Excerpts

United No More! Stories of the Civil War Chapter One The Start of the War In the mid 1800s, twenty-two million people lived in the North and South. Of the eleven million inhabitants of the South, four million were slaves. Life in the North and in the South was very different. The North was a manufacturing center. The South was agricultural. Northerners wanted tariffs, or fees, placed on imported goods. Southerners depended on manufactured goods from England. They didn't want tariffs, because the fees raised the prices of these imported goods. Southerners no longer wanted the federal government telling them what to do; they favored states' rights over federal control. Although the war did not start over slavery, even before the fighting, the issue divided Americans in the North and the South. The question of ending slavery took on momentum as the war continued. At the time of Lincoln's election in 1860, few political leaders in the North advocated an end to slavery. Lincoln was against slavery, but as late as July 1861 he promised to allow it to continue where it existed, but not allow its expansion into other states. Still, the president's Republican Party was very unpopular in the South. The tensions and differences finally erupted when South Carolina seceded from the Union on December 20, 1860. Then on April 12 and 13, 1861, rebel Confederates bombarded federal Fort Sumter, and the Civil War began. Northerners expected to win the war quickly. They had better weapons and equipment, and factories to manufacture more of both. Southerners thought they would win. They believed their men were better shooters, fighters, and horsemen. They also had the advantage of fighting on home territory as most of the battles took place in the South. July 21, 1861, was a hot, humid day. Lighthearted Washing-tonians in carriages traveled twenty-eight miles across the Potomac and into Virginia to picnic. They expected to see the Union army roust the Confederate troops at Bull Run. The small creek at Bull Run flowed down to the town of Manassas Junction. This crucial railroad junction connected two railroad lines, one from Washington and the valley of Virginia north of Manassas, and another that ran south to Richmond. Whichever side controlled this crossing controlled the approach to the Confederate capital in Richmond. The North expected to win that day, march on to capture Richmond, and end the war. But the Union suffered a surprise defeat in what the North ultimately called the First Battle of Bull Run. The Confederacy named this battle the First Battle of Manassas. Southern women living in the nation's capital were thought to have passed information to the Confederate army about the Union's battle strategy, and a handful were arrested. The Union regrouped its army. In November 1861 Northerners again packed picnic hampers and traveled across the Potomac River from the capital to see the newly trained troops drill. United No More! Stories of the Civil War . Copyright © by Doreen Rappaport. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. Available now wherever books are sold. Excerpted from United No More!: Stories of the Civil War by Doreen Rappaport, Joan C. Verniero All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.