the first shot was fired in South Carolina on Fort Sumter, an incomplete fort being built by US government contract in the center of the river leading to the Atlantic.  No lives were lost in this first battle of the Civil War also known as the war between the states or the war of Northern Aggression depending who you talk to.  You would expect a large fort but it is a small outcropping on a pile of rocks shipped from as far away as Maine.  They had contracted slaves and later Irish and others working on building the island of dumped rocks diving into the river to check stability. As we understood it, the Southerners felt that not allowing slaves into new states as they formed to the west would change their way of life which took advantage of human lives to work in the plantation system producing primarily rice, sea-island cotton and indigo in this area.  The idea of all of this is strange and fascinating to me, a dyed in the wool northerner. We took a boat ride out through the harbor to take the tour and learn a little more history.  I, of course critiqued the gift shop and tour guide.  (tiny shop packed to the gills with confederate money, gullah cookbooks and tomes of history and good tour guide giving the big picture in a brief and compact format)