Outside of Gettysburg and Vicksburg, the most significant event of the Civil War wasn’t Lee’s surrender at Appomattox. General William Tecumseh Sherman launched total war by marching through Georgia, Alabama, and Tennessee, burning bridges and farms on their way. President Lincoln and General Grant needed the war to come to a quick end, and they supported more economical/psychological means of warfare. Sherman’s plan was approved, and he captured Atlanta in November. Sherman then had a difficult choice to make. He was supposed to turn north and pin General Lee’s troops after continuing south, but was forced to contend with Confederate general John Bell Hood. Sherman split his troops, taking 62,000 men with him and leaving the rest to keep Hood off of his tail, after burning much of Atlanta (Marzalek, 2014). Sherman took supplies with him, but fanned his men out to force them to live off of the land, and he cut his supply lines. This became the infamous March to Sea, which forever vilified General Sherman in the history of the South. His troops skirmished with small numbers of Confederates in their wake, and destroyed a multitude of farms and fields. Union troops also made it a point to destroy factories and railroads. Rumors about the brutality of the Union soldiers were highly exaggerated, but it played an important part in decreasing the morale of the civilian population. Sherman’s March caused significant cultural animosity that increased between the North and South for years to come, but it also changed the way the world conducted warfare. The US repeated its scorched earth tactics in Korea, Vietnam, and the Middle East. It was most used in instances where US troops faced guerilla warfare, especially in the heavily bombed Vietnam. Thus, Sherman’s policy had a long lasting influence both in warfare, and in the memory of the Civil War.
The North was primarily afraid that any attempt to constitutionally free the slaves would drive a serious wedge between the southern states and the northern states. The South believed the North was attempting to undermine their culture and economy by opposing slavery, something they could not allow. Southern states believed they were losing political clout to the industrializing north. The importation of slaves became illegal in 1808, and over the decades leading to the Civil War, more free territories/states were created than slave states. Thus, southern states were losing ground in the Senate, and theoretically in the House of Representatives as well. The compromises of 1820 and 1850 helped delay the Civil War (“U.S. Capitol visitor center,” n.d.).
The north did primarily support abolition, as they had no economic reasons to oppose. Slavery had not been feasible in the north, as the land was not suited for large scale farming. However, there were fears about the impact of full scale abolition which were justified, such as a huge influx of former slaves into the labor force. It became difficult to find jobs, keeping many freedman in poverty, as they inevitably fled north to escape discrimination. The South had the most to lose, but their economy was changing due to technological increase, decreasing the need for the practice.
References:
Marzalek, J. (2014). Scorched earth. Retrieved June 3, 2016, from Civil War Trust, http://www.civilwar.org/hallowed-ground-magazine/fall-2014/scorched-earth.html?referrer=https://www.google.com/
U.S. Capitol visitor center. Retrieved June 3, 2016, from https://www.visitthecapitol.gov/civilwar/html/section1.html
