sentences:  By the time Lincoln assumed office seven states had declared their secession and had seized federal property within their bounds, but the United States retained control of major military installations at Fort Sumter near Charleston and Fort Pickens near Pensacola.Less secure than Fort Pickens, and situated in the secessionist hotbed of South Carolina, Fort Sumter emerged as an important symbolic issue in both the North and South during early 1861.Any hope Lincoln might have had about using time to his advantage in addressing the crisis was shattered on his first full day in office, when he read a letter from Major Robert Anderson, the commander at Fort Sumter, stating that his troops would run out of provisions within four to six weeks.