Civil War Thanksgivings of 1862

Thanksgiving in Camp

 Although Thanksgiving as we know it on the fourth Thursday of November. did not come into being until 1863, during 1862 Presidents Davis and Lincoln both appointed times of thanksgiving, although on different days than those to which we are accustomed.

Abraham Lincoln declared a day of thanksgiving on April 10th, 1862, with this proclamation:

It has pleased Almighty God to vouchsafe signal victories to the land and naval forces engaged in suppressing an internal rebellion, and at the same time to avert from our country the dangers of foreign intervention and invasion.
It is therefore recommended to the people of the United States that at their next weekly assemblages in their accustomed places of public worship which shall occur after notice of this proclamation shall be have been received they especially acknowledge and render thanks to our Heavenly Fathers for these inestimable blessings, that they then and there implore spiritual consolation in behalf of all who have been brought into affliction by the casualties and calamities of sedition and civil war, and that they reverently invoke the divine guidance for our national counsels, to the end that they may speedily result in the restoration of peace, harmony, and unity throughout our borders and hasten the establishment of fraternal relations among all the countries of the earth.
In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.
Done at the city of Washington, this 10th day of April A.D. 1862, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty-sixth.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN

 Davis did the same a few months later, on September 4th, 1862, after the great victory at Manassas:

Once more upon the plains of Manassas have our armies been blessed by the Lord of Hosts with a triumph over our enemies.  It is my privilege to invite you once more to His footstool, not now in the garb of fasting and sorrow, but with joy and gladness, to render thanks for the great mercies received at His hand.  A few months since, and our enemies poured forth their invading legions upon our soil.  They laid waste our fields, polluted our altars and violated the sanctity of our homes.  Around our capital they gathered their forces, and with boastful threats, claimed it as already their prize.  The brave troops which rallied to its defense have extinguished these vain hopes, and, under the guidance of the same almighty hand, have scattered our enemies and driven them back in dismay.  Uniting these defeated forces and the various armies which had been ravaging our coasts with the army of invasion in Northern Virginia, our enemies have renewed their attempt to subjugate us at the very place where their first effort was defeated, and the vengeance of retributive justice has overtaken the entire host in a second and complete overthrow.
To this signal success accorded to our arms in the East has been graciously added another equally brilliant in the West.  On the very day on which our forces were led to victory on the Plains of Manassas, in Virginia, the same Almighty arm assisted us to overcome our enemies at Richmond, in Kentucky.  Thus, at one and the same time, have two great hostile armies been stricken down, and the wicked designs of their armies been set at naught.
In such circumstances, it is meet and right that, as a people, we should bow down in adoring thankfulness to that gracious God who has been our bulwark and defense, and to offer unto him the tribute of thanksgiving and praise.  In his hand is the issue of all events, and to him should we, in an especial manner, ascribe the honor of this great deliverance.
Now, therefore, I, Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate States, do issue this, my proclamation, setting apart Thursday, the 18th day of September inst., as a day of prayer and thanksgiving to Almighty God for the great mercies vouchsafed to our people, and more especially for the triumph of our arms at Richmond and Manassas; and I do hereby invite the people of the Confederate States to meet on that day at their respective places of public worship, and to unite in rendering thanks and praise to God for these great mercies, and to implore Him to conduct our country safely through the perils which surround us, to the final attainment of the blessings of peace and security.
Given under my hand and the seal of the Confederate States, at Richmond, this fourth day of September, A.D.1862. 
JEFFERSON DAVIS