What was it they did to "assault" Fort Barrancas? My recollection is that they noticed activity, and simply went there to see what was going on, and then they got shot at by the Union soldiers there.
I hadn't heard that they tried to "assault" the place, so you can enlighten me by providing details of how they conducted this assault.
History says: "guards repelled a group of local civilians who intended to occupy the fort."
I'd call that an "assault", but think carefully before you deny everything.
If there was no "assault", if there was no intent to take over Fort Barrancas by force, then we are really just talking about some innocent civilians out for a midnight walk who happened to stroll past the fort while the guard shift was doing routine target practice.
In short, that makes the incident totally innocent and therefore nothing -- repeat nothing -- to do with Civil War.
For this January 1861 incident to be "first shots of the Civil War" that "group of local civilians" must have had nefarious intentions to assault & occupy Fort Barrancas.
If their intentions were innocent, it was not Civil War.
So which was it, Civil War or not Civil War?