# American Civil War - why did no one attack us? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 7, 2005, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374 "2005-06-07T23:32:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Spavined\_Gelding](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/958977/32.png) [@Spavined\_Gelding](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spavined_Gelding)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/21 "2005-06-08T04:50:49Z")
It is worth remembering that France, Napoleon III’s Second Empire, did take advantage of the Civil War to engage in a Mexican Adventure and that at the end of the war a fair hunk of the Union army was sent to Texas under Uncle Billy Sherman to make sure that France did not try to pull any funny stuff. Napoleon was probably eager to get involved in the war but would not do it without British support. Given the antagonism toward a strong and expansive US by the ruling class in Britain and that British democracy was not all that robust, the primary thing that kept Britain out was Prince Albert. It is easy to make fun of him and Victoria’s nearly pathological grief when he died, but for a time he was the primary reason that Gladstone’s ambitions to permanently cripple the US were not put into action. It was Prince Albert who cooled popular anger over the Trent Affair. Victoria continued his policies. That, the Emancipation Proclamation, and Egyptian long staple cotton pretty well assured that Britain was not going to overtly intervene in the American war. That did not stop the British from doing semi-unofficially all sorts of stuff that was very helpful to the Confederacy, for instance the CSS Alabama (armed with British guns and men) and other British built, armed and crewed commerce raiders, the Enfield rifle, and safe harbor for blockade runners in Bermuda. Also, while the British navy was formidable, her army was a pretty small show and poorly organized, equipped, supplied and lead, all as demonstrated by the Crimean War and the Indian Mutiny. Militarily Britain had a full plate in the 1860s without sending an expeditionary force to take a place on the firing line with the Army of Northern Virginia. ---
**Author:** ![Civil\_Guy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/d78d45/32.png) [@Civil\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Civil_Guy)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/22 "2005-06-08T04:51:00Z")
Er, no, the link to [Amazon.com](http://Amazon.com) doesn’t work. :smack: Slinks away… ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/23 "2005-06-08T05:00:27Z")
> [@Exapno Mapcase](#): > > we quickly put together the largest **mechanized** armies the world had ever seen. And then just as quickly disbanded them, when it was realised the internal combustion engine had not yet been invented? ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 7:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/24 "2005-06-08T07:10:05Z")
Well, yes, Britian had a mighty navy. But if it had got within reach of our Ironclad Monitors, it would have been blown to hell in short order. We also had the greatest navy in the world too, albiet not one meant for overseas action. Our army was not only large, it had been modernized, and had the best equiptment, tactic and scads of veterans, too. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 7:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/25 "2005-06-08T07:34:40Z")
Plus, the war was never all that popular in certain sectors of the North - consider the New York Draft Riots. Throughout the was there were Northern Democrats who sympathised with the southern position. The moment British troops would have landed on American shores, the war would have changed in their minds from an avoidable dispute between the states to a foreign invasion. It would be Pearl Harbor X10. ---
**Author:** ![lokij](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/5e9695/32.png) [@lokij](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lokij)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 8:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/26 "2005-06-08T08:03:45Z")
> [@Askance](#): > > And then just as quickly disbanded them, when it was realised the internal combustion engine had not yet been invented? The War Between the States was the first large scale conflict to make widespread use of the railroad and in a larger sense the full fruits of the industrial revolution. It also saw the emergence of the steam powered, armored naval vessel’s dominance of the seas. It was mechanized warfare, just not the kind we’re familiar with today. ---
**Author:** ![lokij](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/5e9695/32.png) [@lokij](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lokij)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 8:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/27 "2005-06-08T08:07:59Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Well, yes, Britian had a mighty navy. But if it had got within reach of our Ironclad Monitors, it would have been blown to hell in short order. We also had the greatest navy in the world too, albiet not one meant for overseas action. > > Our army was not only large, it had been modernized, and had the best equiptment, tactic and scads of veterans, too. The British navy would likely have wiped the US Navy out. Yes, we did have the Monitors and they were revolutionary ships but the Brits had the HMS Warrior as well as a profound numerical superiority in conventional wooden ships. It would have been costly to the empire but they would have won in that contest. ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 8:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/28 "2005-06-08T08:58:52Z")
> [@Exapno Mapcase](#): > > And all this doesn’t even mention that nobody really had a beef against the U.S. at the time: I’m not even sure what you’re referring to. > > I’m sorry, but this is a really hairbrained idea. It doesn’t seem to emerge from any understanding of the world in the 1860s. Have you been reading too much bad alternate history sf? 😃 Well said. Canada invade the U.S.? In the 1860s? As far as I can tell, they _still_ haven’t even finished settling their _own_ territory. And what “beef” did Canada have with the U.S., ignoring that it wasn’t sovereign? And even if Mexico had been stable at the time, invading a terriotory for which you’ve just lost a war, and which you’ve just sold (albeit under duress), and a vast inhospitable area at that, would be difficult to justify both domestically and internationally. IIRC, the Brits did meddle a bit in the South, but as mentioned above, this was a look-see to future trade. ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 9:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/29 "2005-06-08T09:28:53Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > Plus, the war was never all that popular in certain sectors of the North - consider the New York Draft Riots. Throughout the was there were Northern Democrats who sympathised with the southern position. The moment British troops would have landed on American shores, the war would have changed in their minds from an avoidable dispute between the states to a foreign invasion. It would be Pearl Harbor X10. I agree. I’m not a historian, but I also feel that our (US) collective awareness of both the Civil War and the war for independence downplays the role of money. When you read all the details, Lockean (sp?) philosophy alone would never have been sufficient for a “revolution.” It was the taxes that angered people the most. And who were those who participated in the Draft Riots? Those who couldn’t afford the $350 to buy their way out of conscription. Those in the North who _could_ buy their way out were among those who really wanted the cheap labor of freed slaves coming north for manufacturing work, especially textiles. Neither war was so cut and dried. Similar to the wars of today. ---
**Author:** ![RandomLetters](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8edcca/32.png) [@RandomLetters](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RandomLetters)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 12:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/30 "2005-06-08T12:03:32Z")
Also note that a lot of the draft rioters were Irish immigrants - while they feared more competition for low-level labor that black emancipation would bring, I am willing to wager most of them would be incredibly eager to get a chance to fight the British. ---
**Author:** ![MMI](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/53a042/32.png) [@MMI](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MMI)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/31 "2005-06-08T13:35:16Z")
I seem to recall that in addition to the potential threat to Canada intervention might pose (and a general willingness to wait and see - the Confederacy would have to prove their worthiness of intervention just as the nascent US did to the French), one factor in Britain’s decision to not intervene was concern about Union privateers - the griping of the merchants, need for convoying, etc might exceed the potential benefits of taking sides. IIRC, had the UK taken sides though, the US would probably have to find alternative suppliers of gunpowder (or the components thereof?) domestically, as we imported large quantities of the stuff from the UK. > [@RandomLetters](#): > > Also note that a lot of the draft rioters were Irish immigrants - while they feared more competition for low-level labor that black emancipation would bring, I am willing to wager most of them would be incredibly eager to get a chance to fight the British. Thus the various Fenian invasions of Canada post-war. ---
**Author:** ![Balle\_M](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/13edae/32.png) [@Balle\_M](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balle_M)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/32 "2005-06-08T14:15:10Z")
> [@Spavined Gelding](#): > > That did not stop the British from doing semi-unofficially all sorts of stuff that was very helpful to the Confederacy, for instance the CSS Alabama (armed with British guns and men) and other British built, armed and crewed commerce raiders, **the Enfield rifle** , and safe harbor for blockade runners in Bermuda. (Bolding Mine) To be fair, the Brits had no problem selling these to BOTH sides. ---
**Author:** ![Crandolph](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7cd45c/32.png) [@Crandolph](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crandolph)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/33 "2005-06-08T14:43:20Z")
> [@Askance](#): > > And then just as quickly disbanded them, when it was realised the internal combustion engine had not yet been invented? [Nitpick] Maybe not widely used practical ones, but it had in effect been invented: > [@](#): > > 1680 - Dutch physicist, Christian Huygens designed (but never built) an internal combustion engine that was to be fueled with gunpowder. > > 1824 - English engineer, Samuel Brown adapted an old Newcomen steam engine to burn gas, and he used it to briefly power a vehicle up Shooter’s Hill in London. > > 1858 - Belgian-born engineer, Jean Joseph Étienne Lenoir invented and patented (1860) a double-acting, electric spark-ignition internal combustion engine fueled by coal gas. In 1863, Lenoir attached an improved engine (using petroleum and a primitive carburetor) to a three-wheeled wagon that managed to complete an historic fifty-mile road trip. > > 1862 - Alphonse Beau de Rochas, a French civil engineer, patented but did not build a four-stroke engine (French patent #52,593, January 16, 1862). > > 1864 - Austrian engineer, Siegfried Marcus, built a one-cylinder engine with a crude carburetor, and attached his engine to a cart for a rocky 500-foot drive. Several years later, Marcus designed a vehicle that briefly ran at 10 mph that a few historians have considered as the forerunner of the modern automobile by being the world’s first gasoline-powered vehicle (however, read conflicting notes below). [Link](http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aacarsgasa.htm) (yes, to [About.com](http://About.com)… you’ve been warned) [/Nitpick] ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/34 "2005-06-08T15:35:00Z")
Bottom line, from the Brit point of view, I guess: 1. You weren’t all that. 2. We weren’t into conquering other industrialised nations, only with getting a toe-hold into places where we could get valuable resources, industrialising them, educating them, building infrastructure and so on. Call it enlightened self-interest. We weren’t interested in conquering Russia in the Crimean undertaking, only in getting them to leave Constantinople alone. (“We don’t want to fight, but by jingo, if we do…”) 3. We hadn’t the logistics to conquer the US even if it weren’t for 1 & 2. 4. Our existing strategy was a winning one, I mean, 40% of the planet calling Victoria the Queen by the end of the century? Britain the workshop of the world? 5. We did have some ironclads of our own (HMS Warrior, for a start) but it’s true our navy needed modernisation. OTOH your Monitors couldn’t be _everywhere_. 6. We had no real reason to take sides. 7. We were terrified of your countless millions of armed citizens (y’know, like the Confederates were). 8. You weren’t all that. Just a few random thoughts… ---
**Author:** ![Rocketeer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rocketeer/32/4437_2.png) [@Rocketeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rocketeer)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/35 "2005-06-08T15:55:07Z")
> [@lokij](#): > > The British navy would likely have wiped the US Navy out. Yes, we did have the Monitors and they were revolutionary ships but the Brits had the HMS Warrior as well as a profound numerical superiority in conventional wooden ships. It would have been costly to the empire but they would have won in that contest. None of Britain’s wooden ships would have mattered at all; as Hampton Roads and countless riverine battles showed, the ironclads would have demolished them easily (if the battles were near the coastline). **Warrior** , now, that’s a different story. I think the only Union ship that could have matched her was **New Ironsides**. And by the end of the Civil War, the Union was working on a powerful class of enormous ocean-going moniotrs that would have beaten anything afloat. (Scrapped after the war…) ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/36 "2005-06-08T16:41:53Z")
A war between Britain and the United States in the 1860’s would have been similar to a replay of the Anglo-French wars of fifty years before - a whale fighting a lion. The Royal Navy would have swept the Americans from the ocean and ended the Union blockade on the South. But America’s forts and ironclads would have made it difficult for the British to carry out any coastal operations. And the Union’s strength in the field would have, at best, restricted the British Army to defending Canada. After that it would become an economic war. People talk about “King Cotton” but they forget about “King Corn”. By 1860, the United States was already a massive exporter of grain, much of it to Britain. And while the United States did not have the world’s biggest navy, it did have the world’s biggest merchant fleet. So a British blockade of the United States might have hurt the British more than the Americans. At the very least, you would have seen a major price increase in the cost of food. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/37 "2005-06-08T17:06:51Z")
> [@Malacandra](#): > > 1. You weren’t all that. Yeah, but we were damned close to being all that and MORE! > [@](#): > > OTOH your Monitors couldn’t be _everywhere_. As Rocketeer suggests, due to their non-existant freeboard our monitors had trouble being anywhere besides the bottom in any but the calmest water. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/38 "2005-06-08T17:18:31Z")
> [@dropzone](#): > > Yeah, but we were damned close to being all that and MORE!As Rocketeer suggests, due to their non-existant freeboard our monitors had trouble being anywhere besides the bottom in any but the calmest water. It’s true that the Monitor sank becuase of that, but it was in a rather severe storm. The monitors could and did cruise the coast with relative safety. I’d hate to be on one in a storm in the middle of the North Atlantic, yes. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/39 "2005-06-08T19:06:14Z")
No, the early monitors took water through the hatches, vents, and around the turret whenever the opportunity presented itself. _Monitor_, itself, had to go on a diet to end up with 14" of freeboard so the deck was awash in even moderate seas. All of the monitors were virtually semi-submersibles and the _Casco_ class even had ballast tanks to bring freeboard down to three inches, but one of them started out running that low before the turret had even been fitted so early ones of the class were refitted as very slow spar torpedo boats and all but one had the raft built up another 22". Surprising to me, though, of the Civil War monitors that were completed only _Monitor_ and _Weehawken_ sank in high seas, but then _Weehawken_ was at anchor at the time. (To be fair, it was during a gale.) This record can be attributed in part to the USN knowing they were not designed for and had no business on the high seas, though _Roanoke_ and _Dictator_ were supposed to be for use further away from the coastal and river waters most were designed for. On the other hand, they were sometimes used for mine clearing and since they dropped like rocks when mined (_Patapsco_ in fifteen seconds and _Tecumseh_ in 25-30 seconds) maybe the Navy didn’t really know what they were good for. The other thing that saved the lives of many seamen was that most of the monitors started during the Civil War were never commissioned and because they were not needed and were built too quickly from green timber they were either scrapped before their launch or subjected to a “great repair,” which amounted to the same thing–the hulk was scrapped and a new ship built with the same name in an attempt to get new ships built against Congress’ wishes. As an aside (does it look like I’ve been bursting for an excuse to talk about monitors?) the low freeboard made later, more watertight monitors handy submarine tenders and the British found monitors useful both for coastal bombardment and as a cheap way to use spare turrets (examples are at home) up through WWII, though they were so slow and unseaworthy they often needed to be towed to where they were to be used. [http://www.hazegray.org/navhist/battleships/us\_mon.htm#cas-cl](http://www.hazegray.org/navhist/battleships/us_mon.htm#cas-cl) ---
**Author:** ![Cerowyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/82dd89/32.png) [@Cerowyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cerowyn)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2005, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374/40 "2005-06-08T20:03:09Z")
> [@lokij](#): > > The British navy would likely have wiped the US Navy out. Yes, we did have the Monitors and they were revolutionary ships but the Brits had the HMS Warrior as well as a profound numerical superiority in conventional wooden ships. It would have been costly to the empire but they would have won in that contest. The Royal Navy also had HMS Black Prince, another Warrior-class ironclad. Also, IIRC, there were something like twenty to twenty-five other ironclads of various classes in the Royal Navy at the time. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-civil-war-why-did-no-one-attack-us/307374.md?page=3)