On this day in 1864

[Bull Snipe]

Leading elements of Union Major General George G. Meade's Army of the Potomac cross the Rapidan River. With a few hours they would clash with General Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia in the Battle of the Wilderness. Lieutenant General Grant's Overland Campaign had begun.

[BroJoeK]

Bull Snipe on Fort Sumter: "Force was only authorized if the authorities in Charleston resisted the resupply effort."

DiogenesLamp: "Because having dragged up over a hundred cannon and surrounding the fort with regiments of men did not adequately convey the impression that they were going to resist the resupply effort.
Yes, that bit was still up in the air, wasn't it?
The Ships were going to attack, and there is no dodging this bit of obvious truth."

And that's just another of DiogenesLamp's obvious lies.
The Lincoln/Fox plan was resupply by small boats under cover of darkness, and protected by US navy ships well off-shore.
There would be no "attack", no weapons needed to be fired if Fox's rowboats could sneak through.
It was a good plan with reasonable chance of success, especially if weather cooperated with fog further reducing night-time visibility.

But Lincoln's plan did require Major Anderson to hold out a few more days until:

1. Confederate General Beauregard ran out of ammunition (after 48 hours), and
2. Calm seas, darkness of night and maybe even some fog to conceal the resupply boats.

Anderson surrendered after 34 hours, before Beauregard used up his ammunition and before cover of darkness could aid the resupply boats.

So Lincoln was correct in telling Pickens there would be no use of force if the resupply boats were not resisted.
But Jefferson Davis needed war to add four Upper South states and so peace was never a possibility for Davis.
If Lincoln had somehow avoided war at Fort Sumter, Davis would just have forced it somewhere else.

[DiogenesLamp]

Having watched you go on and on about tariffs I must say that I don't feel all that dumb.

No surprise there. A lot of people who don't understand something think the fault lies elsewhere.

And I go on about "European Trade", not so much about Tariffs. I point out that "tariffs" are a red herring for the much more valuable shift in Trade that would have been so very costly to the Northern interests that depended upon it.

People want to focus on "tariffs" because it's so much less money, and therefore more believable that the war had nothing to do with tariffs. They don't want to look critically at what was about to happen to the entire America/European trade traffic.

[DiogenesLamp]

That must be the one my great-grandfather was on, since it was the only one in service in 1864, the Merrimack-Virginia having been scuttled in 1862.

In the letter he refers to his ship as “C. S. Steamer Virginia” and “the Iron Clad Virginia.”

(Just came across the letters recently when I was going through old papers. I had never much looked at them before.)

If I owned such a thing, I believe I would find out what it would take to preserve it, and then I would frame it and put it somewhere where people could read it.

Alas, My family was not in the US until the 1900s.

[MUDDOG]

They’re just copies. My junior branch didn’t get the originals.

[DiogenesLamp]

ith the army. With militia forces. With their contribution of manpower, wealth, and productive capacity. South Carolina was 58% Black and Mississippi was 53% Black.

And for how many years did this condition exist?

If slave revolt broke out it could be very hard to control that population. But I don't expect you to acknowledge this, because it conflicts with your pet idea.

I am fully aware that a bunch of these people were very concerned about the possibility of a slave revolt. Had one broke out, it would have been locally bloody, but I expect it would have been contained fairly quickly because one side had the ready supply of guns, and the other would have to capture whatever they could find. I think the authorities would have quickly streamed in men to deal with the problem, and then it would have probably gotten very ugly.

And yet Davis did start the war.

You keep repeating that, but the evidence demonstrates otherwise. Lincoln knew what he was doing when he sent those warships, and then deliberately detached the command ship. He knew the Southerners would rightly see those ships as a threat, and thereby be provoked, while he could maintain plausible deniability because he had paralyzed those warships from actually carrying out the written orders they had been issued. (and of which he knew the Confederates were aware.)

Lincoln pulled stunts. He had pulled quite a few other stunts in his career. He was a canny fellow.

You should read a book on Lincoln sometime.

You have your pet idea that you can't help talking about and ignore all counterarguments and conflicting evidence.

The Counterarguments do not ever deal with my point. Also, I'm not sure i've ever even seen "conflicting evidence." What your side embraces as "evidence", does not look like such to someone who has a cynical or critical eye.

What sort of evidence do you have that the North (especially New York and Washington DC) wasn't going to lose a whole lot of money if the South traded directly with Europe? BroJoeK's approach is to try to minimize the value of the South's contribution by declaring it to only be 50% of the total, which even with his massaged numbers, is still a whole h3ll of a lot of money that was going to be lost to New York. It's still enough to provide motive for them to insist upon a war to stop it.

Your page just shows Doubleday countering what people said after the battle.

You missed the part about engaging the shore batteries? Why would they get sunk if they weren't expected to do that? Why would the Navy be taking flack for not doing it if it wasn't expected of them?

But I don't expect you to acknowledge that either.

This not acknowledging something is also a regular occurrence with the people on your side of this argument.

For example. One only has to take a look at the shore battery emplacements, and then look at the armament and crews of the ships sent to "deliver supplies" and unless one is a moron, one can immediately see that those ships would be wiped out if they engaged those shore batteries.

Doubleday admits this, as would anyone who was honest with themselves.

Lincoln knew this. You have to be a moron to believe there was any possibility those ships could "force" their way in to deliver supplies. The mission according to the ship's orders was impossible.

This is what i've been saying all along. This is EVIDENCE that the mission was never intended to actually accomplish it's stated goal.

And lo and behold, it never attempted to follow it's orders! By some amazing stroke of "luck" the command ship didn't arrive, and so therefore they didn't do any of the things their orders had said they would do!

Silly Confederates actually believed the fake/leaked orders, and that was the entire point.

[DiogenesLamp]

They’re just copies. My junior branch didn’t get the originals.

Well then, I would display a copy, along with a copy of a picture of the man in question, if one was available.

[BroJoeK]

Bull Snipe: "Yep, Abe Lincoln, the smartest man in North America, so clever, so sly, so intelligent."

DiogenesLamp: "You mock, but the man was in fact quite brilliant.
Have you ever read Lincoln's writings?"

Very likely Lincoln was entirely smart enough to see that Jefferson Davis needed war to add the four Upper South states to his Confederacy, that Davis would stop at nothing to get war and that Lincoln needed to make certain it was in fact Davis who started it.

Bull Snipe: "The south was doomed to failure the instant the prairie lawyer was elected."

DiogenesLamp: "The engineering of which (his election) was another good example of the sort of tricks he was known for.
He used his corporate railroad contacts to ship in thousands of astro-turf "supporters" (paid) to disrupt convention nominations and agitate until he won the nomination.
He also promised federal jobs to enough delegates to create a preference cascade.
A fine bit of dirty trickery that."

Naw! But that's a fine bit of lying, DiogenesLamp.
Cockamamie nonsense, as per usual.
But repeated endlessly and unchallenged, God knows, how many think it might even be true?

So let's begin with DL's most blatant & obvious lie,

"He used his corporate railroad contacts to ship in thousands of astro-turf "supporters" (paid) to disrupt convention..."

What's the truth about the 1860 Republican convention in Chicago?

"William H. Seward, the Republican front-runner from New York, sent his political team to Chicago to lock up his party’s nomination.
In the mid-nineteenth century, it was not considered proper for the aspiring candidate to go to the convention himself, so Seward sent his political manager, Thurlow Weed, along with his states’ 70 delegates and 13 railroad cars of supporters. "

It was front-runner Seward from New York who needed to send in his "13 railroad cars of supporters", while Lincoln's supporters lived nearby and could walk to the Convention.

Did Lincoln's supporters "disrupt convention nominations"?
Of course not, there were 13 candidates and three ballots all entered & voted on normally.
Yes, Lincoln's supporters were quite vocal, as anyone can expect in a political convention.

Did Lincoln " promised federal jobs" to supporters?
No, just the opposite, Lincoln instructed his floor managers:

"make no deals that bind me".

Of course all politicians, then & now, find ways to reward their supporters so Lincoln's actions after the election were in no way exceptional, except, perhaps in his needing to, ahem, "drain the swamp" of Washington insider Democrats left over from the previous administration.

Finally, remember there were thousands of supporters at the convention, including Seward's (not Lincoln's) 13 railroad cars but only 465 voting delegates.
So regardless of how loud or raucous various supporters were, the convention's serious business happened among the candidates' delegates, and they took just three ballots to decide for Lincoln over Seward.

Were Lincoln's delegates especially "clever"?
Sure, but so were the others.
Regardless, Lincoln's key asset was simple "home field advantage", meaning Republicans then considered Illinois the most critical of western states -- it's why their convention was in Chicago.
And Lincoln more than anyone else could bring wins in the "West" (today's Midwest).

Map showing where each 1860 Republican candidate's delegate strengths lay:

[x]

After the war is over, how can a "Wartime measure" be allowed to continue defying what the US Constitution says?

Like I said (and you even quoted):

After the war the 13th Amendment made slavery illegal.

So no, you weren't getting your slaves back after the war.

The 13 amendment itself wasn't even legal. It was a play/pretend kabuki dance political drama puppet show. Do you honestly expect that on the one hand, you people say the south went to war to preserve slavery, and on then on the other hand you say "but they voted to give it up!"

Do you honestly expect that Germany went to war to destroy the Western Democracies in 1939 and then became one of them in 1949 (or at least half of it did)? How the heck did that happen? Maybe your idea is that their earlier approach was more legitimate and the later approach was illegitimate?

You should read a book on Lincoln sometime.

I have read books on Lincoln. I don't see any evidence that you have.

What sort of evidence do you have that the North (especially New York and Washington DC) wasn't going to lose a whole lot of money if the South traded directly with Europe?

What sort of evidence do you have that that caused the war? None, so far as anybody has seen. You jump from your assumption to the belief that it was the proven cause and motivation for the war, and you ignore or dismiss other possible motives including those of the Confederates.

And as I say over and over again, if losing the cotton trade was a fear for Northerners wouldn't they have done what they could to retain that trade through peace, rather than going to war? For your theory to be plausible, the secessionists would have to be at least halfway determined for war and the ruination of the Northern economy. Maybe the Yankees picked up on that and acted accordingly. Under ordinary circumstances, Northerners engaged in trade with the South would have done what they could to continue business as usual.

You missed the part about engaging the shore batteries? Why would they get sunk if they weren't expected to do that?

If the shore batteries had orders to fire on the ships why wouldn't the ships have been sunk whatever they did? I suspect you are playing with the word "engage." Just being in the area would have been regarded as "engaging" the batteries if the Confederacy was intent enough on war.

One only has to take a look at the shore battery emplacements, and then look at the armament and crews of the ships sent to "deliver supplies" and unless one is a moron, one can immediately see that those ships would be wiped out if they engaged those shore batteries.

You have a very complicated theory that you haven't explained very well. It requires so many things that aren't known or proven that -- to the extent that it's understandable at all -- it's unlikely, even implausible. Having failed to prove or even to properly explain your view, you resort to name calling.

[DiogenesLamp]

Like I said (and you even quoted):

After the war the 13th Amendment made slavery illegal.

So no, you weren't getting your slaves back after the war.

The 13 amendment itself wasn't even legal. It was a play/pretend kabuki dance political drama puppet show. Do you honestly expect that on the one hand, you people say the south went to war to preserve slavery, and on then on the other hand you say "but they voted to give it up!"

Do you honestly expect that Germany went to war to destroy the Western Democracies in 1939 and then became one of them in 1949 (or at least half of it did)? How the heck did that happen? Maybe your idea is that their earlier approach was more legitimate and the later approach was illegitimate?

Your responses make me wonder how we can have a conversation if we cannot even agree on what is factual.

Somehow the President ended up with the power to singlehandedly render Article IV, Section 2 as having "null effect", and then his army forces a pretend "vote" to abolish it, and you are also okay with that.

You don't even see what happened as a pretend vote, you consider it completely legitimate and in full compliance with the Constitutional Amendment process.

An honest man would admit that the south would not have done that except through force.

How can I debate someone who is blind to force being a violation of the whole concept of constitutional consent?

[rockrr]

He’s quite unhinged, isn’t he?

[jeffersondem]

“Plenty of things happen in wars that can’t be done during peacetime.”

In his “House Divided” speech Lincoln put out his markers. He telegraphed he and his backers wanted and expected the nation to end slavery everywhere. (At least, he implied he wanted that outcome.)

As noted elsewhere, Lincoln knew he didn’t have the votes to end slavery peacefully using the constitutional amendment process. Arguably that was why Lincoln chose to go to war.

As someone said: “Plenty of things happen in wars that can’t be done during peacetime.”

[DiogenesLamp]

Yes. Thinking that the actual wording of the constitution means something is just crazy talk nowadays.

[Theophilus]

The South is the place to be when the “end of the world” comes. We’re always twenty years behind the times.

[rockrr]

Of course it means something. It just doesn’t mean what you feeeeeeeeeeeel it means.

[DiogenesLamp]

It means what the woooooooorrrrrrrddddddsssss say. But some people will ignore the words and go with their feeeeeeeeeelllllliiiiinnnnggggsss.

[rockrr]

That’s right and your feelings are lying to you.

[BroJoeK]

Bull Snipe: "produce the orders where Lincoln ordered Fox’s ships to fire on Charleston."

DiogenesLamp: "The orders were issued by Lincoln's chain of command, and i'm pretty sure i've already shown them to you before.
If you really haven't seen them, let me know and I'll hunt them up for you."

More nonsense, since DiogenesLamp well knows those orders do not say "fire on Charleston" or anything remotely similar.
Instead they clearly say "no first use of force" and even if force required, the mission was not "attack Charleston" but rather to replenish Fort Sumter.
All of which DiogenesLamp totally knows but can't admit because he hates the truth and much prefers his Lost Causer fantasies.

[BroJoeK]

BJK: "And you well know that no Union official — zero, nada, none — was ever recorded as saying: “let's go to war to restore our money stream from Europe.”

Jeffersondem: "I think this is the quote by the Union official you have been unable to find:
'The power confided to me will be used to hold, occupy, and possess the property and places belonging to the Government and to collect the duties and imposts..' "

More nonsense because:

1. War was already started at Fort Sumter so this was Lincoln's response.
2. There was no "money stream from Europe" to collect at Charleston since very few imports first landed there.
3. That makes Federal property the chief focus of Lincoln's April 15 troop call up.

Finally, Lincoln himself didn't yet consider his April 15 call up a call to war, but only as he said, to assert Federal authority over Federal properties.
Of course, events quickly disbursed him, but your quote doesn't say what you imply.

[BroJoeK]

Bull Snipe: "cite the orders from Lincoln ordering the warships to attack."

DiogenesLamp: "Here is one of them."

Your link says exactly what you've been told many times but refuse to acknowledge: 1) no first use of force, 2) resupply or reinforce only, 3) no attack on Charleston.

You should read it sometime.

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "That doesn't say a thing about people's right to vote.
Were we not discussing people's right to vote?
By what authority were people denied the right to vote?"

I would suppose that waging a war of rebellion against the United States would result in some restrictions on suffrage.
Can you think of a reason why it shouldn't?