept lobbing shells at the fort throughout the night. Sumter's defenders spent a fitful night.

At dawn's break, the fight resumes in earnest.........

Shiloh Principle Players

Let's meet the principles involved in the Battle of Shiloh / Pittsburg Landing:

For the Union:

In command and responsible for the battle:

Major General Ulysses S. Grant

, 

And Grant's most loyal Lieutenant and friend:

Brig. General William T. Sherman

 

 

While his late-arriving forces helped tips the odds in the Federals' favor on 07 April 1862:

Maj. General Don Carlos Buell

For the Confederates: 

Their leader as the battle began on 06 April 1862 and who was shot during during the day:

General Albert Sidney Johnston

After his untimely death, the Confederate forces would be left in the hands of this man:

General P. G. T. Beauregard

There were others who played a role, but it is beyond the time and capacity of this historian to describe all of the events that occurred on the fateful days of April 6th and 7th in 1862. 

Battle of Shiloh / Pittsburg Landing

Speaking of General Buell, 7 April 1862 is the second day of fighting in the Battle of Shiloh (also known in the South as the Battle of Pittsburg Landing).

Shiloh was a major battle in the Civil War and one of the bloodiest.  Though both sides tended to ignore what was going on in the Western Theater, this one battle did draw some attention, for two main reasons.  First, was because the day of fighting on 6 April had gone so well for the Confederates (they had manage to push Grant's troops all the way to the river, where they spent the night protected only by artillery) that it seemed impossible that they should not carry the next day of fighting as well.  Second, was the sheer bloodiness of the fighting, the end tally of casualties proved to be the costliest in American history up to that time, with well over 23,000.

As darkness fell on 6 April 1862, the heart wrenching cries of the wounded and dying men could be heard in both Confederate and Union camps.  While the shelling from Union gunboats made the night miserable for the Confederates, the Federals spent the night no better, camped along the shore at Pittsburg Landing and a thunderstorm made both sides miserable.  Unable to withstand the agonizing voices of the wounded, Grant took shelter under a tree and with Sherman began planning for the next day's battle.  "Well Grant, we've had the devil's own day, haven't we?" Sherman remarked.  "Yes," replied Grant.  Lick 'em tomorrow though."

The Confederates (now led by General Beauregard after General Albert Sidney Johnston had been killed) were overly confident that tomorrow would bring a "complete victory" to quote from Beauregard's telegram to President Davis.  Though Sherman and other officers had been surprised and some even routed on 06 April and Grant was indeed trapped at Pittsburg Landing, victory was not as much a garantee as Beauregard proclaimed it to be.  For there had been stiff resistance to the Confederate advance in several places, the Hornet's Nest being the most famous and costly to the Rebels in time, and Grant had a large number of troops at Pittsburg Landing as well as an impressive defense in the form of artillary.  Also, Beauregard had perhaps made a major tactical error in haulting the assault at dusk and not pressing on.

Come the morning of 07 April 1862, there was a nasty surprise awaiting an uninformed General Beauregard, in the form of General Don Carlos Buell and reinforcements which had arrived late yesterday evening.  Once again outnumbering the Confederates, Grant ordered a counterattack.  And at dawn the Federal forces engaged in a massive one.  Grant and Buell launched their assaults separately, but with a great deal of coordination going on down at lower levels.  The Confederate units however were all entangled with each other and there was little unit cohesion.  The Union forces made steady progress in reclaiming their lost camps (where the Confederates had waited out the rains of the last night in more comfort than they had).

By early afternoon Beauregard found his forces mostly back where they had started from prior to 06 April 1862.  He eventually launched a series of counterattacks, but by late afternoon the last of these assaults failed to gain any ground when the Confederates were flanked and severely repulsed.  Low on ammunition and with over 10,000 men dead, missing or wounded, Beauregard, realizing that he had lost the initiative, knew that he could advance no further and so withdrew to a position beyond Shiloh Church.  In the evening of 07 April 1862, the Confederates began an orderly retreat back to Corinth.

In the aftermath of this bloody conflict both commanding generals' reputations would suffer.  Beauregard would lose the respect of President Davis (never to be regained) and would be forever vilified for "losing the Battle of Shiloh" by not fighting on into the evening on 06 April.  Grant's reputation would suffer thanks to reporters (far from the battle) who spread rumors that Grant was drunk and told stories of his men being bayoneted in their tents due to a lack of preparedness.  Grant's superior, General Henry Halleck, even reorganized the armies, relegating Grant to an impotent position as his second in command.  But President Lincoln refused to fire him, saying, "I can't spare this man; he fights."  Sherman's reputation, on the other hand, was made by Shiloh, his steadfastness under enemy fire and amid the chaos of the battle, made-up for his defensive lapses preceding Shiloh.

Eventually though, Grant was vindicated for his performance at the Battle of Shiloh.  His clear judgment retained under a very strenuous and chaotic situation and his ability to clearly see the larger tactical picture, devise a resourceful strategy and then implement it, were the keys to giving Federal forces the ultimate victory.

Unfortunately, the Battle of Shiloh was also instrumental in bringing home to both Federal and Confederates alike that this war was going to be a very bloody affair and one with no clear end in sight.  In fact, there would be three more longs years full of battles just like Shiloh.

Month of the Civil War

I know that I am late in posting this notification, what with 7 days of April already being spent, but better late than never I suppose.  That would be a phrase that I could also apply to several generals, from both sides, throughout the war.  J.E.B. Stuart at Gettysburg and Buell at Shiloh.  So at least I am in good company. 

Anyway, April 2011 is the 150th Anniversary of the beginning of the Civil War.  In fact, the year 2011 is a whole MONTH of 150th anniversaries, from Fort Sumter to First Manassas and on.  Really though, April 2011 is just the tip of the Civil War Anniversary Iceberg.  We really have 4 whole years of 150th anniversaries to look forward to and I shall endeavor to keep your, my few loyal readers, abreast of the important dates. 

Enjoy!