WI: Bleeding Kansas starts off the US Civil War?

Alright, so the POD is this: Bleeding Kansas is a tad more bloody, and Fremont wins the Election of 1856, both of which start off the War Between the States a couple years earlier. What would such a war look like? When would it end? How would it officially start? With Fremont as POTUS, how would the major players of OTL's Civil War get involved? For example, in 56-58, US Grant was working on farm, and he owned a slave. Sherman was living in California, Lee was serving in Texas, but then was called back to Virginia to execute his father in law's estate. Lincoln was trying to form the Republican party. Jefferson Davis was a member of the senate. Those were just some of the major players in the War. What all would be different?
 
If a radical on race-relations like Fremont wins the 1856 election that will change the entire war in a huge way. Kentucky and Missouri as well as Maryland would all join the Confederacy. Lincoln was both a pragmatist and a statesman where Fremont as a true believer would have immediately faced a much larger opposition. Of course the PODs that lead to such a man rising in the North will also mean that with no slave states in the Union there's nothing stopping much earlier use of abolition and hard war on the part of the Union.

So Confederate manpower advantages gained by this kind of POD are going to be offset by a Union that will have much less resistance to starting hard wars from the get-go. Fremont was already using widespread emancipation in the OTL Civil War even with slave states still in the Union. If he wins as the Free Soil candidate then the war will be much more ruthless on both sides.
 

Thande

Donor
"Don't forget Delaware!"

Interesting idea, I know the USCW is rather overdone but I don't recall this one being mentioned before.
 
The Union loses Maryland and Virginia, they've got a huge problem...

They also lose any real interest in playing soft war with the Slave Power. If the loss of Maryland is according to standard CS practices anyway the USA will be much more willing to unleash weapons the nature of the OTL Union meant were not done for some years.

A North willing to elect Fremont has nothing in common with the OTL one as it is.

"Don't forget Delaware!"

Interesting idea, I know the USCW is rather overdone but I don't recall this one being mentioned before.

Eh, I can't see Delaware seceding even with the rest of them. Too few slaves.
 
"Don't forget Delaware!"

My understanding is that although slave-owning was legal in Delaware it was basically a legal relic with no real social/political signifigance by the time of the civil war.
 
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Thande

Donor
Ah, but given Delaware's position, you can bet that if war breaks out and Maryland is "Confederate" (or whatever the analogue is here), it's going to get occupied pretty soon, and you would expect at least moderate "Confederate" sympathies there.
 
Ah, but given Delaware's position, you can bet that if war breaks out and Maryland is "Confederate" (or whatever the analogue is here), it's going to get occupied pretty soon, and you would expect at least moderate "Confederate" sympathies there.

True, but it would be sympathies imposed at gunpoint. And if Delaware doesn't secede but Maryland does and then proceeds to forcibly annex Delaware that pretty much shreds any claim to freedom the *CSA has as badly as when the Germans attacked Russia and were worse than the Soviets.
 

Xen

Banned
Lincoln was trying to form the Republican party.

Another one? Whats wrong with the one that just elected POTUS? A minor quibble I know, Lincoln is unlikely to rise to prominence in this ATL, seeing how the election of 1858 skyrocketed him to the national stage even though he lost.
 
Ah, but given Delaware's position, you can bet that if war breaks out and Maryland is "Confederate" (or whatever the analogue is here), it's going to get occupied pretty soon, and you would expect at least moderate "Confederate" sympathies there.

Would the feds let Maryland go Confederate though? IIRC they basically kept it in the Union in OTL at gunpoint.
 
Ah, but given Delaware's position, you can bet that if war breaks out and Maryland is "Confederate" (or whatever the analogue is here), it's going to get occupied pretty soon, and you would expect at least moderate "Confederate" sympathies there.

IIRC, Delaware had more citizens serve in the Union (per capita) than any other Northern State. So... yeah.
 
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