All language subtitles for The.Civil.War.S01E01.The.Cause.1990

Original production
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Before thousands
fell on the battlefield,

before millions were
freed and before a country

forged its identity...
A nation declared a new

birth of freedom,
rededicating itself to the

proposition that all
men are created equal.

Bank of America is proud
to sponsor "the civil war,"

a film by Ken Burns,

newly restored for
it's 25th anniversary.

"We have shared the
incommunicable experience of war.

"We have felt, we still feel,

the passion of life
to its top."

"In our youths,

our hearts were
touched with fire."

Oliver Wendell Holmes.

By the summer of 1861,

Wilmer McLean had had enough.

Two great armies were
converging on his farm,

and what would be

the first major battle
of the civil war--

bull run, or Manassas,

as the confederates
called it--

would soon rage across
the aging virginian's farm,

a union shell going so far

as to explode
in the summer kitchen.

Now McLean moved his family
away from Manassas,

far south and west of Richmond,

out of harm's way, he prayed,

to a dusty little crossroads

called Appomattox courthouse.

And it was there
in his living room,

3 1/2 years later,

that Lee surrendered to Grant...

And Wilmer McLean
could rightfully say

that "the war began
in my front yard

and ended
in my front parlor."

The civil war was fought
in 10,000 places

from Valverde, new Mexico,

and Tullahoma, Tennessee,

to St. Albans, Vermont,

and Fernandina on
the Florida coast.

More than 3 million
Americans fought in it,

and over 600,000 men,
2% of the population,

died in it.

American homes
became headquarters.

American churches
and schoolhouses

sheltered the dying...

And huge foraging armies
swept across American farms

and burned American towns.

Americans slaughtered
one another wholesale here,

in America,
in their own corn fields

and peach orchards,

along familiar roads,

and by waters with
old American names.

In two days at Shiloh,

on the banks of the Tennessee,

more American men fell

than in all previous
American wars combined.

At cold harbor,

7,000 Americans fell
in 20 minutes.

Men who had
never strayed 20 miles

from their own front doors

now found themselves
soldiers in great armies,

fighting epic battles
hundreds of miles from home.

They knew
they were making history,

and it was the greatest
adventure of their lives.

The war made some rich,
ruined others,

and changed forever

the lives of all
who lived through it...

A lackluster clerk
from galena, Illinois,

a failure in everything
except marriage and war,

who, in 3 years, would
be head of the union army

and in 7, president
of the United States;

An eccentric student of
theology and military tactics,

a hypochondriac

who rode into battle
with one hand raised

"to keep," he said,
"the blood balanced;"

a college professor from Maine,

who, on a little hill
in Pennsylvania,

ordered an unlikely
textbook maneuver

that saved the union army

and possibly the union itself...

Two ordinary soldiers--

one from Providence,
Rhode Island,

the other from
Columbia, Tennessee,

who each served 4 years

and together seemed
to have been everywhere

during the war and lived
to tell the tale...

The courtly,
unknowable aristocrat,

who disapproved
of secession and slavery,

yet went on to defend them both

at the head of one
of the greatest armies

of all time;

The runaway boy who
"stole himself" from slavery,

recruited two regiments
of black soldiers,

and helped transform
the civil war

into a struggle for
the freedom of all Americans.

And then there was
the rough man from Illinois,

who would rise to be
the greatest president

the country has ever seen.

Between 1861 and 1865,

Americans made war on each other

and killed each other
in great numbers,

if only to become
the kind of country

that could no longer conceive

how that was possible.

What began as a bitter dispute

over union and states' rights

ended as a struggle

over the meaning
of freedom in America.

At Gettysburg in 1863,

Abraham Lincoln said
perhaps more than he knew.

The war was about
"a new birth of freedom."

1938--75th anniversary of
the battle of Gettysburg.

President Roosevelt

spoke to the remaining
few civil war veterans.

Veterans of the blue
and the gray...

On behalf of the people
of the United States,

I accept this monument

in the spirit of
brotherhood and peace.

Year after year,
the nation remembered.

In 1930, veterans
of the union army

marched in Cincinnati, Ohio,

4 years later, in New York City.

They and the surviving
veterans of the confederacy

were the last link

with a terrible conflict
that tore America apart

from 1861 to 1865.

The last civil war veteran
would die in 1959,

and no longer would there be living
memories of long-ago battles,

only history and legends.

Any understanding of this nation

has to be based,
and I mean really based,

on an understanding
of the civil war.

I believe that firmly.

It defined us.

The revolution did what it did.

Our involvement
in European wars,

beginning with
the first world war,

did what it did,

but the civil war
defined us as what we are,

and it opened us
to being what we became,

uh, good and bad things.

And it--
it is very necessary

if you're going to understand
the American character

in the 20th century

to learn about this
enormous catastrophe

of the mid-19th century.

It was the--the-- the
crossroads of our being,

and it was a hell
of a crossroads.

For me, the picture
of the civil war

as a historic phenomenon...

Is not on the battlefield.

It's not about weapons.

It's not about soldiers,

except to the extent

that weapons and soldiers

at that crucial moment

joined a discussion
about something higher,

about humanity,
about human dignity,

about human freedom.

"Whence shall we expect
the approach of danger?

"Shall some transatlantic
giant step the earth

"and crush us at a blow?

"Never.

"All the armies
of Europe and Asia

"could not by force take a drink

"from the Ohio river

"or make a track
on the blue Ridge

"in the trial of
a thousand years.

"If destruction be our lot,

"we must ourselves be
its author and finisher.

"As a nation of free men,
we will live forever...

Or die by suicide."

Abraham Lincoln, 1837.

In 1861,

most of the nation's
31 million people

lived peaceably on farms
and in small towns.

At Sharpsburg, Maryland,

a German pacifist sect,
the Dunkards,

made their home in
a sea of wheat and corn.

In Gettysburg, Pennsylvania,
population 2,400,

young men studied
Latin and mathematics

at the small college there.

Steamboats filled with cotton

came and went at Vicksburg
on the Mississippi.

In Washington, D.C.,

senator Jefferson Davis
reviewed plans

for remodeling the capitol.

In Richmond, the 900 employees

of the Tredegar iron works

turned out gun carriages
and Cannon

for the U.S. government.

At west point on the Hudson,

officers trained,

and friendships were formed

they thought would last
a lifetime.

"In thinking of America,

"I sometimes find myself

"admiring her bright blue sky

"and her grand old woods,

"her fertile fields,

"her beautiful rivers,
her mighty lakes

and star-crowned
mountains..."

"But my rapture is soon checked.

"When I remember
that all is cursed

"with the infernal spirit

"of slaveholding and wrong,

"when I remember

"that with the waters
of her noblest rivers,

"the tears of my brethren

"are borne to the ocean,

"disregarded and forgotten,

"that her most fertile fields

"drink daily of the warm blood

"of my outraged sisters,

I am filled with
unutterable loathing."

Frederick Douglass.

"no day ever dawns
for the slave,"

a freed black man wrote,

"nor is it looked for.

"For the slave, it is all night.

All night forever."

One white mississippian
was more blunt--

"I'd rather be dead," he said,

"than be a nigger

on one of these
big plantations."

A slave entered the world

in a one-room,
dirt-floored shack.

Drafty in winter,
reeking in summer,

slave cabins bred
pneumonia, typhus, cholera,

lockjaw, tuberculosis.

The child who survived
to be sent to the fields at 12

was likely to have
rotten teeth, worms,

dysentery, malaria.

Fewer than 4 out of 100
lived to be 60.

Work began at sunrise

and continued as long
as there was light--

14 hours sometimes,

unless there was a full moon,

when it went on still longer.

On the auction block,

blacks were made
to jump and dance

to demonstrate
their sprightliness

and stripped to show how little
whipping they needed.

Buyers poked and prodded them,

examined their feet,
eyes, and teeth...

"Precisely,"
one ex-slave recalled,

"as a jockey
examines a horse."

A slave could expect to be sold

at least once in his lifetime,

maybe two times,

maybe more.

Since slave marriages
had no legal status,

preachers changed
the wedding vows to read,

"until death or distance
do you part."

You know
what I'd rather do?"

If I thought...

That I'd ever be a slave again,

I'd take a gun and just
end it all right away

because you're
nothing but a dog.

You're not a thing but a dog.

Some slaves refused to work.

Some ran away.

Still, blacks struggled

to hold their families together,

created their own culture

under the worst of conditions...

And yearned to be free.

If there was a single event
that caused the war,

it was the establishment
of the United States

in independence
from Great Britain

with slavery still
a part of its heritage.

It was because we
failed to do the thing

we really have a genius
for, which is compromise.

Americans like to think of
themselves as uncompromising.

Our true genius
is for compromise.

Our whole government's
founded on it,

and it failed.

"There was never
a moment in our history

"when slavery was not
a sleeping serpent.

"It lay coiled up
under the table

"during the deliberations

"of the constitutional
convention.

"Owing to the cotton gin,

"it was more than half awake.

"Thereafter, slavery
was on everyone's mind,

though not always
on his tongue."

John Jay Chapman.

By the time the nation
was founded,

slavery was dying in the north.

There were doubts
in the south, too,

but few could conceive
of any alternative.

Thomas Jefferson of Virginia
said maintaining slavery

was like holding a wolf
by the ears.

You didn't like it,

but you didn't dare let it go.

Then in 1793,
a northerner, Eli Whitney,

taught the south
how to make slavery pay.

Whitney's engine, or gin,

made it easier to separate
cotton from its seed.

Where before it had taken
one slave 10 hours

to produce a single
pound of lint,

the cotton gin could crank out
a thousand pounds a day.

Production soared...

And with it,
the demand for slaves.

By 1860, the last year of peace,

one out of every 7 Americans

belonged to another American.

4 million men, women,
and children were slaves.

In Boston in 1831,

claiming "that which
is not just is not law,"

William Lloyd Garrison
began publishing

a militant, antislavery
newspaper, the liberator.

He called for complete
and immediate abolition.

"I am in earnest.

"I will not equivocate.

"I will not excuse.

"I will not retreat
a single inch,

and I will be heard."

He was heard,

and his message
was clear--

slavery was sin...

And those who maintained it,
criminals.

The abolition movement grew,

inspired by
passionate leaders--

Harriet Tubman,
called "Moses" by the slaves

who followed her north
to freedom;

Wendell Phillips,

named "the golden trumpet"
of abolitionism for his oratory;

And Frederick Douglass,

the son of a slave
and a white man.

"I appear this evening

"as a thief and robber.

"I stole this head, these limbs,

"this body from my master

and ran off
with them."

Douglass was so eloquent
that skeptics charged

he could never
have been a slave.

In part to prove them wrong,

he wrote an autobiography,

purchased his freedom with $600
obtained from English admirers,

and returned to the struggle.

"The abolitionists
would raise the negroes

"to a social and political
equality with the whites.

"And, that being effected,
we would soon see

"the present condition
of the two races reversed.

"They and their northern
allies would be the masters

and we the slaves."

John C. Calhoun.

More and more,

southerners worried
about the growing political

as well as economic
power of the north.

Northerners were increasingly
hostile to slavery.

Still, most southerners
refused to acknowledge

even the possibility
of changing their way of life.

"On the north bank of the Ohio,

"everything is
activity, industry.

"Labor is honored.
There are no slaves.

"Pass to the south bank

"and the scene
changes so suddenly

"that you think yourself

"on the other side of the world.

The enterprising
spirit is gone."

Alexis de Tocqueville.

"We are separated because of
incompatibility of temper.

"We are divorced
north from south

because we hated
each other so."

Mary Chesnut.

On the clear, moonlit
night of November 7, 1837,

a mob surrounded a warehouse
at Alton, Illinois,

intent on destroying
an antislavery newspaper

run by the reverend
Elijah P. Lovejoy.

When one of the mob moved
to set the building on fire,

lovejoy, armed with a pistol,

came out to stop him.

The slavery men shot him dead

and dumped his printing press
into the Mississippi.

The news stunned
the nation--

a white man had been killed
over black slavery.

Protest meetings were held
throughout the north.

One abolitionist wrote that

"thousands of our citizens

"who lately believed that they
had nothing to do with slavery

now begin to discover
their error."

In Hudson, Ohio,

a clergyman told
a church gathering,

"the question now before us

"is no longer,
can slaves be made free,

"but, are we free,

or are we slaves
under mob law?"

In the back of the church,
a strange, gaunt man

Rose to his feet
and raised his right hand.

"Here, before god, in the
presence of these witnesses,

"I consecrate my life

to the destruction
of slavery."

John brown.

In 1846, a lawyer
from Springfield, Illinois,

was elected to congress.

He was born in Kentucky,
the son of a farmer

who could barely sign his name.

He became a legislator at 24,
a prosperous attorney,

and after a turbulent courtship,

the husband of miss Mary Todd,

the daughter of a slave-holding
Kentucky banker.

For Abraham Lincoln,

the declaration of independence

was to be taken literally--

all men had the right to rise

as far as talent
would take them,

just as he had.

He detested slavery,

but he called
for its restriction,

not immediate abolition.

By mid-century,
the country was deeply divided.

Southerners feared the north
might forbid slavery.

Northerners feared slavery
might move west.

As each new state
was added to the union,

it threatened to upset

the delicate
equilibrium of power.

"There are grave doubts

"at the hugeness of the land,

"and whether one government

can comprehend
the whole."

Henry Adams.

Now events accelerated.

In 1852, Harriet Beecher Stowe

published uncle Tom's cabin.

Its portrayal
of slavery's cruelty

moved readers
as nothing else had.

Queen Victoria wept over it.

And within a year,

more than
1.5 million copies

were in print worldwide.

In 1854, congress
allowed settlers

in the Kansas
and Nebraska territories

to decide for themselves

whether or not
to permit slavery.

Kansas exploded.

5,000 pro slavery men
invaded the territory.

In the next 3 months,

200 men died
in "bleeding Kansas."

The killing would not stop
for 10 years.

In 1857, the supreme court

refused to free a slave,
Dred Scott,

even though he had lived
for many years

on free soil.

Chief justice
Roger B. Taney said

a black man had no rights

a white man
was bound to respect.

"As a nation, we
began by declaring

"that all men are created equal.

"We now practically
read it--

"all men are created
equal, except negroes.

"Soon it will read--

"all men are created equal,

"except negroes and foreigners

"and Catholics.

"When it comes to this,

"I should prefer emigrating

"to some country

"where they make no pretense
of loving Liberty--

"to Russia, for instance,

"where despotism
can be taken pure

"and without the base alloy

of hypocrisy."

Abraham Lincoln.

Violence reached the floor

of the United States senate,

where congressman Preston Brooks

of south Carolina

savagely beat abolitionist
senator Charles Sumner

with his cane.

Southern sympathizers
sent Brooks new canes.

Members began carrying
knives and pistols

into the chamber.

Meanwhile, the nation's
chief executive,

James Buchanan, did nothing.

"A house divided against
itself cannot stand.

"I believe this
government cannot endure,

"permanently half
slave and half free.

"I do not expect the
union to be dissolved.

"I do not expect
the house to fall.

"But I do expect it will
cease to be divided.

"It will become all one thing

or all
the other."

On Sunday evening,
October 16, 1859,

the radical abolitionist
John brown

led 5 blacks and 13 whites

into Harpers ferry, Virginia.

He brought along
a wagonload of guns

to arm the slaves

he was sure would rally to him.

Once they had, he planned
to lead them southward

along the crest
of the Appalachians

and destroy slavery.

Brown was an inept businessman

who had failed 20 times
in 6 states

and defaulted on his debts,

yet he believed himself
god's agent on earth.

In 1856, at Pottawatomie creek

in Kansas,

he and his sons

had hacked 5
pro slavery men to death

with broadswords,

all in the name

of defeating Satan
and his legions.

Brown and his men

quietly seized the armory,
arsenal, and engine house,

and took up hostages,

including George Washington's
great-grandnephew.

After that, nothing went right.

The first person killed

was the town baggage master,

a free black.

The slaves did not rise up;

Angry townspeople did.

The first of brown's
followers to fall

was Dangerfield Newby,
a former slave.

Someone in the crowd

cut off his ears as souvenirs.

On Tuesday morning,

federal troops arrived
from Washington,

led by a U.S. army colonel,

Robert E. Lee.

Lee's men stormed
the engine house,

and 9 more
of brown's men were killed,

including two of his sons.

Brown, severely wounded,

was turned over to Virginia

to be tried for treason.

"In firing his gun,

"John brown has merely told

"what time of day it is.

It is high noon,
thank god."

William Lloyd Garrison.

"An undivided south
says, let him hang."

Albany, Georgia patriot.

Virginia found brown guilty

and sentenced him to death.

Among the troops
at the scene of his hanging

were cadets from
the Virginia military institute

led by an eccentric professor,

Thomas J. Jackson.

Also there was a private
in the Richmond grays,

a young actor named
John Wilkes booth.

"December 2, 1859...

"Old John brown has been
executed for treason

"against a state.

"We cannot object,

"even though he agreed with us

"in thinking slavery wrong.

"That cannot excuse violence,
bloodshed, and treason.

"It could avail him nothing

that he might think
himself right."

Abraham Lincoln.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
likened brown to Christ.

Nathaniel Hawthorne declared,

"no man ever more
justly hanged."

And Herman Melville called him,

"the meteor of the war."

Brown had said nothing
from the gallows,

but he did hand
one of his guards a note.

"I, John brown,
am now quite certain

"that the crimes
of this guilty land

will never be purged away
but with blood."

"His zeal in
the cause of freedom

"was infinitely
superior to mine.

"Mine was as the taper light;

"His was as the burning sun.

"I could live for the slave.

John brown
could die for him."

John brown, John brown...

Very important person
in history--

important, though,
for only one episode.

Failure in everything in life,

except he becomes the single
most important factor,

in my opinion,
in bringing on the war.

The militia system in the south,

which had been a joke
before this, before then,

becomes a viable instrument,

as the Southern militias
begin to take a true form

and the south begins to
worry about northerners

agitating the blacks to
murder them in their beds.

It was the beginning
of the confederate army.

"The feeling among
the Southern members

"for dissolution of the union

"is becoming more general.

"Men are now beginning
to talk of it seriously

"who 12 months ago

"hardly permitted
themselves to think of it.

The crisis
is not far ahead."

Alexander Stephens.

The country was coming apart.

In the presidential
election of 1860,

Buchanan happily stepped aside,

but not before his ruling
Democratic party

was fatally split
over the issue of slavery.

The Republicans, a new party,

saw their chance

and nominated Abraham Lincoln,

a moderate.

His platform pledged only

to halt slavery's
further spread.

"On that point, hold firm

"as with a chain of steel.

"Those who deny
freedom to others

"deserve it not for themselves,

"and under a just god

cannot long retain it."

Radical abolitionists
in the north complained

that Lincoln's
opposition to slavery

did not go far enough.

But to most people in the south,

the prospect
of Lincoln's election

posed a lethal threat.

The 1860 campaign
had become a referendum

on the Southern way of life.

On November 6, 1860,

Abraham Lincoln
won the presidency

with only 40% of the vote.

He did not even appear
on the ballot

in 10 Southern states.

"The election
of Mr. Lincoln

"is undoubtedly
the greatest evil

"that has ever
befallen this country.

"But the mischief is done.

"And the only relief
for the American people

"is to shorten sail,

"send down the top masts,

and prepare
for a hurricane."

Richmond Whig.

In the south,

Lincoln was burned in effigy,

and now the south Carolina
legislature

called for a convention

to consider seceding
from the union.

Southerners would have told you

they were fighting
for self-government.

They believed the gathering
of power in Washington

was against them.

When they entered
into that federation,

they certainly would never
have entered into it

if they hadn't believed it
would be possible to get out.

And when the time came that
they wanted to get out,

they thought
they had every right.

The southerners saw
the election of Lincoln

as a sign that the union

was about to be radicalized

and that they were about
to be taken in directions

they did not care to go.

The abolitionist aspect
of it was very strong,

and, uh, they figured
they were about to lose

what they called their property

and faced ruin.

Yet many southerners

thought secession was madness.

"South Carolina,"

one Southern politician wrote,

"is too small for a Republic

and too large
for an insane asylum."

"November 19, 1860.

"A most gloomy day
in wall street.

"Everything at a deadlock.

"First-class paper
not negotiable.

Stocks falling."

George Templeton strong.

In New York, emotions
were no less explosive,

and George Templeton strong,

a conservative lawyer
who distrusted Lincoln,

began to keep track
of events in his diary.

"The bird of our country
is a debilitated chicken,

"disguised in eagle feathers.

"We have never been a nation.

"We are only an aggregate
of communities,

ready to fall apart at the
first serious shock."

When Abraham Lincoln
was elected president,

there were 33 states
in the union,

and a 34th, free Kansas,
was about to join.

By the time of his inauguration
5 months later,

just 27 states would remain.

The suddenness of secession

took everyone by surprise.

South Carolina led the way
on December 20.

A bell in Charleston

tolled the succession
of departing states--

Mississippi on January 9...

Florida on the 10th...

Then Alabama, Georgia,
Louisiana.

In Texas, governor Sam Houston

was deposed when he
tried to stop his state

from joining the confederacy.

"Let me tell you what is coming.

"After the sacrifice of
countless millions of treasure

"and hundreds
of thousands of lives,

"you may win
Southern independence,

"but I doubt it.

"The north is determined
to preserve this union.

"They are not a fiery,
impulsive people as you are,

"for they live
in colder climates.

"But when they begin to
move in a given direction,

"they move
with the steady momentum

and perseverance
of a mighty avalanche."

Texas left anyway.

Even Virginia,

the most populous
Southern state,

birthplace of 7 presidents,

seemed sure to follow.

"All the indications are

"that this treasonable
inflammation,

"secessionitis,

"keeps on making steady
progress, week by week.

"If disunion becomes
an established fact,

"we have one
consolation--

"the self-amputated
members

"were diseased
beyond immediate cure,

and their virus will infect
our system no longer."

George Templeton strong.

The Charleston Mercury.

"The tea has been
thrown overboard.

The revolution of 1860
has been initiated."

After south Carolina seceded,

the handful of federal troops

still stationed in Charleston

withdrew to fort Sumter,
far out in the harbor.

Their commander,
major Robert Anderson,

said he had moved his men

in order to prevent
the effusion of blood.

They were quickly surrounded
by rebel batteries.

"Thank god we have
a country at last,

"to live for, to pray for,

and, if need be,
to die for."

Lucius Quintus Lamar.

On February 18,
a few minutes after noon,

Jefferson Davis
stood on the steps

of the Alabama statehouse
at Montgomery

and took the oath of office
as president

of the provisional
confederate states of America.

The crowds cheered, wept,

sang farewell
to the star-spangled banner

and Dixie,

a minstrel tune written
by a northerner.

He was brittle, nervous,

often unable to sleep,

and partly blind in one eye.

Accustomed to being obeyed,

he scorned the bargaining

that made
Democratic government work.

Sam Houston said
he was as cold as a lizard

and ambitious as Lucifer.

Like Lincoln,
he was a Kentuckian,

the son of an itinerant farmer.

But he had been
educated at west point,

fought in Mexico,

and served as secretary of war.

As senator from Mississippi,

he resisted secession
as long as he could.

But when his state
withdrew from the union,

he headed home
to his plantation, Brierfield,

south of Vicksburg.

He and his wife Varina
were there,

clipping roses in the garden,

when word came that
he had been elected president.

"Reading that telegram,
he looked so grieved

"that I feared some evil
had befallen our family.

"After a few minutes,
he told me,

as a man might speak
of a sentence of death."

"Upon my head were showered
smiles, plaudits, and flowers,

but beyond them, I saw
troubles innumerable."

Jefferson Davis.

The confederate constitution
was almost identical

to the United States
constitution,

but it gave the president
a line-item veto,

a 6-year term,

and it outlawed
international slave trading.

The confederate cabinet met for
the first time in a hotel room.

A sheet of stationery
pinned to the door

marked the president's office.

"Where will I find
the state department?"

A visitor asked Robert Toombs,
secretary of state.

"In my hat, sir,

and the archives
in my coat pocket."

"Our new government is
founded upon the great truth

that the negro is not
equal to the white man."

Vice president
Alexander Stephens.

"God forgive us,

"but ours is a monstrous system.

"Like the patriarchs of old,

"our men live all in one house

"with their wives
and their concubines,

"and the mulattoes
one sees in every family

"exactly resemble
the white children.

"All the time,

"they seem to think
themselves patterns,

models of husbands
and fathers."

Mary Chesnut.

Mary Chesnut
and her husband James,

a former United States
senator from south Carolina,

moved among the highest circles

of the confederacy

and were close
to Jefferson Davis

and his wife.

Mary was subject
to depressions and nightmares,

for which she sometimes
took opium.

Now she, too,
began to keep a diary.

"This journal

"is intended to be
entirely objective.

My subjective days
are over."

"The impression produced by
the size of his extremities

"and by his flapping
and wide-projecting ears

"may be removed
by the appearance

"of kindliness, sagacity.

"The nose itself,
a prominent organ,

"stands out from the face

"with an inquiring, anxious air,

"as though it were sniffing

"for some good thing
in the wind.

"The eyes--dark, full, and
deeply set-- are penetrating,

"but full of an expression

which almost amounts
to tenderness."

William Russell,
the London times.

Two days after
Jefferson Davis left home,

Abraham Lincoln set out
from Springfield, Illinois,

for his capital.

"Here I have lived
a quarter of a century

"and passed from a young
to an old man.

"Here my children have been born

"and one is buried.

"I now leave, not knowing when

"or whether ever I may return,

"with the task before me
greater than that

"which rested upon Washington.

"Without the assistance
of that divine being

"who ever attended him,
I cannot succeed.

"With that assistance,
I cannot fail.

"To his care commending you,

"as I hope in your prayers

"you will commend me,

I bid you an
affectionate farewell."

En route to Washington,

the president's train
stopped at Cleveland,

buffalo, Albany, and New York.

In Philadelphia,
warned of plots to kill him,

Lincoln declared he would
rather be assassinated

than see a single star removed
from the American flag.

Two days later,

he reluctantly canceled plans

for a grand arrival
in Washington

and slipped into the capital
by train at dawn,

wrapped in a shawl

and protected
by two armed guards.

Inauguration day in Washington

was cloudy and cold.

A large, tense crowd gathered

beneath the unfinished dome.

Cannon guarded
the capitol grounds.

Sharpshooters lined the roof.

Lincoln promised not
to interfere with slavery,

but he denied the right
of any state to secede,

vowed to defend
federal installations,

and spoke directly to the south.

"In your hands,
my dissatisfied countrymen,

"and not in mine,

"is the momentous issue
of civil war.

"The government
will not assail you.

"You can have no conflict

"without being
yourselves the aggressors.

"We are not enemies,
but friends.

"We must not be enemies.

"Though passion
may have strained,

"it must not break
our bonds of affection.

"The mystic chords of memory,

"stretching
from every battlefield

"and patriot grave

"to every living heart
and hearthstone

"all over this broad land,

"will yet swell the chorus
of the union,

"when again touched,
as surely they will be,

by the better angels
of our nature."

"I do not pretend
to go to sleep.

"How can I?

"If Anderson does not
accept terms at 4:00,

"the orders are he
shall be fired upon.

"I count 4--
St. Michael chimes.

I begin to hope."

"The heavy booming
of a Cannon--

"I sprang out of bed and
on my knees, prostrate,

I prayed as I have
never prayed before."

The civil war began
at 4:30 A.M.

On the 12th of April, 1861.

General Pierre Gustave
Toutant Beauregard

ordered his confederate gunners

to open fire on fort Sumter,

at that hour, only a dark shape

out in Charleston harbor.

Confederate commander
Beauregard was a gunner,

so skilled as an artillery
student at west point

that his instructor kept him on

as an assistant
for another year.

That instructor
was major Robert Anderson,

union commander
inside fort Sumter.

"all the pent-up hatred
of the past months

"and years is voiced
in the thunder

"of these Cannon.

"And the people seem
almost beside themselves

"in the exultation of a freedom

they deem already won."

The signal to fire
the first shot

was given by a civilian,
Edmund Ruffin,

a virginia farmer and editor

who had preached
secession for 20 years.

"Of course," he said,

"I was delighted
to perform the service."

34 hours later,
a white flag over the fort

ended the bombardment.

The only casualty
had been a confederate horse.

It was a bloodless opening

to the bloodiest war
in American history.

"the first gun that
was fired at fort Sumter

"sounded the death knell
of slavery.

"They who fired it

"were the greatest
practical abolitionists

this nation
has produced."

"April 13.

"So civil war
is inaugurated at last.

God defend the right."

14 April.
Montgomery daily advertiser.

"The intelligence
that fort Sumter

"has surrendered to the
confederate forces yesterday

"sent a thrill of joy
to the heart

"of every true friend
of the south.

"The face of every
Southern man was brighter,

"his step lighter,
and his bearing prouder

than it had been
before."

In Boston,

jubilant volunteers
marched past Faneuil hall,

eager to avenge fort Sumter.

In Baltimore,

anti-Lincoln men
rampaged through the streets.

In Richmond, a mob
marched on the statehouse,

tore down the stars and stripes,

and raised the stars and bars.

There was no longer any doubt
that Virginia would secede.

And in New York,

100,000 people
crowded union square,

where the Sumter flag now flew.

Walt Whitman,

sometime poet and journalist
for the Brooklyn standard,

was stunned by the news.

"All the past

we leave behind
with Sumter," he said.

"Woe to those who began this war

if they were not
in bitter earnest."

Mary Chesnut.

"Father and I
were husking out corn

"when William Corry
came across the field.

"He was excited and said,

"Jonathan, the rebels have fired

"upon fort Sumter.

Father got white
and couldn't say a word."

Theodore F. Upson.

"April 15.
Events multiply.

"The president is out
with a proclamation

"calling for 75,000 volunteers.

"It is said 200,000 more
will be called

within a few days."

On the day Sumter fell,

the regular army
of the United States

consisted of fewer
than 17,000 men,

most of whom were stationed
in the far west.

Only two of its generals

had ever commanded
an army in the field,

and both were
long past their prime.

Winfield Scott,
the hero of the Mexican war,

"old fuss and feathers,"

was too fat
even to mount a horse.

"We was treated as good
as company could be

"at every station.

"We got kisses from the girls
at a good many places,

and we returned
the same to them."

Hercules Stanard.

"I've got the best
suit of clothes

I ever had
in my life."

In the north,
they came by hundreds

and by thousands...

From Boston, Massachusetts...

From Detroit
and Ann arbor, Michigan...

And Portsmouth, New Hampshire,
in the rain.

Whole towns signed up.

The 10th Michigan
volunteer infantry

was made up of flint boys.

Their commander was the mayor,

their regimental doctor,

the man who had been
taking care of them

since they were young.

The 6th New York contained
so many bowery toughs,

it was said a man had to
have done time in prison

just to get into the regiment.

The elite 7th,
on the other hand,

set out for Washington

with sandwiches from Delmonico's

and 1,000
velvet-covered camp stools

on which to sit and eat them.

On his way to war, lieutenant
George Armstrong Custer,

just 22 and less than
a month out of west point,

where he graduated
at the bottom of his class,

stopped in New York
to have himself fitted out

with a splendid new uniform...

Then went to a photographer.

In Pawtuxet, Rhode Island,

19-year-old
Elisha hunt Rhodes

left his job
as a harness maker's clerk

and signed on as a private

in the 2nd
Rhode Island volunteers.

He would have joined earlier,

but his widowed mother
begged him to stay home.

"We drilled all day and night.

"Standing before a long mirror,

"I put many hours of weary work

"and soon thought myself
quite a soldier.

"I was elected first sergeant,

"much to my surprise.

"Just what a first
sergeant's duties might be,

I had no idea."

After two weeks of drilling,

the 2nd Rhode Island moved out.

"Today we have orders to pack up

"and be ready to leave
for Washington.

"My knapsack was so heavy

"that I could scarcely
stagger under the load.

"At the wharf, an immense
crowd had gathered,

"and we went
on board our steamer

with mingled feelings
of joy and sorrow."

In Baton Rouge,

William Tecumseh Sherman
resigned as superintendent

of the Louisiana
military academy

and headed north.

"You politicians,"

he told his brother, senator
John Sherman of Ohio,

"have got things
in a hell of a fix,

"and you may get them out
as best you can.

I will have no more
to do with it."

But when Sumter fell,
he put his uniform back on

and reluctantly went to war.

"You might as well
attempt to put out

"the flames of a burning
house with a squirt gun.

"I think this
is to be a long war,

"very long,

much longer than any
politician thinks."

"There are
but two parties now--

"traitors and patriots--

and I want hereafter to be
ranked with the latter."

Ulysses S. Grant.

In galena, Illinois,

39-year-old
Ulysses S. Grant

was working
in his father's harness shop,

having failed
as a peacetime soldier

and considered by some a drunk.

Now he signed on
as a mustering officer,

handling the flood of volunteers

at $4.20 a day.

"new Orleans, 1861.

"I feel that I would like
to shoot a yankee,

"and yet I know that this
would not be in Harmony

with the spirit
of Christianity."

William Nugent.

"so impatient did I
become for starting

"that I felt like 1,000
pins were pricking me

"in every part of my body,

"and I started off

a week in advance
of my brothers."

"I found mobile boiling
over with enthusiasm.

"The young merchants
had dropped their ledgers

and were forming and drilling
companies by night and day."

"every day,
regiments marched by.

"Charleston is crowded
with soldiers.

"These new ones
are running in fairly.

"They fear the war will be over

"before they get sight
of the fun.

"Every man from every
little country precinct

wants a place
in the picture."

The confederate government,

its capital now in Richmond,

called for 100,000 volunteers.

So many southerners volunteered

that a third of them
had to be sent home.

They came from Catahoula

and Baton Rouge, Louisiana...

Greenville, Mississippi,

Moonsville, Alabama,

and Chattanooga, Tennessee.

Tennessee
joined the confederacy.

So did Arkansas
and north Carolina.

In Memphis,
Nathan Bedford Forrest,

a blacksmith's son who had
made himself a millionaire

selling land,
cotton, and slaves,

put up posters

calling on anyone
who wanted to kill Yankees

to come and ride with him.

The clinch rifles
from Augusta, Georgia,

started out in may 1861.

Only the drummer boy
would survive.

The odds against a Southern
victory were long.

There were nearly
21 million people

in the north,

just 9 million
in the confederacy,

and 4 million of them
were slaves,

whom their masters
did not dare arm.

The value of all
the manufactured goods

produced in
all the confederate states

added up to less than 1/4

of those produced
in New York state alone.

But none of this mattered

to the men who joined
the Tallapoosa thrashers

and Chickasaw Desperados

and Cherokee Lincoln killers.

"The histories of the lost cause

"are all written out
by big bugs--

"generals
and renowned historians.

"Well, I have as much
right as any man

to write a history."

Sam Watkins.

One of the first
to answer the Southern call

was 21-year-old Sam Watkins
of Columbia, Tennessee.

He joined company "H"

of the 1st Tennessee
at Nashville.

Like most rebel soldiers,
he owned no slaves.

"The bugle sounded
to strike tents

"and place everything
aboard the cars.

"We went bowling along
at 30 miles an hour

"as fast as steam could carry us.

"At every town and station,

"citizens and ladies were
waving their handkerchiefs

"and Hurrahing for Jeff Davis

"and the Southern confederacy.

"It's worth soldiering

to receive
such a welcome as this."

"If the president of the
United States would tell me

"that a great battle
was to be fought

"for the Liberty or
slavery of the country

"and asked my judgment

"as to the ability
of a commander,

"I would say with
my dying breath,

let it be
Robert E. Lee."

General winfield Scott.

"I can anticipate no greater
calamity for the country

"than a dissolution
of the union.

"It would be an accumulation

"of all the evils
we complain of.

"And I am willing to sacrifice
everything but honor

for its preservation."

Robert E. Lee.

The most promising
officer in the regular army

was Robert E. Lee
of Virginia.

On April 18,
4 days after Sumter,

Lee was summoned to Blair house

at Lincoln's behest

and offered field command
of the entire union army.

Lee said he would
think about it.

Virginia had voted to secede
the day before.

That night, he paced anxiously

in the gardens around
his Arlington mansion

across the Potomac.

At midnight, Saturday the 20th,

Lee wrote his letter

of resignation
from the United States army.

On the 21st,
the governor of Virginia

asked Lee to take command
of the state militia.

When Lee had to choose between
the nation and Virginia,

there was never any doubt about
what his choice would be.

He went with his state,
and he said,

"I can't draw my sword
against my native state,"

or, as he often said,
"my country."

Lincoln had lost
his best soldier.

"Not by one word or look

"can we detect any change

"in the demeanor
of the negro servants.

"They make no sign.

"Are they stupid?

"Or wiser than we are,

silent and strong,
biding their time?"

Mary Chesnut.

Both sides thought
it would be a 90-day war,

and both sides

agreed it was to be
a white man's fight.

Blacks who tried to sign up
were turned away.

"April 19.

"There has been a serious
disturbance in Baltimore.

"Regiments from Massachusetts

assailed by a mob that was
repulsed by shot and steel."

"It's a notable coincidence

"that the first blood
in this great struggle

"is drawn by Massachusetts men

on the anniversary
of Lexington."

"We are in Washington,
and what a city.

"Mud, pigs, negroes, palaces,
shanties everywhere.

"As we passed the white house,

"I had my first view
of Abraham Lincoln.

"He looks like
a good, honest man.

"And I trust that,
with god's help,

"he can bring our country

safely out
of its peril."

Elisha hunt Rhodes.

The Rhode islanders
set up their bunks

at the patent office.

New yorkers slept on the carpeted
floor of the house chamber.

Massachusetts men
camped in the rotunda

and cooked their bacon

on furnaces in the basement.

Overhead, the capitol dome
remained incomplete.

Despite the war,

Lincoln insisted
that the work go on.

"I take it as a sign," he said,

"that the union
will continue."

"the first thing
in the morning is drill.

"Then drill, then drill again.

"Then drill, drill, a little
more drill, then drill.

"Then lastly, drill.

"Between drills, we drill

"and sometimes stop
to eat a little

and have a roll call."

"Outskirts of Baltimore.
My dear William,

"I can now march
20 and 25 miles a day,

"live on short rations

"of hardtack, raw, rancid bacon,

"green roasting ears
and cold water,

"sleep out in the rain
and heavy dew

"with nothing but an
army coat over me,

and enjoy myself
capitally."

Edward Hastings Ripley.

Early in the war,

there was a confederate veteran,

a--a young country boy,
on guard duty.

He's walking his post
in the woods.

And there was an owl, uh, unknown
to him, in a tree nearby,

and the owl said,
"hooo."

And the boy, trembling
with fear, said,

"it's me, sir, John Albert,
a friend of yours."

In may, union troops crossed
the Potomac by torchlight

and took the heights
of Arlington.

Robert E. Lee's house
would be occupied

by union troops
for the rest of the war.

In late June, the new general

in charge of the union army,
Irvin McDowell,

outlined plans for attacking

the confederates in Virginia,

but he did not yet
want to fight.

"This is not an army,"
he warned the president.

"You are green, it is true,"
Lincoln answered,

"but they are green also.

You are all green alike."

To preserve the constitution,

Lincoln had for 3 months
gone beyond it--

waging war without
congressional consent,

seizing northern
telegraph offices,

suspending habeas corpus.

To keep the border states
from seceding,

Lincoln sent troops
to occupy Baltimore

and clapped the mayor
and 19 secessionist legislators

in jail without trial.

Chief justice Taney ruled
that the president

had exceeded his power.

Lincoln simply ignored him.

"More rogues than honest men

find shelter under
habeas corpus," he said

and even contemplated
arresting the chief justice.

A very mysterious man,

he's got so many sides to him.

The curious thing
about Lincoln to me,

uh, is that he could remove
himself from himself

as if he were looking
at himself.

It's a very strange,
very eerie thing,

uh, and highly intelligent.

Such a simple thing to say,

but, uh, Lincoln's been so smothered
with stories of his compassion,

that people forget what a
highly intelligent man he was,

and almost
everything he did--

almost everything he did
was calculated for effect.

"Teach the rebels and traitors

"that the price they are to pay

"for the attempt
to abolish this government

must be the abolition
of slavery."

Frederick Douglass.

From the start of the war,

slaves fled their plantations

for the union lines,

but Lincoln's policy was clear.

Despite pressure
from the abolitionists,

he insisted he was
making war on secession,

not slavery,

and ordered the army

to return fugitives
to their owners.

But now, an unlikely figure
helped to change men's minds.

General Benjamin Butler
was a Massachusetts politician

with crossed eyes
and mixed motives

who had once backed
Jefferson Davis

for president
of the United States.

"Returning slaves only
aided the enemy,"

Butler argued,

and he got permission
to hold fugitive slaves

as contraband of war

and employ them as laborers
in the union army.

"Major Cary of Virginia

"asked if I did not
feel myself bound

"by my constitutional
obligations

"to deliver up fugitives
under the fugitive slave act.

"To this I replied that
the fugitive slave act

"did not affect
a foreign country,

"which Virginia claimed to be,

"and she must reckon it one of
the infelicities of her position

that insofar, at least,
she was taken at her word."

General Benjamin Butler.

The trickle of runaways
coming into northern lines

now swelled to a flood.

One ex-slave who had
recently bought his freedom

told a union soldier,

"if I had known you gun men
was a-comin',

I'd have saved my money."

War was breaking out
all across the country.

There were engagements
at big Bethel, Virginia,

and Booneville, Missouri;

Skirmishes from Maryland
to new Mexico territory.

At Phillipi,
in western Virginia,

a young union general
George McClellan

won a small,
highly publicized victory

over a tiny confederate force.

But still, there had been
no decisive battle.

"July 9.
Our battle summer.

"May it be our first
and our last so called.

After all, we've not had any
of the horrors of war."

Mary Chesnut.

"July 16. It begins
to look warlike,

"and we shall probably
have a chance

"to pay our Southern brethren

"a visit upon the sacred soil

"of Virginia very soon.

"I hope we shall be successful

and give the rebels
a good pounding."

Elisha hunt Rhodes.

On July 16th,
the volunteer union army

of 37,000 men
marched into Virginia.

Their aim--to cut
the railroad at Manassas,

then move on at last
to Richmond.

Washington star.

"The scene from
the hills was grand.

"Regiment after regiment was
seen coming along the road

"and across the long bridge,

"their arms gleaming in the sun.

"Cheer after cheer was heard
as regiment greeted regiment.

"And with the martial music and sharp,
clear orders of commanding officers,

"it made a combination
of sounds very pleasant

to the ear
of a union man."

To stop the union invasion,

22,000 confederate troops

had moved north from Richmond

commanded by general Beauregard,

who knew in advance
the federals were coming.

Rose Greenhow,

a prominent socialite
in Washington

and a confederate spy,
had alerted him.

Now Beauregard
made his headquarters

in Wilmer McLean's farmhouse.

The confederates formed
a meandering 8-mile line

along one side
of bull run creek.

They were less than
25 miles from Washington,

and there they waited.

Hundreds of Washingtonians
in holiday mood

rode out to Manassas

hoping to see a real battle.

Some brought field glasses,

picnic baskets,
bottles of champagne.

"We saw carriages
which contained civilians

"who'd driven out from Washington
to witness the operations.

"A Connecticut boy said,
there's our senator,

"and some of our men recognized
other members of congress.

"We thought it wasn't a bad idea

"to have the great men
from Washington

come out to
see us thrash the rebs."

Private James Tinkham.

On the morning of the 21st,

McDowell sent his men
across bull run.

They smashed into the left side
of the confederate line,

driving the rebels from
one position after another.

The civilian onlookers

waved hats
and fluttered handkerchiefs.

It was not yet noon,

and all was going
just as they wanted.

"on reaching a clearing

"separated from our left
flank by a rail fence,

"we were saluted
by a volley of musketry

"which was fired so high

"that all the bullets
went over our heads.

"My first sensation
was astonishment

"at the peculiar
whir of the bullets,

"and that the regiment
immediately laid down

without waiting
for orders."

"We fired a volley and
saw the rebels running.

"The boys were saying
constantly in great glee,

"we've whipped them.

"We'll hang Jeff Davis
to a sour apple tree.

They're running.
The war's over."

An onlooker remembered
that the advancing union army

looked like a bristling monster

lifting himself
by a slow, wavy motion

up the laborious ascent.

Union victory seemed so sure

that on one part
of the battlefield

men stopped to gather souvenirs.

But holding a hill

at the center
of the Southern line

was a Virginia brigade led
by general Thomas Jackson.

While other Southern
commands wavered,

Jackson's held firm.

One confederate officer,

trying to rally
his own frightened men,

shouted, "look! There's Jackson
with his Virginians,

standing like
a stone wall."

The name stuck.

He had the strange combination

of religious fanaticism
and a glory in battle.

He--he loved battle.

His eyes would light up.

They called him old blue light

because of the way his eyes
would light up in battle.

He was totally fearless,

had no thought
whatsoever of--of danger

at any time
when the battle was on,

and he could define
what he wanted to do.

He said, "once you
get them running,

"you stay right on top of them.

"And that way a small force

can defeat a large one
every time."

He knew perfectly well that
a reputation for victory

would roll and build.

It was the turning point.

At 4:00, Beauregard
ordered a counterattack.

Jackson urged his men
to yell like furies.

The rebel yell
first heard that day

would echo
from 1,000 battlefields.

Confederate reinforcements
began to arrive.

The first came on horseback.

More arrived by train,
something new in war.

The northern army fell apart.

The retreat soon became a rout,

as union guns became entangled

with the carriages
of fleeing spectators.

"we tried to tell them
that there was no danger,

"called on them to stop,
implored them to stand.

"We called them cowards,

"put out our heavy revolvers
and threatened to shoot,

but all in vain."

"Along the shady little valley

"through which our road lay,

"the surgeons had been plying

"their vocation all the
morning upon the wounded.

"Tables about breast-high
had been erected,

"upon which screaming victims

"were having legs
and arms cut off.

"The surgeons and
their assistants,

"stripped to the waist

"and all bespattered with blood,

"stood around, some
holding the poor fellas,

"while others, armed with
long, bloody knives and saws,

"cut and sawed away

"with frightful rapidity,

"throwing the mangled
limbs on a pile nearby

as soon as removed."

Lieutenant colonel
W.W. Blackford,

the 1st cavalry, Virginia.

"What a horrible
sight it was--

"here a man,

"grasping his gun firmly
in his hands, stone dead,

"several with distorted
features, all horribly dirty.

"Many were terribly wounded,
some with legs shot off,

"others with arms gone.

"Some so badly wounded

"they could not drag themselves
away, slowly bleeding to death.

"We stopped many times
to give some a drink,

"and soon saw enough
to satisfy us

with the horrors of war."

Lieutenant Josiah Favill.

"I struggled on, clinging to
my gun and cartridge box.

"Many times, I sat
down in the mud,

"determined to go no further

"and willing to die
and end my misery,

"but soon a friend would pass

"and urge me to make
another effort,

"and I would stagger
a mile further.

"At daylight, we could see

"the spires of Washington,

"and a welcome sight it was.

"The loss of the regiment
in this disastrous affair

was 93 killed,
wounded, or missing."

There is a--a--a congressman,
I believe from Alabama--

I've forgotten
where from--

who said there would be no war,

and he offered to wipe up all
the blood that would be shed,

uh, with a pocket handkerchief.

Uh, that--that was
his prediction.

I've always said,
someone could get a Ph.D.

By calculating how many pocket
handkerchiefs it would take

to wipe up all the blood
that was shed.

It would be
a lot of handkerchiefs.

From the confederate
white house in Richmond,

Jefferson Davis rejoiced.

"My fellow citizens,

"your little army,

"derided for its want of arms,

"derided for its lack

"of all the essential
material of war,

"has met the grand
army of the enemy,

"routed it at every point,

"and it now flies
inglorious in retreat

"before our victorious columns.

"We have taught them a lesson

in their invasion of the
sacred soil of Virginia."

"Today will be known
as black Monday.

"We are utterly
and disgracefully

routed, beaten,
whipped by secessionists."

George Templeton strong.

London times.

"The inmates of the white house

"are in a state
of utmost trepidation

"and Mr. Lincoln
in despair.

"Why Beauregard does not
attack Washington,

I know not,
nor can I well guess."

It was remembered
as the great skedaddle.

For days, discouraged troops

straggled back into Washington.

"I saw a steady stream of men,

"covered with mud,
soaked through with rain,

"who were pouring irregularly up
pennsylvania avenue toward the capitol.

"A dense stream of vapor
Rose from the multitude.

"I asked a pale young man

"who looked exhausted to death

"whether the whole army
had been defeated.

"That's more
than I know, he said.

"I know I'm going home.

I've had enough of fighting
to last my lifetime."

The north was appalled
at the 5,000 casualties.

Both sides now knew

it would be no 90 days' war.

Two days later,
canny real estate speculators

bought up the battlefield

to make a second kind
of killing--

as a tourist attraction.

"What upon earth is the matter
with the American people?

"Do they really covet
the world's ridicule

"as well as their own
social and political ruin?

"The national edifice
is on fire.

"Every man who can
carry a bucket of water

"or remove a brick is wanted.

"Yet government leaders
persistently refuse

"to receive
as soldiers the slaves,

"the very class of men
which has a deeper interest

"in the defeat and humiliation

"of the rebels than all others.

"Such is the pride,

the stupid prejudice, and
folly that rules the hour."

Frederick Douglass.

"Little did I conceive

"of the greatness of the defeat,

"the magnitude of the disaster

"which had entailed
upon the United States.

"So short-lived has been
the American union

"that men who saw it rise

may live
to see it fall."

William Russell, London times.

"Washington. August.

"I found no preparations
whatever for defense.

"Not a regiment
was properly encamped,

"not a single Avenue
or approach guarded.

"All was chaos, and the
streets, hotels, and barrooms

"were filled
with drunken officers

"and men absent from their
regiments without leave.

Perfect pandemonium."

George McClellan.

5 days after
the disaster at bull run,

a new general took over what was now
called the army of the Potomac.

George Brinton McClellan,
only 34,

seemed just
what the north needed.

He brought with him
to the demoralized capital

what one aide called

"an indescribable air
of success."

He replaced inept officers
with regulars.

He laid out tidy camps
around Washington

to accommodate
the 10,000 new volunteers

arriving each week,

drilled them 8 hours a day,

and staged grand reviews
to boost morale.

"All the attention
was upon the young general

"with the calm eye,
with the satisfied air,

"who moved around
followed by an immense staff

"to the clanking of sabers

and the acclamation
of the spectators."

Regis de Trobiand.

"I find myself in a new and
strange position here--

"president, cabinet,
general Scott,

"and all deferring to me.

"By some strange piece of magic,

"I seem to have become
the power of the land.

"I almost think
that were I to win

"some small success now,

"I could become dictator,

"or anything else
that might please me.

"But nothing of that
kind would please me.

"Therefore, I won't
be a dictator.

Admirable
self-denial."

The newspapers called
him young Napoleon,

and he could not help seeing
the resemblance himself.

But 100,000 untrained volunteers

had become an army,

McClellan's army.

His men, who loved him

for having made them
proud of themselves,

called him little Mac.

His specialty is
preparing troops to fight,

and he did that superbly.

McClellan trained that army.

Whatever the army of the Potomac
did in the after years,

it is largely due to the
training McClellan gave them

in that first year.

With Lincoln,
McClellan and his staff

devised a 3-pronged attack
on the confederacy.

One army would
drive into Virginia

and take Richmond.

Another would secure
Kentucky and Tennessee,

then push into the heartland
of the confederacy

and occupy Mississippi,
Alabama, and Georgia.

Meanwhile, the Navy would
clear the Mississippi,

surround the confederacy by sea,

and choke off supplies.

The war would be fought
along a 1,000-mile front.

That fall,
Lincoln elevated McClellan

to general in chief,

replacing the aging
winfield Scott.

"I can do it all,"
McClellan said.

But he did nothing.

As summer turned to Autumn,

it became increasingly clear

that having made
a magnificent army,

George McClellan had
no immediate plans

to lead it anywhere.

"As we approached
the brow of the hill,

"my heart kept getting
higher and higher,

"until it felt to me
it was in my throat.

"I would have given
anything then

"to have been back in Illinois,

"but I kept right on.

"When the valley below
was in full view, I halted.

"The enemy's troops were gone.

"My heart resumed its place,

"and it occurred to me at once

"that he had been
as much afraid of me

"as I of him.

"This was a view of the question
I had never taken before,

but it was one
I never forgot afterwards."

General Ulysses S. Grant.

In September,
Ulysses S. Grant

took Paducah, Kentucky,

a strategic city
at the mouth of the Tennessee,

but two months later,
his undisciplined recruits

were almost destroyed

looting a captured rebel camp

instead of preparing
for a counterattack.

Grant was returned to desk duty.

In November,
William Tecumseh Sherman

was relieved as
union commander in Kentucky

when he insisted that at least
200,000 men would be needed

to suppress the rebellion
in the west.

No one believed him.

He grew melancholic,

prone to fits
of anxiety and rage.

"Sherman," McClellan said,
"is gone in the head."

December found him at home
in the care of his wife,

contemplating suicide.

No. no one thought
it would last long.

No one on either side
thought it would last long.

Those few individuals
who said that it would,

Tecumseh Sherman, for instance,

were actually judged
to be insane

for making predictions about
casualties, which were actually low.

In November, a union warship

stopped a British steamer
at gunpoint

in international waters

and arrested two confederate
diplomats found on board.

Britain's prime minister,
lord Palmerston,

was outraged, demanded
their immediate release,

and dispatched
11,000 troops to Canada.

"One war at a time,"
Lincoln said,

and quietly let
the two confederates go.

By December,

optimists on both sides
were disappointed.

The confederacy showed
no signs of imminent collapse.

The north would not
abandon its efforts

to reunite the nation by force.

By the end of the year,

there were 700,000 men
in the union army.

No one knew how many
confederates there were.

"December 31st.

"Poor old 1861 just going.

"It has been a gloomy year
of trouble and disaster.

"I should be glad
of its departure

were it not that 1862
is likely to be no better."

George Templeton strong.

A week before
the battle of bull run,

Sullivan Ballou,

a major in the 2nd
Rhode Island volunteers,

wrote home to his wife
in Smithfield.

"July 14, 1861.
Washington, D.C.

"Dear Sarah,

"the indications are very strong

"that we shall move in a few
days, perhaps tomorrow,

"and lest I should not
be able to write you again,

"I feel impelled
to write a few lines

"that may fall under your
eye when I'm no more.

"I have no misgivings about
or lack of confidence

"in the cause in which
I am engaged,

"and my courage
does not halt or falter.

"I know how
American civilization

"now leans upon the triumph
of the government,

"and how great a debt we owe

"to those who went before us

"through the blood and
suffering of the revolution,

"and I am willing,
perfectly willing,

"to lay down all my joys
in this life

"to help maintain
this government

"and to pay that debt.

"Sarah, my love for you
is deathless.

"It seems to bind me
with mighty cables

"that nothing but
omnipotence can break,

"and yet my love of country

"comes over me
like a strong wind

"and bears me irresistibly with all
those chains to the battlefield.

"The memory of all the blissful
moments I have enjoyed with you

"come crowding over me,

"and I feel most deeply
grateful to god and you

"that I've enjoyed them
for so long.

"And how hard it is
for me to give them up

"and burn to ashes
the hopes of future years,

"when, god willing, we might still
have lived and loved together,

"and see our boys grown up to
honorable manhood around us.

"If I do not return,
my dear Sarah,

"never forget
how much I loved you,

"nor that when my last breath
escapes me on the battlefield,

"it will whisper your name.

"Forgive my many faults

"and the many pains
I have caused you,

how thoughtless, how foolish
I have sometimes been."

"But, oh, Sarah,

"if the dead can
come back to this earth

"and flit unseen
around those they love,

"I shall always be with you

"in the brightest day
and the darkest night.

"Always.

Always."

"And when the soft breeze
fans your cheek,

"it shall be my breath.

"Or the cool air
at your throbbing temple,

it shall be
my spirit passing by."

"Sarah, do not mourn me dead.

"Think I am gone

"and wait for me,

for we shall meet again."

Sullivan Ballou
was killed a week later

at the first battle of bull run.

Corporate
funding for this special 25th

anniversary presentation of
the civil war was provided by.

Before thousands
fell on the battlefield,

before millions were
freed and before a country

forged its identity...
A nation declared a new

birth of freedom,
rededicating itself to the

proposition that all
men are created equal.

Bank of America is proud
to sponsor "the civil war,"

a film by Ken burns,

newly restored for
it's 25th anniversary.

Original
production of "the civil war"

was made possible by
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from these funders.

And by the corporation
for public broadcasting.

And by contributions
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