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Missouri Compromise
Missouri wanted to be admitted into the United States. They didn't know whether Missouri would be added as a slave state or free state. They were scared that the admission of a new slave state would upset the balance of power. Meaning that the south would gain more power. -
Underground Railroad
Harriet Tubman was a freed slave. Although she escaped from slavery she returned to slave-holding states 19 times to help other slaves escape. She led them safely to the northern free states and to Canada. It was very dangerous to be a runaway slave. There were rewards for their capture. Even though Tubman knew that every time she went back and forth leading these slaves to freedom she put herself in great danger but she still continued freeing hundreds and hundreds of people -
Fort Sumter
Fort Sumter was the first battle of the Civil War. South Carolina fired the first shot of the Civil War. -
Battle of Bull Run
This was the first major land-based confrontation of the American Civil War. The engagement began when about 35,000 Union troops marched from the federal capital in Washington, D.C. to strike a Confederate force of 20,000 along a small river known as Bull Run. The Union army commander in Washington, Brigadier General Irvin McDowell, gave in to great pressure and he didn't feel the army was trained yet, leading to a stunning Confederate victory and ending northern hopes of a quick end to the war -
Emancipation Proclamation
An act created by Abraham Lincoln declaring that all slaves in states that were in rebellion would be free as of January 1, 1863. Lincoln's intention was to preserve the Union -
Battle of Gettysburg
A civil war battle fought between Union Army of Potomac commanded by General George Meade and Confederate Army of Northern Virginia led by Robert E Lee. The three day battle was fought from July 1 to 3, 1863 near the town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Battle of Gettysburg is the bloodiest battle of US military history. -
Total War
From November 15 until December 21, 1864, Union General William T. Sherman led some 60,000 soldiers on a 285-mile march from Atlanta to Savannah, Georgia. The purpose of this “March to the Sea” was to frighten Georgia’s civilian population into abandoning the Confederate cause. Sherman’s soldiers did not destroy any of the towns in their path, but they stole food and livestock and burned the houses and barns of people who tried to fight back. -
Surrender at Appomattox
Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered his approximately 28,000 troops to Union General Ulysses S. Grant in the front parlor of Wilmer McLean’s home in Appomattox Court House, Virginia, effectively ending the American Civil War. Union forces cut off his final retreat, Lee was forced to surrender, finally ending four years of bloody sectional conflict.
