Comic History of the United States by Bill Nye (book series for 12 year olds TXT) 📕

Major Anderson had seventy men, while General[Pg 249] Beauregard had seven thousand. After a bombardment and a general fight of thirty-four hours, the starved and suffocated garrison yielded to overwhelming numbers.

President Lincoln was not admired by a class of people in the North and South who heard with horror that he had at one time worked for ten dollars a month. They thought the President's salary too much for him, and feared that he would buy watermelons with it. They also feared that some day he might tell a funny story in the presence of Queen Victoria. The snobocracy could hardly sleep nights for fear that Lincoln at a state dinner might put sugar and cream in his cold consommé.

Jefferson Davis, it was said, knew more of etiquette in a minute than Lincoln knew all his life.

The capture of Sumter united the North and unified the South. It made "war Democrats"—i.e., Democrats who had voted against Lincoln—join him in the prosecution of the war. More United States property was cheerfully appropriated by the Confederacy, which showed that it was alive and kicking from the very first minute it was born.

Confederate troops were sent into Virginia and threatened the Capitol at Washington, and would have taken it if the city had not, in summer, been regarded as unhealthful.[Pg 250]

The Sixth Massachusetts Regiment, hurrying to the capital, was attacked in Baltimore and several men were killed. This was the first actual bloodshed in the civil war which caused rivers and lakes and torrents of the best blood of North and South to cover the fair, sweet clover fields and blue-grass meadows made alone for peace.

The general opinion of the author, thirty-five years afterwards, is that the war was as unavoidable as the deluge, and as idiotic in its incipiency as Adam's justly celebrated defence in the great "Apple Sass Case."

Men will fight until it is educated out of them, just as they will no doubt retain rudimentary tails and live in trees till they know better. It's all owing to how a man was brought up.

Of course after we have been drawn into the fight and been fined and sent home, we like to maintain that we were fighting for our home, or liberty, or the flag, or something of the kind. We hate to admit that, as a nation, we fought and paid for it afterwards with our family's bread-money just because we were irritated. That's natural; but most great wars are arranged by people who stay at home and sell groceries to the widow and orphan and old maids at one hundred per cent. advance.

Arlington Heights and Alexandria were now seized and occupied by the Union troops for the[Pg 251] protection of Washington, and mosquito-wires were put up in the Capitol windows to keep the largest of the rebels from coming in and biting Congress.

Fort Monroe was garrisoned by a force under General Benjamin F. Butler, and an expedition was sent out against Big Bethel. On the way the Federal troops fired into each other, which pleased the Confederates very much indeed. The Union troops were repulsed with loss, and went back to the fort, where they stated that they were disappointed in the war.

West Virginia was strongly for the Union in sentiment, and was set off from the original State of Virginia, and, after some fighting the first year of the war over its territory, came into line with the Northern States. The fighting here was not severe. Generals McClellan and Rosecrans (Union) and Lee (Confederate) were the principal commanders.

The first year of the war was largely spent in sparring for wind, as one very able authority has it.

In the next chapter reference will be made to the battle of Bull Run, and the odium will be placed where it belongs. The author reluctantly closes this chapter in order to go out and get some odium for that purpose.[Pg 252]

On the 21st of July, 1861, occurred the battle of Bull Run, under the joint management of General Irwin McDowell and General P. G. T. Beauregard. After a sharp conflict, the Confederates were repulsed, but rallied again under General T. J. Jackson, called thereafter Stonewall Jackson. While the Federals were striving to beat Jackson back, troops under Generals Early and Kirby Smith from Manassas Junction were hurled against their flank.[5] McDowell's men retreated, and as they reached the bridge a shell burst among their crowded and chaotic numbers. A caisson was upset, and a panic ensued, many of the troops continuing at a swift canter till they reached the Capitol, where they could call on the sergeant-at-arms to preserve order.

As a result of this run on the banks of the Potomac, the North suddenly decided that the war might last a week or two longer than at first[Pg 253] stated, that the foe could not be killed with cornstalks, and that a mistake had been made in judging that the rebellion wasn't loaded.[6] Half a million men were called for and five hundred million dollars voted. General George B. McClellan took command of the Army of the Potomac.

The battle of Ball's Bluff resulted disastrously to the Union forces, and two thousand men were mostly driven into the Potomac, some drowned and others shot. Colonel Baker, United States Senator from Oregon, was killed.

The war in Missouri now opened. Captain Lyon reserved the United States arsenal at St. Louis, and defeated Colonel Marmaduke at Booneville. General Sigel was defeated at Carthage, July 5, by the Confederates: so Lyon, with five thousand men, decided to attack more than twice that number of the enemy under Price and McCulloch, which he did, August 10, at Wilson's Creek. He was killed while making a charge, and his men were defeated.

General Frémont then took command, and drove Price to Springfield, but he was in a short time replaced by General Hunter, because his war[Pg 254] policy was offensive to the enemy. Hunter was soon afterwards removed, and Major-General Halleck took his place. Halleck gave general satisfaction to the enemy, and even his red messages from Washington, where he boarded during the war, were filled with nothing but kindness for the misguided foe.

Davis early in the war commissioned privateers, and Lincoln blockaded the Southern ports. The North had but one good vessel at the time, and those who have tried to blockade four or five thousand miles of hostile coast with one vessel know full well what it is to be busy. The entire navy consisted of forty-two ships, and some of these were not seaworthy. Some of them were so pervious that their guns had to be tied on to keep them from leaking through the cracks of the vessel.

Hatteras Inlet was captured, and Commodore Dupont, aided by General Thomas W. Sherman, captured Port Royal Entrance and Tybee Island. Port Royal became the dépôt for the fleet.

It was now decided at the South to send Messrs. Mason and Slidell to England, partly for change of scene and rest, and partly to make a friendly call on Queen Victoria and invite her to come and spend the season at Asheville, North Carolina. It was also hoped that she would give a few readings from her own works at the South, while her retinue[Pg 255] could go to the front and have fun with the Yankees, if so disposed.