The Confederate Cabinet met in Montgomery on April 9 and decided to force Fort Sumter’s surrender by attacking it before President Lincoln’s naval expedition arrived with additional supplies and forces. All around Charleston, Confederate troops prepared for the conflict.
Meanwhile, U.S. Capt. Gustavus V. Fox, the man who had worked with Lincoln to discuss ways to address the “Sumter issue,” departed New York in the steamer Baltic, with about 200 soldiers from the 2nd U.S. Artillery.
