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South Carolina voted to secede from the US due to the escalating controversy over the expansion of slavery into the territory acquired from Mexico. The state ended up being one of the founding member states of the Confederacy in February 1861. -
President Lincoln delivered his first inaugural address on this day. He spoke not only as the new president, but as the leader of a nation in crisis as well. The address touched on several topics: including his pledge to "hold, occupy, and possess the property and places belonging to the government". -
The bombardment of Fort Sumter was near Charleston, South Carolina. Confederates used it to marshal a defense of Charleston Harbor, and it lasted 33 hours. -
On this day, Lincoln suspended the writ of habeas corpus between Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia to give military authorities the necessary power to silence dissenters and rebels. Due to this suspension, commanders could arrest and detain individuals who were deemed threatening to military operations. -
Virginia was the South's industrial center, with an industrial output nearly equal to that of all other Confederate states combined. The Confederate capital was moved to Richmond due to Virginia's strategic importance. -
This was the first major battle of the war. It was fought in Prince William County, Virginia, and the Confederates won, but both sides suffered casualties. The battle left both sides realizing that this would be a long and horrible war. -
On this day, Jefferson Davis was elected to a six-year term presidency of the confederate states. During his presidency, he controlled the armed forces and the acquisition of weapons in the South. He ended up deciding to go to war, because he did not want to damage the image of the confederacy as an independent nation. -
This was a naval battle in the war, and is famous because it was the first clash between ironclad warships. This battle changed the future of naval warfare. -
The Battle of Shiloh was an early battle in the war, and it was a crucial success for the Union Army. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant's led the Army of the Tennessee, and the battle allowed Grant to begin a massive operation in the Mississippi Valley later that year. -
Robert Edward Lee was an American Confederate general best known as a commander of the Confederate States Army during the war. He led the Army of Northern Virginia from 1862 until its surrender in 1865. -
This battle was a decisive engagement that halted the Confederate invasion of Maryland. The Union claimed victory, and keeping Confederates in their southern box enabled President Lincoln to finally release his Emancipation Proclamation on September 22, 1862. The Union had around 87,000 soldiers, while the Confederates had only 38,000. Around 3,500 soldiers were killed and 17,000 wounded. -
This battle signaled the low-point of the war for the Union. Although the Union vastly outnumbered the Confederates (120,000 Union men to 85,000 Confederate men) they suffered over twice as many casualties (12,653 to 5,377). It was a major defeat for the Union Army. -
The Emancipation Proclamation declared, "all persons held as slaves within any States, or designated part of the State, the people whereof shall be in rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free." The Emancipation Proclamation did not free all slaves in the United States. It applied to slaves in the states still in rebellion in 1863 during the war, and it made emancipation a goal of the Civil War. -
This was another major battle of the war. It resulted in a Confederate victory, and it is considered Lee's greatest tactical victory; the much larger Union army was driven from the battlefield and suffered more than 18,000 casualties. -
The Battle of Gettysburg involved the largest number of casualties of the entire war and is often described as the war's turning point. The Union won the Battle, and it ended the Confederacy's last full-scale invasion of the North. Between 46,000 and 51,000 soldiers from both armies were casualties in the three-day battle. -
General Ulysses S. Grant decided to besiege Vicksburg beginning on May 25. After holding out for more than forty days, their supplies nearly ran out, and they had to surrender. -
In July 1863, working-class New Yorkers sparked five days of some of the bloodiest and most destructive rioting in U.S. history. It happened due to a new federal draft law during the war, which made all men between 20 and 45 years of age liable for military service. The government attempted to enforce the draft, and it ignited the most destructive civil disturbance in the city's history. -
President Lincoln was asked to deliver a message at the dedication of the Gettysburg Civil War Cemetery. In this speech, he memorialized the Union dead and highlighted the redemptive power of their sacrifice. He also stated that the living can honor the people that died in the war by continuing to fight for the ideas they gave their lives for. -
Atlanta was used as a center for military operations and as a supply route by the Confederate army during the Civil War, which means it also became a target for the Union army. Sherman ordered a systematic destruction of the city to prevent the Confederates from recovering anything once the Yankees had abandoned it. -
On this day, Abraham Lincoln was elected for a second term.The 1864 Democratic National Convention nominated McClellan, a War Democrat, but adopted a platform advocating peace with the Confederacy, which McClellan rejected. Lincoln's re-election ensured that he would preside over the successful conclusion of the Civil War. -
The purpose of this march was to frighten Georgia's civilian population into abandoning the Confederate cause. Sherman intended his March to the Sea to break the will of the Confederate population, and it frightened and appalled Southerners. -
On this day in 1865, Congress passed the 13th amendment, which abolished slavery. The amendment read, “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude…shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.” -
Freedmen;s Bureau was created to provide food, shelter, clothing, medical services, and land to displaced Southerners, including newly freed African Americans. It helped to locate missing relatives and adjudicated custody disputes among freed men and women, and it negotiated and enforced labor contracts between black laborers and white landowners. -
In this address, Lincoln spoke of mutual forgiveness, North and South, asserting that the true mettle of a nation lies in its capacity for charity. He tried to unite the nation, and spoke about how both the Union and the Confederacy should start working together. -
Richmond was was a vital source of weapons and supplies for the war effort, and the terminus of five railroads. The retreating Confederates chose to burn military supplies rather than let them fall into Union hands, and the resulting fire destroyed much of central Richmond. -
Lee decided to surrender his army in part because he wanted to prevent unnecessary destruction to the South. This signaled the start of the end of the American Civil War. -
President Abraham Lincoln, the sixteenth president of the US, was assassinated on this day in Washington, D.C. He was shot in his box at Ford's theater during a play by John Wilkes Booth. Booth believed that Lincoln wanted to destroy the South and overthrow the constitution, which is apparently what drove him to kill. -
Union soldiers tracked down Booth 12 days after the assassination. He was at a farm in Virginia, and there was a $20,000 reward if he was found. Dr. Samuel Mudd treated Booth's broken leg when he was a refugee, and Mudd ended up getting sentenced to prison time for conspiracy.
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