There have been numerous alternative names for the American Civil War that reflect the historical, political, and cultural sensitivities of different groups and regions.^[1]

Naming the war

The following names have been, or are, used to describe the conflict itself, listed roughly by frequency of use. The first two names have seen enduring usage; the remaining names have been more isolated. Historical texts rarely refer to the war as the American Civil War.

Enduring names

Civil War

In the United States Civil War is the most common term for the conflict; it has been used by the overwhelming majority of reference books, scholarly journals, dictionaries, encyclopedias, popular histories, and mass media in the United States since the early 20th century.^[2] The National Park Service, the government organization entrusted by the United States Congress to preserve the battlefields of the war, uses this term.^[3] It is also the oldest term for the war. Writings of prominent men such as Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, Ulysses S. Grant, William Tecumseh Sherman, P.G.T. Beauregard, Nathan Bedford Forrest, and Judah P. Benjamin used the term "Civil War" both before and during the conflict. Abraham Lincoln used it on multiple occasions.^[4][5][6]

English-speaking historians outside the United States usually refer to the conflict as the "American Civil War" or, less often, "U.S. Civil War". These variations are also used in the United States in cases in which the war might otherwise be confused with another historical event (such as the English Civil War or the Spanish Civil War).

War Between the States

The term War Between the States was rarely used during the war but became common afterwards in the South.

• In 1862, the United States Supreme Court used the terms "the present civil war between the United States and the so called Confederate States," as well as the "civil war such as that now waged between the Northern and Southern States."^[7]

• The Confederate government avoided the term "civil war" and referred in official documents to the "War between the Confederate States of America and the United States of America."^[7] There are a handful of known references during the war to "the war between the states."^[8]

• European diplomacy produced a similar formula for avoiding the phrase "civil war." Queen Victoria's proclamation of British neutrality referred to "hostilities ... between the Government of the United States of America and certain States styling themselves the Confederate States of America".^[7]

• After the war, the memoirs of former Confederate officials and veterans (Joseph E. Johnston, Raphael Semmes, and especially Alexander Stephens) commonly used the term "War Between the States". In 1898, the United Confederate Veterans formally endorsed the name.

• In the early twentieth century, the United Daughters of the Confederacy led a campaign to promote the term "War Between the States" in the media and in public schools.

• Efforts to convince the United States Congress to adopt the term, beginning in 1913, were unsuccessful. Congress has never adopted an official name for the war.

• The name "War Between the States" is inscribed on the USMC War Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery. This name was personally ordered by Lemuel C. Shepherd, Jr., the 20th Commandant of the Marine Corps.

• Franklin Delano Roosevelt referred to the Civil War as "the four-year War Between the States." In his eyes, this was the only crisis that had "ever threatened our national unity." These lines were spoken in the opening paragraphs of his 1941 Annual Message to Congress on January 6th, 1941.^[9]

• References to the "War Between the States" turn up in federal and state court documents from time to time.^[10]

• The names "Civil War" and "War Between the States" have been used jointly in some formal contexts. For example, the war's centenary in the 1960s created the "Georgia Civil War Centennial Commission Commemorating the War Between the States".

• In 1994, the U.S. Postal Service issued a series of commemorative stamps entitled "The Civil War / The War Between the States".

• The official war records of the United States refer to this war as "The War of the Rebellion".

Other historical terms

War of the Rebellion

During and immediately after the war, U.S. officials and pro-Union writers often referred to Confederates as "Rebels" and to the war itself as "the Great Rebellion." The earliest histories published in the northern states commonly refer to the Civil War as "the Great Rebellion" or "the War of the Rebellion,"^[11] as do many war monuments.

The chief source of historical documentation for those interested in Civil War research is the 70-volume collection compiled and published by the U.S. War Department as The War of the Rebellion: a Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, U.S. Government Printing Office, 1880?1901. Present-day historians usually refer to this collection as the Official Records.

War for Southern Independence

The "War for Southern Independence" is a name used by many Southerners in reference to the war.^[12] While popular on the Confederate side during the war, the term's popularity fell in the immediate aftermath of the South's failure to gain independence. The term resurfaced in the late 20th century. To Southerners, the terminology parallels usage of the term "American War for Independence", as demonstrated by the popular poem published in the early stages of the hostilities under the title South Carolina; the prologue of which unambiguously refers to the war as the "Third War for Independence" (specifically naming the War of 1812 as the Second such War)^[13] C.f. "The tea has been thrown overboard. The Revolution of 1860 has been initiated." -- 8th Nov. 1860, Charleston Mercury (regarding post-election 'fall-out').^[14] The Second American Revolution was coined by historian Charles Beard in the 1920s to emphasize the completeness of the northern victory (and still used by the Sons of Confederate Veterans organization, though with a quite different meaning).^[15] The name is also used in Ward Moore's alternate history novella Bring the Jubilee.

War of Northern Aggression

The War of Northern Aggression is a name which emphasizes the opinion that the Southern states had the right to secede from the union and that the North was unjust in making war against the South. This term is consistent with the belief of the partisans of the Lost Cause that the North unjustly invaded the South.

Other terms

Other terms for the war have seen even less frequent usage, particularly in modern times.

In the South: War in Defense of Virginia, Mr. Lincoln's War , and War of Secession. (War of Secession is the common way of referring to the war in French, Italian, German, Polish and Portuguese.)

In the North: War of the Insurrection, Slaveholders War, Great Rebellion, War to Save the Union.

Later writers invented terms such as War for Abolition, War of Southern Reaction, War to Prevent Southern Independence, Second American Revolution, and Second War of Independence which were rarely used in print.

Immediately after the war, the following expressions were common in the South: The War, The Late Unpleasantness, and The Lost Cause.

Naming the combatants

• U.S. forces were popularly referred to as "the Union", "Federals", "the North," "the National Army (Armies)," "The Old Army," "Yanks," "Yankees" or the derogatory "Blue Bellies".
• Confederate forces were commonly referred to as "the Confederacy," "the South," "Secesses," "Grays," "Rebels," "Rebs," or "Dixie."
• Soldiers who fought for the South were referred to as "Johnny Rebs," for the North, "Billy Yanks."

Naming the battles and armies

There is a disparity between the sides in naming some of the battles of the war. The Union forces frequently named battles for bodies of water that were prominent on or near the battlefield; Confederates most often used the name of the nearest town. Because of this, many battles actually have two widely used names. However, not all of the disparities are based on this land-versus-water conflict. Many modern accounts of Civil War battles use the names established by the North. However, for some battles, the Southern name has become the standard. The National Park Service occasionally uses the Southern names for their battlefield parks located in the South, such as Manassas and Shiloh. Some examples of battles with dual names are shown in the table.

Historian Shelby Foote explains that most Northerners were urban and regarded bodies of water as noteworthy; most Southerners were rural and regarded towns as noteworthy.^[16]

Civil War armies were also named in a manner reminiscent of the battlefields: Northern armies were frequently named for major rivers (Army of the Potomac, Army of the Tennessee, Army of the Mississippi), Southern armies for states or geographic regions (Army of Northern Virginia, Army of Tennessee, Army of Mississippi).

Units smaller than armies were named differently in many cases. Corps were usually written out (First Army Corps or more simply, First Corps), although a post-war convention developed to designate Union corps using Roman numerals (XI Corps). Often, particularly with Southern armies, corps were more commonly known by the name of the leader (Hardee's Corps, Polk's Corps).

Union brigades were given numeric designations (1st, 2nd, ...), whereas Confederate brigades were frequently named after their commanding general (Hood's Brigade, Gordon's Brigade, ...). Confederate brigades so-named retained the name of the original commander even when commanded temporarily by another man; for example, at the Battle of Gettysburg, Hoke's Brigade was commanded by Isaac Avery and Nicholl's Brigade by Jesse Williams. Nicknames were common in both armies, such as the Iron Brigade and the Stonewall Brigade.

Union artillery batteries were generally named numerically; Confederate batteries by the name of the town or county in which they were recruited (Fluvanna Artillery). Again, they were often simply referred to by their commander's name (Moody's Battery, Parker's Battery).

In other languages

In Chinese, Japanese and Korean, the term War between the North and the South (literally, "North-South War") is widely used for the American Civil War.

In French, German, Italian, Polish, and Spanish, the war is most often referred to as the "(American) War of Secession."

Notes

Further reading

• Catton, Bruce, The Coming Fury: The Centennial History of the Civil War, Volume 1, Doubleday, 1961, ISBN 0-641-68525-4
• Coski, John M., "The War between the Names," North and South magazine, vol. 8, no. 7., January 2006.
• U.S. War Department, ''The War of the Rebellion'': a Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, U.S. Government Printing Office, 1880?1901.
• Wittichen, Mrs. Murray Forbes, "Let's Say 'War Between the States'," Florida Division, United Daughters of the Confederacy, 1954.

External links

• National Park Service
• Civil War Battle Names
• Declaration of Causes of the Seceding States
• Musick, Michael P., "Civil War Records: A War by Any Other Name." Prologue: Quarterly of the National Archives. Summer 1995, Vol. 27, No. 2.

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