Soldiers and Citizens Life During the Civil War By Walker D. and Zack Y.

Slightly before the civil war started president Lincoln was elected, after that southerners believed they no longer had a say in how the nation was going to be run, quickly after South Carolina seceded and after that Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia , Louisiana and Texas all seceded and elected Jefferson Davis as the leader of their confederacy, as the north called for war after the southern capture of Fort Sumter, however this lead Virginia, Arkansas, North Carolina, and Tennessee seceded. the north would not let the south secede from the union and war broke out.
As the war raged on, more and more soldiers died which lead to conscription. All men black or white on the north side were drafted into the army. The regiments between African Americans and whites were segregated and blacks were given less pay, and commanded by a white officer. Many new recruits had been swayed by propaganda that entering and fighting in the war would be glorious, but as they fought through their first battles and many died they realized war was a filthy affair. The men on the southern side were plagued by hunger, many didn’t have proper latrines or even tent canvas, and medical care was vastly inferior to the power of the then modern weapons.
The prisons for each side were even more atrocious, lack of heat during winters caused many to die of pneumonia, the close quarters lead to a wildfire spread of diseases like dysentery, body lice, and diarrhea. The northern prisons were only slightly better, equally crowded but all had a decent amount of food to eat. Most historians estimate 15% of union soldiers died in southern prisons and 12% of confederate prisoners died in southern prisons.
Outside of the battle field an opportunity arose for women to do their part, 3,000 women served as union army nurses and some of them went on to found the American Red Cross, and on the other side thousands of women also became nurses, the effort of these women improved some of the care given by hospitals.
Prior to the war, the world was only a slightly different place in the south, African American men were technically free but Jim Crow laws and an intense hatred from whites impeded progress, in the north many black men faced less intense issues of segregation. Regardless the United States was broken in many places on both sides.