American Civil War (1861-65)

The War Between the States was the deadliest military contest in American history. This war pitted son against father and brother against brother. By the 1800s, American society found itself split into two distinct and competing regional areas: the North and the South. The main issue, if distilled down to one single factor that ignited the passions of the people to the point of civil war was slavery. The South depended on slavery as the force of labor that allowed their agricultural based economy (dependent on the growing and exporting
of cotton) to exist. The North, on the other hand, didn’t depend on slave labor, instead utilizing immigrants to work in its factories and build its infrastructure. With the election of Abraham Lincoln to the presidency, the Southern states felt that their political influence was in dire jeopardy and seceded from the United States. President Lincoln found this unacceptable. The newly formed Confederate States of America then took the fight to the Union. The Union was initially unprepared to fight a war. While the North could field a larger army and had more resources, their forces were inadequately led (at least in the eastern campaigns). The Confederacy, on the other hand, would produce some of America’s greatest military leaders. True grit, however, only goes so far. Failing to obtain foreign support (which was the element that allowed the Americans during the Revolution to defeat the British, the Confederacy could not long match the resources that were available to the North. Still, the fight was a bloody one. More than 600,000 men lost their lives in this conflict, with well over a million casualties. The property damage was in the billions of dollars. And while more than 4 million slaves were given their freedom and the country was reunited, the emotional scars from the war were deep and to a certain degree, remain to this very day.