Okla-homey
4/13/2008, 08:30 AM
April 13, 1861 Fort Sumter surrenders to SC rebels.
http://img82.imageshack.us/img82/3862/aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa10.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
147 years ago today, the commander of US forces who took refuge in an unfinished fort in Charleston Harbor surrendered to South Carolina secessionist forces. Inside Sumter its commander, Major Robert Anderson, 9 officers, 68 enlisted men, 8 musicians, and 43 construction workers who were still putting the finishing touches on the fort defended the place against a ring of fire posed by rebel batteries ringing the harbor.
Captain Abner Doubleday, the man often inaccurately credited with inventing the game of baseball, returned fire nearly two hours after the barrage began. By the morning of April 13, the garrison in Sumter was in dire straits.
http://img132.imageshack.us/img132/6300/aa489pxabnerdoubledayuk7.jpg
Abner Doubleday earned the stars of a brigadier general before the war ended.
The soldiers had sustained only minor injuries, but they could not hold out much longer. The fort was badly damaged, and the Confederate's shots were becoming more precise. Around noon, the flagstaff was shot away. Louis Wigfall, a prominent "fireeater" (period nickname for rabid secessonists) and former U.S. senator from Texas, rowed out without permission to see if the garrison was trying to surrender.
http://img132.imageshack.us/img132/1446/aa460pxltwigfallmb2.jpg
Louis Wigfall. The Texan joined many other prominent secessionists from around the South who had traveled to Charleston to join in the fun of twisting the US eagle's beak. They would come to rue the day they began such folly.
Anderson decided that further resistance was futile, and he ran a white flag up a makeshift flagpole.
The first engagement of the war was over, and the only casualty had been a Confederate horse. The Federals were not taken prisoner and were allowed to leave for the north; before leaving, the soldiers fired a 100-gun salute. During the salute, one soldier was killed and another mortally wounded by a prematurely exploding cartridge. The Civil War had officially begun.
By the end of the four year long and bloody war that ensued, the United States became a fundamentally different place.
Events leading up to Sumter's surrender.
The fort had been the source of tension between the Union and infant Confederacy for several months. After South Carolina seceded, the state demanded the fort be turned over but US officials refused. A supply ship, the "Star of the West," tried to reach Fort Sumter on January 9 to resupply the besieged Sumter garrison, but a shore battery manned by Citadel cadets opened fire and drove it away.
For both sides, Sumter was a symbol of sovereignty. The United States could not allow it to fall to the Confederates, although throughout the Deep South other federal installations had been seized.
For South Carolinians, secession meant little if the hated Yankees still held the stronghold. The issue hung in the air when Abraham Lincoln took the oath of office on March 4, putting secessionists on notice in his inauguration address: "You can have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors."
http://img91.imageshack.us/img91/2606/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz36.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
US Major Robert Anderson, 2d US Heavy Artillery, commander of the Ft Sumter garrison
The Confederate Congress meeting at the Confederacy's first capital in Montgomery, Alabama, had decided on February 15 that Sumter and other forts must be acquired "either by negotiation or force." Negotiation had failed. The Confederates demanded surrender of the fort, but the loyal son of the South, US Major Robert Anderson of Kentucky, commander of Fort Sumter, refused.
At 4:30 a.m. on April 12, the Confederate guns opened fire. For thirty-three hours, the shore batteries lobbed 4,000 shells in the direction of the fort.
http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/7540/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz21.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Eight times during the bombardment Sumter's flagpole had been hit without serious injury; but at near 2 P.M. that day the pole was shot off near the peak and the flag fell among the gleaming cinders. Lieutenant Hall rescued the precious bunting before it took fire. Sergeant Peter Hart shinnied up the pole, and nailed it in place it amid deadly shot and shell, where the scarred banner was kept flying defiantly.
http://img83.imageshack.us/img83/2606/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz36.th.jpg (http://img83.imageshack.us/my.php?image=zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz36.jpg)
After the bombardment and departure of US forces, the new Confederate flag waves defiantly over the shattered fort. It would fly there until February 19, 1865 when US forces re-entered the fort after Charleston was evacuated by Confederate forces who were hastily and futiley flung in the path of Sherman's forces moving through the state
http://img91.imageshack.us/img91/7906/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz38.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Ft Sumter is administered by the National Park Service. It may be visited by a short boat ride from the city of Charleston. To get a sense of how much damage the fort sustained during the Civil War, realize that in 1861, the brick walls extended to the height of the smaller flagpoles ringing the tall flagpole seen in this photo. The black concrete emplacement in the fort's center is a late 19th century leftover when the fort was reinforced and equippied with modern coast artillery to defend against invasion during the run-up to the Spanish American War.
http://img83.imageshack.us/img83/4333/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz37.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
One of the coolest things your correspondent has ever done was on 19 Feb. 2005, when he took part in a reenactment of the Federal re-occupation of Ft Sumter. A group of 89 living historians from literally all over the US camped on Morris Island across the channel from Ft Sumter and on the morning of 19 Feb. rowed across the channel in period rowboats to occupy Ft Sumter while portraying the company of the 52d Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry who did it the first time exactly 140 years earlier.
Enduring Legacy of the Civil War
Recently departed Civil War historian and native Mississipian Shelby Foote probably explained the impact of the Civil War in the fewest yet most powerful and accurate terms when he said, "Before the Civil War, people referred to the country as 'These United States,' after the war, people began to refer to the newly reformed nation as 'The United States.'" IOW, for good or bad, the constitutional debate over the issue of "states rights" was settled once and for all.
Shortly after conclusion of the war, the XIII - XV amendments to the Constitution were ratified and became the law of the land. Slavery was forever outlawed in the "Land of the Free," newly freed slaves were given the right to vote, and the original "Bill of Rights" Fifth Amendment notion that no American could be denied his life, liberty or property without due process of law was applied to the action of state governments. Further, the XIVth made law the principle that no state could deny its residents the rights enjoyed by all US citizens under the Constitution.
Finally, citizenship acquired by birth in the United States was made a Constitutional principle (XIVth Amendment) -- a matter which today is a source of friction as we struggle with the immigration issue and what to do about the minor children born of illegal migrants in the US when/if their non-citizen parents face deportation.
http://img83.imageshack.us/img83/6396/insane7zo1zn.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
http://img82.imageshack.us/img82/3862/aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa10.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
147 years ago today, the commander of US forces who took refuge in an unfinished fort in Charleston Harbor surrendered to South Carolina secessionist forces. Inside Sumter its commander, Major Robert Anderson, 9 officers, 68 enlisted men, 8 musicians, and 43 construction workers who were still putting the finishing touches on the fort defended the place against a ring of fire posed by rebel batteries ringing the harbor.
Captain Abner Doubleday, the man often inaccurately credited with inventing the game of baseball, returned fire nearly two hours after the barrage began. By the morning of April 13, the garrison in Sumter was in dire straits.
http://img132.imageshack.us/img132/6300/aa489pxabnerdoubledayuk7.jpg
Abner Doubleday earned the stars of a brigadier general before the war ended.
The soldiers had sustained only minor injuries, but they could not hold out much longer. The fort was badly damaged, and the Confederate's shots were becoming more precise. Around noon, the flagstaff was shot away. Louis Wigfall, a prominent "fireeater" (period nickname for rabid secessonists) and former U.S. senator from Texas, rowed out without permission to see if the garrison was trying to surrender.
http://img132.imageshack.us/img132/1446/aa460pxltwigfallmb2.jpg
Louis Wigfall. The Texan joined many other prominent secessionists from around the South who had traveled to Charleston to join in the fun of twisting the US eagle's beak. They would come to rue the day they began such folly.
Anderson decided that further resistance was futile, and he ran a white flag up a makeshift flagpole.
The first engagement of the war was over, and the only casualty had been a Confederate horse. The Federals were not taken prisoner and were allowed to leave for the north; before leaving, the soldiers fired a 100-gun salute. During the salute, one soldier was killed and another mortally wounded by a prematurely exploding cartridge. The Civil War had officially begun.
By the end of the four year long and bloody war that ensued, the United States became a fundamentally different place.
Events leading up to Sumter's surrender.
The fort had been the source of tension between the Union and infant Confederacy for several months. After South Carolina seceded, the state demanded the fort be turned over but US officials refused. A supply ship, the "Star of the West," tried to reach Fort Sumter on January 9 to resupply the besieged Sumter garrison, but a shore battery manned by Citadel cadets opened fire and drove it away.
For both sides, Sumter was a symbol of sovereignty. The United States could not allow it to fall to the Confederates, although throughout the Deep South other federal installations had been seized.
For South Carolinians, secession meant little if the hated Yankees still held the stronghold. The issue hung in the air when Abraham Lincoln took the oath of office on March 4, putting secessionists on notice in his inauguration address: "You can have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors."
http://img91.imageshack.us/img91/2606/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz36.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
US Major Robert Anderson, 2d US Heavy Artillery, commander of the Ft Sumter garrison
The Confederate Congress meeting at the Confederacy's first capital in Montgomery, Alabama, had decided on February 15 that Sumter and other forts must be acquired "either by negotiation or force." Negotiation had failed. The Confederates demanded surrender of the fort, but the loyal son of the South, US Major Robert Anderson of Kentucky, commander of Fort Sumter, refused.
At 4:30 a.m. on April 12, the Confederate guns opened fire. For thirty-three hours, the shore batteries lobbed 4,000 shells in the direction of the fort.
http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/7540/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz21.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Eight times during the bombardment Sumter's flagpole had been hit without serious injury; but at near 2 P.M. that day the pole was shot off near the peak and the flag fell among the gleaming cinders. Lieutenant Hall rescued the precious bunting before it took fire. Sergeant Peter Hart shinnied up the pole, and nailed it in place it amid deadly shot and shell, where the scarred banner was kept flying defiantly.
http://img83.imageshack.us/img83/2606/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz36.th.jpg (http://img83.imageshack.us/my.php?image=zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz36.jpg)
After the bombardment and departure of US forces, the new Confederate flag waves defiantly over the shattered fort. It would fly there until February 19, 1865 when US forces re-entered the fort after Charleston was evacuated by Confederate forces who were hastily and futiley flung in the path of Sherman's forces moving through the state
http://img91.imageshack.us/img91/7906/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz38.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Ft Sumter is administered by the National Park Service. It may be visited by a short boat ride from the city of Charleston. To get a sense of how much damage the fort sustained during the Civil War, realize that in 1861, the brick walls extended to the height of the smaller flagpoles ringing the tall flagpole seen in this photo. The black concrete emplacement in the fort's center is a late 19th century leftover when the fort was reinforced and equippied with modern coast artillery to defend against invasion during the run-up to the Spanish American War.
http://img83.imageshack.us/img83/4333/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz37.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
One of the coolest things your correspondent has ever done was on 19 Feb. 2005, when he took part in a reenactment of the Federal re-occupation of Ft Sumter. A group of 89 living historians from literally all over the US camped on Morris Island across the channel from Ft Sumter and on the morning of 19 Feb. rowed across the channel in period rowboats to occupy Ft Sumter while portraying the company of the 52d Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry who did it the first time exactly 140 years earlier.
Enduring Legacy of the Civil War
Recently departed Civil War historian and native Mississipian Shelby Foote probably explained the impact of the Civil War in the fewest yet most powerful and accurate terms when he said, "Before the Civil War, people referred to the country as 'These United States,' after the war, people began to refer to the newly reformed nation as 'The United States.'" IOW, for good or bad, the constitutional debate over the issue of "states rights" was settled once and for all.
Shortly after conclusion of the war, the XIII - XV amendments to the Constitution were ratified and became the law of the land. Slavery was forever outlawed in the "Land of the Free," newly freed slaves were given the right to vote, and the original "Bill of Rights" Fifth Amendment notion that no American could be denied his life, liberty or property without due process of law was applied to the action of state governments. Further, the XIVth made law the principle that no state could deny its residents the rights enjoyed by all US citizens under the Constitution.
Finally, citizenship acquired by birth in the United States was made a Constitutional principle (XIVth Amendment) -- a matter which today is a source of friction as we struggle with the immigration issue and what to do about the minor children born of illegal migrants in the US when/if their non-citizen parents face deportation.
http://img83.imageshack.us/img83/6396/insane7zo1zn.jpg (http://imageshack.us)