12 Historical "Facts" That Simply Aren't True

9. "The Great Emancipator" Abraham Lincoln Did Not Fight The US Civil War Merely To End Slavery... It Was Just A By-Product

Often referred to by such nicknames as "The Great Emancipator" or "The Liberator" due to the fact he helped bring about the abolition of slavery in the USA, the 16th President of the United States Abraham Lincoln was not as anti-slavery as history would have you believe.

Having swept the northern vote in the US presidential election of 1860 as the Republican Party nominee, Lincoln received very little support in the southern states - and then the so-called "Confederate States of America" attacked Fort Sumter in April 1861, bringing about the four-year US Civil War. But Lincoln did not declare war simply to end slavery - it was far more complex than that, and mainly it was because the Confederate States were threatening to secede from the Union.

In fact, in a letter to the New York Tribune in 1862, Lincoln explained:

"If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that."

Privately Lincoln may have been against slavery, but it took three years of fighting during the US Civil War before he felt compelled to sign the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 - and even then this was partially due to Unionists rallying for better economic terms, rather than just for purely humanitarian reasons. "Honest Abe" has sometimes been painted as being far more liberal a human being that he possibly was...