Civil War Map

The media item that I selected for this week is a map of the United States from 1861-1865. These were the years of the Civil War, and this map is unique because it shows all the states and whether they were a free or slave state. I came upon this map by simply typing in “Civil War” on the msn search engine. This map is great because it also shows were junctions for slave trade occurred, along with exactly what states abolished slavery in 1862. This map of the U.S. is very detailed and shares a lot of the same information we have come across in last weeks readings.

The major point I would like to discuss about this map and how it relates to our course material is the landmarks of the victories by either the confederates or the union. Zinn’s chapter 9, particularly the second half of it (emancipation without freedom), talks about the Civil War and the struggle not just between whites and blacks, but between the north and the south. This map shows the thirteen major battle sites of the Civil War, and the outcomes of each battle. Looking at the map one can see that the Union won 8 of the 13, whereas the Confederates only won 5. Also, one can see that all but one of the Confederates victories came along the east close, near the Atlantic Ocean. And finally this map shows were each side had a “stronghold”, and it was no surprise to see that the Confederates had many of them farther south. It was in the deeper south that more white plantation owners were protesting against the abolition of slavery; they were the most racist whites in the U.S.

Copy and paste the url to check out this in depth map of the Civil War yourself.
http://www.heartland.it/_lib/_ill/map_civil_war.jpg