FATEFUL LIGHTNING
FATEFUL LIGHTNING
A NEW HISTORY OF THE CIVIL WAR & RECONSTRUCTION
ALLEN C. GUELZO
Oxford University Press, Inc., publishes works that further
Oxford University’s objective of excellence
in research, scholarship, and education.
Oxford New York
Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi
Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi
New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto
With offices in
Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece
Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore
South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam
Copyright © 2012 by Oxford University Press, Inc.
Published by Oxford University Press, Inc.
198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016
www.oup.com
Oxford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press
The first edition of this book was published as The Crisis of the American Republic: A History of the Civil War and Reconstruction Era (St. Martin’s Press, 1994).
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of Oxford University Press.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Guelzo, Allen C.
Fateful lightning : a new history of the Civil War and Reconstruction / Allen C. Guelzo.
p. cm.
“First edition… was published as The crisis of the American Republic : a history of the Civil War and Reconstruction Era, St. Martin’s Press, 1994”—T.p. verso.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-19-984328-2 (pbk.)
1. United States—History—Civil War, 1861–1865.
2. Reconstruction (U.S. history, 1865–1877)
I. Guelzo, Allen C. Crisis of the American republic. II. Title.
E468.G85 2012
973.7—dc23 2011041918
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper
FOR DEBRA
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments
1. A Nation Announcing Itself
2. The Game of Balances
3. Year of Meteors
4. To War upon Slavery: The East and Emancipation, 1861–1862
5. Elusive Victories: East and West, 1862–1863
6. The Soldier’s Tale
7. The Manufacture of War
8. The Year That Trembled: East and West, 1863
9. World Turned Upside Down
10. Stalemate and Triumph
11. A Dim Shore Ahead
Epilogue
Further Reading
Index
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
In acknowledging the help, encouragement, and support of so many others in the creation of this book, the mere extension of thanks seems but a poor reward for the value of those contributions. Nevertheless, the well of personal gratitude for the time, labor, and sympathy which was given by those whom I salute here is real and profound. I begin with two of my former students in the Civil War Era Studies program at Gettysburg College, Brian M. Jordan (Yale University) and Brandon R. Roos (King’s College, London), who devoted long nights and caffeine-fueled energies to fact-checking, and on a purely volunteer basis. Various other debts have been accumulated in the name of Thomas Legg (West Chester University), Stephen Fratt (Trinity College), Steven E. Woodworth (Texas Christian University), Thomas Askew (Gordon College), and James Geary (Kent State University). Steven J. Wright, former curator of the old Civil War Library & Museum, Roland Baumann of the Oberlin College Archives, and James Mundy of the Union League of Philadelphia cheerfully provided access to rare Civil War materials in their collections.
The images in this book are the result of a long process of collection and selection, which included generous cooperation by David Charles (1926–2004), Blake Magner (1950-2011), Henry Deeks, and the Library Company of Philadelphia. Cathy Bain, Lauren Roedner and Tim Koenig of Gettysburg College provided invaluable assistance in acting as liaison between myself and Oxford University Press, where Nancy Toff and Sonia Tycko played the key roles as readers, managers, schedule-keepers, and editors of the manuscript. Michele Rubin and Brianne Johnson of Writer’s House, Inc., provided a helping hand at a key point in the evolution of this project. Dorothy Bruton (1925–2009) of Dallas, Texas, knew what the rebel yell really sounded like, and generously granted me permission to use the letters of her grandfather, George Asbury Bruton of the 19th Louisiana. My wife, Debra, has been a loving and faithful reader and exhorter all through the writing of this book, and I have at times had the peculiar pleasure of being outrun by her in a mutual enthusiasm for it. She has hallowed it far above my poor power to add or detract.
FATEFUL LIGHTNING
CHAPTER ONE
A NATION ANNOUNCING ITSELF
Inauguration Day, March 4, 1865, dawned over the city of Washington with a blustery, overcast chill. It rained early in the morning, cleared, then rained again. But even without the cooperation of the weather, thousands upon thousands—“a crowd almost numberless,” wrote a visitor—braved the drizzle and cold to watch a giant parade, with now sodden floats, wheel up Pennsylvania Avenue toward the newly completed dome of the Capitol building. There, in the Capitol, the principal actor in this inauguration pageant, Abraham Lincoln, the president of the United States, was already at work, signing the last pieces of legislation passed by the outgoing Congress and witnessing a new Senate being sworn into office.
The ceremonies held few surprises for Lincoln, since this day would mark Lincoln’s second presidential inauguration. He had come to the Capitol on March 4, 1861, as a newly elected president, untried and unprepared, and now, four years later, the country had chosen him a second time as its chief executive. When the congressional ceremonies within the Capitol were over, a great file of legislators, cabinet secretaries, ambassadors, and judges streamed out onto the Capitol steps, where a broad platform had been constructed for the president to take his oath of office in public view. Last of all onto the platform came Lincoln, holding in his hand a single large sheet of paper. A band struck up “Hail to the Chief” as “cheer upon cheer arose.”1
Four years before, when he first stood on a platform like this to take his presidential oath, the weather had still been thick with early spring chilliness and damp, but the sun shone with a hard and resolute cheerfulness. And in 1861 the sunshine was almost the only thing smiling upon Abraham Lincoln. Even as he took his first oath of office, swearing to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States,” seven of
