12 avr. 1861 - American Civil War Started

Description:

The American Civil War was a battle between the Northern and Southern halves of the United States. When Abraham Lincoln won the election in 1860, he was the first Republican president on a platform that was dedicated to keep slavery out of the states. Seven southern slave states seceded and formed a new nation known as the Confederate States of America. The Lincoln administration and most Northern people refused to accept the legitimacy of secession. They feared that it would shatter the no-longer United States into several small, fractured countries. The trigger for the war was when the Confederate army claimed Fort Sumter in Charleston Bay as their own, opening fire on the federal garrison and forcing them to surrender. This event took place on April 12, 1861, and Lincoln ordered the militia afterwards to suppress this ‘insurrection’. Four more slave states seceded and joined the Confederates. By the time December rolled around, nearly a million armed Americans confronted each other along a line stretching 1200 miles from Virginia to Missouri (about 1930 km).