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I confess my thoughts weren't completely worked through, but solid staff work before the battle would have included a variety of contingency plans, one of which would have included a scenario where the Union line burst and the troops streamed back to DC. The occasional similarities of uniforms could only have aided in this. It would have to have been an audacious plan, and one totally outside the bounds of conventional 19th century thinking, presumably drawing on spies, sympathizers, and with slight chance of success.
So back on topic - the confusion & chaos cracked the door open for a complete CS victory on the evening of the 21st and the early morning hours of the 22nd. By late afternoon on the 22nd it was closed for good, IMO.
Obviously foreign support would have made a big impact on the South and in fact just greater resources in general. Lee obviously needs no introduction as a fantastic general and by looking at what he accomplised even with a numerical disadvantage just consider the damage he could've done with more men.
In retrospect, the South couldn't win the war. By 1863, it couldn't even get a tie, because it never again controlled certain important territory which it claimed.
By 1863, the Confederacy could not longer be a nation of 13 states. We might argue over the possiblility of six or seven states, but I think the dye was set on much less than 13 Confederate States.
When we see argument over Confederacy chances it is total victory, never a consideration of partial victory.
I would say that a Confederacy with six or seven states could never sustain slavery, and slaves would greatly decrease in value, after the war.
I doubt any of the Confederate founding fathers ever considered how many states it really needed, in its slave holding confederacy, to sustain slavery.
and then only part of Virginia. Most of the western counties of Virginia were lost early in the war.
The South could never hold any ground, permanently that bordered within 100 miles of the Ohio, Missouri, and Mississippi Rivers for long. So how could it ever win a complete victory?
Lee held out until 1865, but Kentucky, Missouri, western Tennessee, Arkansas and most of Louisiana and Mississippi were lost by 1862 and 1863. If the Confederacy lasted as a nation, it would have been much smaller than the 13 states in its Confederate battle flag. How could anyone consider that a possibility for victory?
In most part, the Confederacy did not exist as a whole nation after mid-1863. Texas and western Louisiana were isolated. How would slavery continue to exist under such concentration to the many fewer states.
The Confederate States no longer existed in the months prior to Appomattox. Strategically, defeat had come in too many states for the Confederacy to survive after 1864.
The Army of Northern Virginia, existed in part, into 1865. But defeat had come to too many Confederate areas, for the Confederacy to even have a small victory.
I think that the key to the South winning the war hinged on impactful victories in 1863 that would have helped to sway public opinion and result in a different outcome for the 1864 presidential election. An election result that might have more readily negotiated a peace. The South's objective of wearing down the resolve of their opponent and forcing an end to the war was not going to be acheived with Lincoln in office. With a new term in office as President, their fate was virtually sealed. The South did not have the resources in equipment and manpower to go on the offensive and decisively defeat northern armies AND hold that territory won. As long as Lincoln was willing to pick the AoP back up, dust it off, and send it back into the fight with replacements and equipment it was only a matter of time. The North could well afford that kind of grind provided they had a leader with resolve to make it happen.
I think that the key to the South winning the war hinged on impactful victories in 1863 that would have helped to sway public opinion and result in a different outcome for the 1864 presidential election. An election result that might have more readily negotiated a peace. The South's objective of wearing down the resolve of their opponent and forcing an end to the war was not going to be acheived with Lincoln in office. With a new term in office as President, their fate was virtually sealed. The South did not have the resources in equipment and manpower to go on the offensive and decisively defeat northern armies AND hold that territory won. As long as Lincoln was willing to pick the AoP back up, dust it off, and send it back into the fight with replacements and equipment it was only a matter of time. The North could well afford that kind of grind provided they had a leader with resolve to make it happen.
The best chance for the Confederacy to actually "win" the war was in September of 1862. Lee is invading Maryland; Bragg and Kirby Smith are invading Kentucky; the British are actually willing to consider offering to mediate a peace settlement.
Lee's campaign ended -- if not in disaster -- in disappointment and retreat. But if McClellan does not receive the famous "lost order" by luck, Lee will not be brought to bay at Antietam. McClellan will continue at his cautious approach; Jackson will take Harpers Ferry with time to spare and rejoin Lee. What happens then is unknown, but clearly Lee will be stronger and better positioned to meet McClellan.
Bragg and Smith managed a brilliant outflanking maneuver, forcing Buell back hundreds of miles. But once they got there, they seemed unable to co-operate and appear to have had no real plan for continuing the operation. Smith stayed away from Bragg, pursuing the Union force withdrawing from Cumberland Gap. The forces that were supposed to join them in KY failed (Price and Van Dorn losing bloodily at Iuka and Corinth, Breckinridge detained by others on the way from LA). Then Bragg blundered into near-disaster at Perryville and had no choice but to retreat out of the state.
But if one or both of those campaigns turn out better -- if Lee smacks McClellan around and stays north of the Potomac, if Bragg manages a victory over Buell in KY -- then the war will look very bad to the Union. Maybe it will look bad enough for the British and French to wiggle their way in and suggest mediation. There was never a moment after this that was as likely to offer the Confederates a chance to "win".
On Lincoln, the situation would have been different. The Fall 1862 elections went badly for the Republicans as it was. If Lee was north of the Potomac and Bragg's Confederates were on the banks of the Ohio, the Democrats might have done even better.
But that didn't happen.
Tim
__________________ "Let us, then, consider all attempts to weaken this Union, by maintaining that each state is separately and individually independent, as a species of political heresy, which can never benefit us, but may bring on us the most serious distresses."
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney of South Carolina, 1740-1824, Revolutionary War soldier, one of the authors of the US Constitution in 1787, speaking at the South Carolina Ratifying Convention in 1788.
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