A Brief History of the United StatesMcMaster, John Bach
History
A Brief History of the United States
McMaster, John Bach
United States -- History
[2] Read "The Third Day at Gettysburg" in Battles and Leaders of the Civil
War, Vol. III, pp. 369-385. The field of Gettysburg is now a national park
dotted with monuments erected in memory of the dead, and marking the
positions of the regiments and spots where desperate fighting occurred.
Near by is a national cemetery in which are interred several thousand
Union soldiers. Read President Lincoln's beautiful Gettysburg Address.
[3] With the exception of a small body of regulars, the Union armies were
composed of volunteers. When it became apparent that the war would not end
in a few months, Congress passed a Draft Act: whenever a congressional
district failed to furnish the required number of volunteers, the names of
able-bodied men not already in the army were to be put into a box, and
enough names to complete the number were to be drawn out by a blindfolded
man. In July, 1863, when this was done in New York city, a riot broke out
and for several days the city was mob-ruled. Negroes were killed, property
was destroyed, and the rioters were not put down till troops were sent by
the government.
[4] William Tecumseh Sherman was born in Ohio in 1820, graduated from West
Point, and served in the Seminole and Mexican wars. He became a banker in
San Francisco, then a lawyer in Kansas, in 1860 superintendent of a
military school in Louisiana, and then president of a street car company
in St. Louis. In 1861 he was appointed colonel in the regular army. He
fought at Bull Run, was made brigadier general of volunteers, and was
transferred to the West, where he rose rapidly. After the war, Grant was
made general of the army, and Sherman lieutenant general; and when Grant
became President, Sherman was promoted to the rank of general. He was
retired in 1884 and died in 1891 at New York.
[5] Joseph Eggleston Johnston was born in Virginia in 1807, graduated from
West Point, and served in the Black Hawk, Seminole, and Mexican wars. When
the Civil War opened, he joined the Confederacy, was made a major general,
and with Beauregard commanded at the first battle of Bull Run. Johnston
was next put in charge of the operations against McClellan (1862); but was
wounded at Fair Oaks and succeeded by Lee. In 1863 he was sent to relieve
Vicksburg, but failed. In 1864 he was put in command of Bragg's army after
its defeat, and so became opposed to Sherman.
[6] Early in October Hood had reached Dallas on his way to Tennessee. From
Dallas he sent a division to capture a garrison and depots at Allatoona,
commanded by General Corse. Sherman, who was following Hood, communicated
with Corse from the top of Kenesaw Mountain by signals; and Corse, though
greatly outnumbered, held the fort and drove off the enemy. On this
incident was founded the popular hymn _Hold the Fort, for I am Coming_.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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