Portal:American Civil War

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The American Civil War Portal

This flag flew over Fort Sumter during the bombardment

The American Civil War (1861–1865) was a sectional rebellion against the United States of America by the Confederate States, formed of eleven southern states' governments which moved to secede from the Union after the 1860 election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States. The Union's victory was eventually achieved by leveraging advantages in population, manufacturing and logistics and through a strategic naval blockade denying the Confederacy access to the world's markets.

In many ways, the conflict's central issues – the enslavement of African Americans, the role of constitutional federal government, and the rights of states – are still not completely resolved. Not surprisingly, the Confederate army's surrender at Appomattox on April 9,1865 did little to change many Americans' attitudes toward the potential powers of central government. The passage of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments to the Constitution in the years immediately following the war did not change the racial prejudice prevalent among Americans of the day; and the process of Reconstruction did not heal the deeply personal wounds inflicted by four brutal years of war and more than 970,000 casualties – 3 percent of the population, including approximately 560,000 deaths. As a result, controversies affected by the war's unresolved social, political, economic and racial tensions continue to shape contemporary American thought. The causes of the war, the reasons for the outcome, and even the name of the war itself are subjects of much discussion even today. (Full article)

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Soldiers and Sailors, the monument at Lafayette Square

Lafayette Square (formerly Court House Park or Courthouse Square) is a park in the center of downtown Buffalo, Erie County, New York, United States, that hosts a Civil War monument. The block, which was once square, is lined by many of the city's tallest buildings. The square was named for General Lafayette, who visited Buffalo in 1825.

The square was part of the original urban plan for the city as laid out by Joseph Ellicott in 1804. Its eastern edge has long been defined by important civic structures; first, the Erie County Courthouse, followed by the original Buffalo & Erie County Public Library. Presidential history was made in Lafayette Square when former United States President Martin Van Buren received the Free Soil Party nomination for the 1848 election. President-elect Abraham Lincoln also spoke at the square. (Full article...)

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Grand Parade of the States

The New Mexico Territory, comprising what are today the U.S. states of New Mexico and Arizona, as well as the southern portion of Nevada, played a small but significant role in the trans-Mississippi theater of the American Civil War. Despite its remoteness from the major battlefields of the east, and its being part of the sparsely populated and largely undeveloped American frontier, both Confederate and Union governments claimed ownership over the territory, and several important battles and military operations took place in the region. Roughly 7,000-8,000 troops from the New Mexico Territory served the Union, more than any other western state or territory.

In 1861, the Confederacy claimed the southern half of the vast New Mexico Territory as its own Arizona Territory and waged the ambitious New Mexico Campaign in an attempt to control the American Southwest and open up access to Union-held California. Confederate power in the New Mexico Territory was effectively broken when the campaign culminated in the Union victory at the Battle of Glorieta Pass in 1862. Although the Confederacy never attempted another invasion of the region, its territorial government continued to operate out of Texas, with Confederate troops marching under the Arizona flag until the end of the war. (Full article...)

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McCreary in 1914

James Bennett McCreary (July 8, 1838 – October 8, 1918) was an American lawyer and politician from Kentucky. He represented the state in both houses of the U.S. Congress and served as its 27th and 37th governor. Shortly after graduating from law school, he was commissioned as the only major in the 11th Kentucky Cavalry, serving under Confederate Brigadier General John Hunt Morgan during the American Civil War. He returned to his legal practice after the war. In 1869, he was elected to the Kentucky House of Representatives where he served until 1875; he was twice chosen Speaker of the House. At their 1875 nominating convention, state Democrats chose McCreary as their nominee for governor, and he won an easy victory over Republican John Marshall Harlan. With the state still feeling the effects of the Panic of 1873, most of McCreary's actions as governor were aimed at easing the plight of the state's poor farmers.

In 1884, McCreary was elected to the first of six consecutive terms in the U.S. House of Representatives. As a legislator, he was an advocate of free silver and a champion of the state's agricultural interests. After two failed bids for election to the Senate, McCreary secured the support of Governor J. C. W. Beckham, and in 1902, the General Assembly elected him to the Senate. He served one largely undistinguished term, and Beckham then successfully challenged him for his Senate seat in 1908. The divide between McCreary and Beckham was short-lived, however, and Beckham supported McCreary's election to a second term as governor in 1911. (Full article...)

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Image 1John Lorimer Worden, by Mathew Brady
Image 2Military execution of the conspirators in the Abraham Lincoln assassination
Image 3The original sketch of Sherman in South Carolina: The burning of McPhersonville, at and by William Waud
Image 4Battle of Franklin, by Kurz and Allison
Image 5Atlanta roundhouse ruin at History of Atlanta, by George Barnard
Image 6John A. Dahlgren, by Mathew Brady
Image 7Lithographic facsimile of the Bixby letter, by Huber's Museum
Image 8Ambrose Burnside, by Matthew Brady
Image 9Quaker guns, by George Barnard and James F. Gibson
Image 10Siege of Yorktown, by James F. Gibson
Image 11Braxton Bragg
Image 12Assassination of Abraham Lincoln
Image 13Confederate casualties at Chancellorsville during the American Civil War, by the National Archives and Records Administration
Image 14Pickett's Charge, by Thure de Thulstrup
Image 15Andersonville survivor
Image 16George Atzerodt, by Alexander Gardner
Image 17George Armstrong Custer, by George L. Andrews
Image 18Francis B. Spinola, Brigadier General for the Union in the American Civil War, and Congressman from New York
Image 19The Chickahominy – Sumner's Upper Bridge at Peninsula campaign, by William McIlvaine
Image 20Abraham Lincoln's private secretary and biographer John Hay
Image 21Richmond, Virginia after the American Civil War
Image 22John F. Reynolds, by Alfred Rudolph Waud
Image 23Ulysses S. Grant, by Thure de Thulstrup
Image 24Battle of Harpers Ferry, by Robert Knox Sneden
Image 25Harriet Tubman
Image 26The burning of Columbia at Columbia, South Carolina in the American Civil War, by William Waud
Image 27William Birney
Image 28The print version of Sherman in South Carolina: The burning of McPhersonville at McPhersonville, South Carolina, by William Waud
Image 29African-American Civil War soldiers
Image 30First Battle of Bull Run map
Image 31Battle of Kennesaw Mountain, by Alfred Waud
Image 32David Dixon Porter, by Mathew Brady
Image 33Christian Fleetwood
Image 34United States President (and former Brigadier-General) Benjamin Harrison
Image 35Daniel McCallum, by the Brady National Photographic Art Gallery
Image 36Andersonville Prison at Andersonville National Historic Site, by John L. Ransom
Image 37Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, by Thure de Thulstrup
Image 38Allan Pinkerton, President Lincoln, and John A. McClernand in 1862 by Alexander Gardner
Image 39William H. Seward, United States Secretary of State during the American Civil War
Image 40Charles Griffin
Image 41Christopher Raymond Perry Rodgers
Image 42Robert E. Lee, by Levin Corbin Handy
Image 43Battle of Fort Sanders, by Kurz and Allison
Image 44Abner Doubleday
Image 45Charles Pomeroy Stone
Image 46President Rutherford B. Hayes was the 19th President of the USA

Did you know...

... that Justus H. Rathbone, founder of the Knights of Pythias, served as a hospital steward during the American Civil War?
... that Carter Moore Braxton fought for the Confederacy throughout the American Civil War and, according to one report, had seven horses killed under him but avoided any wounds?
... that after the Little Rock campaign, Union forces held three-quarters of Arkansas?
... that Chinese-born Joseph Pierce enlisted as a Union Army soldier, fought at the Battle of Gettysburg during the American Civil War, and was made a corporal?
... that some Confederate bullets were sourced from a silver mine?
... that Colonel Bradley Winslow was brevetted by US president Abraham Lincoln for "brave and gallant conduct" during the siege of Petersburg in the American Civil War?