November 3, 1863---Fort Sumter in ruins

NOVEMBER 3, 1863:          

After months of ‘round-the-clock shelling by the Union, Fort Sumter is nothing but a huge heap of rubble. The Union’s Admiral John Dahlgren, however, is dissatisfied: “[S]till, this mass of ruin [Sumter] is capable of harboring a number of the enemy, who may retain their hold until expelled by the bayonet.” Amidst the wreckage is a warren of dugouts and tunnels, and Confederates are using the ruined redoubt effectively to fire upon Union ships even as the Fort itself is reduced to blasted bits. 

November 2, 1863---Edward Everett is asked to deliver the Gettysburg Address

NOVEMBER 2, 1863:          

President Abraham Lincoln is invited to attend the dedication ceremonies of the new National Military Cemetery at Gettysburg later in the month. Although Lincoln is expected to speak, Edward Everett, a famed orator of the day, and Lincoln’s Vice-Presidential opponent on the 1860 Constitutional Union Party ticket, is tapped as keynote speaker. 

November 1, 1863---Longstreet goes to Knoxville

NOVEMBER 1, 1863:         

After The Richmond Examiner publishes a scathing editorial criticizing General Braxton Bragg for his failure to attack General Ambrose Burnside’s Union troops in Knoxville (carping that  “the hogs of East Tennessee, affording 25 millions of pounds of pork, are now being slaughtered for the Yankee armies,” and declaiming vociferously on the Southern army’s lack of shoes for their soldiers), Bragg, under pressure, sends the insubordinate petition-writing James Longstreet (and most of The Army of Tennessee) to operate against Burnside. There are skirmishes at Eastport and Fayetteville, Tennessee. A shrunken Confederate force remains near Lookout Mountain to harry the Union forces in Chattanooga. 

October 31, 1863---The Siege of Charleston goes on . . .

OCTOBER 31, 1863:            

The seemingly endless siege of Charleston, South Carolina continues. Bombarded by Union forces on land and sea since late Spring, the “Cradle of Secession” is constantly rocked, but will not fall.  

Indomitable Charlestonians attempt to sink the U.S.S. NEW IRONSIDES by night, but are unsuccessful.

October 30, 1863---“I will show them how a Confederate Soldier can die.”

OCTOBER 30, 1863:           

John Nichols, one of only two members of the Confederate guerrilla band “James Johnson’s Boys” is hanged in Jefferson City, Missouri. Nichols is one of the few men denied clemency by President Lincoln. Johnson and Nichols had been particularly active in the Sedalia, Missouri area, and so effective (primarily against Unionist civilians, mainly women and children) that the Union ordered a “shoot on sight” order against them. As the rope was being adjusted around his neck, Nichols defiantly said: “I will show them how a Confederate Soldier can die.”