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Republican Party is formed
Republican Party was founded in the Northern United States by forces opposed to the expansion of slavery. -
Kansas-Nebraska Act passed
The Kansas-Nebraska Act repealed the Missouri Compromise, created two new territories, and allowed for popular sovereignty -
Election of 1860 - (Abraham Lincoln elected president)
Abraham Lincoln (Republican) won the elections of 1860 he won over less that 40% of the popular vote, but he easily won the electoral college vote when he was against Stephan Douglas, Lincoln won because the Democrats were split over slavery -
South Carolina votes to secede from the United States
South Carolina was the first state to secede from the federal Union. Once Abe Lincoln was elected president they saw him as a threat because he was against slavery. They believed Lincoln would try to abolish slavery. -
Confederate forces fire on Fort Sumter
Confederate troops fired on Fort Sumter in South Carolina's Charleston Harbor. Confederates won. This battle lasted less than 34 hours. -
Richmond becomes the capital of the Confederacy
Once Virginia seceded, the Confederate government moved the capital to Richmond, the South's second-largest city. In the Confederate Capital City of Montgomery, Alabama, the decision was made to name the City of Richmond, Virginia as the new Capital of the Confederacy. -
First Battle of Bull Run is fought
The First Battle of Bull Run was fought in Prince William County, Virginia. It was the first land battle of the Civil War. It was 30 miles away from Washington close enough for senators to witness the battle in person. The Confederates won the Union forces retreated. -
Jefferson Davis elected president of the Confederacy
Jefferson Davis was elected president of the Confederacy in 1861. Jefferson Davis was a man from Mississippi. The Confederacy were the Southern states that supported slavery. He withdrew from the senate and became the President of the Confederacy. Jefferson Davis was pro-slavery saying, "The South shall rise again." -
The Merrimack and the Monitor fight of the Virginia coast
This Battle was a naval battle at Hampton Roads, Virginia. This was the first Battle with ironclad warships. No one lost or won the battle. This showed a significant advancement in their use of naval technology. -
Battle of Shiloh
The battle begun with the Confederates launching a surprise attack on the Union Forces. This didn't stop the Union forces, the Union ended up winning the war. The Confederates ended up losing General Albert Sidney Johnston. Ulysses S. Grant was the General for the Union Forces and he was praised by Abe Lincoln from his victory at Shiloh. This battle caused 13,047 losses for the Union Forces and 10,694 losses for the Confederates. -
Robert E. Lee is named commander of the Army of Northern Virginia
On June first Robert E. Lee was given command of the Army of Northern Virginia. They are the main Confederate Army. -
Battle of Antietam
This was a battle between Union General George McClellan's Army of the Potomac against General Robert E. Lee and his Army of Northern Virginia. The Maryland Campaign was Lee's first attempt to take the war North and it was McClellan who was tasked by President Abraham Lincoln with stopping him. This was a Union Victory. This also allowed Lincol to address the Emancipation Proclamation which states that all people who are being held as slaves are freed. -
Battle of Fredericksburg
In December 1862, General Burnside marched his men to Richmond. Lee had his men at Fredericksburg, Virginia. The Union suffered 13,000 casualties and the South only lost 5,000. This was a Confederate victory. -
Lincoln suspends habeas corpus
On April 27, 1861, Lincoln suspended the habeas corpus between Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia to give military authorities the necessary power to silence dissenters and rebels. The habeas corpus wass a writ requiring a person under arrest to be brought before a judge or into court, especially to secure the person's release unless lawful grounds are shown for their detention. -
Emancipation Proclamation is announced
President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863. The proclamation declared "that all persons held as slaves" within the rebellious states "are, and henceforward shall be free." -
Battle of Chancellorsville
The Battle of Chancellorsville was a victory for the Confederacy and General Robert E. Lee during the Civil War. It is also known for being the battle in which Confederate General Thomas Jackson was mortally wounded. The death of General Stonewall Jackson was devastating to the Confederate war effort. But the victory allowed General Lee to move north into Maryland and invade Pennsylvania. -
Battle of Gettysburg
The Battle of Gettysburg was when the Confederate States launched an attack on the Union army. This caused a massive amount of casualties (about 51,000) and the Confederates retreated South. This was one of the most bloody battle of the Civil War. -
Confederates surrender at Vicksburg
When two major attacks against the Confederate forts the Confederates were repulsed with heavy casualties, Grant decided to surround his army around the city beginning on May 25. After holding out for more than 40 days, with their supplies nearly gone, the Confederates surrendered on July 4. -
New York City draft riots
The New York City draft riots were violent disturbances in Lower Manhattan, widely regarded as the culmination of working-class discontent with new laws passed by Congress that year to draft men to fight in the Civil War. In addition to destroying homes and businesses, mobs specifically targeted African-Americans and the wealthy. Those who supported the abolitionist movement were also in danger. By the fourth day, NYC resorted to extreme measures by firing cannons at the angry mobs. -
Lincoln gives his Gettysburg Address
The Gettysburg Address was a speech given by President Abraham Lincoln on November 19, 1863, at the official dedication of the Soldiers National Cemetery (now called the Gettysburg National Cemetery) at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Lincoln delivered his speech to honor the men who had fought and died in the Battle of Gettysburg to preserve the Union. -
Atlanta is captured
Union troops reached it on August 31. With their arrival and victory there, the last life line to Atlanta was effectively cut. Hood was forced to abandon Atlanta on the night of September 1, and the city surrendered to Federal forces the following morning. THis was a Union Victory. -
Abraham Lincoln defeats George McClellan to win re-election
The national outcome of the 1860 election gave Lincoln a victory in both the popular vote and the electoral vote, with just under 40 percent of the popular vote, which totaled 1,866,452, and 180 electoral votes. A major division in the Democratic Party also helped assure a Republican victory in the presidential election of 1860. -
Sherman begins his March to the Sea
During the civil war, a war military campaign, led by union general William Tecumseh Sherman, that involved marching 60,000 union troops through Georgia from Atlanta to Savannah and destroying everything along there way. Sherman's March to the Sea spanned some 285 miles over 37 days. His armies sustained more than 1,300 casualties, with the Confederacy suffering roughly 2,300. Between 17,000 and 25,000 enslaved Black people were freed. -
Congress passes the 13th Amendment
It was passed by the Senate on April 8, 1864, and by the House on January 31, 1865. The joint resolution of both bodies that submitted the amendment to the states for approval was signed by President Abraham Lincoln on February 1, 1865. -
Freedman’s Bureau is created
On March 3, 1865, Congress passed “An Act to establish a Bureau for the Relief of Freedmen and Refugees” to provide food, shelter, clothing, medical services, and land to displaced Southerners, including newly freed African Americans. -
Lincoln gives his second inaugural address
The main point of Lincoln's second inaugural address was to claim that both the South and North had to share some of the blame for the sin of slavery. Lincoln expressed the tone for reconstruction and commonly used the term "we" to unify the people of the North and South when it came to the means of reunification. -
Richmond falls to the Union Army
Richmond was important to the Union in that its capture would signal the end of the Confederacy. Richmond fell when Lt. General Grant attacked Five Forks on March 31, 1865, to cut Lee's last remaining supply line. -
Robert E. Lee surrenders at Appomattox
Confederate General Robert E. Lee agreed to surrender his Army of Northern Virginia, marking a symbolic end to the Civil War on April 9, 1865. Lee desperately sought a train loaded with supplies for his troops but encountered none. Grant, realizing that Lee's army was running out of options, sent a letter to Lee on April 7 requesting the Confederate general's surrender. -
President Lincoln Assassination
After years of death threats Lincoln was assassinated on April 15, 1865. A man named John Wilkes Booth (pro slavery) killed him out of vengeance due to the Confederacy's defeat in the Civil War. -
John Wilkes Booth is killed
After assassinating Abraham Lincoln, John Wilkes Booth fled Ford's Theatre and went on the run. For twelve days, John Wilkes Booth led the U.S. Army on a chase through Maryland and Virginia before finally being caught in a barn near Port Royal, Virginia. Cornered alongside fellow conspirator David Herold and surrounded by federal troops. Boston Corbett, approached the barn and claimed to have seen Booth leveling his pistol at him, so Corbett fired a round from his revolver.