L. Emancipation Proclamation

Antietam was also the signal for a major shift in Union policy. From the beginning of the war, President Lincoln had insisted that his primary aim was the restoration of the Union, not the abolition of slavery. As the war continued, however, Lincoln saw that the preservation of the Union depended, in part, on the destruction of slavery. The Lincoln Administration believed that if they made the abolition of slavery a war aim, they could stop Britain or France from recognizing the Confederacy. Both Britain and France had long since abolished slavery and would not support a country fighting a war to defend it. Furthermore, emancipation might allow the North to undercut the South's war effort, which was supported by slave labor.

Emancipation would also clarify the status of slaves who were running away to the Union lines. These black people were refugees and later soldiers in the Union Army. This activity, called self-emancipation, presented a problem to the Union Army. Were these black people free, or enslaved? Should they be returned to their Southern masters under the fugitive slave laws? Some military leaders had already tried to deal with this dilemma. Benjamin F. Butler, a Northern general stationed in Virginia, claimed that he would not return slaves to their masters because they were property, and in war time, the enemy's property can be seized. The Lincoln Administration agreed with Butler's policy.

In addition, public opinion in the North had begun to favor abolition, and Congress, no longer needing to be concerned about the Southern states, had started passing legislation to end slavery. In 1862 Congress abolished slavery in the District of Columbia and prohibited slavery in the territories.

On July 22, 1862, Lincoln had informed his Cabinet that he intended to free the slaves in states that were in active rebellion. However, they had persuaded him to wait until a Northern victory because it would seem less like a desperate measure. Antietam served that purpose. Five days afterward, on September 22, Lincoln issued the first, or preliminary, Emancipation Proclamation. The final proclamation, issued on January 1, 1863, freed the slaves only in the states that had rebelled: Arkansas, Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and parts of Louisiana and Virginia.

The president issued the proclamation under the powers granted during war to seize the enemies' property. Lincoln only had the authority to end slavery in the Confederate states, and then the slaves were freed only as the Union armies made their way throughout the South.In the states that remained loyal to the Union slavery was protected by the Constitution. Slavery was only completely abolished throughout the United States by the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, which was ratified in 1865.

M. The Battle of Perryville

In August and September 1862, on the western front, the Confederate army invaded Kentucky. Although Kentucky was a slave state, it had not seceded from the Union. The people of Kentucky were divided over the issue of the war, and Kentucky recruits joined both the Confederate and the Union forces. When General Braxton Bragg, who was in charge of the Army of Tennessee, and Major General Edmund Kirby Smith decided to move into Kentucky, they split their forces and headed north from Chattanooga, Tennessee. The Union forces in Kentucky were under the command of Major General Don Carlos Buell. The armies met at the Battle of Perryville on October 8, 1862. The battle was marked by confusion on both sides and did not produce a clear victory, but the Confederates retreated.

N. Fredericksburg

After the Battle of Antietam, McClellan refused to take the offensive against Lee's army. His patience at an end, Lincoln relieved McClellan, this time permanently. The command of the Army of the Potomac was given to Ambrose E. Burnside. On December 13, 1862, Burnside's troops engaged the Army of Northern Virginia, placed in strong defensive positions on the hills near Fredericksburg, Virginia, south of the Rappahannock River. The result was a slaughter. Union losses in killed, wounded, and missing amounted to 12,600, as opposed to Confederate losses of 5300. In January 1863 Lincoln relieved Burnside and put General Joseph Hooker in command of the army.

O. Murfreesboro, or Stones River

Two weeks after Fredericksburg, the western front was the scene of an even bloodier battle. On December 31, 1862, General William S. Rosecrans, commanding the Union Army of the Cumberland, and General Braxton Bragg, leading the Confederate Army of Tennessee, engaged each other at Murfreesboro, Tennessee, 47 km (29 mi) southeast of Nashville. After three days of fighting, in which the two armies lost nearly 25,000 of the 76,000 men engaged, Bragg withdrew from the field, but he left the Army of the Cumberland too badly hurt to resume operations for several months.

P. Naval Warfare

At the beginning of the war the Union blockade of Southern ports was not effective, because the North lacked ships to make it so. Blockade-runners, mainly British, made fortunes by landing cargoes of munitions and scarce goods at Southern ports. The Union, however, soon converted all kinds of seagoing craft to armed blockaders and began tightening the net. Armed forces closed a number of important ports. One federal expedition took Roanoke Island, North Carolina, on February 8, 1862. Another occupied New Bern, North Carolina, on March 14. A third expedition captured Beaufort, South Carolina, on April 11. Fort Pulaski, which guarded the approach to Savannah, Georgia, was taken by the Federals on the same day. At the end of 1862 the blockade was well on the way to strangling Southern commerce. In 1860, $191 million of cotton was exported, but the 1862 cotton exports amounted to only $4 million. In addition, the South had difficulty importing goods such as ammunition, shoes, and salt.

Although the Confederacy had no navy, it still found ways to cripple Northern commerce. In spite of its lack of shipyards, it managed to equip a number of ships for service at sea. It also ordered the construction or purchase of other ships in England. Over the protests of the Union government, three English-built ships, the Florida, the Alabama, and the Shenandoah, were delivered to Confederate naval officers and given the task of destroying the U.S. merchant fleet. These three raiders alone inflicted damage estimated at $16.6 million on Union shipping. The loss, while serious, was trivial in comparison to the effect of the Union blockade on the Southern economy.