Was Uncle Tom's Cabin an effect of the civil war?

Answer 1

It dramatised the relations between slaves and their owners, and aroused the feelings of millions in the North who had not been especially interested in slavery until then.

It drew attention to the Underground Railroad, and encouraged many people to help runaway slaves escape into Canada.

Answer 2

No, it was a major cause of the war.

It was written as a protest against the Fugitive Slave Act - a deliberately macho gesture in favour of the South, to appease them for the rest of the 1850 Compromise, which was mostly pro-North.

Many Northerners who were not Abolitionists were still greatly offended by the Act, which turned them into unpaid slave-catchers.

There is a very believable anecdote that Lincoln met the author and said "So you're the little lady who started this big war", though that story is now discredited.

Answer 3

"Uncle Tom's Cabin" by Harriet Beecher Stowe was published in 1852, almost a decade before the Civil War began. While it did contribute to the growing tensions between the North and South over the issue of slavery, it was not a direct cause of the war itself. The novel helped to raise awareness about the cruelty of slavery and influenced public opinion on the issue.