Everyone knows the story of how the Civil War began at Fort Sumter, but what happened to the fort after the first shots were fired there? The North wanted to restore Sumter to its rightful place in the Union and close the vital Confederate supply port of Charleston while the South needed to defend its birthplace and keep the supplies flowing—thus making Fort Sumter one of the most fervently attacked and most tenaciously defended pieces of real estate in the United or Confederate States of America throughout four years of war.