February 1863–Was the Danville North Star a Copperhead?

April 2, 2013Posted inHistorical events
A Copperhead cartoon
A Cop­per­head cartoon

By Gary Far­row, Danville His­tor­i­cal Society

The North Star was not abo­li­tion­ist. Dur­ing the War, polit­i­cal posi­tions arose along a con­tin­u­um. On one end of the spec­trum were Rad­i­cal Abo­li­tion­ists, who saw slav­ery as a moral imper­a­tive that must tri­umph at all costs; on the oth­er were the Peace Democ­rats or Cop­per­heads, who want­ed peace with the Con­fed­er­ates at any price. In between were the War Democ­rats, who reject­ed the Cop­per­heads fac­tion that con­trolled the Demo­c­ra­t­ic Par­ty. These War Democ­rats joined with the Repub­li­cans to sup­port the war effort against the South. Lincoln’s Eman­ci­pa­tion Procla­ma­tion, which freed slaves in all rebel states, had just tak­en effect in Jan­u­ary. Now in Feb­ru­ary, the North Star became more explic­it about where it stood.

February 21,1863 North Star, What is Radicalism?

The abolitionist, Charles Sumner.
The abo­li­tion­ist, Charles Sumner.

Wen­dell Phillips defined Rad­i­cal­ism in a late speech at Ply­mouth Church, when he said: -“Now, I would accept any­thing on an anti­slav­ery basis. I would accept sep­a­ra­tion. I would accept com­pro­mise. I would accept peace, and pay the whole Con­fed­er­ate debt at par on an anti­slav­ery basis. On that basis, I have touched the hard path of Nation­al exis­tence. I have reached the gran­ite stra­ta, and may begin to build agrar­i­an peace. And until I reach that no chi­canery of par­ties, no inge­nu­ity of com­pro­mise, no man­ner of sep­a­ra­tion can make any dif­fer­ence. We are in for the war.”

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January 1863–Congress Looks Into Fredericksburg Amid Low Public Confidence

April 2, 2013Posted inHistorical events

By Gary Far­row, Danville His­tor­i­cal Society

The completed pontoon bridge necessary for troop movement into Fredericksburg .
The com­plet­ed pon­toon bridge nec­es­sary for troop move­ment into Fredericksburg .

The events of late fall — ear­ly win­ter had brought the North to a low point. Although the army expe­ri­enced some suc­cess in the West, the war in the Vir­ginia the­atre had seen one North­ern deba­cle after another.

iwadebe001p1
Ohio’s Ben Wade, chair of the Con­gres­sion­al Com­mit­tee look­ing into Fredericksburg.

The Con­gress’ Joint Com­mit­tee on the Con­duct of the War, which was estab­lished in 1861 and chaired by Ohio’s Ben Wade, was now look­ing into the loss at Fred­er­icks­burg. Over time the com­mit­tee had become iden­ti­fied with the Rad­i­cal Repub­li­cans, who were at odds with the admin­is­tra­tion over the lack of an aggres­sive war effort.

January 3, 1863 North Star, The Fredericksburg Disaster

The evi­dence in the report of the com­mit­tee for inves­ti­gat­ing the dis­as­ter of Fred­er­icks­burg fix­es def­i­nite­ly the respon­si­bil­i­ty for the con­se­quences of not cross­ing the Rap­pa­han­nock at once. It besides makes rev­e­la­tions that are painful and can­not fail to sink deep into the pub­lic mind.

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Dec 1862–A Resurrected Peninsula Campaign Suffers a Bloody Death

March 22, 2013Posted inHistorical events, Historical people, NSM articles, Uncategorized

By Gary Far­row, Danville His­tor­i­cal Society

With the armies expect­ed to shut down for the win­ter, Decem­ber was antic­i­pat­ed to be a qui­et month, but Lin­coln had oth­er ideas.

December 20, 1862 North Star–The War

The Bat­tle of Fredericksburg

Our war news this week is of the most excit­ing char­ac­ter — of a nature cal­cu­lat­ed to painful­ly inter­est the pub­lic. Great events have tran­spired at Fred­er­icks­burg. Again have the Union forces met the ene­my, have fought severe and bloody engage­ments, and again has that ene­my been found too strong­ly post­ed to be over­come… The pre­lim­i­nary shelling and occu­pa­tion of Fred­er­icks­burg by our troops appeared to be a suc­cess. So was the cross­ing of the Rap­pa­han­nock in the face and eyes of a dead­ly foe — that was one of the most dar­ing mil­i­tary exploits on record.

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Mapa-de-la-Batalla-de-Fredericksburg-Guerra-Civil-Estadounidense--13-Diciembre-1862The Fed­er­als were slaugh­tered. One of the most one-sided bat­tles of the Amer­i­can Civ­il War was fought by Gen­er­al Robert E. Lee’s Con­fed­er­ate Army of North Vir­ginia and the Army of the Potomac, now com­mand­ed Major Gen­er­al Ambrose E. Burn­side. It was waged over five mild days in mid-Decem­ber. The Union troops ini­tial­ly took Fred­er­icks­burg with only token resis­tance from the Grays. The city had been evac­u­at­ed pri­or to the com­mence­ment of seri­ous bom­bard­ment. The rebels wait­ed and for­ti­fied their posi­tions in the Marye’s Heights behind the town.

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Nov 1862–America’s Little Napoleon Meets His Waterloo

March 22, 2013Posted inHistorical events, Historical people, NSM articles, Uncategorized

By Gary Far­row, Danville His­tor­i­cal Society

November 15, 1862 North Star–Removal of Gen. McClellan

General George B McClellan, America's little Napoleon
Gen­er­al George B McClel­lan, Amer­i­ca’s lit­tle Napoleon

The lat­est mil­i­tary change is the removal of Gen. McClel­lan from the army of the Potomac, and the appoint­ment of Gen. Burn­side in his stead. The order was deliv­ered last week Fri­day night; and it took the army by sur­prise. He was relieved of his com­mand and ordered to report him­self at Tren­ton N.J., where his fam­i­ly now is. His last offi­cial act was the issu­ing of an address to his sol­diers inform­ing them in a few words that the com­mand had devolved on Gen. Burn­side and took affec­tion­ate leave of them. He imme­di­ate­ly depart­ed for Trenton.

This change will per­haps take many of our read­ers by sur­prise. It is claimed to have been a mil­i­tary neces­si­ty, which means we sup­pose that the best good of the army and its future suc­cess, required the change. If this is true, and the only motive for removal, no one should com­plain, for it is no worse for Gen. McClel­lan to be super­seded for these impor­tant rea­sons, than for many oth­er mil­i­tary offi­cers, who have shared the same fate.

Every­thing should yield to mil­i­tary suc­cess and fit­ness for the place, so far as army appoint­ments are con­cerned, not with­stand­ing many of these offices have been and still are, con­ferred as a mat­ter of favoritism, rather than mer­it. Gen McClel­lan, we have believed, to be an able Gen­er­al — a man of ster­ling per­son­al pro­bity, and unwa­ver­ing loy­al­ty. And while he has, as we believe tried to do his work con­sci­en­tious­ly and sure­ly, in meet­ing the ene­my in front, almost from first to last, he has had ene­mies in his rear, who have tried to thwart his plans and secure his down­fall. There have been polit­i­cal, if not per­son­al, plots and coun­ter­plots against him and although Pres­i­dent Lin­coln has not been engaged in them, but has always defend­ed and sus­tained McClel­lan, yet his oppo­nents have at last tri­umphed in his removal, and they are now glo­ri­fy­ing the change.

General Burnside replaced McClellan
Gen­er­al Burn­side replaced McClellan

We sin­cere­ly trust, that as a mil­i­tary mea­sure, the removal may prove high­ly ben­e­fi­cial to the Fed­er­al cause and that the gal­lant Gen­er­al Burn­side will secure speedy and bril­liant suc­cess, and that the noble McClel­lan, whether he entire­ly retires from mil­i­tary life or accepts some oth­er com­mand, will live long enough to over­come those polit­i­cal and envi­ous con­spir­a­tors who have been instru­men­tal in his removal.

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“Plots and coun­ter­plots” weren’t the half of it. As evi­denced by the Civ­il War itself, the Repub­lic was frag­ile, only some 85 years removed from the Amer­i­can Rev­o­lu­tion. Today the notion that our mil­i­tary exists to serve civ­il author­i­ty is a bedrock assump­tion; one hun­dred and fifty years ago with the nation com­ing apart at the seams, the bound­aries between civil­ian gov­ern­ment and the mil­i­tary weren’t so clear.

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Oct 1862–After Antietam, Lincoln Changes the Game

March 22, 2013Posted inHistorical events, Historical people, NSM articles

By Gary Far­row, Danville His­tor­i­cal Society

A vic­to­ry on the field of bat­tle gave Pres­i­dent Lin­coln oppor­tu­ni­ty to issue a doc­u­ment that would change the nature of the Civ­il War.

The Union victory at Antietam came at a high price.
The Union vic­to­ry at Anti­etam came at a high price.

Com­ing a few days after a nar­row Union vic­to­ry at the Bat­tle of Anti­etam, Lin­coln issued the Pre­lim­i­nary Eman­ci­pa­tion Procla­ma­tion on Sep­tem­ber 22, 1862. It declared “that all per­sons held as slaves” with­in rebel states as of Jan­u­ary 1, 1863 “are, and hence­for­ward shall be free.”

Pri­or to this point, the war had been about quelling the seces­sion of the South­ern states and pre­serv­ing the Union. Now this doc­u­ment, one of the great­est in human his­to­ry, casts the war in a new light. The Civ­il War became a moral con­flict about human freedom.

A bold gam­ble, the Procla­ma­tion also strength­ened the North mil­i­tar­i­ly and polit­i­cal­ly with the announce­ment of the accep­tance of black men into the Union Army and Navy. By the end of the war almost 200,000 black sol­diers and sailors served in the armed forces.

Lincoln and his cabinet at the first reading of the Emancipation Proclamation.
Lin­coln and his cab­i­net at the first read­ing of the Eman­ci­pa­tion Proclamation.

As can be seen by the North Star’s edi­to­r­i­al, the issuance of the Eman­ci­pa­tion Procla­ma­tion was by no means a clear call.

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Sep 1862–Lincoln’s Cockamamie Idea; Rebels at the Doorstep; the Constitution Takes a Beating

March 22, 2013Posted inHistorical events, Historical people, NSM articles, Uncategorized

By Gary Far­row, Danville VT His­tor­i­cal Society

slaveThe times were very bleak indeed for the North: the Pres­i­dent was flop­ping around on the race ques­tion; a shock­ing­ly swift mil­i­tary rever­sal had just occurred in the east; and the Fed­er­al gov­ern­ment was fight­ing with the judi­cia­ry here in Ver­mont. Mean­while, the Ninth Ver­mont suf­fered a rever­sal of fortune.

North Star–September 6, 1862

The President’s Colonization Scheme

Sen­a­tor S. C. Pomeroy of Kansas by request of the Pres­i­dent con­sent­ed to orga­nize emi­gra­tion par­ties of free col­ored per­sons for set­tle­ment in South Amer­i­ca and has been com­mis­sioned accord­ing­ly. This gentleman’s suc­cess in orga­niz­ing “Emi­grant Aid Expe­di­tions” from Mass­a­chu­setts for the pur­pose of get­ting con­trol of Kansas for the Free Soil­ers is looked upon as an encour­age­ment for the present scheme. The Gov­ern­ment pro­pos­es to send the emi­grants in good steamships and pro­vide them with all the nec­es­sary imple­ments of labor and also sus­te­nance until they gath­er a harvest.

Sen­a­tor Pomeroy’s address pro­pos­es to take with him on the first day of Octo­ber next, 100 col­ored men, as pio­neers in the move­ment with their fam­i­lies to Chirigui in New Grana­da [Nicaragua], if the place on exam­i­na­tion is found sat­is­fac­to­ry and promis­ing. He desires all per­sons of the African race, of sound health, who desire to go, to send him at Wash­ing­ton their names, sex, age, num­bers and post office address… He wants mechan­ics and labor­ers, earnest and sober men, for the inter­ests of a gen­er­a­tion, if may be, are involved in the suc­cess of this exper­i­ment, and with the appro­ba­tion of the Amer­i­can peo­ple and under the bless­ing of God it can­not fail.

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