Louisiana secession
Louisiana, like the other states, could not see the desolation that lay ahead when it entered a war expected to last only a few weeks.
[citation needed] The pressure of the slavery issue split the Democratic Party convention wide open and led to a presidential election in 1860 with four candidates.
[2] The extremists among the southern Democrats, labeled "Fire-Eaters" because of their strong pro-slavery speeches, led a walkout at the convention.
One New Orleans newspaper said the Republican Party opposed the "dignity, interest, and well-being of Louisiana."
He warned the secession threatened the interests and destiny of Louisiana, He predicted war, ruin, and decline.
The newly formed Confederate government gained the political skills of Louisiana's ex-United States senators.
Judah P. Benjamin, called the "brains of the Confederacy", served in Confederate President Jefferson Davis's cabinet.
Louisiana also contributed four key generals to the Confederate army – Braxton Bragg, Leonidas Polk, Richard Taylor, and P. G. T. Beauregard.
They chose names like the Louisiana Swamp Rangers, Crescent City Guards, Vienna Rifles, Irish Brigade, Carondelet Invincibles, Franklin Sharpshooters, and Caddo Greys.
An area to the north of Lake Pontchartrain attracted the Confederate commanders to a site with hills, tall pines, and good water.
In the early days of the war, equipment and supplies were furnished by parish governments, wealthy individuals, or the soldiers themselves.
Ranches in southwest Louisiana and Texas supplied the cattle for a slaughterhouse south of Alexandria.
Discovering the extensive salt deposits at Avery Island gave the Confederates a valuable source.
Monogrammed linen pillowcases became sandbags at Port Hudson, and treasured carpets became blankets for freezing soldiers.
In his inaugural address, Moore told the legislators and visitors at the Capitol that a powerful anti-slavery party (i.e. the Republican Party) in the Northern free states threatened the existence of the slave-holding states: So bitter is this hostility felt toward slavery, which these fifteen states regard as a great social and political blessing, that it exhibits itself in legislation for the avowed purpose of destroying the rights of slaveholders guaranteed by the Constitution and protected by the Acts of Congress... [in] the North, a widespread sympathy with felons has deepened the distrust in the permanent Federal Government, and awakened sentiments favorable to a separation of states.
A wealthy planter and slaveholder, Moore acted aggressively to engineer the secession of Louisiana from the Union by a convention on January 23.
[4] After the ordinance of secession passed the convention on January 26, 1861, Moore placed Colonel Braxton Bragg in command of the state military.
When war erupted, he unsuccessfully lobbied the Confederate government in Richmond for a strong defense of New Orleans.
Two days before the city surrendered in April 1862, Moore and the legislature abandoned Baton Rouge as the state capital, relocating to Opelousas on May 1, 1862.
[5] However, despite a brief check at Baton Rouge, Union forces continued to advance into Louisiana and up the Mississippi, and the capital was moved again to Shreveport.
New Orleans, Louisiana, the largest city in the entire South, was strategically important as a port city due to its location along the Mississippi River and its access to the Gulf of Mexico, and the United States War Department very early on planned on its capture.
