WI: Virginia Stayed Loyal in the ACW?

A Virginia which stays with the Union is not automatically a Virginia which fights the Confederacy.

Virginia staying with the Union will likely be the reverse of Kentucky in that they will declare neutrality like Kentucky did but will be more sympathetic to the South meaning that if Federal's try to recruit troops from Virginia or send troops across Virginia's borders the state will condemn this and demand the removal of these things. In the even of Virginia being invaded by both Federal and Confederate forces they are more likely to condemn the north and side with the south than to condemn both and maintain neutrality.
 
If you refrain from further trolling, there would be none for you to respond to.

Your ATL point is correct--VA, NC, etc., are only staying in the Union if Lincoln decides to let the erring sisters go in peace--but you swathed your point with trollery and misinformation.
Pretty much this. I find it both annoying and disappointing that Old South apologists, or trolls spouting their rhetoric, are so common on the internet.

Getting back to the topic, I would say that there might not be so much a war, as some saber-rattling, perhaps a blockade, and the seceded states being brought back in, a few years later.

I'm rather curious about what would happen with the institution of slavery ITTL. Some sort of gradual emancipation plan, perhaps?
 
It doesn't make a bit of difference how you feel about the legality of it. The point is that the slave states, including Virginia, perceived these things as acts of war, as unlawful, and as unacceptable, and therefore seceded. All of them acknowledged the right of states to secede, they just hadn't chosen that option for themselves. In their eyes, the seceded states were not part of the USA. Lincoln, as usual, was utterly devoid of any insight and completely misapprehended the situation, just as you have.

EDIT: I will not respond to further trolling on this thread. Have it to yourselves.

Don't accuse people of trolling for disagreeing with you. Taking a strongly revisionist pro-Southern anti-Lincoln view is a more controversial stance, so you should expect to have people questioning it and be ready to respond to it.

Dumping something that's borderline flamebait in a thread and accusing people of "trolling" for questioning you isn't really something something that fosters discussion.
 
I've always wondered about the many threads concerning the ACW.

To me the more interesting notion is the political changes if Lincoln
had decided to allow the deep South to leave on their own which
would have kept the four states of the Upper North in the union
and trusting the economic difficulties of Lower South would ultimately
force the lower south back into some type reunion (with the possible
exception of Texas).
 
I've always wondered about the many threads concerning the ACW.

To me the more interesting notion is the political changes if Lincoln
had decided to allow the deep South to leave on their own which
would have kept the four states of the Upper North in the union
and trusting the economic difficulties of Lower South would ultimately
force the lower south back into some type reunion (with the possible
exception of Texas).

Lincoln would never have allowed secession, especially after the belligerence of the seceding states.

In order to have a 'peaceful' secession you either have to have Lincoln not winning in 1860 or it happening under Buchanan and Lincoln taking a 'wait and see' kind of approach if the CSA is already collapsing by the time he gets into office.
 

Wolfpaw

Banned
Bumping this because I'm still interested in what effects the new wealth of Virginian officers would have on the Union army.

Would Lee get the command like Scott recommended? What of Jackson and Stuart?
 
If Virginia, North Carolina, and Tennessee remain in the Union, then it's never going to become a war on slavery. In fact, it may turn out to be more of a Great Rebellion than a Civil War. I'd give the rump-Confederacy two nasty, brutal, and short years with Johnston, Beauregard, and Longstreet being the stars.

What would Robert E. Lee's fate be? Would Scott secure him a high command? Or would McClellan still take over?

He'd be a Burnside figure who is overly aggressive and attacks for no good reason with overly complex plans lousily executed and gracefully accepts that it's his fault, not Lincoln's.
 
In the first place, sending a squadron of warships into Charleston harbor; then (and this is what actually triggered the border state secessions) raising an army to attack the South. Lincoln was even so brazen as to demand that each of the border states furnish a quota of troops for this army, which of course was out of the question.

And which every single CS state furnished USCT units and only South Carolina failed to provide at least a brigade of white Union troops from said state. Sorry, the Confederacy was a Tamil Tigers-style rebellion, not universally speaking for the entire South.

It doesn't make a bit of difference how you feel about the legality of it. The point is that the slave states, including Virginia, perceived these things as acts of war, as unlawful, and as unacceptable, and therefore seceded. All of them acknowledged the right of states to secede, they just hadn't chosen that option for themselves. In their eyes, the seceded states were not part of the USA. Lincoln, as usual, was utterly devoid of any insight and completely misapprehended the situation, just as you have.

EDIT: I will not respond to further trolling on this thread. Have it to yourselves.

Except Kentucky, Missouri, Maryland, and Delaware which stayed in the Union, and West Virginia which seceded from secession to join the Union, and all the white and black Southerners who fought for the Union in blue and kepis. Except also for the reality that the border states had two popular referenda that outright defeated secession and were more or less bullied into joining the Confederacy, while the Union slave states provided a great deal of troops for the Union cause.
 

Wolfpaw

Banned
He'd be a Burnside figure who is overly aggressive and attacks for no good reason with overly complex plans lousily executed and gracefully accepts that it's his fault, not Lincoln's.
Interesting. So he'd likely wind up in charge of the AoP (or its equivalent) at some point? What about Jackson? Would he be sent West or would he probably get a brigade command and then rise as rapidly as he did IOTL?
 
Interesting. So he'd likely wind up in charge of the AoP (or its equivalent) at some point? What about Jackson? Would he be sent West or would he probably get a brigade command and then rise as rapidly as he did IOTL?

Jackson would probably be a Nathaniel Banks figure at the start who by the time the war is won has dramatically improved to at least Sheridan's levels. Historically Jackson was the Eastern Braxton Bragg and had a continual series of tactical mistakes, that could still cost the Union quite dearly.

Here Longstreet is probably still going to side with the Confederacy. Lee is going to be given a high command for sure, and his same traits as OTL, the continual desire to attack, the grand and complicated plans that saw no staff work and excessive reliance on subordinates, and of course the tendency to associate high casualties with success, are precisely the kind that will damage the ATL Union and buy the Confederacy time before it completely disintegrates.
 
Somebody should try a tl where va, nc, ky and tn are allowed to stay neutral, and the core union has to try amphibious landings and attacks down the western bank of the mississippi...
 

EricM

Banned
In the first place, sending a squadron of warships into Charleston harbor; then (and this is what actually triggered the border state secessions) raising an army to attack the South. Lincoln was even so brazen as to demand that each of the border states furnish a quota of troops for this army, which of course was out of the question.

Last time I checked several states had committed treason and seceded before Lincoln was sworn in. Not to mention the whole little fact that The Rebels were the first ones to fire any shots.

The Civil War had been brewing for decades. Blaming it on Lincoln's "brazen aggression" is just silly.
 
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