Washington, D.C., in the American Civil War Washington, D.C., in the American Civil War Washington, D.C., during the American Civil War was the nerve-center of the Union war effort, which rapidly turned it from a small city into a major capital with a full civic infrastructure and strong defenses. The shock of Union defeat at First Bull Run, with demoralized troops wandering the streets of the capital, caused President Lincoln to order extensive fortifications and a large garrison. This required an influx of troops, military suppliers and building contractors, which would set up a new demand for accommodation, including military hospitals. The abolition of slavery in D.C.
Names of the American Civil War and "War Between the States" have been used jointly in some formal contexts. For example, to mark the war's centenary in the 1960s, the State of Georgia created the "Georgia Civil War Centennial Commission Commemorating the War Between the States". In 1994, the U.S. Postal Service issued a series of commemorative stamps entitled "The Civil War/The War Between the States". During and immediately after the war, U.S. officials, Southern Unionists, and pro-Union writers often referred to Confederates as "Rebels". The earliest histories published in northern U.S. states commonly refer to the American Civil War as "the Great Rebellion" or "the