Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire The South secedes, why die to stop it?

I don't believe that more than a small percentage of the Union soldiers who served during the American Civil War fought to free slaves, they fought to preserve the Union and because they wanted to join their friends on the greatest adventure of their time. Soldiers fight for their friends, for their units, not for high ideals, but in an effort to survive the conflict. I've read dozens of letters that my ancestors sent home and not once was slavery mentioned.

I have long understood that that some unit of the South Carolina Militia fired the first shot of the American Civil War at Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861. Is that not correct?

I believe that Lincoln issued The Emancipation Proclamation for political and military reasons, to take the high moral ground and keep the European Empires of the UK and Russia from actively/openly supporting the CSA.

The fourth paragraph of Lincoln's First Inaugural Address clearly states his position on slavery; " I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so.". How much clearer could he have been?

Many folks seems to forget that when the question of secession arose during the Nullification Crisis of the late 1820's and early 1830's a slave owning POTUS, Andrew Jackson, said that he would preserve The Union by force is necessary and the crisis subsided. I guess that people felt that Old Hickory was likely to do what he said he'd do, while some of the same people didn't believe that Honest Abe would do what he said he'd do, preserve the Union, and not do, end slavery in the States where it existed.

See Proverbs 18:12