“Battle Hymn of the Republic” Battles and Campaigns
“BATTLE HYMN OF THE REPUBLIC” 36 “Battle Hymn of the Republic” broader goal (such as the capture of an en- The Civil War song “Battle Hymn of the tire peninsula in a certain amount of time). Republic” was extremely popular with Such operations, taken collectively, were Union soldiers, who often sang it while called a campaign (e.g., the Peninsula rallying for battle. The tune, however, pre- Campaign). dates the Civil War as an 1856 Methodist Historians disagree somewhat on which camp-meeting hymn titled “Oh Brothers, battles should be included in a list of the Will You Meet Us on Canaan’s Happy most important Civil War conflicts. How- Shore?” by William Steffe of South Car- ever, the most commonly cited major bat- olina. (It is not known whether he com- tles and campaigns are as follows: posed the lyrics as well as the tune.) The Attack on Fort Sumter. On April Shortly after the war began, a group of 12, 1861, the Confederates fired the first Union soldiers in Boston, Massachusetts, shots of the war when they attacked a fed- composed new lyrics that referred to abo- eral garrison at Fort Sumter, located on litionist John Brown, who had been a man-made island in the middle of hanged in Virginia in 1859 for trying to Charleston Harbor in South Carolina; on lead a slave rebellion. To many people in April 14, after a seige of more than fifty the North, John Brown was a hero, and the hours, the fort fell into Confederate hands. Union soldiers’ lyrics called him “a soldier The First Battle of Bull Run (also in the army of the Lord.” This song, called known as the First Battle of Manassas).
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