Sold – Fort Sumter 1861, Just 9 Days After the First Shots Were Fired

In November 1860, Abraham Lincoln was elected President of the United States. As a direct result, on December 20 South Carolina delegates to a special secession convention voted unanimously to secede from the Union. Six days later, U.S. Army Major Robert Anderson, commander of the army garrison in Charleston harbor, abandoned the indefensible Fort Moultrie and secretly relocated to Fort Sumter without orders from Washington, on his own initiative. He thought that providing a stronger position would delay an attack by South Carolina militia and improve the chances of a successful defense. Over the next weeks, repeated calls for the U.S. evacuation of Fort Sumter by the government of South Carolina were ignored. Then on January 9, 1861 a naval attempt to resupply and reinforce the garrison was repulsed, when the first shots of the war were fired to prevent the steamer Star of the West from completing the task.

A signed sentiment, “Your obt. Servt., Robert Anderson, Major U.S.A., Fort Sumter, S.C., Jany. 18, 1861.” At this point, only Mississippi, Florida and Alabama had joined South Carolina in secession. Georgia would follow the next day.