Civil War Timeline Supplement
Directions: As we explore the Civil War Timeline posted to Canvas, I recommend jotting down additional notes/thoughts for certain events that we highlight here.
- Lincoln inaugurated March 4th, 1861
- By January, southern states are leaving the country
South Carolina Secedes
- South Carolina is first to secede from the U.S. after Lincoln wins
- Declared themselves independent
Reasoning
- Just trying to own slaves, northern states trying to be aggressive + hostile
- Nullification → going against national law, northern states enforced personal liberty laws
- Thoughts about Lincoln : Reference the speech where he mentions freeing slaves eventually, get agitated
- Republicans are trying to take power
- (Other states quickly follow)
South Government
- Gather in Montgomery for a convention
- create the Confederate Constitution
- Seven seceded states
- Like constitution, but more focused on autonomy
- Jefferson Davis → provisional president of Confederacy
Map Analysis of Sedition
- Green symbolizes Union (the U.S.)
- Orange symbolizes the confederate states
- Border states are slave states → join union, still part of the U.S.
- Delaware
- Maryland
- Kentucky
- Missouri
Oct. 1861 → West Virginia created
- Some people from Virginia wanted to break away from the Confederacy, remain part of the Union
Fort Sumter Battle
- Fort Sumter is in South Carolina
- U.S. fort deep in Confederate state → surrounded by confederate soldiers
- Resupply ship gets bombarded by confederate soldiers
- Shot the first shot → Confederacy
- First battle of the Civil War
Infographic Analysis (1860)
- 2x the amount of people in the Union vs confederacy
- Way more __ in North than South
- Infrastructure
- Workers
- Manufacturing
- Banks
- Value of farmland
- Railways (can help with communication/transportation)
Same amount of farm acreage between North and South
Military strategy
Anaconda Plan
Union
- Blockade Southern Ports
- Control Mississippi River (Split Confederacy)
- Capture Richmond, VA (Confederate capital)
Confederacy
- Survive as a nation
- Defend
- Cautious opportunism
First Battle of Bull Run
- July 21st, 1861
- A.k.a. First Battle of Manassas
- Union army marches south for this battle
- 45,000 union soldiers confronting confederacy
- This battle did not end until 1865
- People treated it like a form of entertainment (picnics on battlefields)
- Dynamic of different reinforcements coming in, since railroads are super close
- Right on the border of confederate states and union
- Confederacy is victorious
Personnel changes
- Lincoln replaced General McDowell with McClellan
- McClellan leads union army
A Blockade of the South
- Union navy blockades south coastal borders
- South relying on factories in the North, but North doesn’t want to trade with them
- South also can’t trade with other countries
- Lincoln→ Commander in Chief
Abraham Lincoln Takes Action
- Lincoln cut off food, railroad, material imports from the North
- McClellan gets fired because McClellan ignores orders
Battle of the “Monitor” and the “Merrimac”
- North is constructing iron warships
- clad→ covers in
- Shell covered in iron (rest is wood)
- South can’t produce this ship
- Conflict in Civil War → South has territory in which the Iron clad prototype was
- Monitor → Completely made by Iron
- Blockade stayed
The Battle of Shiloh
- 1862
- Confederate forces attack Union
- Ulysses S. Grant → Leadership within Union Army
- Federal troop were about to be fully defeated, until reinforcements came in, and the next morning the Union was back on their feet
- 13,000 out of 63,000 Union soldiers died
- 11,000 out of 40,000 Confederate troops killed
Battle of New Orleans
- War of 1812 → Andrew Jackson got his fame from that war
- Control New Orleans → Control Mississippi River
The Battle of Fredericksburg
- Northern Virginia
- Really close to Washington D.C. (Union is worried)
- McClellan is replaced by Burnside
- McClellan was criticized for not being able to take commands from Lincoln (Lincoln is having trouble finding a leader who he trusts).
- Confederate victory
Jan. 1863 → Emancipation Proclamation
January 1st
- Lincoln only freed the slaves in certain states through the Emancipation Proclamation - which states were these? (Hint: Look at lines 1 - 2.)
Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland, and Delaware → The Border States, not free states
Did this probably for:
- Economic purposes
- Compromise
The rest are declared free
The First Conscription Act
- Conscription → Draft
- Reading
The Battle of Chancellorsville
- General Hooker
- Not in power much longer
- U.S. divided it’s army → part of Anaconda plan
- Concentrated army in Northern Virginia
- Split some into Washington D.C.
- And the rest go into the South
- Confederacy
The Vicksburg Campaign
Union won
The Gettysburg Campaign
- June 1863
- Pennsylvania
- Happening over a course of days
- Over July 4th
- 165,000 fighting
- 23,000 casualties on Union side
- 28,000 casualties on Confederacy
- Deadliest Battle of the war
- Union is victorious
- Confederates pushing into Union territory
- Considered the “Turning Point”
- The Union can afford to lose men, while the Confederacy doesn’t.
- Lincoln shows up to the battle
- Speaks at the commemoration
- Leave the bodies in field, turn it into cemetery
- “Four score and seven years ago,” referencing declaration of independence
- Lincoln wants to preserve the Union
- Edward Everett gives a speech as well
- Everett speaks for two hours
Important People
Union
- McClellan → Abraham Lincoln ordered him a command, McClellan “rejected” it
- Grant → Going to become president
Confederate
- Robert Lee → Divided on which side to join, Nickname “Stonewall Jackson”
General William T. Sherman Atlanta Campaign
- Goes all the way from the north to Georgia
- Mission is to destroy confederate infrastructure (railways, roads, canals)
- Disrupt Confederate supply lines
- Him and his men destroy factories, bridges, railroads, and public buildings
- This can be called “Total War” → destroying anything to make enemy surrender
- Play a big role in reconstruction
- “March to the Sea” → important name for next year
Lincoln Reelection
- South does not participate in vote → has its own electoral system
- Most are red → Voted Lincoln (Republican)
- Only 3 states blue → McClellan (Democrat)
The KKK
- Burning Cross→ symbol
- Many southern whites were upset with the forced inclusion of blacks into the political system
- 1866 → KKK formed in Tennessee as a social organization
- White supremacists
- Goal: Terrorize blacks and prominent white Republicans
- Democrats → hate republicans (promoted abolition)
- Methods: marches, burning crosses, lynching, etc.
- Some wear white sheets over heads
- Still not comfortable with 13th, 14th, and 15th amendment
KKK Primary Source
- Targeted towards Republicans → Radical
- The author is threatening to nail republicans into boxes (caskets, coffins) and send them away to the KKK.
- James Davie → Radical Republican
The Election of 1876
- Rutherford B. Hayes REPUBLICAN (Wins) vs. Samuel Tilden DEMOCRAT
- 1876: Republicans only control 3 southern states (SC, LA, FL)
- Democrats return to power → “the redemption” (getting a second chance after the first)
- The “Redeemers” (southern democrats) join power with Northern Democrats→ become Democrats as a whole.
- Democrats sympathize with the KKK
- Election Results → disputed
- Tilden won popular vote
- Hayes won electoral votes
Compromise of 1877
- Special Congressional Commission investigates if the winner is correct
- Investigate → conclude that Hayes did win
- Southern Democrats accept on two conditions
- Guarantee of federal aid to the South
- Removal of all remaining federal troops
- Threat of succession is pretty much gone
- Marks the end of reconstruction