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Missouri Compromise 1820-1821
Behind the leadership of Henry Clay, Congress passed a series of agreements in 1820–1821 known as the Missouri Compromise. Under these agreements, Maine was admitted as a free state and Missouri as a slave state. The rest of the Louisiana Territory was split into two parts. The dividing line was set at 36°30´ north latitude. South of the line, slavery was legal. North of the line—except in Missouri—slavery was banned. -
Harriet Tubman
One of the most famous conductors was Harriet Tubman,
born a slave in Maryland in 1820 or 1821. In 1849, after Tubman’s owner died, she heard rumors that she was about to be sold. Fearing this possibility, Tubman decided to make a break for freedom and succeeded in reaching Philadelphia. Shortly after passage of the Fugitive Slave Act, Tubman resolved to become a conductor on the Underground Railroad. In all, she made 19 trips back to the South and is said to have helped 300 slaves—her parents.. -
Santa Fe Trail
The settlers and traders who made the trek west used a series of old Native American trails as well as new
routes. One of the busiest routes was the Santa Fe Trail,
which stretched 780 miles from Independence, Missouri, to
Santa Fe in the Mexican province of New Mexico. Each spring from 1821 through the 1860s, American traders loaded their covered wagons with goods and set off toward Santa Fe. -
San Felipe de Austin
The main settlement of the colony was named San Felipe de Austin, in Stephen’s honor. By 1825, Austin had issued 297 land grants to the group that later became known as Texas’s Old Three Hundred. Each family received either 177 very inexpensive acres of farmland, or 4,428 acres for stock grazing, as well as a 10-year exemption from paying taxes. “I am convinced,” Austin said, “that I could take on fifteen hundred families as easily as three hundred if permitted to do so.” By 1830, there were mor -
Stephen F. Austin goes to jail
Many Americans rushed at the chance to buy inexpensive land in Texas. The population of Anglo, or English-speaking, settlers from the United States soon surpassed the population of Tejanos, or Mexican settlers, who lived in Texas. Among the more prominent leaders of these American settlers was
Stephen F. Austin. -
Mexico abolishes slavery
Despite peaceful cooperation between Anglos and Tejanos, differences over cultural issues intensified between Anglos and the Mexican government. The overwhelmingly Protestant Anglo settlers spoke English instead of Spanish. Furthermore, many of the settlers were Southerners, who had brought slaves with them to Texas. Mexico, which had abolished slavery in 1829, insisted in vain that the Texans free their slaves. -
The Liberator
The most radical white abolitionist was a young editor named William Lloyd Garrison. Active in religious reform movements in Massachusetts, Garrison became the editor of an antislavery paper in 1828. Three years later he established his own paper, The Liberator, to deliver an uncompromising demand: immediate emancipation. -
Nat Turner's Rebellion
Some slaves rebelled against their condition of
bondage. One of the most prominent rebellions was led by Virginia slave Nat Turner. In August 1831, Turner and more than 50 followers attacked four plantations and killed about 60 whites. Whites eventually captured and executed many members of the group, including Turner. -
Texas Revolution
the 1836 rebellion in which Texas gained its independence from Mexico. -
Oregon Trail
The Oregon Trail stretched from Independence, Missouri, to Oregon City, Oregon. It was blazed in 1836 by two Methodist missionaries named Marcus and Narcissa Whitman. By driving their wagon as far as Fort Boise (near present-day Boise, Idaho), they proved that wagons could travel on the Oregon Trail. -
Manifest Destiny
For a quarter century after the War of 1812, only a few Americans explored the West. Then, in the 1840s, expansion fever gripped the country. Many Americans began to believe that their movement westward was predestined by God. The phrase “manifest destiny” expressed the belief that the United States was ordained to expand to the Pacific Ocean and into Mexican and Native American territory. Many Americans also
believed that this destiny was manifest, or obvious and inevitable. -
Texas enters the United States
In March 1845, angered by U.S.-Texas negotiation on annexation, the Mexican government recalled its ambassador from Washington. On December 29, 1845, Texas entered the Union. Events moved quickly toward war. -
Mexican-American War
Mexican War definition. A war fought between the United States and Mexico from 1846 to 1848. The United States won the war, encouraged by the feelings of many Americans that the country was accomplishing its manifest destiny of expansion. -
The North Star
One of those eager readers was Frederick Douglass, who escaped from bondage to become an eloquent and outspoken critic of slavery. Garrison heard him speak and was so impressed that he sponsored Douglass to speak for various anti-slavery organizations. Hoping that abolition could be
achieved without violence, Douglass broke with Garrison, who believed that abolition justified whatever means were necessary to achieve it. In 1847, Douglass began his own
antislavery newspaper. -
Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
the 1848 treaty ending the U.S. war with Mexico, in which Mexico ceded California and New Mexico to the United States. -
Compromise of 1850
At last, in September, after eight months of effort, the Compromise of 1850 became law. For the moment, the crisis over slavery in the territories had passed. However, relief was short-lived. Another crisis loomed on the horizon—enforcement of the new fugitive slave law. The Compromise of 1850 had provided for popular sovereignty in New Mexico and Utah. To Senator Stephen Douglas, popular sovereignty seemed like an excellent way to decide whether slavery would be allowed in the Nebraska Territor -
Fugitive Slave Act
The book stirred Northern abolitionists to increase their protests against the Fugitive Slave Act, while Southerners criticized the book as an attack on the South. The furor over
Uncle Tom’s Cabin had barely begun to settle when the issue of slavery in the territories surfaced once again. -
Uncle Tom's Cabin
Harriet Beecher Stowe published her novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin, which stressed that slavery was not just a political contest, but also a great moral struggle. As a young girl, Stowe had watched boats filled with people on
their way to be sold at slave markets. Uncle Tom’s Cabin expressed her lifetime hatred of slavery. -
Underground Railroad
free African Americans and white abolitionists developed a
secret network of people who would, at great risk to themselves, hide fugitive slaves. The system of escape routes they used became known as the Underground Railroad. “Conductors” on the routes hid fugitives in secret tunnels and false cupboards, provided them with food and clothing, and escorted or directed them to the next “station.” Once fugitives
reached the North, many chose to remain there. -
Kansas-Nebraska Act
Some Northern congressmen saw the bill as part of a plot to turn the territories into slave states. Southerners strongly defended the proposed legislation. After months of struggle, the Kansas-Nebraska Act became law in 1854. -
Dread Scott v. Sandford
Dred Scott’s slave master had brought him from the slave state
of Missouri to live for a time in free territory and in the free state of Illinois. Eventually they returned to Missouri. Scott believed that because he had lived in free territory, he should be free. In 1854 he sued in federal court for his freedom. The court ruled against him, and he appealed to the Supreme Court. -
Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas Debates
Douglas was a well-known two-term senator with an outstanding record and a large campaign chest, while Lincoln was a selfeducated man who had been elected to one term in Congress in 1846. To counteract Douglas, Lincoln challenged the man known as the “Little Giant” to a series of debates on the issue of slavery in the territories. Douglas accepted the challenge, and the stage was set for some of the most celebrated debates in U.S. history. -
John Brown's raid/ Harpers Ferry
While politicians debated the slavery issue, the abolitionist John Brown was studying the slave uprisings that had occurred in ancient Rome and, more recently, on the French island of Haiti. He believed that the time was ripe for similar uprisings in the United States. Brown secretly obtained financial backing from several prominent Northern abolitionists. On the night of October 16, 1859, he led a band of 21 men, black and white, into Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia). -
Abraham Lincoln becomes president
As the 1860 presidential election approached, the Republicans nominated Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln appeared to be moderate in his views. Although he pledged to halt the further spread of slavery, he also tried to reassure Southerners that a Republican administration would not “interfere with their slaves, or with them, about their slaves.” Nonetheless, many Southerners viewed him as an enemy. -
Attack on Fort Sumter
Months earlier, as soon as the Confederacy was formed, Confederate soldiers in each secessionist state began seizing federal installations—especially forts. By the time of Lincoln’s inauguration on March 4, 1861, only four Southern forts remained in Union hands. The most important was Fort Sumter, on an island in Charleston harbor. -
Formation of the Confederacy
Mississippi soon followed South Carolina’s lead, as did
Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas. In
February 1861, delegates from the secessionist states met in
Montgomery, Alabama, where they formed the Confederate
States of America, or Confederacy. They also drew up a
constitution that closely resembled that of the United States, but with a few notable differences. The most important
difference was that it “protected and recognized” slavery
in new territories. -
Battle of Bull Run
The first bloodshed on the battlefield occurred about three months after Fort Sumter fell, near the little creek of Bull Run, just 25 miles from Washington, D.C. The battle was a seesaw affair. In the morning the Union army gained the upper hand, but the Confederates held firm, inspired by General Thomas J. Jackson. “There stands Jackson like a stone wall!” another general shouted, coining the nickname Stonewall Jackson. -
Battle at Antietam
McClellan ordered his men to pursue Lee, and the two
sides fought on September 17 near a creek called the
Antietam (Bn-tCPtEm). The clash proved to be the bloodiest
single-day battle in American history, with casualties totaling more than 26,000. The next day, instead of pursuing the battered Confederate army into Virginia and possibly
ending the war, McClellan did nothing. As a result, Lincoln removed him from command. -
Emancipation Proclamation
On January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued his Emancipation Proclamation. The following portion captured national attention.The proclamation did not free any slaves immediately because it applied only to areas behind Confederate lines, outside Union control. Nevertheless, for many, the proclamation gave the war a moral purpose by turning the struggle into a fight to free the slaves. It also ensured that compromise was no longer possible. -
Conscription
The war led to social upheaval and political unrest in both the North and the South. As the fighting intensified, heavy casualties and widespread desertions led each side to impose conscription, a draft that forced men to serve in the army. In the North, conscription led to draft riots, the most violent of which took place in New York City. Sweeping changes occurred in the wartime economies of both sides as well as in the roles played by African Americans and women. -
Battle at Vicksburg
While Meade’s Army of the Potomac was destroying Confederate hopes in Gettysburg, Union general Ulysses S. Grant fought to take Vicksburg, one of the two remaining Confederate strongholds on the Mississippi River. Vicksburg itself was particularly important because it rested on bluffs above the river from which guns could control all water traffic. In the winter of 1862–1863, Grant tried several schemes to reach Vicksburg and take it from the Confederates.Nothing seemed to work–until spring 1863 -
Battle of Gettysburg
Near the sleepy town of Gettysburg, in southern Pennsylvania, the most decisive battle of the war was fought. The Battle of Gettysburg began on July 1 when Confederate soldiers led by A. P. Hill encountered several brigades of Union cavalry under the command of John Buford, an experienced officer from Illinois. The three-day battle produced staggering losses: 23,000 Union men and 28,000 Confederates were killed or wounded. Total casualties were more than 30 percent. -
Gettysburg address
In November 1863, a ceremony was held to dedicate a cemetery in Gettysburg. There, President Lincoln spoke for a little more than two minutes. According to some contemporary historians, Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address “remade America.” Before Lincoln’s speech, people said, “The United States are . . .” Afterward, they said, “The United States is . . .” In other words, the speech helped the country to realize that it was not just a collection of individual states; it was one unified nation. -
Sherman's March
In the spring of 1864, Sherman began his march southeast through Georgia to the sea, creating a wide path of destruction. His army burned almost every house in its path and destroyed livestock and railroads. Sherman was determined to make Southerners “so sick of war that generations would pass away before they would again appeal to it.” By mid-November he had burned most of Atlanta.After reaching the ocean, Sherman’s forces—followed by 25,000 former slaves—turned north to help Grant“wipe out Lee -
Abolition
the movement to abolish slavery, became the most important of a series of reform movements in America. -
Thirteenth Amendment
an amendment to the U.S. Constitution, adopted in 1865, that has abolished slavery and involuntary servitude. -
Income Tax
As the Northern economy grew, Congress decided to help pay for the war by collecting the nation’s first income tax, a tax that takes a specified percentage of an individual’s income. -
Surrender at Appomattox Court House
On April 3, 1865, Union troops conquered Richmond, the Confederate capital. Southerners had abandoned the city the day before, setting it afire to keep the Northerners from taking it. On April 9, 1865, in a Virginia town called Appomattox Court House, Lee and Grant met at a private home to arrange a Confederate surrender. At Lincoln’s request, the terms were generous. Grant paroled Lee’s soldiers and sent them home with their possessions and three days’ worth of rations. -
Assassination of Abraham Lincoln
Whatever further plans Lincoln had to reunify the nation after the war, he never got to implement them. On April 14, 1865, five days after Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox, Lincoln and his wife went to Ford’s Theatre in Washington to see a British comedy, Our American Cousin. During its third act, a man crept up behind Lincoln and shot the president
in the back of his head.
