Time for a Tide Turning

The battle at Gettysburg is considered a turning point in the Civil War because Lincoln used his win at Gettysburg to help fight for freedom of all people. The Union won the battle at Gettysburg because they had more people to replace the people who were injured or killed while fighting. The Confederates and Union had the same amount of people fighting in the battle, but the Union had more people to replace than the Confederates. From Brian Williams, Military History Online, 2007, and E.B. Long, The Civil War Day by Day, Doubleday and Co., Garden City, NY, 1971., I have discovered that a total of 23,040 people from the Union were killed, wounded, or missing, compared to 20,650-25,000 Confederates. The Union still ended with a larger army than the Confederates, even after losing more people than the Confederates. The total size of the Union army in December, 1863 was 918,000 men, while the total size of the Confederate army was 278,000 men. This is because they had more replacements available than the Confederacy. Also, fighting mainly occurred in the South. Since the South had been pillaged, it needed to resupply and if they had won the battle at Gettysburg, that would have helped to resupply the South.  However, they did not win the battle at Gettysburg, and therefore were not able to resupply.

                Total war means taking away all supplies in order to keep an army strong.  Total war causes armies to worry about their families at home, so the army’s moral gets crushed.  It was not acceptable for Sherman, Grant, and Sheridan to conduct a total war campaign in the Confederacy. First of all, Sherman purposely made people suffer from total war. According to Pathways to the Present. Chapter 11, Sections 3 and 4. PearsonSuccessNet.com., Sherman once wrote,” “War is cruelty. There is no use trying to reform it. The crueler it is, the sooner it will be over.” Sherman was saying that the more violent the war was the least amount of time it would last. He wanted the war to end quickly so that he could gain control over the South. He wanted more people to agonize so the war would finish sooner. He hurt other people for his own benefit, which is unfair. Sherman targeted large, major buildings, factories, bridges, farms, and railroads in cities. Citizens’ towns were destroyed, so they had nowhere to live. Also, Grant took away the supplies that civilians needed to survive. Lincoln ordered Grant to destroy the South’s army capacity and confront Lee’s army in the West. Grant was told to destroy crops and property that the army is depending on. The goal may not have been to kill civilians, however taking away their resources, like homes and food, made it difficult for the civilians to survive. America: Pathways to the Present. Chapter 11, Sections 3 and 4. PearsonSuccessNet.com. explains, “To avoid being killed by the shells falling on their homes, residents dug caves in hillsides, some complete with furniture and attended by slaves.” Civilians had to leave their homes and eat anything they could find, like rats. Total war affected armies and civilians in negative ways, including people suffering and the loss of necessities.

                Part of the nation reacted positively, while some of the nation reacted negatively to the end of the war. First of all, civilians in Washington D.C were joyful that the war had ended. Lincoln was physically and emotionally fatigued because he put all of his effort into fighting the war. Also, Northern soldiers began to cheer as Lee was walking away, but Grant made them stop. Grant said, “Because we won they are our countrymen.” The Northern soldiers were ecstatic, but they had to control their excitement in order to move forward. Another side was the Southern soldiers. They were not mad because they wanted to honor their new leader. They were also relieved that the war was over, due to exhaustion. On the other hand, John Wilkes Booth and Lewis Paine revolted at the end of the war. The picture below, found at http://www.edline.net/files/_zJGmH_/071c2c342438efbc3745a49013852ec4/Lincolns_Assassination_Document_Analysis.pdf, shows Booth shooting Lincoln at Ford’s Theater, while attending a special performance of the comedy, "Our American Cousin.” Abraham Lincoln Papers. Library of Congress Manuscript Division and Lincoln Studies Center, Knox College http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/alhtml/malhome.html explains, “Lewis Paine, attacked Lincoln's Secretary of State, William Henry Seward.” Both attacks by Booth and Paine were on April 14, 1865. These two men reacted violently to the end of the war, while soldiers and civilians were content with the end of the war.