May 8 1861 Wednesday
Camp Jackson Operations
CSA. The Confederate Congress voted for military enlistments to be made for the duration of the war and not for a pre-determined period. A call for 82,000 more volunteers had been issued in April.
Maryland. The steamer Baltic and the USS Constitution prepared to complete the relocation of the US Naval Academy from Maryland, to Newport, Rhode Island, in order to avoid disruption by the civil unrest in Maryland.
Missouri. A consignment of arms sent by Confederate President Jefferson Finis Davis from Baton Rouge, Louisiana, reached the pro-secession militia at Camp Jackson, near St Louis.
Virginia. Virginia State Major Thomas H Williamson, aided by military engineers, began the construction of fortifications at the Aquia Creek landing to protect the terminus of the Fredericksburg & Potomac Railroad. The Confederate defences were subsequently strengthened by the addition of a second battery on the bluffs to the south of the confluence of the Aquia Creek with the Potomac River.
Union Organisation
USA: The parts of Pennsylvania and Virginia north of the Kanawha River, north and west of the Greenbrier River, and thence on a line northwest to the southwest boundary of Maryland were transferred from the Union Department of the East to the Department of the Ohio.
Commander in Chief: President Abraham Lincoln
Vice-President: Hannibal Hamlin
Secretary of War: Simon Cameron
Secretary of the Navy: Gideon Welles
Coast Blockading Squadron: Silas Horton Stringham
Gulf Blockading Squadron: William Mervine
Pacific Squadron: John Berrien Montgomery
Potomac Flotilla: James Harmon Ward
General–in-Chief: Winfield Scott
Department of Annapolis: Benjamin Franklin Butler awaited
Department of the East: John Ellis Wool
Department of Florida: Harvey Brown
Department of New Mexico: Vacant
Department of the Ohio: George Brinton McClellan awaited
Department of the Pacific: Edwin Vose Sumner
- District of Oregon: George Wright
Department of Pennsylvania: Robert Patterson
Department of Texas: Vacant
Department of Utah: Philip St George Cooke
Department of Washington: Joseph King Fenno Mansfield
Department of the West: Edmund Brooke Alexander temporary
Confederate Organisation
CSA: Colonel John Bankhead Magruder assumed command of the Forces in Richmond, succeeding Colonel Joseph Eggleston Johnston.
CSA: The Department of Southwestern Virginia was established, comprising the mountainous regions of southwest Virginia.
CSA: Colonel William Wing Loring assumed command of the Department of Southwestern Virginia.
Commander in Chief: President Jefferson Finis Davis
Vice-President: Alexander Hamilton Stephens
Secretary of War: Leroy Pope Walker
Secretary of the Navy: Stephen Russell Mallory
Department of Alexandria: Philip St George Cocke
- Alexandria Line: Philip St George Cocke
Department of North Carolina: Theophilus Hunter Holmes
- Defences of North Carolina: Theophilus Hunter Holmes
Department of South Carolina: Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard
- “Forces in Charleston”: Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard
Department of Southwestern Virginia: William Wing Loring
Department of Texas: Earl Van Dorn
Department of West Florida: Braxton Bragg
- “Forces in Pensacola”: Braxton Bragg
District of Louisiana: David Emanuel Twiggs
- “Forces in New Orleans” “Army of Louisiana”: Braxton Bragg
Defences of Savannah: Alexander Robert Lawton
Potomac Line: Daniel Ruggles
Forces in Harper’s Ferry”: Thomas Jonathan Jackson
“Forces in Norfolk”: Walter Gwynn
Forces in Richmond: John Bankhead Magruder
Forces in the Kanawha Valley: Christopher Quarles Tompkins
Union Generals
Major-General USA
Winfield Scott
Brigadier-General USA
John Ellis Wool
William Selby Harney
Edwin Vose Sumner
Confederate Generals
Note: Italics, awaiting confirmation of the commission
Major-General PACS
David Emanuel Twiggs
Brigadier-General ACSA
Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard
Braxton Bragg
Brigadier-General PACS
Alexander Robert Lawton
Milledge Lake Bonham