Manassas Mania _

Yesterday, April 12, 1861, General Anderson was threatened that if he did not pack up and leave Fort Sumter by 4:00 A.M. the Confederates would attack. He didn't accept the threats. At 4:30 A.M. the Confederates at Fort Pickens attacked. There was so much firing. Although the fort was being damaged, no one was hurt. The North started to run out of supplies and weapons. President Lincoln had sent supplies but the supplies were blocked by the Confederate General Robert E. Lee. Today, April 13, 1861, at 2:30 P.M. General Anderson knew they had to surrender or they would get hurt. Today was a proud day for the South when General Anderson waved a white flag. Even though we have won Sumter we know that the battle is not truly over.

Yesterday, March 4, 1861 our president, Abraham Lincoln gave his inaugural address in front of thousands of spectators in our capital, Washington, D.C. In the address he decided to build up support in the North without alienating the South anymore, which already hate or fear him. Lincoln also avoided talking about the efforts to reopen the African slave trade, which was most of the Republican Party platform. The address also denied any plan to interfere with slavery in states where it existed. But, Lincoln made sure to tell the South that “We are not enemies, but friends” and “We must not be enemies”. In his last concluding paragraph he says to the South, “Shall it be peace or sword”. We’ll soon see how the South will react to this. The First Battle of Bull Run

Yesterday, July 21, 1861 General Pierre Beauregard marched his troops to Bull Run Creek in Virginia and waited for the Union troops to arrive. While civilians set up picnics and drank wine. General Beauregard had been told by a spy that Union generals where heading for Bull Run creek and then marching towards the Confederates capital, Richmond, Virginia, to try and take control. When Beauregard arrived he spread his men across a 8 miles of the creek. When the Union troops arrived they surprised the Confederates by smashing into their left side and sending them running in all directions. The Union was killing the Confederates and were so confident that they would win that they started picking up souvenirs to remind them of the win. But then, Confederate General Thomas Jackson showed up with reinforcements. Back ups for then Confederate troops started pouring in from every direction. They came by horseback, walking, and even trains, which was a new way of transportation that the Confederates had and the Union didn’t. They soon pummeled the Union troops into dust. The battle was soon over. In total there were 93 deaths. The agony of war was not over yet. Soldiers were still wounded and to have limbs removed and the sadness of loss still hung in the air. The war was definitely not over.

Emancipation=freedom,we have feared this word ever sence Lincoln became president.Two days ago on January 1, 1863, Lincoln anounced the Emancipation Proclamation.This document states that all slaves in the rebel states are free!! It also states that any black man can become part of the Union Army and Navy! We will not stand for this. I can not beleive the nerve of that man,freeing our slaves!!!!Does the North think that that is helping us not secede. We must take action now!

Gettysburg, Pennsylvania

The battle broke out on July 1, 1863. No one really planned a fight there, but when a Confederate soldier saw an advertisement for shoes, the headed right over to Gettysburg. There, they met the Union cavalry…

The Confederates won the first battle, of course, but now more Union reinforcements started coming in. General Buford had sent General Meade a message saying to “bring more soldiers, this is a good location. Now the Confederates not only had to face fresh Union soldiers, but J.E.B. Stuart, their cavalry star, was missing. No one knew where he was. Of course, the cavalry is an army’s eyes, so when Stuart was missing, the Confederates were blind. Still, they were confident. At night, both sides were praying to see another night.

July 2 came. The fighting got worse. The men on both sides fought and fought. The death rate was terribly large. Neither side seemed to be wining.

Finally July 3 came. The Confederates came up with a plan. First they planned for non-stop artillery fire for two hours. The noise and shaking combined was like one long, large earthquake. It never seemed to stop. The Confederate Major General George E. Pickett arrived at Gettysburg with fresh troops. Pickett is very courageous and eager to fight. He leads the most famous charge in this battle, The Pickett’s Charge. The men were charging to the stone wall. Only a few make it. When the charge is over, 28,000 men were killed, wounded or missing. At the Confederate camp, General Lee blamed only himself. Both sides were tired. Both had terrible losses. This was a war that no one will forget.

It was November of 1863, Look-out mountain, Chattanooga. General Rosecrans and his troops moved south, to take Chattanooga under Union control for revenge. Confederate forces had been guarding Chattanooga and surrounded it. They did not want Union troops taking Chattanooga. For just as Lincoln has said: “...taking Chattanooga is as important as taking Richmond.” That was because Chattanooga’s rails were connected to most of the Confederacy’s major cities. The Union’s plan was to “divide and conquer” the South. General Braxton Bragg of the Confederacy ordered his troops to occupy Missionary Ridge and Lookout Mountain. When the Union forces got there, Bragg laid siege under General Rosecrans’s troops, to cut off their supplies. On October 17, Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant received command of the Western armies; he moved to reinforce Chattanooga and replaced Rosecrans with Maj. Gen. George Thomas. A new supply line was soon made. General Sherman brought his divisions and began offensive operations. On November 25, Union soldiers assaulted and carried the seemingly impregnable Confederate position on Missionary Ridge.

Now one of the Confederacy’s major cities has been taken over by the Union.