The Interesting Thesis that the Turning Point of the US Civil War Was a Battle the Union Lost.

[NNadir]

I have this guilty pleasure of spending a few hours most weekends watching CSPAN history shows. Most weekends there's a section about the US Civil War, and one sees famous Civil War Historians give lectures on the subject.

Gary Gallagher is of course, a very prominent historian, and this weekend I watched one of his lectures, at the Lincoln Forum, on the battle of Gettysburg. He makes the point that no one during the war saw it as decisive, and thus it wasn't decisive.

In the Q&A after the talk he offers a thesis about which I never really thought, but actually makes a lot of sense. He says that the war's turning point was actually the Seven Days, a battle the Union lost because it's commander, George McClellan, was terrified of the enemy. He makes the case in the Q&A which begins at about 45 minutes into the video. (The full lecture is well worth watching.)

The video can be found at the CSPAN history link below:

https://www.c-span.org/video/?516143-2/important-gettysburg

He makes the point that without ending slavery the war would not have been won by the Union, and because the defeat at the Seven Days hardened the Union to do that, to make a war for the Union into a war to end slavery, the defeat was the turning point.

[rampartc]

1. not to be disagreeable

and the 7 days was an important battle battle but

certainly longstreet , and probably lee, knew that when picketts charge failed at gettysburg the war was lost.

my own theory is that the war was lost at appomattox courthouse. by allowing the confederates to get off so easily, they were able to reestablish themselves by 1876, impose segregation and prison labor, and by 1981 were in charge of the nation and its economy. here are a few of the post appomattox battles, all won by confederates .....

The Memphis riots of 1866
The New Orleans massacre of 1866
The Camilla massacre of 1868
The Opelousas massacre of 1868
The 1868 St. Bernard Parish Massacre of 1868
The Jackson County War of 1869
The Meridian race riot of 1871
The Colfax massacre of 1873
The Eufaula, Alabama Election riot of 1874
The Coushatta massacre of 1874
The Hamburg massacre of 1876
The Ellenton riot of 1876
The Wilmington insurrection of 1898

[Journeyman]

2. Slavery was ultimately vanquished because of Robert E. Lee & the 7 Days Battles . . .

It is one of those supremely ironic situations that doesn’t get near enough recognition.

Up until the time Lee took command of the Army of Northern Virginia (June 1862) it was Mr Lincoln’s stated objective that if the South ceased its rebellion, and submitted again to Union control, then slavery would remain as it had been prior to the rebellion. The original 13th Amendment, the Corwin Amendment (after the Ohio Congressman who proposed it), held that slavery was to be unmolested in perpetuity. Mr Lincoln himself endorsed this idea in his First Inaugural. (1)

It was Robert E. Lee’s success against far superior Union forces in the Seven Days Battles that sealed the South’s fate and slavery’s demise. In driving the Army of the Potomac back, Lee turned around Confederate morale, and its soldiers took to battle with renewed purpose. That summer, however, convinced Mr Lincoln that every tactic needed to be deployed against the rebellion, including denial of its labor force and the eventual use of black soldiers. This decision would directly lead to the Emancipation Proclamation. The die was cast -- by Robert E. Lee -- and the result was eventual total war and the destruction of Southern social and political order.


(1) "I understand a proposed amendment to the Constitution—which amendment, however, I have not seen—has passed Congress, to the effect that the Federal Government shall never interfere with the domestic institutions of the States, including that of persons held to service. To avoid misconstruction of what I have said, I depart from my purpose not to speak of particular amendments so far as to say that, holding such a provision to now be implied constitutional law, I have no objection to its being made express and irrevocable.” ~ President Abraham Lincoln, First Inaugural, March 4, 1861