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Chapter 1 The Guns of War As chattering telegraphs relayed the news of the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter to towns, villages, and cities across the nation, many Americans, both North and South, seemed to welcome the news with a sense of relief. In retrospect , their reaction seems an odd way to greet the opening of what would be the bloodiest war in American history. But for those who had experienced crises that had threatened to rip the Republic apart for decades, the coming of war offered a long-awaited denouement that would finally settle issues fundamental to the future of the United States. While many welcomed a resolution to sectional conflict, little consensus existed about the meaning of the war in April 1861. Some white southerners saw the war as a necessary fight for independence, a requisite step to protect a distinctive southern way of life built on slavery. Like their Revolutionary forefathers, they viewed a war for independence as a last resort, instigated by years of mistreatment. Others rejected the overblown rhetoric of “fire eaters” and instead viewed the war simply as a defense of hearth and home, especially after Lincoln called for troops to quash the rebellion in the aftermath of the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter. Slaves, drawing on intricate networks of communication that kept many of them abreast of national developments, saw the war as the long-expected and divinely promised vehicle of their liberation. In the North, most citizens viewed the war as a defense of the Union against wretched traitors who would tear the young nation asunder by arrogantly proclaiming their independence. Abolitionists, on the other hand, while a distinct minority of the northern population, saw the war as a chance 12 The Guns of War to rid the nation of its most egregious sin—slavery. While they disagreed among themselves about how to achieve that goal, they, like slaves in the South, envisioned the end of slavery as the purpose of the war, imbuing the conflict with deep moral purpose and meaning. “The storm burst and the whole community awakened” News of events at Fort Sumter catalyzed Worcester County, Massachusetts, as it did the rest of the nation, setting off a frenzy of activities. Thomas Wentworth Higginson, radical abolitionist and minister of Worcester’s Free Church, remembered that “on the day that Fort Sumter was fired upon, the storm burst and the whole community awakened.” As local citizens read the first sketchy reports of the Confederate attack on the morning of 13 April 1861—and two days later learned of Lincoln’s call for 75,000 volunteers to suppress the rebellion—they quickly organized to show their support for the Union cause. Fort Sumter dominated the thoughts and actions of nearly all Worcesterites. The Worcester Daily Spy noted, “The subject is the one controlling , absorbing theme of conversation in all ranks and classes.”1 By the time of the Civil War, ranks and classes proliferated in the city of Worcester as well as in the towns that dotted the county. Situated on the central corridor running from Boston to the east and Springfield to the west, Worcester had emerged, in the words of historian John Brooke, “as a powerful vortex of population, commerce, and public culture, exerting an overwhelming influence on the surrounding region.” Worcester was for many years, as Brooke notes, “only one of a mosaic of towns of roughly equal size” that characterized Worcester County, even though it had been established as the shire town in 1730. But Worcester’s location, combined with its forward-looking town leaders , soon propelled it to the heart of the nation’s budding industrial revolution . Embracing advances in transportation, Worcester merchants forged a link with Providence, Rhode Island, by constructing the Blackstone Canal, which opened in 1828. Only seven years later, the Boston and Worcester Railroad , the first in the nation, accelerated the city’s growth. Other railroads soon followed, elevating Worcester to a regional railroad hub by the 1840s. Whereas many New England towns focused on one industry, particularly textiles, Worcester developed a variety of industries, ranging from textile and boot and shoe production to machinery production and wire works. In 1860, approximately 25,000 people resided in the city, its population exploding by nearly 18,000 in twenty years, as smaller towns in the county declined in population. On the eve of the Civil War, the city boasted 170 manufacturing [18.218.184.214] Project MUSE (2024-04-16 20:19 GMT...

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