On this day in 1861, the first shot of the Civil War is fired. You may remember from yesterday’s story that Confederate and Union forces had been at a stalemate in South Carolina. The federal government needed to resupply Fort Sumter, but it could not do so without treading into Confederate territory. The Confederacy viewed such federal movements as a sign of aggression and as a challenge to its sovereignty. Matters came to a head when Lincoln decided to send an unarmed resupply convoy to the st