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Jefferson Davis announced that he was in favor of secession from the Union for the first time. -
Southern delegates hold a National Democratic convention in Richmond, VA. -
A Democratic Convention was held in Richmond, VA. They chose John C. Breckinridge as their nominee for President there. -
The Election of 1860 demonstrated the divisions within the United States just before the Civil War. The election was unusual because four strong candidates competed for the presidency. Abraham Lincoln won the election making him the 16th president. -
James Chesnut was the first Southerner to resign from Senate on November 10, 1860. -
After many secession debates, Robert Toombs announced their resignation from the US Senate at the end of his term. -
This event was held in Columbia, South Carolina, and decided whether or not leaving the Union would benefit South Carolina as a state and converse on the future events if they were to leave -
South Carolina became the first state to secede from the federal Union. The victory of Abraham Lincoln in the 1860 presidential election triggered cries for disunion across the slaveholding South. -
Edwin Stanton becomes Attorney-General in the Buchanan Administration on December 20, 1860. -
John Floyd resigned as Secretary of War for misdirecting funds to contractors and guns to the South. -
Jefferson Davis is appointed the first President of the Confederate States of America at Montgomery, Alabama, a position he will hold until elections can be arranged. -
An increased import tariff in the United States was adopted. This would affect the South and its cotton trade. -
Abraham Lincoln is inaugurated as the sixteenth president of the United States in Washington, DC. By this time all Southern States would secede by the time Lincoln took office afraid he would take his slaves -
The Confederacy attacked the United States military garrison at Fort Sumter, South Carolina. Less than two days later, the fort surrendered. No one was killed. -
President Lincoln issues a public declaration that an insurrection exists and calls for 75,000 militia to stop the rebellion. As a result of this call for volunteers, four additional southern states secede from the Union in the following weeks. Lincoln will respond on May 3 with an additional call for 43,000+ volunteers to serve for three years, expanding the size of the Regular Army. -
McClellan was notable for the first battlefield amputations. As the first of a series of victories that pushed Confederate forces out of northwest Virginia, it strengthened the Union government in exile that would soon create the new state of West Virginia. -
The First Battle of Bull Run resulted in 3,000 Union casualties, compared with 1,750 for the Confederates. Its outcome sent northerners who had expected a quick, decisive victory reeling, and gave rejoicing southerners a false hope that they themselves could pull off a swift victory. -
The first combined operation of the Union Army and Navy in the American Civil War resulted in Union domination of the strategically important North Carolina Sounds. Two forts on the Outer Banks had been built by the Confederates, to protect their commerce-raiding activity. -
Colonel Edward D. Baker, senator from Oregon and a friend of President Lincoln, led troops across the Potomac River only to be forced back to the river's edge where he was killed. The ensuing Union withdrawal turned into a rout with many soldiers drowning while trying to re-cross the icy waters of the Potomac River. -
It gave President Abraham Lincoln, who was desperate for his armies to attack the Confederates somewhere, a positive impression of Grant. Belmont Avenue in Chicago, Illinois, was named after this battle. -
The decisive Union victory at the Battle of Mill Springs, Kentucky led to the total collapse of the eastern sector of the Confederate defensive line established to defend the Upper South and hopefully secure Kentucky's allegiance to the Southern cause. -
Surrender of Fort Henry, Tennessee. The loss of this southern fort on the Tennessee River opened the door to Union control of the river. -
A Confederate defeat, the battle resulted in the Union occupation of eastern North Carolina and control of Pamlico Sound, to be used as a Northern base for further operations against the southern coast. -
The Battle of Shiloh was the first major battle in Tennessee. Confederate General Albert Sidney Johnston, a veteran of the Texas War of Independence and the War with Mexico considered to be one of the finest officers the South has, is killed on the first day of fighting. The Union victory further secures the career of Union General Ulysses S. Grant. -
General Johnston's injury also had profound influence on the war it led to the appointment of Robert E. Lee as Confederate commander. The more aggressive Lee initiated the Seven Days Battles, leading to a Union retreat in late June. Seven Pines therefore marked the closest Union forces came to Richmond in this offensive. -
Battle of Memphis, Tennessee. A Union flotilla under Commodore Charles Davis successfully defeats a Confederate river force on the Mississippi River near the city and Memphis surrenders. The Mississippi River is now in Union control except for its course west of Mississippi where the city of Vicksburg stands as the last southern stronghold on the great river. -
Seven Days Battles, (June 25–July 1, 1862), a series of American Civil War battles in which a Confederate army under General Robert E. Lee drove back General George B. McClellan's Union forces and thwarted the Northern attempt to capture the Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia. -
The Battle of Second Bull Run is fought on the same ground where one year before, the Union army was defeated and sent reeling in retreat to Washington. Likewise, the result of this battle is a Union defeat. -
The bloodiest single day of the Civil War. The result of the battle ends General Lee's first invasion of the North. Following the Union victory, President Lincoln will introduce the Emancipation Proclamation, an executive order that freed every slave in the Confederate States. -
It was a battle with many Union casualties, the largest river crossing of the war, and it also acted as a boost for the Confederate hopes of victory. -
The Emancipation Proclamation goes into effect. Applauded by many abolitionists including Frederick Douglass, there are others who feel it does not go far enough to totally abolish slavery. -
Conscription, or the drafting of soldiers into military service, begins in the North. It had begun in the South the year before. This allows them to maintain more men than their opponent to overpower them. -
General Lee's greatest victory is marred by the mortal wounding of "Stonewall" Jackson, who dies on May 10. Soon after, Lee asks Jefferson Davis for permission to invade the North and take the war out of Virginia. -
Union cavalry forces cross the Rapidan River to attack General J.E.B. Stuart's cavalry and discover that Lee's men are moving west toward the Shenandoah Valley. The largest cavalry battle of the Civil War also marks the beginning of the Gettysburg Campaign. Meanwhile, the Union assault on Vicksburg, Mississippi has become a siege of the city where soldiers and civilians alike suffer from constant bombardment. -
Confederates pass through York and reach the bridge over the Susquehanna River at Columbia, but Union militia set fire to the bridge, denying access to the east shore. Southern cavalry skirmishes with Union militia near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. -
The Union's eventual victory in the Battle of Gettysburg would give the North a major morale boost and put a definitive end to Confederate General Robert E. Lee's bold plan to invade the North. This was the bloodiest multi-day battle in the Civil War. -
Chickamauga was the largest Confederate victory in the Western theater. At the end of a summer that had seen the disastrous Confederate loss at Gettysburg and Vicksburg, the triumph of the Army of Tennessee at Chickamauga was a well-timed turnaround for the Confederates. -
In a feint toward Washington, Lee's Army of Northern Virginia marches into northern Virginia in an attempt to flank the Army of the Potomac, under General Meade. Lee successfully outmaneuvers Meade though fails to bring him to battle or catch him in the open. An engagement at Bristoe Station, Virginia, on October 14 gives the campaign its name. -
To commemorate a new national cemetery at Gettysburg during the American Civil War. The Gettysburg Address's significance is that it sought to give meaning to the sacrifice of soldiers who died during the war. -
Union forces break the Confederate siege of the city in successive attacks. The most notable event is the storming of Lookout Mountain on November 24 and the Battle of Missionary Ridge the following day. The decisive Union victory sends the Confederate Army south into Georgia where General Bragg reorganizes his forces before resigning from command on November 30. -
The opening battle of the "Overland Campaign" or "Wilderness Campaign". General Ulysses S. Grant, accompanying the Army of the Potomac under General Meade, issued orders for the campaign to begin on May 3. Lee responded by attacking the Union column in the dense woods and underbrush of an area known as the Wilderness, west of Fredericksburg, Virginia. -
The second significant engagement was in Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant's Overland Campaign, a major Union offensive to chase down Robert E. Lee, destroy his forces, and defeat the Confederacy. -
Lee had prevented Grant from breaking through the Confederate lines to capture Richmond, less than 10 miles away. He had caused Grant so many casualties that anti-war sentiment in the north became a serious issue for the Lincoln administration. -
The Confederate victory at Brices Cross Roads was a significant victory for Major General Nathan Bedford Forrest, but its long-term effect on the war proved costly for the Confederates. -
After withdrawing from the lines at Cold Harbor, the Army of the Potomac crossed the James River and with troops from the Army of the James attacked the outer defenses of Petersburg, the primary junction for several southern railroads. After four days of bloody attacks, Grant accepts that only a siege can systematically isolate the city and cut off Confederate supplies to the capital of Richmond. -
An important battle of the Atlanta Campaign by Union General William Sherman was to launch a full-scale frontal assault on the entrenched position of General Joseph Johnston's Rebels. -
In an attempt to draw Union troops away from the ongoing siege of Petersburg and Richmond, a Confederate force under Jubal Early quietly moved north into Maryland. Early had made excellent progress until he reached Frederick, Maryland, where a force of 6,000 Federal troops under General Lew Wallace, was arrayed to delay his advance. Though the battle was a Union defeat. -
The Union victory over Confederate forces in northeast Mississippi ensured the safety of Sherman's supply lines during the Atlanta Campaign. -
After a month of tunneling by soldiers of the 48th Pennsylvania Infantry, a massive mine exploded under a Confederate fort in the Petersburg siege lines. The infantry charge that followed was poorly coordinated and by day's end, Confederate counterattacks had driven out the Union troops and the siege lines remained unchanged. -
Shattered the Confederate Army of Tennessee and marked the end of major Confederate offensives in the Western theater during the Civil War. -
Union occupation of this fort at the mouth of the Cape Fear River closes access to Wilmington, the last southern seaport on the east coast that was open to blockade runners and commercial shipping. -
Sherman ordered the burning of Columbia. All of Columbia burned. There was a "battle" for Columbia. Union soldiers burned the Congaree River bridge. -
Falls to Union troops, closing the last important southern port on the east coast. On this same day, Joseph E. Johnston is restored to command the nearly shattered Army of Tennessee, vice John B. Hood resigned a month earlier. -
Sherman's army is stalled in its drive northward from Fayetteville but succeeds in passing around the Confederate forces toward its object of Raleigh. -
Touted as "Lee's last offensive", Confederate troops under General John B. Gordon attacked and briefly capture the Union fort in the Petersburg siege lines in an attempt to thwart Union plans for a late March assault. By day's end, the southerners have been thrown out and the lines remain unchanged. -
The Confederate defeat at Five Forks initiates General Lee's decision to abandon the Petersburg-Richmond siege lines. -
General Lee abandons both cities and moves his army west in hopes of joining Confederate forces under General Johnston in North Carolina. -
After an early morning attempt to break through Union forces blocking the route west to Danville, Virginia, Lee seeks an audience with General Grant to discuss terms. That afternoon in the parlor of Wilmer McLean, Lee signs the document of surrender. On April 12, the Army of Northern Virginia formally surrenders and is disbanded. -
President Abraham Lincoln is assassinated by actor John Wilkes Booth at Ford's Theater in Washington, DC. On the same day, Fort Sumter, South Carolina is re-occupied by Union troops. -
General Simon Bolivar Buckner enters into terms for the surrender of the Army of the Trans-Mississippi, which are agreed to on June 2, 1865. The Civil War officially ends. -
New Freedman's Bureau bill was passed by Congress. -
Texas repeals the actions of the Secessionist Convention. -
President Johnson vetos the Civil Rights Act of 1866 on the grounds that it was unconstitutional. -
Congress overrides President Andrew Johnson's veto of the Civil Rights Act. -
Thirty-ninth Congress approves the 14th Amendment to the Constitution. -
Congress creates the rank of Admiral. David Farragut is appointed to that rank. -
The U. S. Secret Service begins an investigation into the Ku Klux Klan. -
A proclamation of peace with Texas is issued by United States President Andrew Johnson. -
President Andrew Johnson formally declares that the war is over. -
On the 6th anniversary of secession, South Carolina rejects the 14th Amendment. -
Blacks in Washington D. C. gain the right to vote in a bill passed over President Andrew Johnson's veto. -
Nebraska becomes a state. -
Congress passes the Tenure of Office Act, denying the right of the President to remove officials who had been appointed with the consent of Congress. -
Alexandria, Virginia rejects thousands of votes cast by Negroes, who were granted universal suffrage under the Reconstruction Act. -
Congress passes the 2nd Reconstruction Act over Andrew Johnson's veto. -
Senate ratifies the treaty of purchasing Alaska. -
House Select Committee on Reconstruction is appointed. -
President Andrew Johnson demands the resignation of Edwin Stanton, Secretary of War. -
Ulysses S. Grant becomes ad interim Secretary of War. -
Russia turns over Alaska to the United States.