Intelligence collection during the Civil War

Abstract

Intelligence and its collection is an everyday staple and necessity in the United States but it has not always been this way. Forms of intelligence have been conducted for all of American History, but it is widely believed that the true history of the intelligence began during the World Wars in the early twentieth century. However, intelligence was conducted long before that and through the examination of intelligence collection and methods during the Civil War this thesis demonstrates exactly why that history should indeed begin with this major nineteenth-century conflict and not the World Wars. During the Civil War many old forms of intelligence were used but many new forms were devised and developed and it is these new methods that are the roots of, and laid the groundwork for, the rise of intelligence during the World Wars.