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Fort Sumter and Confederate Diplomacy
Author(s): Ludwell H. Johnson
Source: The Journal of Southern History, Vol. 26, No. 4 (Nov., 1960), pp. 441-477
Published by: Southern Historical Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2204623 .
Accessed: 16/03/2014 04:02
A look at the diplomacy surrounding Fort Sumpter
'Charles W. Radsdell, Lincoln and Fort Sumter,"
Journal of Southern History,
III (August 1937), 259-88.
2Samuel Wylie Crawford,
The Genesis of the Civil War: The Story of Sumter,
1860-1861 (New York, 1887).
3John G. Nicolay and John Hay, Abraham Lincoln: A History (10 vols., New
York, 1890), III-IV.
Author(s): Ludwell H. Johnson
Source: The Journal of Southern History, Vol. 26, No. 4 (Nov., 1960), pp. 441-477
Published by: Southern Historical Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2204623 .
Accessed: 16/03/2014 04:02
A look at the diplomacy surrounding Fort Sumpter
THE DECISION OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN TO PROVISION FORT SUMTER and the decision of the Confederate government to attack it have been the focus of one of the more persistent controversies of Civil War history. Claims that the South fired the first shot and thus unnecessarily began a bloody conflict have been countered by accusations that the attempt to supply the fort was a hostile act, the spark that really touched off the explosion. The part Lincoln himself played in the Sumter affair has, to say the least, attracted much attention. The most devastating and provocative charge thus far made, one which the late Professor Charles W. Ramsdell was the first to put forward in a complete and scholarly manner, is that Lincoln deliberately provoked the Confederates into firing the first shot as the only possible way out of an otherwise insoluble political dilemma.' This allegation is especially controversial because it is felt by many to challenge, if not overthrow, the most widely accepted picture of Lincoln's character.
I think the more likely explanation is that Lincoln gave the choice of war or peace to Davis giving Davis the initiative and Davis chose war. Lincoln was in a bind, there was unanimity in the North on how to proceed and the legal path was uncertain. War simplifies the situation for Lincoln and for Davis.Preoccupation with the Lincoln side of the Sumter question has meant comparative neglect of the Confederate side. Writers have not taken the trouble to give a connected narrative of the Sumter negotiations as they were seen by the Montgomery government and its officials. Perhaps the fullest account is contained in Crawford's Genesis of the Civil War, but it is often unclear and sometimes inaccurate.2 Nicolay and Hay, in their massive biography of Lincoln, treat the subject at some length, but with venomous partisanship. And at best such works discuss it only as part of some larger story. Therefore a narrative confined to the diplomacy of Sumter as seen by the Confederate government should help to throw into sharper relief the reasons which led President Jefferson Davis and his cabinet to make that momentous choice which sent the first shell arching across Charleston Harbor.
Footnotes'Charles W. Radsdell, Lincoln and Fort Sumter,"
Journal of Southern History,
III (August 1937), 259-88.
2Samuel Wylie Crawford,
The Genesis of the Civil War: The Story of Sumter,
1860-1861 (New York, 1887).
3John G. Nicolay and John Hay, Abraham Lincoln: A History (10 vols., New
York, 1890), III-IV.