When was the US Civil War at its height?

Answer 1

There are many ways to measure the US Civil War. Perhaps one way to highlight its height is to focus on the events connected to the Battle of Gettysburg both before it and the aftermath.In a summary form the following events made 1863 a year in the US Civil War where there was no positive predictions on the war's outcome:

1. March 1863, the Union enacts the first US conscription act. This is a concern for all observers. It does not mean the Union is putting the final touches on an anticipated victory, it means that recruiting volunteers has been difficult;

2. Vastly outnumbered, Lee's Army of Northern Virginia defeats Joseph Hooker's Army of the Potomac at Chancellorsville. Eastern Theater actions are always huge news events for all newspapers, North and South. The inability to dominate Virginia and capture Richmond had to have observers wondering what was wrong with the Army of the Potomac;

3. Citizens of Harrisburg Pennsylvania are panicking and taking trains out of Pennsylvania's capital city. The news of Lee's army marching north is cause for great concern;

4. Then all good news for the North. Vicksburg has fallen and Lee has lost the huge Battle of Gettysburg;

5. Directly after Gettysburg, the largest US civil insurrection in the US's largest city, New York, explodes as angry mobs burn, kill and rampage throughout the city. Most fatalities are among Freed Blacks who are killed by the mobs. The riots are a result of the Union's draft operation which has opened in New York; and

6. Lincoln orders 20,000 US troops and artillery from Gettysburg to end the riots in New York; and

7. The Gettysburg battlefield is consecrated and President Lincoln gives his famous Gettysburg Address.

These events of 1863 occurred within March to November. The South began jubilant but that soon enough fell to despair. The North remained unsettled as despite Lee's defeat and the fall of Vicksburg, no end of war scenarios are found. The rioting had to be unsettling for the US.

For some, the "height" of the war was within the above parameters.