Maine.
This didn’t sit well with the Confederacy. Jefferson Davis even made a speech condemning the choice, at which point Johnson made an answering speech, inviting the Confederacy to re-join the Union and put up their own candidates. Neither side took it seriously, and tensions continued to grow as Johnson won an easy victory.
Things came to a head on April 14, 1865.
U PON BEGINNING HIS first elected term, Johnson cast about for some way to bolster the sagging economy, and finally he hit upon an across-the-board 20% increase on all tariffs applied to Confederacy imports. Davis responded with a total cessation of agricultural exports to the Union.
It’s difficult to say which side suffered more because of Johnson’s tactic. Both economies took major hits, the Confederacy’s more than the Union’s—but the Union had tremendous food shortages, and towns and cities suffered severe displacements of their populations as they were unable to supply the citizenry with essential foodstuffs.
It was on April 12 that South Carolina announced that it would be unable to pay its debts by the end of June, and Johnson felt his strategy was working. There was every possibility that South Carolina might return to the Union if the Union would guarantee its debts, and that might well start a stampede of secessionist states back to the stars and stripes.
Two days later, convinced he had hit upon the most effective strategy, Johnson celebrated by going out to Ford’s Theater to watch a performance of Our American Cousin.
A failed actor and Confederate sympathizer named John Wilkes Booth was waiting for him.
I T TOOK H ANNIBAL Hamlin exactly forty-three minutes after the assassination of President Johnson and four minutes after taking the oath of office to declare war on the Confederacy. His instructions to General McDowell were to pursue a symbolic victory at Fort Sumter “at any cost.”
He got his victory, the first of the Second Civil War. The cost was 8,300 men.
M C D OWELL WAS REPLACED in January of 1866. And his replacement was replaced. And so was his replacement. It made no difference. None of them were a match for Lee, and those few generals who might have been were no longer in the service.
The Union had a large advantage in manpower. The South had an advantage in its military leadership. Each side was certain that it held the high moral ground, and neither side was willing to toss in the towel.
1868 came and went, and so did 1872, and 1876, and soon it was the dawn of the Twentieth Century and the two sides, their resources and manpower horribly depleted, fought on. Over the years a number of men and women from both sides had had enough, crossed the Mississippi, and started forming their own nation to the west of the seemingly endless conflict.
The Second Civil War came to an end in 1911, when the Confederacy finally outlawed slavery, and after half a century the two nations, joined by their Western brethren, became one united country again, just in time for a nasty little disturbance that was brewing across the ocean in Europe.
CHARLOTTE
SARAH LOTZ
Sarah Lotz is a screenwriter and pulp fiction novelist with a fondness for the macabre and fake names. Among other things, she writes urban horror novels under the name SL Grey with South African author Louis Greenberg and a YA zombie series with her daughter, Savannah, under the name Lily Herne. She lives in Cape Town with her family and other animals.
E LLEN DOESN’T LIKE the look of the oblong crate her daughter is inching off the back of the truck. One of its sides is latched and hinged like a door, and why are there holes scored in its lid? “What’s in there, Zelda?”
“Patience, Ma,” Zelda huffs, thumping the crate onto the wheelbarrow and rolling her shoulders. “Ag. That’s bloody heavy.”
“It’s not a dog, is it?”
“You think I’d dare replace Zizu, Ma?”
Ellen pretends to pluck a piece of lint
This didn’t sit well with the Confederacy. Jefferson Davis even made a speech condemning the choice, at which point Johnson made an answering speech, inviting the Confederacy to re-join the Union and put up their own candidates. Neither side took it seriously, and tensions continued to grow as Johnson won an easy victory.
Things came to a head on April 14, 1865.
U PON BEGINNING HIS first elected term, Johnson cast about for some way to bolster the sagging economy, and finally he hit upon an across-the-board 20% increase on all tariffs applied to Confederacy imports. Davis responded with a total cessation of agricultural exports to the Union.
It’s difficult to say which side suffered more because of Johnson’s tactic. Both economies took major hits, the Confederacy’s more than the Union’s—but the Union had tremendous food shortages, and towns and cities suffered severe displacements of their populations as they were unable to supply the citizenry with essential foodstuffs.
It was on April 12 that South Carolina announced that it would be unable to pay its debts by the end of June, and Johnson felt his strategy was working. There was every possibility that South Carolina might return to the Union if the Union would guarantee its debts, and that might well start a stampede of secessionist states back to the stars and stripes.
Two days later, convinced he had hit upon the most effective strategy, Johnson celebrated by going out to Ford’s Theater to watch a performance of Our American Cousin.
A failed actor and Confederate sympathizer named John Wilkes Booth was waiting for him.
I T TOOK H ANNIBAL Hamlin exactly forty-three minutes after the assassination of President Johnson and four minutes after taking the oath of office to declare war on the Confederacy. His instructions to General McDowell were to pursue a symbolic victory at Fort Sumter “at any cost.”
He got his victory, the first of the Second Civil War. The cost was 8,300 men.
M C D OWELL WAS REPLACED in January of 1866. And his replacement was replaced. And so was his replacement. It made no difference. None of them were a match for Lee, and those few generals who might have been were no longer in the service.
The Union had a large advantage in manpower. The South had an advantage in its military leadership. Each side was certain that it held the high moral ground, and neither side was willing to toss in the towel.
1868 came and went, and so did 1872, and 1876, and soon it was the dawn of the Twentieth Century and the two sides, their resources and manpower horribly depleted, fought on. Over the years a number of men and women from both sides had had enough, crossed the Mississippi, and started forming their own nation to the west of the seemingly endless conflict.
The Second Civil War came to an end in 1911, when the Confederacy finally outlawed slavery, and after half a century the two nations, joined by their Western brethren, became one united country again, just in time for a nasty little disturbance that was brewing across the ocean in Europe.
CHARLOTTE
SARAH LOTZ
Sarah Lotz is a screenwriter and pulp fiction novelist with a fondness for the macabre and fake names. Among other things, she writes urban horror novels under the name SL Grey with South African author Louis Greenberg and a YA zombie series with her daughter, Savannah, under the name Lily Herne. She lives in Cape Town with her family and other animals.
E LLEN DOESN’T LIKE the look of the oblong crate her daughter is inching off the back of the truck. One of its sides is latched and hinged like a door, and why are there holes scored in its lid? “What’s in there, Zelda?”
“Patience, Ma,” Zelda huffs, thumping the crate onto the wheelbarrow and rolling her shoulders. “Ag. That’s bloody heavy.”
“It’s not a dog, is it?”
“You think I’d dare replace Zizu, Ma?”
Ellen pretends to pluck a piece of lint
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