The Election of 1864

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Map 15.4 The Election of 1864

In the summer of 1864, with Sherman temporarily checked outside Atlanta and Grant bogged down in the siege of Petersburg, the Democratic Party smelled victory in the fall elections. Lincoln himself concluded, “It seems exceedingly probable that this administration will not be re-elected.”

The Democrats were badly divided, however. Peace Democrats insisted on an armistice, while “war” Democrats supported the conflict but opposed Republican means of fighting it. The party tried to paper over the chasm by nominating a war candidate, General George McClellan, but adopting a peace platform that demanded that “immediate efforts be made for a cessation of hostilities.” Republicans denounced the peace plank as a cut-and-run plan that “virtually proposed to surrender the country to the rebels in arms against us.”

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The capture of Atlanta in September turned the political tide in favor of the Republicans. Lincoln received 55 percent of the popular vote, but his electoral margin was a whopping 212 to McClellan’s 21 (Map 15.4). Lincoln’s party won a resounding victory, one that gave him a mandate to continue the war until slavery and the Confederacy were dead.

Major Battles of the Civil War, 1863–1865

May 1–4, 1863 Battle of Chancellorsville
July 1–3, 1863 Battle of Gettysburg
July 4, 1863 Fall of Vicksburg
September 16–20, 1863 Battle of Chickamauga
November 23–25, 1863 Battle of Chattanooga
May 5–7, 1864 Battle of the Wilderness
May 7–19, 1864 Battle of Spotsylvania Court House
June 3, 1864 Battle of Cold Harbor
June 27, 1864 Battle of Kennesaw Mountain
September 2, 1864 Fall of Atlanta
November–December 1864 Sheridan sacks Shenandoah Valley Sherman’s March to the Sea
December 15–16, 1864 Battle of Nashville
December 22, 1864 Fall of Savannah
April 2–3, 1865 Fall of Petersburg and Richmond
April 9, 1865 Lee surrenders at Appomattox Court House