In 1862, the northerners achieved the greatest success in the western theater of operations. In February and April, the army of General US Grant, having captured a number of forts, ousted the southerners from Kentucky, and after the hard- won victory at Shiloh cleared them of Tennessee. By the summer, Missouri was liberated, and Grant’s troops entered the northern districts of Mississippi and Alabama.
April 12, 1862 entered the history of the war thanks to the famous episode with the hijacking by a group of volunteers-northerners of the “General” locomotive, known as the Great Locomotive Race.
Of great importance was the capture of New Orleans on April 25, 1862, carried out by a squadron of northerners under the command of Commodore David Farragut. As a result of this battle, the Southerners lost one of their largest ports and shipbuilding centers, and were forced to destroy the unfinished battleships in order to avoid capture. The northerners at the expense of this operation strengthened their presence in the Gulf of Mexico, found a reliable base for the blockade of the ports remaining in the hands of the confederates, and – most importantly – captured a bridgehead in the lower reaches of the Mississippi. This allowed the army and the fleet of the North to organize a successful offensive campaign in the future (in 1862–1863), which deprived the southerners of their most important transportation artery.
Shenandoa Valley Campaign (1862)
In the spring, General McClellan began to prepare an offensive on Richmond from the Virginia Peninsula, the federal Virginia Army was preparing to launch an offensive from the north, and Nathaniel Banks’s detachment entered the Shenandoah Valley in March. The defense of the valley was assigned to the squad of Thomas Jackson, numbering about 5,000 people. After the first unsuccessful battle, Jackson retreated southward across the valley, then attacked and defeated the Fremont squad. For about a month, Jackson accumulated strength, and then attacked Banks again and smashed one of his units in the Battle of Front Royal. Banks began to retreat to Winchester. Jackson caught up with Banks and on May 25 he defeated him again in the battle of Winchester . President Lincoln personally sent three armies to encircle Jackson in the valley, but on June 1, Jackson slipped away to the south.
On June 2, the two federal armies, John Freemont (14,000 people) and James Shields (10,000 people) headed south along the valley, pursuing Jackson, who retreated to Port Republik. On June 8, Richard Ewell stopped the Freemont offensive at Cross Case , and on June 9, Jackson attacked and defeated Shields at Port Republic. This ended the campaign: the federal army went to the north, and on June 18 Jackson went to Richmond to join up with General Lee’s army.
Peninsula Campaign
In the east, McClellan, who nicknamed Lincoln the “slower,” was dismissed from his post as commander in chief and at the head of one of the armies sent to attack Richmond. The so-called “Peninsula Campaign” began. McClellan hoped to use numerical superiority and heavy artillery to win the war in one campaign, without harming civilians and not bringing the matter to the liberation of blacks.
More than 100 thousand soldiers of the federal army landed on the virgin coast, but the southerners, despite the inequality of forces, managed to detain the enemy for a whole month in the battle of Yorktown. May 4, 1862 Yorktown was commissioned. Southerners slowly retreated, and Richmond was preparing for evacuation. General Johnston decided to attack the enemy and smash one of his isolated corps, however, in the battle at Seven-Pines, this goal could not be achieved – Johnston himself was wounded, and General Robert Lee took command.
Also, this battle was marked by the first experience in the history of military conflicts in the use of Gatling and mitraliez barrels – remote prototypes of machine guns. Then, due to the imperfection of the design, they could not somehow significantly affect the course of the battle. But in the army, both northerners and southerners began to appear in the case of various designers.
When Robert Lee took command of the army, General Jackson had just completed the campaign in the Shenandoah Valley and was ready to go to Washington, but Lee called him to Richmond. On 23 June, the commanders of the army of the South met and discussed the plan for the upcoming offensive. It was decided to attack the enemy in positions north of the river Chikahomini. The ensuing series of battles went down in history as the Seven Day Battle. On June 26, 1862, Lee’s army launched an offensive. The battle of Beaverdem Creek as a whole went badly for the southerners, but the command of the Army of the Potomac was alarmed by the activity of the enemy and decided to withdraw the army closer to the bases. On June 27, Lee attacked the retreating army and the South Battle of Gains Mill was successful. Following this, Lee decided to attack the retreating troops, scattered on the roads of McClellan’s army from Glendale, but because of the inconsistency of action the battle of Glendale went unsuccessfully. This was the only moment in the whole war when Lee had a chance to completely destroy the Potomac army, and this chance was lost. On July 1, 1862, the Southerners attacked the enemy again at Malvern Hill. The uncoordinated attack of the strong positions of the enemy caused great casualties, but despite this, the retreat of the federal army became irreversible.
North Virginia Campaign
After McClellan’s setbacks on the Virginia Peninsula, President Lincoln appointed General John Pope as commander of the newly formed Virginia Army. The army was supposed to protect Washington and the Shenandoah Valley, as well as distract the enemy from the army of McClelan on the peninsula. General Lee immediately transferred to the north the army of Jackson, who decided to try to defeat the Virginia army in parts, but after the battle at Cedar Hill abandoned this plan. August 15, Lee arrived in the area of hostilities. General Jackson made a round of the right flank of Pope, which forced him to retreat to the north. He managed to draw Pope into the Second Battle of Bull Run (August 29-30), in which the federal Virginia Army was defeated and retreated to the north. The president insisted on repeating the attack, but Jackson again went around Pope’s flank to cut him off from Washington. This led to the battle of Chantilly. Jackson was unable to achieve his goals, however, Pope was forced to cancel all offensive activities in order to ward off the army for the fortifications of Washington.
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