Photo: Southern Causes for the Civil War

Photographer: Tom Bosse
Taken: July 5, 2018
Caption: Southern Causes for the Civil War
Additional Description: There were social and economic differences between the north and south. The north was an industrialized society with a large population. Workers were involved with shipping, commerce, fishing and manufacturing. Much of their population consisted of immigrants providing free or low-cost labor. Slavery, unnecessary there and outlawed, gave rise to politically strong abolition movements. The southern states were an agrarian based society. Seventy-five percent of which consisted of subsistence farmers living on their own land, few of whom owned slaves. The large slave holders were wealthy aristocratic planters who farmed large plantations and commanded the real political, economic and social power. The Plantation system depended on slave labor. Towns, cities commerce and railroads of the south were largely supported by the plantations which were underpinned by slavery. Northern abolition movements with a goal to end slavery threatened to undermine the entire southern economy and way of life. The desire to preserve their economy and culture free from northern interference, the south under pressure from the aristocratic plantation owners, seceded from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America. South Carolina was the first state to secede and gave a deadline for the Union to vacate Fort Sumpter. Lincoln decided to resupply the Fort and South Carolina reacted with an artillery barrage. Shortly thereafter the Union Army invaded Virginia. The Civil war began April 12, 1861, ending in 1865. As many southern soldiers, mostly farmers owning no slaves, opined… “A rich man’s war but a poor man’s fight”.
Submitted: November 13, 2018, by Tom Bosse of Jefferson City, Tennessee.
Database Locator Identification Number: p453730
File Size: 9.136 Megabytes

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