White supremacists and counter protesters clash in Charlottesville

[Anomalocaris]

Well then why did they fire the first shot? The Confederate militia tried to force the US Army out of Fort Sumter as manoeuvring towards securing their sea flanks during what they saw as an inevitable war. They fired at the garrison in a deliberate act of war.

Even their conventions demanding to be alliwed secede were taken in the full knowledge those actions would provoke wae. Guess what? The Confederate leaders didn't care. They wanted war ever since they realised they could no longer control the federal government.

They fired the first shot because Lincoln was a crafty MF and Davis fell right into his trap.  Lincoln never intended to let the Southern states leave.  However, he also needed more support among the northern populations and the moral highground for starting the war.

The best way to do that was to manuveur the South into firing the first shot.  Fort Sumter was useless to the North except for one reason.  To defend the harbor of South Carolina.  If South Carolina was no longer in the Union you would only need to defend the harbor if you wanted to invade South Carolina through that harbor.  So the South Carolinians demanded the Union troops to leave.

Lincoln responded by sending ships to resupply the harbor in the hopes that Confederate troops would attack it.  Quick propaganda, moral high ground achieved.

Jefferson Davis, well two things were on his mind.  One was that continued occupation of a Southern harbor fort that was part of a Confederate state was in itself a declaration of war from the North, but also he was worried that Southerners would calm down if nothing happened soon and decide it would be better to stay in the Union.

So Davis played right into Lincoln's hands.  Davis was outmatched.

But still, not a single soldier was killed in the bombardment.  The only ones that died, like two I think, died afterward when they were abandoning the fort after the surrender and were firing one of their cannons off as a salute or something and the thing exploded. 

Hell, in 2000 the USS Cole was bombed.  Killed 17 sailors and the US didn't go to war.  But over zero deaths from a Fort Sumter bombardment, that was good enough for a war for Lincoln.  And really it was.  He wanted a reason.  He needed it.

Lincoln was not going to let the South go.  It didn't matter if they never fired on Fort Sumter or not.  Lincoln wasn't letting it happen.  Everyone will admit to that.

But no, the Confederacy would have very much preferred for a peaceful separation.  That's why they kept sending peace delegations.  They were willing to resort to war, as we all know.  But they would have very much liked to have been allowed to leave quietly.

And his Gettysburg address is simultaneously a forthright admission and an eloquent and overwhelming defense of it.