[ml/nj]

A supply ship, the "Star of the West," tried to reach Fort Sumter on January 9

Yeah it was a supply ship all right! It was attempting to supply "250 United States troops."

Shots were fired, but it would be inconvenient for our historians now to consider these the first shots of the "Civil War" as the sending of this ship into Charleston harbor was clearly an act of war, and clearly something the North did. Better to say it all began with some other incident where the North could pretend to be blameless.

ML/NJ

[Non-Sequitur]

Shots were fired, but it would be inconvenient for our historians now to consider these the first shots of the "Civil War" as the sending of this ship into Charleston harbor was clearly an act of war, and clearly something the North did.

The inconvenience is that if you did claim that as the opening shots of the war then you couldn't blame it all on Lincoln. Where's the fun in that?