First Battle of Bull Run

A half-trained army is marched toward Richmond to win the war in an afternoon, with congressmen and picnickers riding out to watch.

McDowell’s (North) wide swing across Sudley Ford works: by midday the rebels are driven back and it looks like a Union victory.

The Confederate line holds on Henry House Hill, Jackson earns a nickname, and a bedridden widow becomes the war’s first civilian killed.

Fresh rebels off the trains break the Union right; the retreat dissolves into panic, and both nations wake to a long, terrible war.