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Start of the war
This episodes of irregular fighting at Charleston’s Fort Sumter, then one of only two forts in the Southern states that had seceded still under federal jurisdiction, was brief and ended on April 14 with the evacuation of federal troops and rebel Confederate victory. -
Shiloh (Pittsburgh Landing)
At the time, Shiloh was both the bloodiest single day and bloodiest two-day battle in American history. It served as America's introduction to the "total warfare" of the rest of the Civil War. Until Ulysses S. Grant's advance down the Tennessee River, engagements in the Civil War had been relatively small. The engagement also saw the death of Sidney Albert Johnston, on whom Jefferson Davis had pinned his hopes in the West. -
Antietam
Bloodiest day of the Civil War, this battle gave Abraham Lincoln the perceived victory he desired to release the Emancipation Proclamation. The costly battle also ended Robert E. Lee's advance into Maryland. -
Emancipation Proclomation
The Emancipation Proclamation was issued by President Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863, as the country entered the third year of the Civil War. It declared that "all persons held as slaves … shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free"—but it applied only to states designated as being in rebellion, not to the slave-holding border states of Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, and Missouri or to areas of the Confederacy that had already come under Union control. -
Gettysburg
George Meade won the largest and most costly battle in American history fought on the farms and hillsides of southern Pennsylvania. The Union victory ended Lee's belief that a single massive victory would defeat the Army of the Potomac. -
Vicksburg
Lincoln realized early in the war that control of the Mississippi was a major goal of the Western forces. Ulysses S. Grant delivered the city when the Army of Mississippi surrendered after a prolonged siege. In response Lincoln proclaimed "I have found the man who can win this war." -
President Lincoln Delivers a presidental speech
President Abraham Lincoln delivered a short speech at the end of the ceremonies dedicating the battlefield cemetery at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. This speech has come to be known as the Gettysburg Address. In this Lincoln paid tribute to the Union soldiers who sacrificed their lives for union and equality. -
Chattanooga
Following the worst defeat of any United States army at Chickamauga Lincoln used three of his best generals to Chattanooga. Six weeks later Grant broke out of the city, drove the Confederate Army into Georgia, and began preparing for the Spring campaigns -
Presidential election of 1864
In the United States Presidential election of 1864, Abraham Lincoln was re-elected as president. Lincoln ran under the National Union banner against his former top Civil War general, the Democratic candidate, George B. McClellan. McClellan was the "peace candidate" but did not personally believe in his party's platform. -
End of Civil War
This is the day that Robert E. Lee surrendered his troops to Ulysses Grant at the Appomattox court house, located in Virginia. However, fighting continued until May 9th, 1865, since it took awhile for all the fighting troops to be contacted about the ending of the war.
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Assassanation
On April 14, 1865, John Wilkes Booth, a famous actor and Confederate sympathizer, fatally shot President Abraham Lincoln at a play at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. The attack came only five days after Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered his massive army at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, effectively ending the American Civil War.
