On this day in 1861,

FORT SUMTER FALLS  

CIVIL WAR BEGINS

30 hour shelling results in no fatalities other than a Confederate horse 

felled by an errant Union cannon shot. 

The first shot of the Civil War was fired by secessionist and slaveholder Edmund Ruffin.  The first shot by Union forces was fired by Captain Abner Doubleday of baseball fame.

Although there were no human fatalities during the battle, a Union soldier was killed when his gun exploded in his hands as he attempted to fire the 47th shot in the 100-gun salute allowed the Union army by the Confederates before the Union army abandoned the fort. 

Ruffin survived the war but killed himself while draped in the Confederate flag after Lee’s surrender because he did not want to live under “Yankee" rule.