US History: Writing To Learn
1862: Antietam and Emancipation
Name: ________________________________
Abraham Lincoln, while personally opposed to slavery did not champion emancipation of slaves at the
outset of the Civil War. His sole objective at that time was to restore the union.
As the war raged on in 1862, Lincoln knew that he needed bold action. On 7/22/1862, Lincoln read his bipartisan cabinet a copy of his Emancipation Proclamation, noting that he was not asking for their
approval, rather he was informing them of it, in case he decided to do it. This type of leadership was
typical of Lincoln. Only one man dared to speak against such an edict, secretary of War Edwin Stanton.
Stanton noted that the decree would be far more effective if it came on the heels of a major Union victory.
Victories had been few and far between for the disorientated Union forces.
While Lincoln held a copy of the Emancipation Proclamation in his desk, he endured an attack from a
northern newspaper man named Horace Greeley, a famed abolitionist. In the letter Greeley condemned
Lincoln for a lack of leadership for failing to emancipate the slaves. He cited social, economic, and
military reasons for doing so, in a very compelling public letter. Greeley’s August letter failed to push
Lincoln towards emancipation. Lincoln chose to wait for that major Union victory.
That victory would come in September of 1862.
The Battle of Antietam was the bloodiest day in American history with a staggering 23,000 casualties in
one day. Lincoln was reported to have promised God that if he could drive the rebels from Maryland he
would issue the proclamation. Three days after Antietam, Lincoln released the decree for Emancipation
of slaves in “states that were in rebellion”.
Questions to consider:
1. Did Lincoln wait too long to express his opinion on the issue of slavery?
2.
Do you find anything “strange” about the language Lincoln used in the Emancipation
Proclamation? If so, what and why?
3.
How did the Emancipation Proclamation change the focus of the Civil War?
Reviewer: _______________________ Comments below:
Primary Source Interpretation: Gettysburg Address
Name: _______________________________
As the nation approached its third Fourth of July in rebellion, the largest battle of the Civil War took
place in the small hamlet of Gettysburg, Pa. The two huge armies stumbled upon each other with very
different goals, the South with a hope of finding the rumored storehouse of shoes, an item in desperate
need by the Confederates. The North with a goal of securing this strategic location, as twelve roads met
at and around Gettysburg.
The first shot was fired by a young Illinois Lieutenant named Marcellus Jones. At the end of the three
day slaughter, nearly 50,000 casualties littered the grounds around Gettysburg, with 8,000 fatalities.
While it didn’t end the war, the event highlighted by Lee’s grand blunder ordering Pickett’s charge into
heavy Union fortifications, the end was clearly in sight. The Confederates were running out of resources
and men. Lincoln’s decision to replace General George Meade with Ulysses S. Grant signaled a new
strategy of total war that the South couldn’t respond to.
Lincoln was asked to attend a ceremony to commemorate a new cemetery on the grounds. Lincoln was to
be the keynote speaker. Famed orator Edward Everett spoke first, addressing the 15,000 people for over
two hours. Lincoln’s speech was shockingly short, yet marks one of the high points of American oratory.
Everett later noted “I should be glad, if I could flatter myself that I came as near to the central idea of the
occasion in two hours, as you did in two minutes!”
"Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in
liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil
war, testing whether that nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated can long endure. We are met
on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting-place for
those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should
do this. But in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. The
brave men, living and dead who struggled here have consecrated it far above our poor power to add or
detract. The world will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they
did here. It is for us the living rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought
here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining
before us--that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the
last full measure of devotion--that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain, that
this nation under God shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people,
for the people shall not perish from the earth."
1.
Consider the following:
How does he provide us a glimpse into the future of our nation and the role of citizens?
2.
What do you make of the fact that in the 278 words, he doesn’t use the word “I” or “Me”?
3.
How does Lincoln speak to the nature of the sacrifice that took place at Gettysburg?