150-Year Anniversary ยท October 1861
On October 21, 1861, a poorly managed Union reconnaissance across the Potomac ended in disaster at Ball's Bluff near Leesburg, Virginia. Among the dead was Colonel Edward Baker, a sitting United States senator and a friend of Lincoln's, a loss that shook Washington.
The defeat, coming after Bull Run, hardened sentiment in Congress and would soon lead to the creation of the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War to scrutinize the generals.
Through the autumn the Union pressed forward with the blockade and assembled the naval expedition that would strike the southern coast in November, tightening the ring around the Confederacy.
Ball's Bluff and the autumn stalemate of 1861 belong to a longer military story. That story is gathered on the American Civil War site.