The next day, March 5th, Lincoln had letters from Fort Sumter, in Charleston harbor.

Major Anderson was besieged there by the batteries of secession, was being starved out, might hold on a month longer, needed help.

Through staggering complications and embarrassments, which were presently to be outstaggered by worse ones, Lincoln by the end of March saw his path clear.

"In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow-countrymen, and not mine, is the momentous issue of civil war." The clew to the path had been in those words from the first.
The flag of the Union, the little island of loyalty amid the waters of secession, was covered by the Charleston batteries.

"Batteries ready to open Wednesday or Thursday.