Civil War Military Strategies of North and South

Did you know that the first official battle of the civil war had spectators? That's right, Northerners actually traveled from Washington D.C., armed with picnic baskets, to watch the First Battle of Bull Run unfold. They expected a quick victory, as did Southerners, but instead they faced a sobering realization--the war was going to be much longer, and bloodier, than they had expected. Strategy was going to be key to a Northern or Southern victory.

Northern and Southern Advantages in the Civil War

When it came to military strategy, leaders of both the Union and the Confederacy needed to consider their respective advantages. We can get an idea of these advantages in the table below:

Interestingly, upon evaluation, both the North and the South believed they would earn a swift victory. The North was counting on its infrastructure, and the South believed several major victories would make the Union abandon the war effort altogether. But the First Battle of Bull Run made both sides realize the war was going to take longer than they thought and that they needed to re-evaluate strategy. It was a long and bloody battle that foreshadowed what was to come.

Union Military Strategy During the Civil War

At the beginning of the war, the explicit Northern goal was to unify the nation. Essentially, the North was fighting a war of attrition where they needed to overpower and outlast the South’s capabilities so that they would give up and return to the Union. Winfield Scott, an American military leader, suggested the Anaconda Plan to strangle the South into submission.

Northern Civil War Military Strategies: The Anaconda Plan

The Anaconda Plan was to create a naval blockade surrounding the entire South so that food and supplies could not get through. While the South was prepared to acquire supplies without the North, their plan was to turn to Europe. And without access to European trade, the South was left without much-needed supplies. The suspension of the cotton trade also left the South without necessary funding. This was detrimental enough, but eventually, the North also gained control of the Mississippi River, which essentially cut the South in half.

Fig. 1 - illustration of the Anaconda Plan

Northern Civil War Military Strategies: Lincoln’s Strategy at the Beginning of the War

As we noted above, at the beginning of the war, the goal was to preserve the Union, and President Abraham Lincoln did not have a particular interest in bringing an end to slavery. In fact, he believed such a move would alienate border states that still had slaves. Instead, he focused on the Anaconda Plan and cracked down on so-called copperheads that threatened the war effort.

Fig, 2 - Abraham Lincoln

Northern Civil War Military Strategies: The Shift in Lincoln’s Strategy

As the war carried on, it became clear to President Lincoln that Northern morale was falling rapidly, and draft riots were just one of the symptoms. In a strategic decision, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, which shifted the goal of the war to ending slavery and provided renewed vigor in the North.

Southern Civil War Military Strategy

While the North was going on the offensive, the South was on the defensive, trying to prevent the Union from encroaching on Confederate territory. While they began with the cordon defense which placed Confederate forces on the borders of Southern territory, they soon turned to an offensive-defensive method. Using the offensive-defensive method, they went on the offensive only when they were sure to be successful, such as when they overpowered Union troops in numbers

Overall, many of the strategies the South implemented did not have the desired results, and sometimes Southerners outright rejected strategies introduced by leaders before they could even implement them. We can take a look at the key examples in the table below:

Fig. 3 - Depiction of the USS Merrimack, the first iron-clad ship made by the Confederates

The Success of Northern Civil War Strategies

So, as you can see, Southerners’ actual desires often came into conflict with Southern military strategies and interests. While the Confederacy needed to unite and make sacrifices to win the war, the ever-present issue of states’ rights prevented leaders from taking decisive action (e.g., instituting an income tax or draft). The Confederacy continued to face severe food and supply shortages, and eventually, war weariness took its toll. The North had won its war of attrition, and Confederate forces surrendered.