The vulnerability of the Southern nation was imminently clear to both Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis by mid-February 1864. Sherman’s expedition to Meridian, Mississippi was busily destroying Confederate property within that state.
Originally fearing that Sherman intended to march to Mobile, Alabama to resupply his invading troops from the Gulf of Mexico, Jefferson Davis by Monday, February 15, 1864 believed Sherman might instead march toward Montgomery, Alabama, that state’s capital.
However, at this time fighting around Mobile Bay--including ship and shore operations against Fort Powell at the entrance to the bay--only aggravated the Davis government’s fear of an attack. On that same day Lincoln met in Washington to be given the details of yet another, audacious plan to raid Richmond, Virginia, the national capital of the South.