What Caused the Civil War? | Secession

American History Hit

History Hit

America, History

4.5 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 25 September 2025

⏱️ 39 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In the wake of Abraham Lincoln’s election, Southern leaders made a fateful choice: to break from the Union. Yet instead of plunging the country into war, what followed next was a tense standoff. There were, as we'll learn today, twists and turns on the path from Secession to all out Civil War.

Edited by Tomos Delargy. Produced by Freddy Chick. Senior Producer is Charlotte Long.

Sign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a new release every week and ad-free podcasts. Sign up at https://www.historyhit.com/subscribe.

You can take part in our listener survey here.

All music from Epidemic Sounds.

American History Hit is a History Hit podcast.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Here's the truth about AI. AI is only as powerful as the platform it's built into. Service Now puts
0:06.7	AI to work for people across your business, removing friction and frustration for your employees,
0:12.9	supercharging productivity for your developers, providing intelligent tools for your service
0:17.8	agents to make customers happier, all built into a single platform you can
0:22.1	use right now. That's why the world works with ServiceNow. Visit ServiceNow.com
0:28.0	slash UK slash AI for people.
0:45.7	It's early November 1860 in the rural town of Chattahoochee, deep in the Florida panhandle.
0:51.1	A wagon rattles up from the riverboat landing, carrying among its load a delivery of mail.
0:56.0	The leather bag is slung down to the local postmaster. It's stuffed with letters, small packages, and a parcel of the latest issue of the Floridian
1:01.0	and Journal newspaper.
1:03.0	Rumors have been circulating for days down on the docks, gossip of the presidential election.
1:08.0	But since the telegraph doesn't reach this far out, the once-weekly Floridian
1:11.6	and Journal is the only official source of news. So when the papers are passed out, the townsfolk
1:17.6	lean in, eyes wide with shock and dread as they scan the front page headline. Lincoln is
1:23.9	elected. This is the beginning of the end.
1:28.2	It went on.
1:30.1	Sectionalism has triumphed.
1:31.1	What is to be done?
1:33.0	We say, resist.
1:38.1	Upon Lincoln's victory, it is a sentiment felt far and wide throughout the deep south.
1:41.3	One that would build momentum in the weeks and months to follow.
1:44.8	A call to action that signaled one way or another a new reality.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from History Hit, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of History Hit and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.