Compiled by Jim Hachtel, President
Gen. William T. Sherman Memorial Civil War Roundtable
July 28, 1863 - "If a victim would secure the success of our cause, I would freely offer myself." Words of Jefferson Davis written as the pressure of the recent Confederate losses were contemplated.
July 28, 1863 - Several Union wagons were seized by Major John Hunt Mosby's partisan rangers at Aldie, Virginia. A sharp counterattack by the Union force took the wagons and supplies back.
July 28, 1863 - A raid at New Smyrna, Florida captured several schooners and a large supply of cotton ready for export. The cotton was burned by the crews from the USS Beauregard, Oleander, and Sagamore.
July 29, 1863 - In another blow to the Confederacy, Queen Victoria informs Parliament that she "sees no reason to depart from the strict neutrality which Her Majesty has observed from the beginning of the contest." The Confederate leaders hoped England would call for negotiations between the North and South but these hopes faded with the losses at Vicksburg and Gettysburg, and now seem completely dead.
July 29, 1863 - Admiral David G. Farragut is succeeded by Admiral Charles H Bell. Farragut sails to New York in his flagship USS Hartford.
July 30, 1863 - President Lincoln threatens to execute captured Southern officers and put Southern soldiers to hard labor, if any harm came to Union officers assigned to units made up of former slaves. The same retaliation would be in effect if former slaves were returned to bondage.
July 31, 1863 - Confederate forces and 1,700 Union cavalrymen skirmish at St. Catharine's Creek, Mississippi. The Federals were led by General John A. Logan.
August 1, 1863 - Confederate desertions increased drastically as the odds favoring victory declined. President Jefferson Davis offers amnesty to anyone absent without leave and warns that there is no choice but "victory, or subjugation, slavery, and utter ruin of yourselves, your families, and your country."
August 1, 1863 - Union troops corner General John Mosby's partisans at Warrenton Junction, Virginia and take prisoners.
August 1, 1863 - Confederate spy Belle Boyd is arrested at Martinsburg, West Virginia and sent to Washington D.C. to be imprisoned.
August 1, 1863 - Residents of Coles County, Illinois, a hotbed of anti-war feeling, gather at Matton, Illinois to hear Peace Democrat John R. Eden denounce the Lincoln administration. The crowd was variously estimated at 3,000 to 12,000.
August 1, 1863 - Admiral David D. Porter formally takes command of the naval operations along the Mississippi River.
August 2, 1863 - At Charleston Harbor, South Carolina, General Quincy Gillmore orders construction of a siege battery on swampy Morris Island. An eight-inch Parrot cannon firing 200-pound projectile eventually is installed and the troops name the cannon "Swamp Angel."
August 3, 1863 - Governor Horatio Seymour asks President Lincoln to suspend conscription in his state, the scene of recent draft riots in New York City. Abraham Lincoln declines.
