i mean that party of lincoln and that party of grant that he so vehemently defended, promoted, stumped for, voted for worked for all of his life the last 30 years of his life is no longer the same party at all. the modern contemporary republican party has become essentially the american white conservative party. let's face it. and douglass would have no home there. now, times change. history changes. parties move on, people move on. new political persuasions, no issues, no coalitions grow and he would understand that. but i can tell you that if we can guess at one thing, he would resent current modern day republicans calling themselves the party of lincoln. >> david blight from the yale university study of slavery resistance and abolition and one of the five historians participating in the person of the year 1862 at the library of

virginia. good luck with the results this afternoon and thanks for taking the time to speak with our viewers. >> thank you very much. you are watching a museum of confederacy foreup, who "time" magazine would have chosen as person of the year in 1862 in the midst of the civil war 150 years ago. our civil war coverage continues this weekend when we focus on the battle of shilo in southwestern tennessee, april 6, 7, 1862. the civil war, on american history tv, this saturday at 6:00 p.m. and 10:00 p.m. eastern and sunday at 11:00 a.m. >> this saturday at noon, on cspan 2 book tv join our call unprogram with chris kyle as he talks about his life from professional rodeo rider to becoming the most lethal sniper in u.s. military history.

at 10:00 p.m. on afterwards. >> if you think of yourself as a family and you think of yourself as a team. she said when i get a raise at work, he is proud of me. it's like we got a raise. our family got a raise. she redefined providing to include what her husband does and had a lot of respect. >> the richer sex author, on the changing role of women as bread winners out family and how that impacts their lives. also this weekend, america the beautiful. director of pediatric neu neurosurgery at johns hopkins, declares the decline of empires past with america and shares his thought on what should be done to avoid a similar fate. sunday, 3. 30. a.m. book tv every weekend. on cspan 2. >> all week in primetime we are showing american history tv programming seen every weekend on cspan 3. next we return to the museum of the confederacy for a forum on

who "time" magazine would have selected as person of the year in 1862 in the midst of the civil war. over the next four hours, a panel of historians will continue to nominate candidates. with the audience making the final decision. a similar event shows abraham lincoln as person of the year for 1861. captain charles steedman of the united states navy offered what some might consider extravagant praise for the subject of my talk today. that man, under medium height, clean shaven, piercing eyes and determined jaw, that little man has done more to put down the

rebellion than any general except grant and sherman. some of you -- may have already figured out who -- who he was talking about. it was of course, admiral david glasgow, the commander of the fleet at mobile bay, and more important and relevant to our chronological focus today, the captor of new orleans. an architect of union control of the lower miss valley in 1862. in my judgment, these achievement s along with part i the port hudson and vicksburg campaigns in 1863, but especially, the capture of new orleans one of the most important northern strategic victories of the war do indeed entitle faragut to equal status with grant and sherman in

winning the war. allegiance to the united states in the sectional conflict was an open question. although he had served under the american flag for half a century, and had fought in the war of 1812, and the mexican war, under that flag -- a similar record was true of other southern-born officers who chose to go with the confederacy. faragut had been born and raised in tennessee. had married a woman from virginia. after his first wife died, he married another virginia woman, in 1843. when he was not at sea, he lived in norfolk. as the sectional conflict heated

up, he said to friends in virginia, god forbid i should ever have to raise my hand against the south. but when abraham lincoln called out the militia after the confederate as tacked fort sumter, faragut express add prufl -- expressed approval of that action. his neighbors told him any one holding that opinion could not continue to live in norfolk. then faragut replied, i can live some where else. he decided to move to new york. he told his wife -- this act of mine may cause years of separation from your family. so you must decide quickly whether you will go north, or remain here. she went with him. as the they prepared to leave, the thin lipped, faragut offered a few parting words to his virginia friends. you fellows will catch the devil

before you get through with this business. and as matters turned out, they caught a good many devils from faragut himself. a law passed gave gideon wells authority to ignore the age-old rule of seniority in making promotions during the civil war. wells was quick to weed out deadwood in the senior ranks of captains in the u.s. navy. in order to promote younger and promising officers over their heads. although faragut was 60 years old in 161, he had the vigor and ambition of a younger man. he stood 37th in seniority on the captain's list. he was respected by many of his fellow officers, but virtually unknown to the public, at the beginning of 1862. when wells appointed him

commander of the gulf west gulf blockading squadron whose ta task would be not only to blockade the confederate coast from west florida to brownsville texas on the mexican border, but also to capture new orleans and gain control of the lower vall. at the time, many in the north wondered at wells' selection of fara faragut for this herculean effort. as the the naval secretary, wells wrote in his famous war time diary, neither the president nor any member of the cabinet knew faragut or knew of him. members of congress inquired who he was. and some of them remonstrated and questioned whether i was making a mistake for he was a southern man and had a southern wife. but wells knew about faragut's expression of unionism when he

moved from norfolk to new york. and wells was willing to gamble on his loyalty as well as his ability. rarely in the history of naval warfare has a gamble paid off so handsomely. faragut began biuilding his fleet. the capture of new orleans. the leading port and largest city and the gayway teway to th carrier of the lifeblood, the mississippi river. after kidable effort, faragut got his supplies across to the gulf of mexico in march 1862. they were supported by 20 skooners that had been modified and strengthened to carry a mortar to bombard the

confederate defenses at two forts, flanking the mississippi 70 miles below new orleans. forts jackson and saint phillip. together, these forts mounted 126 big seacoast guns, most of them on the river to try to blow out of the water any fleet attempting to come up the river. in addition the confederates the few gets a fleet of eight gun boats, converted from river steam boats. one small iron-clad, css manassas, and, another large, but uncompleted iron-clad, the css louisiana. which had its guns in place but didn't yet have engines in working order. so it was anchored near the fort as a floating battery. the fleet was supported by an army of 15,000 union soldiers commanded by benjamin butler, probably not much of a military

asset for the -- for the union effort. and indeed the public expected the navy to do the heavy work. just as the fleet under flag offic officer, samuel dupont had done at port royal, south carolina, five months earlier. iowa senator james grimes, a member of the senate committee on naval affairs, told assistant secretary of the navy, gustaves fox. take new orleans and hold it until the army comes up. and that's exactly how it happened. the mortar schooners commanded by commander david dixon porter were towed into position on april 18th to begin bombarding the forts. over the next six days and nights they lobbed thousand of 216-pound shells into the forts.

doing a lot of damage, but knocking out only a few of the guns. faragut grew impatient and decided to run his ships past the forts in the predawn darkness of april 24th. this was not a popular decision among this captains. who had in the words of one of them, little or no sanguine feeling of success. for his part though, faragut wrote to his wife, succession its the only thing listened to in this war. and i know i must sink or stwwi by that rule. as the to being prepared by defeat, i certainly am not. any man who is prepared for defeat would be half defeated before he commenced. on april 22nd, faragut called for a meeting of his captains to

plan the attack. in military annals, it was proverbial that councsecils of never fight. but this one proved off to be an exception. after faragut outlined his plans for running past the forts in the darkness he invited the response of his captains. as one of them wrote, the prevailing opinions seem to be adverse to making the attempt to pass the forts at that time. that it was premature. that the forts had not yet been sufficiently reduced by the fire of the mortar vessels and the risk of the loss of too many vessels was too great to be run. but faragut pointed out that the mortars would soon exhaust their ammunition. it was now or never. and he concluded the meeting with the words -- i believe in solarity. now you heard about stonewall

jackson this morning who also believed in solarity. that too was faragut's hallmark. how many times would you have heard that from union army commanders at this stage of the war? maybe from one other, whose name, last name has five letters, starting with g. but not from most of the others. but it was becoming the slogan of the navy and especially of faragut. at 2:00 a.m. on april 24th, 17 of his ships carrying 154 guns, weighed anchor and began moving up river. with faragut's flag ship, uss hartford, in the middle of three divisions of the fleet in which the smaller gun boats were in the first and third divisions, and the larger ones in the middle divisions. the mortar fleet and five gun boats that towed them stayed behind and opened a furious

fuselage to keep down the fire of the forts. while the ships of the three divisions also opened fire as they approached the forts. these forts began firing on the ships as they approached. and as the first ships got through, the confederate gun boats, above the forts, also engaged. in this melee, scores of shells were in the air and exploding at the same time in what was surely the most spectacular fireworks display in american history to that time. the captain of the gunboat that -- that first passed the forts, the uss, described his experience in his official report. we were struck from stem to stern. at length we were up close with saint phillip. when we opened with grape and canister. scarcely we were, were we above the line of fire when we found ourselves attacked by the rebel fleet of gun boats. this was hot.

but more congenial work. three of the gun boats converged on the ship, hoping to ram and board her. the 11 inch gun fired on one of them at 30 yards distance. the effect was very destructive, wrote the captain. he immediately sheered in shore, ran aground and burned himself up. two other union gun boats eme e emerged from the smoke adds several confederate vessels swarmed around the three union ships. the enemy, were so thick, wrote the cuyahoga captain, that it was like duck shooting. what missed one hit another. with their aid, aid of the other two union sthihips, we cleared kitchen, not before two ran and sank the uss veruna, the only vesselle lost in faragut's

fleet. by that time the middle division was also passing the forts. on the hartford, faragut climbed the port to get above the smoke of the guns for a better view what was happening. holding on to the shrouds, he stood there as cool as if leaning against a mantle in his own house. according to a sailor. faragut's signal officer pleaded with him to come down. we can't afford to lose you, flag officer, he shouted. they'll get you up there, sure. faragut finally climbed down. as he reached the deck. a shell exploded where he had been standing just a moment before on the rattling. on deck of the hartford during much of this action, was the fleet surgeon. who made notes in realtime and a little notebook strapped to his wrist to write up later in his journal. i cannot and will not attempt to description of this awful,

dreadful, trying scene. he wrote. but then, proceeded to do so. the din, the roar, the crash, the whistling of the balls, the bursting of shells, the crashing of masts and timbers, the sleeks of the wounded and dying was a scene which has never been surpassed. a magazine in fort jackson exploded. the river was filled with burning fire rafts. these were large rafts, piled with kindling and logs, soaked with oil which the confederates lit and floated down toward the union ships. veering to avoid one of them, the hartford ran aground. under the guns of fort saint phillip. a confederate tug pushed the raft against the port quartered. flames climbed up the side of the hull and shot halfway up the mast. i thought it was all up with us. faragut wrote. after a few second of confusion, the crew want to fire stations

and began playing hoses on the burping ship. the quick thinking signal officer, the same man who had talked faragut down from the rigging, rolled three shells to the side of the deck, uncapped them and pushed them over the side into the blazing raft, blowing it into fragments. the hoses finally doused the fire on the hartford, the engineers applied all power to back the ship off the mud and she proceeded on up river. after treating some wounded men below, the hartford surgeon came back on deck again. where, as he wrote in his journal, i saw a big river steamboat come strauight for us. her decks were black with armed men who evidently hoped to board our ship. the forecast gun, manned by marines, immediately planted a shell in the advancing steamboat, he wrote. it must have gone straight to her boiler, the magazine, for

there was a terrific explosion and the entire vessel with her swarming human freight disappeared. the most feared confederate v vessel was the "css manassas" which was actually the first iron clad to have gone into action on the lower mississippi the previous october. it was a small river steamer cut down and sheathed in one inch of iron so that it looked like a turtle shell. in a letter to his wife farragut described what happened. to the "manassas" on this morning in 1862. after we passed the forts i saw the ram, that's what they called it, the ram coming up. i hailed smith, commander of the big side wheeler "uss mississippi" and told him to run her smith turned the ship and they down. ran at each other.

we all looked on with intense anxiety. within 50 yards the enemy's heart failed him and he turned to the right and ran on shore. smith poured in abroad side which riddled her. he fired down stream and soon sank. as a side bar to this sinking, the lieutenant who conned the mississippi in this confrontation was 24-year-old george dewey who would sail into manila bay to earn his admiral stripes 36 years later. 14 of the 17 union ships at new orleans made it past the forts. and only one, "the verona," was sunk. the confederates lost seven of their eight gun boats plus the manassas. the remaining confederate gun boat was later captured and the

southerners blew up the "css louisiana request" to prevent its capture. at a cost of only 147 wounded, farragut's fleet won a remarkable victory. but that victory was incomplete until new orleans was in their possession. at mid morning on april 24th, farragut's surviving 13 ships rendezvoused seven miles above the forts. they were all more or less damaged but still operational. farragut decided to continue upriver and attack the city. the confederate troops that had been stationed in new orleans earlier had been called upriver to tennessee to meet the union threat there after grant had captured ft. donaldson leaving behind only local militia which fled at the approach of the fleet.

the city was virtually defenseless except for two earth works with 14 guns flanking the river at chalmette, three miles down stream from new orleans where andrew jackson had stopped the british in 1815, but nothing was going to stop farragut. five of his ships including the "hartford" came on firing first with their bow guns and then veering leflt or right to fire crushing broad sides into the works. in 20 minutes the confederate guns were silenced. those who could run, farragut reported to secretary of the navy wells, were running in every direction. can cut off and isolated down river with butlers troops finally approaching the forts, the garrison at ft. jackson mutinied and both forts surrendered to porter and the navy ships that had remained

there on april 28th. farragut meanwhile led the fleet to new orleans where they found all of the ships on the water front burning and thousands of bales of cotton floating down the river also on fire destroyed by confederates to prevent the capture. mob rioted in the streets and threatened the yankees with bloody vengeance. the southern author george washington cable witnessed the fury of this mob. the crowds on the levee howled and screamed with rage, he recalled. the swarming decks answered never a word. one old tar on "the heaartford" standing with lanyard in hand so plain to view that you could see him smile silently patted its big black breach and

blandly grinned. with naval guns trained on its streets new orleans sullenly surrendered and butler's troops finally arrive to preserve some kind of order. if the passage of the forts by the union fleet under farragut was not quite the night the war was lost as a title of a modern book about this campaign would have it, the capture of new orleans was arguably the most important union strategic victory of 1862. and one of the most important in the entire war. southern newspapers bemoaned the and these are now quotations from southern newspapers. bemoaned the great disaster and humiliation, sudden shock, unexpected and heavy blow, deplorable calamity, by far the most serious reverse of the war. the fire eating secessionist

edmond ruffin of virginia who proudly claimed to have fired the first shot at ft. sumpter, lamented in his diary, lamented, i can not help admitting the possibility of the subjugation of the southern states. far away in london young henry adams returned to the american ligation from a spring time walk in hyde park to find his father, normally austere, charles francis adams, american minister to the court of st. james dancing across the floor and shouting we've got new orleans. the effect of this news here, henry added, has been greater than anything yet. the confederate envoy in britain, james mason, virginian also wrote from london that the

fall of new orleans will certainly exercise a depressing influence here for intervention. it was the climactic event in the series of union victories that winter and spring that we talked about this morning that jackson's campaign in the shenandoah valley began to turn around. but the fall of new orleans at the end of april was the climactic event in a series of union victories that winter and spring which dampened even the french emperor's pro confederate sympathies. the american minister to france noted there is little more said just now about the propriety of an early reck thigs of the south. farragut did not intend to rest on his laurels. his original orders instructed him after capturing new orleans 0, take advantage of the panic

to push a strong force up the river and take all their defenses in the rear. you will also reduce the fortifications which defend mobile bay and turn them over to the army to be held, a tall order, indeed, as future events would demonstrate. farragut would have preferred to attack mobile before going up the mississippi. he was a blue water sailor. never very happy confined by river banks with mud or sand bars uncomfortably close under his keel but his orders specified priority for opening the river before attacking mobile. so he informed wells in early may i have sent seven gun boats up the river to keep up the panic as far as possible. the large ships, i fear, will not be able to go higher than baton rouge. in fact, as we'll see in a moment, they did go much higher

than that but he at that time thought they could not. while i sent the smaller vessels under commander samuel phillips lead, also a virginian, a distant cousin but also a loyal union commander, the smaller vessels under commander samuel phillips lead as high as vicksburg. these force the surrender of baton rouge. when lee reaches vicksburg and demanded its capitulation the c confederate military governor there sent a cheeky reply. mississippians don't know and refuse to learn how to surrender to any enemy. if commodore farragut or the brigadier general can teach them, let them come and try. farragut would soon come and try. he decided to take most of the fleet up to vicksburg, including