What settled the matter for Virginians—with the same galvanizing speed with which the attack on Sumter had united the North—was a proclamation, issued on April 15 by Abraham Lincoln, calling on the states that had not seceded to provide 75,000 troops “to maintain the honor, the integrity, and the existence of our National Union,” and also “to execute the laws of the Union, [and] suppress rebellions.” Virginians knew what this meant: armed coercion.
