When it comes to your "currents of historical events," and their ebb and flow and your tides of human emotion that swept over the landscape of the 1860s, there is one other very important force; that being the natural expansion and contraction of business cycles that influence economic decisions and create very real consequences. According to some economists, these long term business cycles are 25 to 35 year waves of incresing prosperity and living standards followed by a decade or more of depression, during which factories lay idle, crops go unharvested and legions of the working class lose jobs and become demoralized. These severe economic upheavals also come at fairly regular 45-60 year intervals.
When the CW started, our American South, which was politically and economically tied to England by virtue of producing about 7/8th of the world's cotton was enjoying the "good times," which were also being experienced in England. However, the South became involved in our CW which initiated a period of inflation, speculation and hightened long term interest rates.
These influences cannot but affect national military options. I've never really thought about where the South was in the business cycle at, say, the time the CW started. As I recall, it was a time of prosperity and economic expansion in the South. Nor, do I recall the CW and its relationship to long term business cycles ever being discussed on the board, but I guess I will now have to spend a little time doing some Googling or dust off a book or two on economics.
Maybe someone else has some ideas along this line of thought?