The Civil War, Part I: Crash Course US History #20

Summary

In this Crash Course US History episode, John Green discusses the American Civil War, focusing on its causes, key figures, and pivotal moments rather than battles or tactics. He emphasizes the war's inevitability due to slavery and refutes alternative theories. Green also highlights the Union's advantages in resources and population, the Confederacy's leadership, and the critical role of General Ulysses S. Grant's attrition strategy. The episode explores motivations behind the war, significant battles like Vicksburg and Gettysburg, and the political impact of the 1864 election on the war's outcome.

Takeaways

• 📚 The Civil War is often considered the conflict that truly created the United States as a unified nation.
• 🎥 The script does not focus on battle tactics or personal praise or criticism of Abraham Lincoln, but rather on the broader context and implications of the war.
• 📈 The Civil War was fundamentally about slavery, with historians like David Goldfield supporting this view, and Lincoln himself acknowledging the central role of slavery in the conflict.
• 👥 The war was not solely about Lincoln; it involved many other individuals and their contributions to the conflict.
• 🏰 The border states of Kentucky, Missouri, Delaware, and Maryland allowed slavery but remained part of the Union, highlighting the complexity of the war's causes.
• 🌾 There were economic and ideological differences between the agrarian South and the industrial North, but these were not the primary cause of the war.
• 🔍 Lincoln initially downplayed the issue of slavery, framing the war as a fight to preserve the Union.
• 🙏 Religion played a significant role in the motivations of both the North and the South, with each side viewing the war as part of a divine plan.
• 💪 The Union had significant advantages in population, industrial capacity, and resources, which greatly influenced the outcome of the war.
• ⚔️ Despite having fewer resources, the South had strong leadership in generals like Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson.
• 🏆 The Union's eventual success can be attributed to the adoption of Ulysses S. Grant's strategy of attrition, which aimed to wear down the Confederacy through continuous engagement.

Q & A

What is the main focus of the video script provided?

The main focus of the video script is to provide an overview of the American Civil War, emphasizing its causes, key figures, significant battles, and the various factors that contributed to the outcome of the war.

Why does the script mention not to expect descriptions of battles and tactics?

The script mentions not to expect descriptions of battles and tactics because the presenter suggests that those interested in such details might refer to works by Ken Burns or books by authors like James McPherson and Shelby Foote, who have extensively covered these aspects.

What is the significance of the number of Lincolns mentioned in the script?

The mention of multiple Lincolns is a humorous reference to the common portrayal of Abraham Lincoln as the central figure in the Civil War, suggesting that having multiple representations of him might be good for ratings, although the script aims to present a more balanced view of the war.

What is the estimated number of casualties in the American Civil War according to the script?

The script provides an estimate of between 680,000 and 800,000 total casualties for the American Civil War, highlighting its devastating impact on the American population.

Why does the script emphasize that the Civil War was not about something other than slavery?

The script emphasizes that the Civil War was about slavery to counter early 20th-century narratives that attempted to downplay or reinterpret the central role of slavery in the conflict.

What is the significance of the border states mentioned in the script?

The border states, such as Kentucky, Missouri, Delaware, and Maryland, are significant because they allowed slavery but did not secede from the Union. Their strategic locations provided critical advantages to the Union during the war.

How did the script address the role of religion in the Civil War?

The script addresses the role of religion by suggesting that for both the North and the South, the war was seen as a means to protect and extend their respective interpretations of God's plan, with the North aiming to spread democracy and Christianity, and the South seeking to create a nation more faithful to God.

What is the importance of the Battle of Gettysburg mentioned in the script?

The Battle of Gettysburg is highlighted as a significant turning point in the war, marking the farthest major offensive by General Lee into the North. Its outcome helped shift the tide of the war in favor of the North and ensured that Confederate forces would not again threaten a northern city.

Why is the capture of Atlanta in August 1864 considered a turning point in the war?

The capture of Atlanta is considered a turning point because it was a major political victory for the Union, occurring close to the 1864 election. This event helped secure President Lincoln's re-election, ensuring the continuation of the Union's war effort.

What does the script suggest about the inevitability of the Union's victory in the Civil War?

The script suggests that while the Union had significant advantages in resources and population, the outcome of the war was not inevitable and was influenced by various factors, including military strategies, political developments, and turning points in key battles.

Outlines

00:00

🏰 Introduction to the American Civil War

John Green introduces the topic of the American Civil War, emphasizing that the video will not focus on battle tactics or personalizing the conflict around Abraham Lincoln. He clarifies that the war was fundamentally about slavery, contrary to some revisionist views, and highlights the scale of the conflict with the number of casualties. The introduction also touches on the importance of the border states, the economic and military disparities between the North and the South, and the religious motivations of the soldiers.

05:07

🎖 The Confederacy's Disadvantages and Generalship

This paragraph discusses the South's disadvantages in the war, including the need to build a nation from scratch and the internal class conflicts. It highlights the superior leadership of Southern generals like Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson, and contrasts their famous last words with those of Union General Ulysses S. Grant. The paragraph also explores the question of whether the Union's victory was inevitable, considering the North's vast resources and the South's strategy of attrition, which aimed to outlast the Union's efforts to bring them back into the fold.

10:14

🛤️ Turning Points and Political Implications in the Civil War

The final paragraph focuses on the critical turning points of the Civil War, particularly the Union victories at Vicksburg and Gettysburg in July 1863, which shifted the war's momentum in favor of the North. It also discusses the political implications of the war, especially the significance of Lincoln's re-election in 1864, which was influenced by the capture of Atlanta. The paragraph concludes by reflecting on the complex motivations of the soldiers and the contingent nature of the war's outcome, emphasizing that the Union's victory was not solely determined by military success but also by political factors.

Keywords

💡Civil War

The American Civil War was a conflict fought from 1861 to 1865 between the United States (the Union) and 11 Southern states that seceded to form the Confederate States of America. It is central to the video's theme as it discusses the causes, key events, and implications of this war, which is considered to have shaped the nation's identity and history. The video script mentions the war's duration, the opposing sides, and its significance in American history.

💡Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving during the Civil War. He is a key figure in the video's narrative due to his leadership during the war and his role in the abolition of slavery. The script humorously notes the portrayal of Lincoln in various accounts and his importance in shaping the Union's war effort.

💡Slavery

Slavery was the practice of owning human beings, particularly the trade and ownership of African people, which is identified in the video as the primary cause of the Civil War. The script emphasizes that both Northerners and Southerners recognized it as the immediate cause, and it influenced the motivations and actions of those involved in the conflict.

💡Union

The Union refers to the United States of America, specifically the Northern states that remained loyal to the U.S. government during the Civil War. The video explains the Union's advantages in terms of population, industrial capacity, and military force, which contributed to its ultimate victory.

💡Confederacy

The Confederate States of America was a group of 11 Southern states that seceded from the U.S. to form their own government. The video discusses the challenges the Confederacy faced in building a nation and maintaining unity among its states, which was crucial to its war effort.

💡Attrition

Attrition in the context of the video refers to a military strategy of wearing down the enemy by depleting their resources and manpower over time. The script mentions this as a Confederate strategy and later discusses how Ulysses S. Grant employed a similar strategy to defeat the South.

💡Ulysses S. Grant

Ulysses S. Grant was a Union general during the Civil War and later the 18th President of the United States. The video highlights Grant's strategy of attrition and his willingness to sustain heavy casualties to achieve victory, which was instrumental in the Union's success.

💡Vicksburg

Vicksburg is a city in Mississippi that was a strategic location during the Civil War due to its position on the Mississippi River. The video describes the Union's capture of Vicksburg as a turning point in the war, giving the North control of the river and splitting the Confederacy.

💡Gettysburg

The Battle of Gettysburg was one of the most significant battles of the Civil War, fought in Pennsylvania in July 1863. The video mentions this battle as a pivotal Union victory that halted General Lee's invasion of the North and shifted the momentum in favor of the Union.

💡Sherman

William Tecumseh Sherman was a Union general known for his 'March to the Sea,' a campaign that devastated the South's infrastructure. The video discusses Sherman's capture of Atlanta, which was a significant military and political victory for the Union and contributed to Lincoln's re-election.

💡Election of 1864

The Election of 1864 was a critical event during the Civil War, where Abraham Lincoln was re-elected as President. The video emphasizes the importance of this election in securing the Union's commitment to victory, as Lincoln's opponent, George McClellan, had a less aggressive stance towards the war.

Highlights

Introduction to the Civil War as a defining moment in American history.

Clarification that the video will not focus on battle descriptions or tactics.

Acknowledgment of the Civil War's complexity beyond Lincoln's actions.

Rejection of alternative theories for the war's cause, affirming it was about slavery.

Mention of the significant number of casualties, emphasizing the war's severity.

Explanation of the Union and Confederacy, and the symbolic 'blue' and 'gray'.

Importance of border states to the Union and their role in the war.

Discussion on the economic and industrial differences between the North and South.

The role of religion in motivating both sides of the conflict.

Personal reasons of soldiers for enlisting, beyond ideological motivations.

Union's advantages in population, manufacturing, and infrastructure.

Contrasting leadership qualities of the South with the Union's资源优势.

Questioning the inevitability of the Union's victory despite资源优势.

Introduction of Ulysses S. Grant's strategy of attrition and its impact.

The significance of the 1863 turning points at Vicksburg and Gettysburg.

The political importance of the capture of Atlanta in 1864.

The impact of the 1864 election on the war's outcome and Lincoln's commitment to Union victory.

Transcripts

Hi I’m John Green this is Crash Course US History and today we come at last to the Civil War, the conflict that in many ways created a nation.

So here’s what you won’t be getting today. We will not be describing battles and tactics.

If that’s your bag, might I suggest Ken Burns or if you prefer books, like 1000 authors, my favorites being James McPherson and Shelby Foote.

And 2. We won’t be bashing and/or praising Abraham Lincoln very much, although we do have multiple Lincolns here because we’ve heard that’s good for ratings.

I mean, to watch or read certain accounts, you would think that the Civil War was a lengthy chess game played by Abraham Lincoln against his cunning opponent Abraham Lincoln,

but of course there were other people involved.

We are going to quote a fair bit of Lincoln, though, because, you know, that won Tony Kushner an Academy Award nomination.

3. We won’t be claiming that the Civil War was somehow secretly about something other than slavery, because that is just so early 20th century.

And 4. There will not be a lot of jokes today because hahaha 700,000 people died.

Mr. Green, actually only 680,000 people died.

Yeah, it depends on how you count, you sniveling little ghoul. But recent estimates are between 680,000 and 800,000 total casualties.

Deadlier for Americans than the American Revolution, World War I, World War II, and Vietnam combined.

[Theme Music]

So let’s start with some basic facts about the American Civil War. 1861 to 1865, which corresponded with the presidency of Abraham Lincoln. The Union, or more colloquially the North, fought against the forces of the Confederate States of America, or the South.

Sometimes people call the Union ‘the blue” and the confederates “the gray,” but in fact the uniforms weren’t very uniform, they were all different kinds of color.

And also, with all that dirt and blood, they were all just brown. Alright, let’s go to the Thought Bubble.

You’ll notice from this map that not all the states that held slaves were part of the Confederacy. The border states of Kentucky, Missouri, Delaware and Maryland allowed slavery and never left the United States.

All of these border states were critical to the Union--Maryland was north of the nation’s capitol in Washington D.C.; Kentucky controlled the Ohio River;

Missouri was the gateway to the West; Delaware actually wasn’t that important.

So none of that should be particularly controversial, unless you’re from Delaware, but the causes of the war, that’s another story.

The Civil War was about slavery--actual historians will back me up on this, like David Goldfield, who wrote, “Both Northerners and Southerners recognized slavery as the immediate cause of the Civil War.”

Also, Lincoln said in his second inaugural address, “One eighth of the whole population were colored slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, but localized in the southern part of it.

These slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was, somehow, the cause of the war.”

That said, in comments lots of people will be like, the war was about agriculture versus industry, or the states’ rights to protect themselves from the tyranny of a big federal government,

but if it were REALLY about that, the Civil War would’ve started during the Nullification crisis in the 1830s, when--

as I’m sure you’ll remember--Andrew Jackson said that South Carolina couldn’t declare a federal tariff null in their state.

Why didn’t that cause a Civil War?

The Confederate government passed the first conscription act in American history, implemented national taxes, created a national currency,

and had a government bureaucracy of about 70,000 people, more than the federal bureaucracy in Washington D.C.

Thanks, Thought Bubble. That said, in the beginning of the war, Lincoln deliberately tried to downplay the slavery angle, arguing that the war was only about preserving “the Union.”

But the war was also about religion, for both sides.

As David Goldfield put it, “In protecting the Revolutionary ideals, northerners would preserve God’s plan to extend democracy and Christianity across an unbroken continent and around the world.

Southerners welcomed a war to create a nation more perfect in its fealty to God than the one they had left.”

But it’s also important to remember that regular soldiers often had more prosaic reasons for going off to fight, as you will eventually learn when you are forced to read The Red Badge of Courage,

Goldfield tells the story of one Alabamian who enlisted only after his girlfriend mailed him a dress and told him he should start wearing if he wasn’t willing to go fight.

And for Northerners, Union, religion and an end to slavery mixed together to form a potent rationale for war. It’s summed up nicely by Julia Ward Howe’s words to the song that would become famous as the Battle Hymn of the Republic:

“As he died to make men holy, let us die to make men free.”

You thought I was going to sing, but you were wrong.

So spoiler alert the Union won the war, which in a sense was unsurprising, because they had massive advantages:

For starters, they had many more people, approximately 22 million as compared to 9 million in the South, of whom 3.5 million were slaves and therefore unlikely to be sympathetic to the Southern cause.

Also, the north manufactured more than 90% of all goods in America; its factories turned out 17 times more textiles than the South, 30 times more shoes and boots, 13 times more iron, and 32 times more firearms.

Plus, at the outbreak of the war the North had twenty thousand miles of railroad compared with the South’s ten thousand.

This made it easier for the Union to move its army, which over the course of the war enlisted more than 2 million men, compared with 900,000 for the Confederacy.

Even northern agriculture was also more productive, taking greater advantage of mechanization than southern farmers did.

Really the only advantage the south had was better leaders, like most of the tactically famous generals of the Civil War, Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, J. E. B. Stewart, etc., were Southerners.

And also, by the way, they all had great last words.

Lee said “Strike the tent,” Stonewall Jackson said “Let us cross over the river and rest under the shade of those trees,” and JEB Stuart after being mortally wounded in battle said to his close friend and lieutenant, “Honey-bun, how do I look in the face?”

Famous Union general Ulysses Grant’s last word was “Water,” which isn’t near so good, but he said that last word after having survived the war and getting to be, like, President of the United States and stuff.

Right but anyway, this all raises an interesting question: Was the result of the war a foregone conclusion?

The Confederacy had to create a nation from scratch and build national unity among people who were committed to the autonomy of their individual home states.

So that’s a problem. And, then there was the issue of overcoming class conflicts, especially when the ruling class was often exempted from actually fighting in the war.

But when you put aside all that nation-building stuff and just focus on the actual fighting of the war, the question of the union’s inevitable win becomes much trickier.

Some have argued that all the Confederacy really to do was outlast the Northern efforts to bring them back into the Union, like Washington had to do against the British.

And the idea was that the war of attrition would eventually wear down northern resolve.

But, there were two problems with this theory.

First, the North had such superiority in its resources that it would take a long time to wear down.

Secondly, fighting a war of attrition would be costly to the South, as well and their resources would be depleted long before the North’s.

Oh it’s time for the Mystery Document? The rules here are simple. Woah! That was intense.

I try to identify the author of the Mystery Document. If I am right, I do not get shocked, but I’m never right because Stan makes it too hard. Alright, let’s see what we’ve got today.

“I therefore determined, first, to use the greatest number of troops practicable against the armed force of the enemy, preventing him from using the same force at different seasons

[and] second, to hammer continuously against the armed force of the enemy and his resources, until by mere attrition … there should be nothing left to him but submission.”

Okay so the strategy of attrition was a Confederate strategy. But, Stan is a jerk.

But it talks about the enemy AND HIS RESOURCES, which was kind of a Union focus. And more importantly, it talks about preventing him from using the same force at different seasons.

That makes me think it is a Union general. Final answer Ulysses S. Grant. OH HOW DO YOU LIKE THEM APPLES.

Grant was different from previous Union generals in that he was willing to sustain enormous casualties in pursuit of his goal to wear down the South.

Because of this, Grant was branded a butcher, like he was willing to weather incredible losses including the 52,000 men -- 41% of his army -- who were injured or killed at the battles of the Wilderness and Cold Harbor.

But his grim determination not just to defeat but to destroy his opponent is what made Grant one of the first truly modern generals and also the most successful leader the Union found.

So, Grant’s brutal strategy coupled with the vast superiority in Northern resources suggests that the outcome of the Civil war really was inevitable, but it also points to some of the reasons to be cautious about that conclusion.

First off, it took three years before the Union actually fully adopted Grant’s strategy, and between 1861 and 1864 it was possible that Southern victories would eventually force the Union to give in.

I mean, the Union lost a lot of battles in the first two years, largely due to ineffective General-ing and nothing saps a nation’s motivation for war like losing.

Now, some argue that the North had superior motivation to prosecute the war because they had God on their side and they were against slavery, but that’s also pretty problematic.

I mean, for many men who joined the federal army, a war to end slavery had very little appeal, especially poor enlistees who might be afraid that newly-freed slaves would compete with them for jobs.

Also, while we are correct in considering slavery unjust, southerners who took up arms for the Confederacy saw themselves as engaged in a fight for their own freedom, rather than a fight to protect slavery.

The truth is, when it comes to fighting, motivation is a very tricky business, and I’m most comfortable agreeing with James McPherson who argued that motivation waxes and wanes with victory,

and that the outcome of the war was contingent on a number of turning points.

And we’re just gonna discuss two of the most important: July 1863 and August 1864.

July 1863 saw two of the most important Union victories in the whole war. In the western theater, General Grant laid siege to and captured Vicksburg Mississippi, thus giving the federals control of the lower Mississippi river.

I mean, by then, the North already had New Orleans, which made it pretty much impossible for the Confederates to ship cotton or anything else along the Mississippi River.

After that, Grant was able to turn his attention to the east with the aforementioned hammering of the enemy and their resources.

More famously, especially in the eastern part of the United States, the first three days of July 1863 saw the battle of Gettysburg in Pennsylvania.

This was General Lee’s furthest major offensive in the north and had he won the battle it is likely that panic would have set in in places like Philadelphia and maybe even New York.

Actually panic did overcome New York in draft riots that killed more than 100 people and only ended after troops from Gettysburg were called in.

I’m not going to go into detail about either of these battles, but they shifted the tide of the war in favor of the North, although not enough to bring the war to a quick end.

Confederate forces would never again threaten a northern city.

August 1864 saw another turning point that really spelled the doom of the Confederacy, and that was when Union general Sherman took Atlanta.

Atlanta was a railroad hub and manufacturing center but its capture was more significant politically than militarily because it happened close to the election of 1864.

And that American election was really the last time that the Confederate states of America could have won the Civil War.

It’s easy to forget this, but Lincoln actually had to run for reelection during the Civil War, and by the summer of 1864 the war was pretty unpopular and it looked like Lincoln might lose.

The capture of Atlanta changed public opinion about Lincoln and meant it that his Democratic opponent and former top general George McClellan didn’t stand a chance of winning,

which was really significant for the war because Lincoln was committed to ending it with a Union victory and McClellan, meh.

I think it says a lot about American history that in the end the war’s outcome was insured not just by military victories but by a political one.

Next week, we’ll examine the effects of the Civil War and the enduring questions that have arisen out of it, such as who, exactly, freed the slaves?

But, until then, thanks for watching.

Crash Course is produced and directed by Stan Muller. The script supervisor is Meredith Danko. Our show is written by my high school history teacher, Raoul Meyer, and myself.

Our graphics team is Thought Café. And our associate producer is Danica Johnson, also responsible for felt Abraham Lincoln.

If you want to suggest captions for the libertage, you can do so in comments where you can also ask questions about today’s video that will be answered by our team of historians.

Thanks for watching Crash Course and as we say in my hometown, don’t forget to be awesome.