History buffs, would the South have won the civil war if the border slave states (Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, Missouri, West Virginia) would have joined the Confederacy instead of staying with the Union?  

Or would it have made little difference?



Blue = Union States
Light Blue = border slave states
Red = Confederacy States

Popcorn

On the other hand, what if the other border states had gone Union?

No. The blockade of the South worked very well and the North had too many factories that fueled their war machine. I dought the border states, as you call them, would of made that much of difference.    IMO

They lost over 140 years ago.[/thread]

Could well have made a big difference. Battles would have been in Maryland and Pa a lot more and the South would have had more soldiers. D.C. would have been surrounded and had to leave or surrender which would have had a morale affect.  Attacks would have been easy to make into Ohio , Ind., Ill., etc. which may well have discouraged yankees from wanting to continue the War of Northern Aggression.

+1

Live with it.

It wouldn't have mattered.  They didn't have the population, the manufacturing resources, and the steady influx of conscripts from Ireland.

Nope.  Plenty of Tennesseeans fought for the Union.  More Kentuckians fought for the Union than did for the Confederacy.  Western Marylanders were pro-Union.  West Virginia  seceded from Virginia because it was not pro-Richmond pro-secession.  If Western North Carolina could have seceded, it would have too.  There was also the State of Jones in Georgia that wanted out of the state and of the wa-oh.

For the South to have succeeded, it would need both foreign recognition and intervention.  That's something that France and England paused at when New Orleans fell and finally was considered by them to be unfeasible after the Emancipation Proclaimation.

Oh no you di'nt



 

Don't think it would have made any difference. It was the lack of manufacturing ability in the South that was the cause of the South not winning the war.

Also, it was the War of Northern Aggression. Plain & simple. Them damn yankees just couldn't keep their nose out of our business. Thought they were better than us for some reason. Kind of like my neighbors from Maryland.

The South could have never won in a slugging match.  The only hope was Lee's success at routing the Union armies and getting into Washington to force an end.  That hope ended in 3 days in July 1863 at Gettysburg.  If Lee would've listened to Longstreet,  there would have been nothing between the army of Northern VA and DC.  The game would have been over.

+2, why do you care about it..?

Kentucky would have helped quite a bit, I think.   Would have given the CSA alot more manufacturing ability.

No. The South was crippled by the incompetent leadership of Robert E. Lee. Lee was defeated when he tried to invade the North. He should have fought a defensive guerrilla style war on CSA territory.

 Lee massacred his own Soldiers at Gettysburg against hopeless odds, when they should have been home defending their homeland from the superior tactician William Tecumseh Sherman.

 The CSA could have run and hid, hit and run again. Eventually Northern opinion would have turned against the war as more and more bodies came home in pine boxes.

Lee's arrogance and hubris cost him the war. A couple more border states would not have changed that.

Maryland was going to join the Confederacy, but federal troops got there first.

Then the feds violated the Constitution (for the billionth time) and stole West Virginia.

Yup. Outnumbered over five-to-one and with far less industry, the South didn't have much chance of winning without either an extremely decisive victory in 1861 or foreign aid from Britain, France, or both.

The Confederacy may have had superior soldiers for most of the war and nearly all of the superior officers, but the Union had enough competent officers (like Grant), more advanced weapons (repeating rifles), and sheer force of numbers on their side.

They tried to go Confederate. I know in Maryland, almost the entire General Assembly was arrested and jailed by the Union Government.

Nice try.  Even if Lee could have beaten Meade or Hooker (who both he and Jeff Davis thought he was going to fight.) and had enough power left to go to Washington.  He could not have beat the Army of the Potomac  sufficiently bad enough to allow him room and time  AND still have enough troops to successfully assault the lines of defences around Washington before the North could have restored a larger Army in the field than he had and would have hammered him to pieces between them and the forts.

Lee had no reinforcements.  His supply train was what he had with him.  Any supply train from VA would never have reached him   Meade had approximately 10 times the number of wagons as Lee had waiting for him at the Pipe Creek Line where he had planned to make his stand, drawing Lee into a massive trap.  Meade also had several RR lines into his rear from Philly, NYC and Baltimore.  Lee had none.  Had Meade moved to the Pipe Creek line Lee would have been caught on the horns of a dilemna.  Attack a numerically stronger force in a stronger position and an interior position at that.  That attack would have been necessary in Lee and Davis's minds to accomplish what both Lee and Davis hoped to accomplish by going North.  Throw his army away to accomplish the mission (hopefully) or save his army and get the hell out while he could.

Lee went North, not primarily to invade the North, not primarily to try to destroy the Army of the Potomac or to take Washington, although any or all of those would potentially been the trigger to get the desired result.  What was that?  Cause the North to pull enough troops away from Grant on the Mississippi to stall or cancel the Vicksburg Campaign.  Why?  Because everybody knew that when Vicksburg fell the river fell and when the river fell the western half of the CSA was gone.  Didn't work.  Grant was never asked to release troops, Lee had to go after Meade and not Hooker, Lee barely got his Army away.  There was never another offensive campaign of any strength by the South after July '63.

If Lee had been focused on attacking and taking Washington, he would have had a very similar challenge to what Grant was facing.  Going after a well fortified city on the other side of a major river.  With one advantage ONLY.  North of Washington the river was such that it could be crossed at several fords or with pontoon bridges.  South of the city was not only well and strongly defended the river could not be crossed without a major amphibious effort.  the south had NO capability of mounting an amphibious campaign of any size, let alone one that could have had any hopes of success against the Union forces in the Potomac and Chesapeake.  Pemberton and Johnston were trying to get reinforcements to Vicksburg, not only none worth mentioning to be had, but only one rail line in.  Meade/Hooker had several rail lines to assist in the protection of a DC front and lots of reinforcements available.

The only Border State who could have made a difference was Maryland.

Major error by the South there, Sumter was a political feature of no real strategic significance to either side.  the south should have put all it's efforts into peeling Maryland away from the North or isolating Washington and forcing the government to leave.  All shelling Sumter did was give Lincoln a major rallying point.  Seal the channel and passively prevent supplies and Sumter surrenders quietly.

I keep hearing stories that Lee at at least two angina attacks before/during Gettysburg and that drove his need to end this now.  Any truth to that?  And I wonder what would have happened had someone discovered what rubbing a small amount of nitro between your hands did for angina?

No.

Yes, Lee suffered from angina quite a bit, according to my civil war professor, Dr. James Robertson

This

Thanks to Mr Lincoln.

Oh get off it: You lost. Period. Everything else is just whining.

You do realize it is someone from NY asking the question? Can they not ask a question? I thought this was an open discussion forum. Guess i am mistaken.

Let it go...

Only way the south would of won was to evict the democrat party.

In before the Sore Loser Brigade.