In the first year of the war, around 21 million people lived in the 23 northern states, whereas only 9 million lived in the 11 confederate southern states, of which 3.5 million were slaves. However, with the Northern states great number, the Southerners had an army of equal size. In addition, the north had big industrial advantage. They had 9 times greater industrial capacity than the South, and in 1960 they manufactured, 97, 96, 94, 93 and 90% of the firearms, railroad locomotive, cloth, pig iron and boots and shoes respectively. Furthermore, the North had all the rifle works and twice the density of railroads (Pulgarin, 2010).
Since the South couldn’t manufacture armories including guns, they melted bells from churches and town squares from which they created their ammunition. However, they still had to import the gunpowder, however the economic policy couldn’t allow since the Northerners controlled the navy and the seas. The South was in a position of producing all the food for its people, but they couldn’t transport to their soldiers. Nevertheless, the South had the advantage of hosting 7 out of the 8 military collages, thus they had a big number of trained officers. They also had a ragged, biggest terrain with poor roads and biggest coastline that was difficult to capture (Pulgarin, 2010).
Initially when the war started, the South had the advantage of fighting on the defensive side, from its territory, thus they enjoyed advantage of morale, whereas the North to save the union had to invade and attack the Southerners, who were fighting to maintain their way of life. But since the North had the biggest advantage of the industrial capacity, man power and political leadership in Abraham Lincoln, they emerged the victors.
Reference
Pulgarin, W. (2010). Advantages and disadvantages of the North and South. SCRIBID. Retrieved on 25th/10/2012 from www.scribed.com/doc/32287010.
