Yes, eventually the peace was brokered by RE Lee and other surrendering generals.
What a shame that hundreds of thousands of potentially productive lives were cut short.
I think the big secret was Virginia, the most populous of the slave states would only join the insurrection if there was a war, and so the slave power started the war they needed to get Virginia in.
Certainly Virginia had no problem putting down an insurrection in Pennsylvania when RE Lee’s father was governor.
“and so the slave power started the war they needed to get Virginia in.”
“the slave power”. Of course this phrase described the majority of American Presidents right up through Zachary Taylor. “The slave power” was a favorite phrase for a political faction back in the 1800s who saw the world in terms of class warfare. They were supporters of Lincoln, and a number of these ‘48er’ European revolutionaries even served as Union generals.
This is the opening of their letter of support to the re-elected President Lincoln:
” Sir:
We congratulate the American people upon your re-election by a large majority. If resistance to the Slave Power was the reserved watchword of your first election, the triumphant war cry of your re-election is Death to Slavery.
From the commencement of the titanic American strife the workingmen of Europe felt instinctively that the star-spangled banner carried the destiny of their class. The contest for the territories which opened the dire epopee, was it not to decide whether the virgin soil of immense tracts should be wedded to the labor of the emigrant or prostituted by the tramp of the slave driver? “
from the “Address of the International Working Men’s Association to Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States of America “ written by their corresponding secretary for Germany, Karl Marx.