[DiogenesLamp]

What happened matters more than what might have happened.

What I hear you saying here is that we should ignore the evidence that Lincoln did deliberately and with malice aforethought trigger a civil war that killed 750,000 people and destroyed billions of dollars worth of land, property and wealth because you think the outcome achieved was a good result.

Well I have a couple of issues with this approach, not the least of which is the damage caused to the inherent right of independence. Now most of the population do not believe that people can have self determination unless they have the power to fight and win a war with the larger part of the nation. The original consensual pact has become a Mafioso style coerced "family" which you can't leave.

As it was, instead of waiting for the surrender and evacuation of Fort Sumter due to lack of supplies on April 15 as promised by its Union commander, the Confederates fired on it on April 12 and began the Civil War.

Of course they did. Lincoln's *PUBLIC* orders were that when the flotilla was complete with all ships present, the Union Forces would attack and attempt to reinforce the fortress by force. No one knew about his secret order preventing their main battleship from showing up at the appointed time and place.

People expected that when the Powhatan arrived, the ships would began firing on the Confederate forces than surrounding the fort, and a man would have to be a d@mn fool to know that an attack is coming and be expected to just stand there and wait to be caught between the guns of the Fort and the guns of Naval Warships.

If the Confederates had waited for the Union Navy to arrive in force, the battle might also have included exchanges of fire between Confederate land artillery and Union vessels attempting to supply Fort Sumter. Yet, by Confederate choice, that is not what happened.

Yes they did. They believed the *PUBLIC* orders that Lincoln's navy had issued. They already knew the ships were ordered to attack them, and silly them, they thought that perhaps it would be best to not face both the Fortress guns and the Ship guns at the same time.

Lincoln had already taken a swing at them when he issued those orders. No one expected him to pull back his punch at the last moment. Lincoln was a clever fellow, wasn't he?

[Rockingham]

Your account beggars the question of why Jefferson Davis and the Confederate government did not accept a peaceful resupply of Fort Sumter, or, in the alternative, at least let the Union Navy fire the first shot.

As it is, Jefferson Davis does not even mention the Powhatan in his two volume published memoir and history of the Confederacy. He states the issue as being that the federal government had made clear that it would use force to resupply Fort Sumter. Any resupply being unacceptable to Davis and the Confederate cabinet, Beauregard was ordered to fire on Fort Sumter. And so the war began.

My point is that the Confederate government was wrong and foolish to initiate hostilities -- and especially so after insisting that they wanted a peaceful separation. In keeping with Davis's personality, his approach to the problem was carping and legalistic -- characteristics that helped to inspire errors and division in the Confederate government and deprive it of the clarity and focus on strategic goals that Lincoln demonstrated.

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "What I hear you saying here is that we should ignore the evidence that Lincoln did deliberately and with malice aforethought trigger a civil war that killed 750,000 people and destroyed billions of dollars worth of land, property and wealth because you think the outcome achieved was a good result."

As the old song says, our boxer FRiend DiogenesLamp only "hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest".

The facts of history are simple here:

1. In his February 1861 Inaugural address Jefferson Davis promised he would start war if he felt his "integrity" was "assailed".

2. In his March 1861 Inaugural address Abraham Lincoln promised he would not "assail" and therefore Confederates could not have war, unless they themselves started it.

In April Lincoln sent a resupply mission to Union troops in Fort Sumter, an act Davis regarded as "assailing" and so ordered Civil War to begin then & there.

Did Lincoln have other options?
Yes, he had hoped to bargain away Fort Sumter in exchange for Virginia's pledge not to succeed, but Virginians would make no such pledge.
What about surrender without a fight?
Not an option, just as US surrender of Guantanamo Naval Base today to Cubans is not an option.

Did Davis have other options?
Well, from Day One in December, South Carolina governor Pickens had demanded Fort Sumter's surrender, both to Major Anderson and later to Jefferson Davis.
So Confederate public opinion was growing increasingly agitated over Fort Sumter, and Davis could defy it only at his own political peril.
Possibly, Davis felt he had no choice in the matter, regardless of Secretary Toombs' warning.

But the bottom line is that in April 1861, Jefferson Davis did as he promised in February and Lincoln did as he promised in March.

Finally, even if you claim that somehow, some way, Davis was not responsible for starting Civil War, he was absolutely responsible for refusing to end it on any terms better than "Unconditional Surrender" of the Confederacy, and therefore for all the lives lost & disrupted as a result.

[BroJoeK]

DiogenesLamp: "Now most of the population do not believe that people can have self determination unless they have the power to fight and win a war with the larger part of the nation.
The original consensual pact has become a Mafioso style coerced "family" which you can't leave."

Except that, regardless of DiogenesLamp's fantasies, no Founder -- none, zero, nada -- no Founder ever proposed or advocated secession "at pleasure", meaning without either 1) mutual consent or 2) "a long train of abuses & usurpations".
They considered such disunion "at pleasure" nothing more than rebellion & treason.

DiogenesLamp: "Lincoln's *PUBLIC* orders were that when the flotilla was complete with all ships present, the Union Forces would attack and attempt to reinforce the fortress by force.
No one knew about his secret order preventing their main battleship from showing up at the appointed time and place."

I'd call that a "fog of war" defense, claiming Jefferson Davis was not responsible for ordering the Confederate assault on Fort Sumter because Davis was "confused" by inaccurate intelligence from his spies in Washington, DC, or by misunderstanding Lincoln's message to Governor Pickens.
But you may as well claim Japanese were "confused" into attacking Pearl Harbor, or First World War Germans "confused" into ordering unlimited submarine attacks on US shipping and offering Mexico a big chunk of the US Southwest.

So the problem with DiogenesLamp's "confused" argument is that Davis remained "confused" for the next four years, and indeed never did come to his senses until many years after his war was over, surrendered unconditionally.

DiogenesLamp: " They believed the *PUBLIC* orders that Lincoln's navy had issued."

It's certainly true that Union Secretary Seward told pro-Confederates Lincoln intended to withdraw from Fort Sumter, but I've seen no evidence Lincoln's orders to the Navy were made public ahead of time.

DiogenesLamp: "Lincoln had already taken a swing at them when he issued those orders.
No one expected him to pull back his punch at the last moment.
Lincoln was a clever fellow, wasn't he?"

I doubt if anyone who did not know Lincoln (i.e., Davis) considered him a "clever fellow" at that time.
"Ape" Lincoln was the common portrayal in Confederate circles.