A Guide to Civil War Washington, D.C.: The Capital of the Union

When the first shots of the Civil War were fired in 1861, Washington, D.C., was a small, essentially Southern city. The capital rapidly transformed as it prepared for invasion—army camps sprung up in Foggy Bottom, the Navy Yard on Anacostia was a beehive of activity and even the Capitol was pressed into service as a barracks. Local citizens and government officials struggled to accommodate the fugitive slave...