Up till now both England and France had shown themselves ready to sympathise with the South. English newspapers abused Lincoln and the North in the most violent language. In the English dockyards vessels had been built and equipped which were used by the South as privateers to do great damage to the Northern navy. One of these was the famous _Alabama_. But when the war was a war against slavery, English feeling was all on the side of the North. The United States was made a really free country: slavery, which had made such a name a mockery, was wiped off the statute book. Lincoln showed rare judgment and courage in doing what he did at this time. At first a large section in the North was opposed to Emancipation, but gradually all united in admiring the wisdom of Lincoln’s action. The South knew that if they were conquered slavery was gone. And however black things might look, Lincoln and the North were not going to give in till they did conquer. They had set their teeth; they were going to fight to the bitter end. M’Clellan had been dismissed, but his successors were not much more successful. In December Burnside threw away thousands of lives in an attempt to scale Mary’s Heights. Men were shot down in heaps by the enemy, and the army fell into a panic; a battle against overwhelming odds ended in a complete defeat. Lincoln’s heart bled for the loss of so many splendid citizens: there was deep indignation in Washington, much of it vented against the President. The darkest moment of the war came when, in May, the news of the battle of Chancellorsville reached the Government. Hooker met Jackson: a long and fearfully bloody battle followed. There were dreadful losses on both sides: another valuable opportunity of pressing south was lost. In the battle “Stonewall” Jackson was killed, shot accidentally by his own men; a disastrous loss to the Southern side, though the North was defeated. All hope seemed gone from the North. Up till now the North had lost more than the South. It had suffered most of all from a lack of really able commanders. Now, however, Lincoln discovered a really great general in Ulysses S. Grant, and from this time on the fortune of the war began to change.