In the ear­ly hours of April 12, 1861, amidst a tumul­tuous stormy night, a boat car­ry­ing four enslaved row­ers approached Fort Sumter, con­vey­ing three Con­fed­er­ate offi­cers. As they rowed through chop­py waters from Charleston, they reached the fort, now trans­formed from a rel­ic into a for­mi­da­ble strong­hold under Major Robert Ander­son. How­ev­er, the fort was sig­nif­i­cant­ly under­manned with only sev­en­ty-five sol­diers defend­ing against a back­drop of mount­ing ten­sions over dwin­dling food sup­plies cut off by Con­fed­er­ate author­i­ties.

Major Ander­son, a clean-shaven, devot­ed fam­i­ly man, faced the grim prospect of sur­ren­der. He was sep­a­rat­ed from his wife, Eliza (Eba), and their young chil­dren, liv­ing in a lux­u­ri­ous hotel, the Brevoort House, while he com­mand­ed Fort Sumter. Their daugh­ters attend­ed a board­ing school to ease Eba’s bur­dens, as she suf­fered from a chron­ic ill­ness. Ander­son, deeply reli­gious, fre­quent­ly prayed for peace and to be reunit­ed with his fam­i­ly. Despite being cor­dial with Gen­er­al P.G.T. Beau­re­gard, his for­mer pupil and Con­fed­er­ate com­man­der across the har­bor, Ander­son­’s resolve to with­stand siege was test­ed by the dire cir­cum­stances.

Charleston was an epi­cen­ter of the domes­tic slave trade, with a sig­nif­i­cant pop­u­la­tion of enslaved peo­ple, cre­at­ing unease among the city’s white res­i­dents. The planters of South Car­oli­na, regard­ed them­selves as an aris­toc­ra­cy steeped in notions of chival­ry, illus­trat­ing their social sta­tus through lav­ish lifestyles and adher­ence to strict codes of hon­or. Yet the state seemed increas­ing­ly behind the times, resist­ing the advance­ment rep­re­sent­ed by the bur­geon­ing rail­road age.

As the Con­fed­er­ate offi­cers con­veyed their ulti­ma­tum, Ander­son delib­er­at­ed with his offi­cers about the fort’s defense capa­bil­i­ties. They agreed that they could last five days with­out sup­plies. In his mes­sage back to the Con­fed­er­ate lead­ers, Ander­son affirmed an evac­u­a­tion plan in three days pro­vid­ed no addi­tion­al orders came from the gov­ern­ment.

This agree­ment, how­ev­er, was com­pli­cat­ed by the arrival of Union sup­plies head­ing toward Fort Sumter, cre­at­ing ten­sion for the Con­fed­er­ate lead­ers, who feared the need to act swift­ly. The night was filled with warn­ings of impend­ing con­flict, indi­cat­ing a pre­car­i­ous sit­u­a­tion that could ignite the Civ­il War. Mary Boykin Ches­nut, observ­ing the fever­ish atmos­phere around her in Charleston, not­ed an unset­tling mix­ture of fes­tiv­i­ties and anx­i­ety, pre­sag­ing the siege to come .