The Role of Media in the American Civil War
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- 3.2.2.Lincoln re-elected
3.2. The Last Years of War3.2.1.The Battle of AtlantaAtlanta in 1864 was an important supply hub of Confederacy mainly owing to the Western and Atlantic railroad. By this time the Union troops were already deep in the South, marking the inevitable end of the war. In spring 1864 Union. Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman began a series of operations called “the Atlanta campaign” in order to take control over Georgia and subsequently continue to the Deep South. Sherman spent the spring 1864 pushing first gen. Johnson and after Johnson’s removal Gen. Hood, closer and closer to Atlanta. In spite of the Confederate’s victories in Resaca and New Hope Church, Sherman’s unceasing pressure on the Southern troops lead to the battle of Atlanta on July 22 1864. As the South was getting slowly on the verge of losing the war, Sherman let its citizens to feel “the hard hand of war”. People on both sides were frustrated by long years of fighting. On July 30 Harper’s Weekly published an article “Peace” analyzing the course of events had the war been shortened: The duration of the war and its cost in life and money incline some quiet souls, who would never consent to disunion, to ask whether we had not better try to find a shorter road to peace than fighting. But is there any such road? Suppose that the Government should order General Grant to send in a flag of truce and propose an armistice. What should follow? (482) Although even people in the North were tired of the war, the nation felt the victory coming. Only Lee’s army was now threatening the Union border in Virginia and Sherman was just a few steps to destroy the already outnumbered army of Tennessee. The Daily Intelligencer from Wheeling in Western Virginia, released news about the current troops to its readers counting the Confederate troops 106 000 men utmost and the Sherman’s army alone 170 000 men. (2) Not only the North hold superiority in the number of troops but also the country possessed considerably more resources as the blockade had influenced the South. On the other hand, the people in Confederate States kept on fighting desperately, although they sensed that their Cause would be probably lost in the end. The reporter of the Richmond Enquirer made an unusual confession in the article “The New Terms of Peace”: “We have been too proud and self-reliant and we have depended too much upon our Generals and not enough on Providence. It let us to believe that God would probably bless our cause and that under Stonewall Jackson, Lee, Bragg and Johnston commanding armies that could whip “five to one” (2). Although the battle of Atlanta took place in July 1864, the city itself did not fall under the Union control until September of the same year. The general despair in the South after the loss of Atlanta expressed Mary Boykin Chestnut in the Diary from Dixie: “Since Atlanta fell, I have felt as if all were dead within me forever” (436) 3.2.2.Lincoln re-electedTo hold election in wartime was an unprecedented event in 19th century. Still the current President Abraham Lincoln insisted on the necessity of regular election claiming: “We can not have free government without elections; and if the rebellion could force us to forego, or postpone a national election, it might fairly claim to have already conquered and ruined us” (641). Consequently, the United States announced Presidential elections on 8th November 1864. Against the republican President Lincoln, the Democrats nominated George B. McClellan, the former Union General of the Army of the Potomac. The Democrats proclaimed peace and called for foreseeable end of the war. However “As the armistice would be invoked without requiring the South to agree to come to the convention, the Democrats, whether they realized it or not, were paving the way for Confederate independence.” (Williams 119) The people tired of the war seemed to prefer McClellan’s peaceful platform, and besides according to “President Lincoln is re-elected”, many Northerners were strictly against Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation from 1862 that turned the war from one of reunion to a crusade to abolish slavery. However Lady Fortune smiled upon Lincoln and the Union started to win again. Finally, after the fall of Atlanta in September 1864, people in the North were determined to endure the war for a while and re-elected Abraham Lincoln President for the second time. The 19th century newspapers were far from being unbiased, thus as the elections were getting closer, both Republican and Democratic newspapers openly supported their candidates. As McClellan won in 3 voting states only – Delaware, Kentucky and New Jersey, the majority of northern newspapers celebrated Lincoln’s victory. On 9th November the National Republican commented on the elections in the article “The Grand Result”: “The people have nobly repudiated the traitors who sympathize with the Southern cravens who squeal about taxation and who would stop the war and allow the insurrection to triumph after so many better men than themselves have given their lives to the sacred cause, in order to save their paltry dimes.” The Republican went on with criticizing the Democrats for the indirect support of slavery and southern independence owing to the negotiations between “Northern copperheads and Southern traitors” (2). Not surprisingly the Democratic South backed up George McClellan, although the Northerners only were allowed to vote. The Houston Telegraph was concerned with Lincoln’s potential power as a re-elected President in the article “Old Abe – an Ugly Customer”: For our part, if we had the choosing of the President, it would be certainly McClellan. Old Abe has been and will continue to be an ugly customer. His re-election will be a national ratification of the most extreme war policy. His power will be absolute. Anything he has heretofore done, anything he may choose, he will feel himself authorized to do under the popular sanction of his acts. (1) On the contrary, a few southern newspapers saw a danger in McClellan’s election. For instance in the article “The Presidential Elections”, the Richmond Enquirer feared that McClellan’s ability to lead the Union army would put the Confederacy in danger of losing the war: “He [McClellan] would conduct the war strictly for military results, and on military principles, and therefore more formidably, and that the democratic party would become rapidly consolidated in the strenuous support of the war.” (1) Only five months after Lincoln’s re-election, the war came to an end as Gen. Lee surrendered at Appomattox in 1865.
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