The bombardment of Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861, shattered the illusion that a peaceful resolution was still possible. When the news reached Washington, Lincoln moved with a precision that silenced his doubters. He immediately issued a call for 75,000 volunteers to suppress the rebellion. This was not the act of a man who desired war, but of a man who understood that a government that could not enforce its own laws was, in effect, no government at all. The shock of the attack forced a unification of the North that few expected. It marked the definitive end of the "political" phase of the conflict and the beginning of a total war. Lincoln realized that the scale of the conflict would dwarf anything in the nation’s history. He was no longer a civilian administrator; he was now the Commander-in-Chief of a broken nation, tasked with stitching it back together with iron and blood.