This is part of a series of posts documenting the cartographic history of maps related to the American Civil War, 1861-1865. The posts will appear on a regular basis. Show One of the primary strategies employed by Federal forces in weakening the Confederacy was the use of blockading fleets along the eastern and Gulf coasts of the United States. Scott’s Great Snake, published at the outset of the Civil War, humorously portrays General Winfield Scott’s “Anaconda Plan” to strangle the southern states by cutting off any imported supplies and halting cotton exports. Blockading fleets were also used on inland rivers to assist Union military operations. The Anaconda Plan emerged out of Scott’s understanding that the war would be long and slow, frustrating Northerners who thought a quick capture of Richmond would bring the rebellion to a sudden end. By 1862, however, the tenets of the “Anaconda Plan” became widely adopted, as it became clear that a more drawn-out conflict was in store.  “Scott’s great snake Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1861.” J.B. Elliott, 1861. Geography and Map Division, Library of Congress. The two versions of Robert Sneden’s Blockade of the Potomac, shown below, shows the Union use of blockading to deny ship passage along the lower stretches of the Potomac River during the winter of 1861/1862. According to a note on the map, the “Rebels evacuated all their batteries night of 4th March 1862.” “Blockade of the Potomac – by Rebels, winter of 1861.” Robert Knox Sneden, 1861. Virginia Historical Society. “Blockade of the Potomac. Map showing Union and Rebel batteries January 1862. The Rebels evacuated all their batteries night of 4th March 1862.” Robert Knox Sneden, 1862. Virginia Historical Society. Robert Knox Sneden (1832-1918) enlisted in the Union Army at the start of the war and served with the Army of the Potomac in Virginia during the Peninsula Campaign. He would then serve in Washington, D.C. as a topographical engineer on the staff of Major General Samuel P. Heintzelman. In 1863, Sneden was captured by Confederate forces and imprisoned for over a year, an experience he documented by drawing maps of the camps in South Carolina and Georgia where he was detained. Over the course of the war, Sneden’s eyewitness accounts and extremely detailed pen-and-ink watercolor maps, provide vivid glimpses of life as a Civil War soldier. Sneden’s original diaries are housed in the Virginia Historical Society in Richmond, Virginia. Through a joint agreement, more than 300 maps from the diary are available on the Library of Congress web site. Elsewhere in the American South, as the war raged on in February, 1862, the Union achieved important victories in Tennessee. Located in central Tennessee, Forts Henry and Donelson guarded the Tennessee and Cumberland Rivers with interconnecting roads and telegraph lines between the two Confederate fortifications. In the first week of February, 1862, General Ulysses Grant led a massive assault composed of more than 15,000 troops and gunships. Confederate forces evacuated Fort Henry on the Tennessee River and General Grant followed up with a successful assault on Fort Donelson, located on the Cumberland River. “Sketch showing the relative positions of Fort Henry and Fort Donelson : with the roads connecting the two places.” United States War Department, Corps. of Engineers, 1862. Geography and Map Division, Library of Congress. The above map, showing the topography and transportation routes between Forts Henry and Donelson, is an example of a map prepared to document the history of this campaign as opposed to planning maps. This map was among many others (including larger scale vicinity maps of Fort Henry and Fort Donelson) that were prepared for the “Atlas to accompany the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies,” a one-volume atlas designed to accompany a multi-volume textual history of the Civil War.
This cartoon map illustrates Gen. Winfield Scott's plan to crush the Confederacy, economically, during the Civil War. It is sometimes called the "Anaconda Plan." This map somewhat humorously depicts Winfield Scott’s “Anaconda Plan” which resulted in an overall blockade (beginning in 1862) of southern ports and not only targeted the major points of entry for slave/slave trade but also crippled cotton exports. Reference: Elliott, , J. B. . "Scott's great snake. Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1861 by J.B. Elliott of Cincinnati.." Library of Congress. Library of Congress Geography and Map Division Washington, n.d. Web. 22 May 2013. <http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/h?ammem/gmd:@field(NUMBER @band(g3701s cw0011000))>. The Anaconda Plan was General Winfield Scott's strategy to slowly strangle the southern rebellion by blockading southern seaports and seizing control of the Mississippi River. The Anaconda Plan was a strategy devised by General Winfield Scott in the early days of the Secession Criss that called for a naval blockade of Southern ports, which would prevent the southern states from conducting trade with foreign nations. After Abraham Lincoln was elected President in 1860, South Carolina responded by seceding from the Union, which created the Secession Crisis. As more southern states joined South Carolina, Scott proposed a blockade of southern ports along the coast and the Mississippi river to force the “insurgent States” to agree to “terms with less bloodshed than by any other plan.” When the details of Scott’s plan were leaked to the press, newspaper editors were critical. They felt it was a slow, drawn-out solution, and nicknamed it the “Anaconda Plan.” Although Lincoln ordered a blockade of southern ports after the Battle of Fort Sumter, he also approved an assault on Richmond, the Confederate capital. Scott helped plan the campaign, but it failed when the Confederates won the First Battle of Bull Run. Scott eventually resigned and was succeeded by George B. McClellan. However, the Union Blockade continued through the war and contributed to the Union victory. Anaconda Plan Overview and HistoryLieutenant General Winfield ScottOn March 7, 1855, Congress passed a joint resolution temporarily reviving the rank of lieutenant general to be “filled by brevet, and brevet only.” The bill also conferred the title upon Winfield Scott, to rank from March 29, 1847, to acknowledge his “eminent services of a Major-General of the Army in the late war with Mexico.” Five years after his appointment, the federal government called upon Scott to develop a strategy for leading the nation’s armed forces into the bloodiest conflict in American history. March 3, 1861 — Scott Proposes to Blockade the SouthOn December 20, 1860, the South Carolina legislature enacted an ordinance of secession in reaction to Abraham Lincoln’s election to the U.S. presidency six weeks earlier. On March 3, 1861, the day before Lincoln’s inauguration, General Scott proposed four alternatives for dealing with the secession crisis. The second option on Scott’s list was to “Collect the duties on foreign goods outside the ports of which this Government has lost the command, or close such ports by acts of congress, & blockade them.” Two months later, after the Battle of Fort Sumter and the outbreak of the Civil War, Scott elaborated on his blockade recommendation in a letter to Major General George B. McClellan, major general of Ohio volunteers. On May 3, 1861, Scott wrote:
Scott’s Plan is Not Well-ReceivedUnfortunately for Scott (and perhaps the nation), his plan to slowly strangle the Confederacy by blockading her seaports and securing the Mississippi was not well-received by those envisioning a quick end to the conflict. In the same communique, the prescient general warned that “The greatest obstacle in the way of this plan—the great danger now pressing upon us—[is] the impatience of our patriotic and loyal Union friends. They will urge instant and vigorous action, regardless, I fear, of the consequences.” Anaconda PlanScott could not have been more correct, but he may have been unaware initially that McClellan was among those who championed bludgeoning the South into submission using the seemingly invincible military and industrial might of the northern states. As the young general lobbied to crush the rebellion by leading a campaign against the Confederate capital at Richmond, he disdainfully likened the aging general’s more passive approach to the strangulation tactics used by boa constrictors. Seizing upon McClellan’s derisive comparison, Northern newspaper editors began sarcastically to refer to Scott’s proposal as the Anaconda Plan. McClellan Replaces ScottEventually, the war hawks prevailed. After several months of discord, Scott offered Lincoln his resignation on November 1, 1861. On the same day, the War Department issued General Orders No. 94, announcing the president’s executive order reporting Scott’s retirement. Lincoln announced that “Major-General George B. McClellan . . . [would] assume the command of the Army of the United States.” After his ascension, McClellan adopted a more measured approach to extinguishing the rebellion. Much to the consternation of the President, McClellan spent four months organizing the largest land force to date on the North American continent and planning for a campaign up the Virginia Peninsula, as opposed to a direct overland assault on Richmond. McClellan finally launched his Peninsula Campaign on March 17, 1862. By late May, the Army of the Potomac was only six miles from the Confederate capital. Inexplicably, McClellan then lost his nerve and began a slow retreat in the face of stern resistance from General Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia. The Union lost the opportunity to end the rebellion quickly. Anaconda Plan OutcomeWhat followed was the protracted war Scott had so earnestly wished to avoid. Tragically, the Civil War may have claimed the lives of over 850,000 Americans. Anaconda Plan SignificanceIronically, two of the primary elements of Scott’s Anaconda Plan to avoid the bloodbath — the naval blockade of Southern ports and the subjugation of the Mississippi River — eventually became two of the decisive factors that ended the carnage. |
What was the purpose of the anaconda plan?
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