who should have won the american civil war

bf109 Emil said:

North wanted to free the slaves, or so the issue goes...but can i ask why???
human rights and equallity are nice...but did the black african americans become really free?? Equal??? receive the same pay??? same schooling??? ...I know i will get a lot of ..."what do you know???your Canadian???

Can i ask this question...who threw millions of dollars into the Union coffers to fund the war???
who would benefit the most from freeing the slaves and have access to a cheaper source of labour????
Who started to feel the pinch from higher labour costs, strikes, and lost sales do to the souths abundant source of labour being virtually free????
Was this a war of making men equal and free?? or a war funded by huge industrialists from the North all looking for a cheap/strike free/long hour per week labourer????
If this is not so or not the reason....their sure must have been a lot of deep pockets in the north all trying to make men free and equal...

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A lot more complicated. First, slavery wasn't the prime issue but 3/5 of the slave population counted as credit against one House of representative vote in the South - and the South had lost the HR.

Second, the North had control of House of Representatives and South lost on all tariff issues - meaning thaey had to 'buy' from North rather than Europe all manufacturing goods, and sell to North all Agricultural goods.

Slaves were noy emancipated until Gettysburg address in 1863.

At the end of the day, the War Between the States put nearly 5,000,000 men under arms for a 60,000,000 population - and THAT got Europe's attention!

The United States had less than 1200 officers and 30,000 men in the US army when the war started

drgondog said:

Slaves were not emancipated until Gettysburg address in 1863.

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You mean the Emancipation Proclamations in Sept 1862 and Jan 1863, right after the battle of Antietam.

Right, the Emancipation Proclamation was not signed until after the fight at Sharpsburg,1862,(Antietam.) The interesting thing was that the Proclamation only "freed" the slaves in the Confederacy. There were, I believe, three states in the Union, Maryland being one, that were slave states where they weren't freed. The net result of the war, economically was that the South came out destitute and the North came out with a vibrant economy, even more industrialised than before the war.

Even U.S. Grant owned slaves, four of them I believe.

TO

and Maryland was a hotponit - the North wanted them on the Northern cause that some things were overlooked wink-wink.

I have a purely Southern view point, having grown up in the deep South and having at least one ancestor who fought for the Rebel side. I remember clearly "white" and "colored" drinking fountains. I remember thinking how stupid it was when my mother chided me for trying to drink out of a "colored" fountain. My high school was Escambia High, and we were the "Rebels". I had a little Rebel flag on the antenna of my '54 Ford four door, not a cool car! I only did that because my high school mascot was the "Rebels". There was much animosity when integration came and the name had to be changed. That animosity, however, changed in a flash when a young football player named Emmett Smith put on an Escambia uniform.

With unlimited, relatively speaking, industry, manpower, weaponry, materiel, technology, and Navy, the North should have, and did, win. It should have done it much quicker.

The South did have some going-in advantages.

The South was mainly rural and agricultural with little manufacturing capability. It was also a very patriarchal. As a result, it had a high percentage of men who were used to using guns and horses, and was quite adaptable to rigid military discipline (just another family).

The war was mostly fought on home ground. Terrain was familiar and logistics was short.

Up to 1863, Army of Northern Virginia was most likely the best army in the world at that time (as opined by Sir Winston Churchill in his "A History of English-Speaking Peoples"). It had:
Leadership that was aggressive, flexible, imaginative, and loyal. They certainly won the officer draft.
Excellent cavalry
Very good artillery
Disciplined, brave, highly motivated (they were fighting on their home ground), and intensely loyal soldiers.

The North, in the East, had weak leadership that could not even win a battle with the enemy battle plan in hand (Battle of Antietam).

Idiots ran the Northern weapons development program. More aggressive and universal acceptance of the Spenser, Henry, and Gatlin weapons could have easily ended the war much quicker.

Had the North tired and opted out, the results would have been catastropic. Slavery would have ended in the South anyway. It was a barbaric institution and I am imbarrassed as a Southerner that it existed. How could basically good people endure such evil? I think the Confederacy would have evolved into a aparthied system like South Africa. There probably would have been massive emigration into the North of African Americans.

As for the Stars and Bars (Confederate Battle Flag), I am at a puzzlement. As a person who has a history in the Old South, I understand the rememberance of the emotions of the people who fought and died for it, not to perserve slavery, but to defend their homes and their freedoms. On the other hand, I understand the symbology of the horror of slavery, similar to the swastika's symbol for the holocaust. My current opinion, the Stars and Bars has no business flying over a government facility.

Davparlr untill early 1864, the best officers in the whole country were in the Union fighting in the west.

Gens. Sherman and Grant understood the war and the logistics side of it extremely well.

syscom3 said:

Davparlr untill early 1864, the best officers in the whole country were in the Union fighting in the west.

Gens. Sherman and Grant understood the war and the logistics side of it extremely well.

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syscom3, please name the battles that Grant won where,

1. He did not outnumber his opponent.

2. He did not have better weapons.

3. He did not have a significant materiel advantage.

Here is the list for Lee

Seven Days US 104,100 CSA 92,000

Second Bull Run US 62,000 CSA 50,000

Fredricksburg US 114,000 CSA 72,000

Chancellersville US 133,868 CSA 60,892

Cold Harbor US 108,000 CSA 62,000 (against Grant after anticipating and blocking Grant at The Wilderness and Spotsylvania, all with about half the troops)

As for Sherman, he seems to be rather lackluster in his efforts. His lone real claim to fame was his march through Georgia, where, I suspect he outnumbered all of his opponents (he invaded with about 100,000 troops). He lost a couple of battles he should have won, Chickasaw Bayou and Kennesaw Mountain, where he outnumbered the enemy two to one at both engagements, and at Chattanooga, he was basically impotent in support of the victory, failing to achieve his goals.

Its hard to assign greatness to a player who can win with all the aces, however, many of the Northern generals could not do even that. Nothing succeeds like success.

Name me a campaign that he lost? No points for second place!

Grants Vicksburg Campaign is/was brilliant. Been a while since I studied it but I seem to recall he was in the middle of several different enemy forces, on the wrong side of the river and could have been cut off and destroyed. He saw got moving and engaged them piecemeal, never really giving them time to settle.

syscom3 said:

Name me a campaign that he lost? No points for second place!

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Hmmm, using your logic, you must think Montgomery is a better general than Rommel, since Montgomery won all of his campaigns and Rommel did not, and got no points for coming in second.

timshatz said:

Grants Vicksburg Campaign is/was brilliant. Been a while since I studied it but I seem to recall he was in the middle of several different enemy forces, on the wrong side of the river and could have been cut off and destroyed. He saw got moving and engaged them piecemeal, never really giving them time to settle.

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Grant's strategy was sporatic. His set up to Vicksburg was well done but the final victory was not particually brilliant. After being unsuccessfull in attacking Vicksburg with poorly executed frontal assults, and wasting many good men, he resorted to the time proven system of seige. His executon of the siege, however, was expertly done. As usual, Grant had twice the forces of the defenders, which showed he did not understand attacking fortifications, where 3-1 odds or more likely to succeed, but he had more enough to successfully pull off a siege, where only about 6000 external forces were available to the confederates to break the seige.

Winning has a quality all of its own.

Lee's invasion of the North was brilliant - Gettysburg was a great strategic victory and ensured the US a future position of strength in the world.

syscom3 said:

Winning has a quality all of its own.

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So, then you believe Montgomery was a better general than Rommel.

mkloby said:

Lee's invasion of the North was brilliant - Gettysburg was a great strategic victory and ensured the US a future position of strength in the world.

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Lee's invasion of the North was meant to convince the North the war was too expensive. He almost succeeded and was only thwarted by heroic fighting by Northern forces in several pitched battles. His order for Pickett's charge was foolish and reflected his own ego in thinking he was unbeatable with his Army of Northern Virginia. He knew better as he saw what happened at Fredericksburg when armies attack a well fortified line. He was also outnumbered, by the way. Still , it almost turned out to be a war changer in the opposite direction.


Also, no one has named a single major battle where Grant


1. He did not outnumber his opponent.

2. He did not have better weapons.

3. He did not have a significant materiel advantage.

davparlr said:

....His order for Pickett's charge was foolish and reflected his own ego in thinking he was unbeatable with his Army of Northern Virginia. He knew better as he saw what happened at Fredericksburg when armies attack a well fortified line. .....

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Lee made a monumental blunder at Gettysburg. Brilliant fighting by several Union Generals also blunted his forces on several occasions. This battle alone should knock him off the statue of exaltation.

1. He did not outnumber his opponent.

2. He did not have better weapons.

3. He did not have a significant materiel advantage.

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Like, I said, winning has a quality all its own!

Union had more Industrial areas and factories to manufacture weapons and what not

I believe that Lee at Gettysburg made a mistake on the last day with the attack by Pickett, Pettigrew and Trimble but I believe one must get inside his head to see that there were extenuating circumstances. I believe that he knew that if the war lasted another year, it was lost. he knew that the South was growing weaker while the North grew stronger. He knew another winter for his horses and mules would leave them so weak, he would have no mobility. He knew that Union confidence was at a low ebb and that a victory at Gettysburg and threatening Washington could possibly bring them to terms. He himself was tired, ill and worn out and he knew that his most aggressive corps commander, Jackson, could not be replaced by Hill or Ewell. His troops had prevailed so many times against impossible odds that he thought they might pull it out. He knew that he only risked the lives of perhaps 7500 men in the charge and that if it failed the Union army lacked the initiative to finish him off. If I was in his shoes under those circumstances and thought that 7500 men's lives could very possibly end the war, I believe that I would have made the same choice. His greatness as a general is proven by his leadership during 1864-65 against overwhelming odds. If Lee had commanded the Army of the Potomac instead of Northern Virginia the chances are the war would have ended much sooner.

At Gettysburg, the Union held every single assault made on their lines.

Lee lost the battle.

On the contrary, Grant won every single battle when it counted.

syscom3 said:

. Brilliant fighting by several Union Generals also blunted his forces on several occasions.

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Betcha none had fewer troops.

Like, I said, winning has a quality all its own!

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A strange comment repeated. If a coach has 11 men on his football team and only plays games against 7 men teams, and wins all of them, you would call him a great coach. I would say, at least he was good enough to win with more players. If a coach of a 7 man team played only 11 men teams, and won 5 out of 7 and on playing the one that lost none, played even or better until 3 of his 7 player went out with injuries, I would say he is a great coach, and you would say, winning is a quality all its own and the winning coach is special. "Winning has a quality all its own", without understanding the variables, it is a useless statement.

Grant, with twice the troops (all well-fed), unlimited replacements, great logistics, and outstanding weaponry, was unable to defeat Lee in open battle and suffered severe losses trying (a trait of Grant). Only after almost a year of irreplaceable attrition by the South, including a WWI type of siege, was Grant able to chase Lee to ground. He was continually outsmarted and out fought by a much smaller army that was getting smaller and smaller, a poor and wasteful performance, at best.

But, he did know how to beat a 7 man team with an 11 man team. That is better than most of the Union generals.

renrich said:

I believe that Lee at Gettysburg made a mistake on the last day with the attack by Pickett, Pettigrew and Trimble but I believe one must get inside his head to see that there were extenuating circumstances. I believe that he knew that if the war lasted another year, it was lost. he knew that the South was growing weaker while the North grew stronger. He knew another winter for his horses and mules would leave them so weak, he would have no mobility. He knew that Union confidence was at a low ebb and that a victory at Gettysburg and threatening Washington could possibly bring them to terms. He himself was tired, ill and worn out and he knew that his most aggressive corps commander, Jackson, could not be replaced by Hill or Ewell. His troops had prevailed so many times against impossible odds that he thought they might pull it out. He knew that he only risked the lives of perhaps 7500 men in the charge and that if it failed the Union army lacked the initiative to finish him off. If I was in his shoes under those circumstances and thought that 7500 men's lives could very possibly end the war, I believe that I would have made the same choice. His greatness as a general is proven by his leadership during 1864-65 against overwhelming odds. If Lee had commanded the Army of the Potomac instead of Northern Virginia the chances are the war would have ended much sooner.

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Very astute, in my opinion.