An invasion as proposed would alienate many of them and subject both enemies and friends to the ravages of war. More seriously, western Virginia (West Virginia had not yet parted from Virginia) was still very much pro-Union according to Scott's estimate, its populace stood five out of seven opposed to secession. Firstly, the Kanawha was not suited for water transport and so the march on Richmond would have to be overland and thus subject to breakdowns of men, horses, and equipment. Scott's endorsement of McClellan's letter, which he submitted to the President, shows that he considered it but not favorably. Alternatively, if Kentucky were to leave the Union, a march directly across that state should take Nashville, and then, he would "act on circumstances." He proposed an immediate march on Richmond, by now the capital of the Confederacy, directed up the Kanawha River. From this power base, he felt enabled on April 27, 1861, to write a letter to General Winfield Scott outlining his strategy. In a few weeks, as the state militias were incorporated into the national service, the militias of Indiana and Illinois were added to his command. McClellan, who was to serve as the commander of its militia, with rank Major General of Volunteers. Ohio was particularly active in doing so and early acquired the services of George B. Missouri was torn by internal conflict that mimicked in miniature the larger war that was convulsing the nation, Maryland was kept in the Union by jailing many of the opposition faction, and Kentucky tried to keep the peace by proclaiming its neutrality by aiding neither the North nor the South if both would agree to leave the state alone.īecause Congress was not in session to authorize presidential initiatives to suppress the rebellion, the burden of raising troops for the war fell on the loyal state governments. All except Delaware had strong pro-Southern interests.
In the early days of the secession movement, the status of the border states Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland, and Delaware, all of which allowed slavery, was unclear. The executive order was not rescinded until the end of the war and so the blockade existed independently of Scott's plan. On April 19, 1861, a week after the bombardment of Fort Sumter that marked the outbreak of the war, he announced that the ports of all the seceded states, from South Carolina to Texas, would be blockaded later, when Virginia and North Carolina also seceded, their coastlines were added.
The blockade had already been proclaimed by Lincoln. The Anaconda had a logical development, both in its origin and the way it played out in the experience of battle. When they fell, the river would be in US hands from its source to its mouth, and the rebellion would be cut in two. The culminating battle would be for the forts below New Orleans. It would be followed by a more traditional army, marching behind to secure victories. A spearhead, a relatively small amphibious force of army troops transported by boats and supported by gunboats, should advance rapidly, capturing the Confederate positions down the river in sequence. Secondly, a strong column of perhaps 80,000 men should use the Mississippi River as a highway to thrust completely through the Confederacy. First, all ports in the seceding states were to be rigorously blockaded. In the early days of the Civil War, Scott's proposed strategy for the war against the South had two prominent features. The snake image caught on, giving the proposal its popular name. Because the blockade would be rather passive, it was widely derided by a vociferous faction of Union generals who wanted a more vigorous prosecution of the war and likened it to the coils of an anaconda suffocating its victim. Proposed by Union General-in-Chief Winfield Scott, the plan emphasized a Union blockade of the Southern ports and called for an advance down the Mississippi River to cut the South in two. The Anaconda Plan was a strategy outlined by the Union Army for suppressing the Confederacy at the beginning of the American Civil War. 1861 cartoon map of Scott's plan with caricatures
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