Skirmish in Civil War botched up (5)
I believe the answer is:
brawl
'skirmish' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'in civil war botched up' is the wordplay.
'in' indicates the answer is hidden within the clue.
'up' shows that the letters should be reversed in order (in down clue: letters go upwards).
'lwarb' can be found hidden inside 'civil war botched'.
'lwarb' written backwards gives 'BRAWL'.
(Other definitions for brawl that I've seen before include "Quarrel noisily" , "Riotous fight" , "Affray" , "Noisy quarrel" , "squabble" .)