The Civil War (Part 2)

Hi, everybody, and welcome

back to Heimler's History.

Now, in the last lecture,

I left you with Lincoln's plan to win

the Civil War and how it turned

on a document known as

the Emancipation Proclamation.

And Lincoln desperately needed a new

strategy because up to this point,

the South had badly been whipping

the North, and it looked like,

at long last, the United States

would become the Disunited States.

But maybe, just maybe, Lincoln's plan

will work, and the Union will be saved.

Let's get to it.

It is time to kick it old school.

[MUSIC]

Now,

the purpose

of the Emancipation Proclamation was

to unilaterally free all the slaves

in territories which were in rebellion.

And that sounds great,

but if the Union keeps losing battles,

then they have no ground

on which to make such a power play.

If you can imagine the North and the South

represented by two guys who get

into a brawl outside a bar one night,

maybe this will help you understand.

Suppose the Southern boy is whipping

the Yankee. And while the Yankee is

on the ground moaning and groaning

and breathing hard, he proclaims, "Hey,

after this is over, I'm taking your car."

And of course we know that the Southern

boy will respond with a laughing disdain,

"Boy, I will slap you to sleep

and then slap you for sleeping."

You see, the battered and bruised Yankee

on the ground has no place to say what he

will and will not take

from the Southern boy.

And so, even though Lincoln decided

that emancipating the slaves was the way

to win the war and save the Union,

he needed a good victory on which to stand

so he could proclaim it. And that victory

came at Antietam Creek in Maryland.

And as it just so happened,

a couple of Union soldiers found a copy

of General Lee's battle plans that was

wrapped around a couple of cigars

and dropped on the ground by a couple

of careless Confederate soldiers.

And with this crucial information in hand,

the Union had a decided

advantage over the South.

Now, it's hard to underestimate the

significance of the Battle of Antietam.

First of all, it was the bloodiest battle

in the entire war with over 3,600

men dead and about 22,000 casualties.

Second of all, it was probably the most

important battle in the entire Civil War,

and some historians even claim that it was

one of the most important

battles in world history.

Why?

Well, Lincoln's enemy, Jefferson Davis,

the president of the Confederacy,

was never so close to victory as

he was at the Battle of Antietam.

You see, Britain and France were already

in talks to aid the South in their

struggle against the North. And if Davis

had been victorious at the Battle

of Antietam, he would have surely received

that British and French aid, and that

would have been devastating for the North.

But the Union Army showed unusual strength

and vigor during this battle

and barely squeaked out a victory.

And after that, the British and the French

decided to mind their own affairs.

And so, the Union victory at Antietam gave

Lincoln all the ground he needed for his

Emancipation Proclamation in which he said

the following: "That on the first day

of January, in the year of our Lord one

thousand eight hundred and sixty-three,

all persons held as slaves within any

State, or designated part of a State,

the people whereof shall then be

in rebellion against the United States,

shall be then, thenceforward,

and forever free."

And after giving the Proclamation,

Lincoln acknowledged in his own words,

"The character of the war will be changed.

It will be one of subjugation.

The South is to be destroyed and replaced

with new propositions and ideas."

Now, as most Americans look back

on the Emancipation Proclamation,

it has sort of a golden hue around it.

It's one of our national

treasures, and so it is.

But we must not misunderstand it.

Despite what it said,

the Emancipation Proclamation was heavy

on Proclamation and light on Emancipation.

Now, why is that?

Well, if you were paying close attention,

you may have noticed that Lincoln

emancipated the slaves only in those

territories which were in rebellion.

Now, what do you think happened in the

South when this proclamation was made?

Oh, man.

That guy just freed all our slaves.

Welp, guess y'all are free to go.

No, not one slaveholder, as far as I know,

obeyed Lincoln's injunction

to free their slaves.

But what you may not know is

that there were a few slave states

that did not secede with the other slave

states and remained in the Union,

specifically Delaware, Kentucky,

Maryland, Missouri, and West Virginia.

So, since the Emancipation Proclamation

only freed slaves in those territories

which were in rebellion,

all the slaves which were in those border

states that belonged to the Union

kept their slaves.

So, Lincoln freed the slaves in the South,

where he technically could not free them,

and he did not free the slaves

in the North, where he technically could.

So, what's going on here?

What's going on is that Lincoln has

not deviated from his purpose one bit.

Remember that his original

intent was to save the Union.

And so, by casting the war into the shape

of abolitionism,

now he spurned other nations that would

have lent aid to the South,

and it was a very good tactic.

Now, I don't mean to speak

of the Proclamation negatively.

It is a marvelous thing,

and it actually provided the ground

on which several Constitutional amendments

were made, and I'll save

that for another lecture.

But we do need to understand

the Proclamation for what it was

and what it actually accomplished.

And from this point on,

victory was in Lincoln's grasp.

In 1863, the Union won critical battles

at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania

and Vicksburg, Mississippi.

Also, in that year, Union troops captured

Port Hudson, which was the last and most

vital Confederate port

on the Mississippi River.

And by the end of 1863, all hopes for a

Confederate victory were extinguished.

But the fighting lasted for another two

years. And in 1864 it was time again

for another presidential election.

Now, you would think that with all

that Lincoln had done and all

the political skill that he had exercised,

that Lincoln would've won hands down.

But lots of people had lots

of problems with Lincoln.

First of all, they thought he was too

conciliatory towards the South, and second

of all, he had not yet won the war.

But even with such strong opposition,

Lincoln clinched the victory and was

elected to a second term as president.

And now Lincoln knew what he had to do:

win the war, preserve

the Union, and do it now.

Lincoln actually met with some

Confederates who wanted to negotiate

for peace, but they discovered very

quickly that they were at loggerheads.

Lincoln's terms were emancipation

and union, the Confederate

terms were independence.

And so, the war ground on to its climax,

and the climax came suddenly.

At this point, Northern troops captured

Richmond, Virginia,

and Union General Grant cornered

Confederate General Lee

at Appomattox Courthouse in April of 1865.

Grant offered Lee generous terms

of surrender, and Lee took them.

At the news of this,

Union soldiers cheered loudly,

but Grant silenced them abruptly

with the following: "The war is over.

The rebels are our countrymen again."

And after this,

Lincoln traveled to conquered Richmond

and sat in Jefferson Davis' office,

just 40 hours after Davis evacuated it.

And it was reported by those who were

there that Lincoln muttered with great

pathos, "Thank God I've lived to see this."

But only five days later,

as Lincoln was enjoying the rest that came

with victory, he sat in an upper box

in Ford's Theater enjoying

a drama unfold on the stage.

Unknown to him, a pro-slavery fanatic

by the name of John Wilkes Booth slipped

silently into Lincoln's box,

aimed a revolver at the back

of his head, and fired.

And after laying unconscious all night,

Lincoln died the next morning.

And it was Lincoln's Secretary of War,

Edwin Stanton, who was frequently critical

of Lincoln, who pronounced

the proper benediction.

Upon hearing of Lincoln's death,

Stanton said, "Now he belongs to the ages."

And indeed he does.

I will see you next time.