The summer and winter of 1862 were hard times for the North. Confederate offensives from Maryland to the Mississippi River sat at the peak of Union setbacks in the summer of 1862. In the end, these offensives were turned back at Corinth, Perryville, and Antietam Creek; the latter also serving to redefine the nation and the war as it now sought to end slavery in the United States due to the Union victory on the banks of Antietam Creek. Abraham Lincoln stated that he issued the proclamation strictly “as a military measure” and as such, only slaves then in territories that “the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States…” would “be then, thenceforward, and forever free….”
