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April 12: Confederate forces attack Fort Sumter, marking the start of the Civil War.
April 15: President Abraham Lincoln issued a call for volunteers to suppress the rebellion. -
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September 17: Battle of Antietam, the bloodiest single-day battle in American history.
January 1: Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, declaring all slaves in Confederate territory to be free. -
July 1-3: Battle of Gettysburg, a turning point in the war in favor of the Union.
November 19: Lincoln delivers the Gettysburg Address. -
May 4: Union General Ulysses S. Grant becomes the commander of all Union armies.
November 8: Lincoln is re-elected as president. -
April 9: General Robert E. Lee surrenders to General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House.
April 14: Lincoln is assassinated by John Wilkes Booth.
December 6: The Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is ratified, abolishing slavery. -
Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1866, granting citizenship and equal rights to all born in the United States, regardless of race. -
The Fourteenth Amendment is ratified, guaranteeing equal protection under the law for all citizens. -
Transcontinental Railroad Completed, connecting the East and West Coasts and promoting national unity. -
The Fifteenth Amendment was Ratified, granting African-American men the right to vote. -
Compromise of 1877 ended Reconstruction, withdrawing federal troops from the South and marking the end of the rebuilding era.