Portal:American Civil War

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The American Civil War Portal

Specifications of the third Confederate national flag

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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The Bixby letter is a brief, consoling message sent by President Abraham Lincoln in November 1864 to Lydia Parker Bixby, a widow living in Boston, Massachusetts, who was thought to have lost five sons in the Union Army during the American Civil War. Along with the Gettysburg Address and his second inaugural address, the letter has been praised as one of Lincoln's finest written works and is often reproduced in memorials, media, and print.

Controversy surrounds the recipient, the fate of her sons, and the authorship of the letter. Bixby's character has been questioned (including rumored Confederate sympathies), at least two of her sons survived the war, and the letter was possibly written by Lincoln's assistant private secretary, John Hay. (Full article...)

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Grand Parade of the States

As a fervently abolitionist and strongly Republican state, Maine contributed a higher proportion of its citizens to the Union armies than any other, as well as supplying money, equipment and stores. No land battles were fought in Maine. The only episode was the Battle of Portland Harbor (1863) that saw a Confederate raiding party thwarted in its attempt to capture a revenue cutter.

Abraham Lincoln chose Maine's Hannibal Hamlin as his first Vice President. The future General Joshua L. Chamberlain and the 20th Maine Volunteer Infantry Regiment played a key role at the Battle of Gettysburg, and the 1st Maine Heavy Artillery Regiment lost more men in a single charge during the siege of Petersburg than any Union regiment in the war. (Full article...)

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Grant c. 1870–1880

Ulysses S. Grant (born Hiram Ulysses Grant; April 27, 1822 – July 23, 1885) was an American military officer and politician who served as the 18th president of the United States from 1869 to 1877. As commanding general, Grant led the Union Army to victory in the American Civil War in 1865 and briefly served as U.S. secretary of war. An effective civil rights executive, Grant signed a bill to create the Justice Department and worked with Radical Republicans to protect African Americans during Reconstruction.

Grant was born in Ohio and graduated from West Point in 1843. He served with distinction in the Mexican–American War, but resigned from the army in 1854 and returned to civilian life impoverished. In 1861, shortly after the Civil War began, Grant joined the Union Army and rose to prominence after securing Union victories in the western theater. In 1863, he led the Vicksburg campaign that gave Union forces control of the Mississippi River and dealt a major strategic blow to the Confederacy. President Abraham Lincoln promoted Grant to lieutenant general after his victory at Chattanooga. For thirteen months, Grant fought Robert E. Lee during the high-casualty Overland Campaign which ended with capture of Lee's army at Appomattox, where he formally surrendered to Grant. In 1866, President Andrew Johnson promoted Grant to General of the Army. Later, Grant broke with Johnson over Reconstruction policies. A war hero, drawn in by his sense of duty, Grant was unanimously nominated by the Republican Party and then elected president in 1868. (Full article...)

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

Did you know...

... that the only functioning secondary school in Mississippi during the American Civil War was founded by Thomas S. Gathright?
... that Francis Orray Ticknor was a country doctor whose fame as a poet relies on "Little Giffen", a poem about one of his patients who died in the American Civil War?
... that Romeo and Juliet both served in the Union Navy?
... that Byron Root Pierce was Michigan's last living Civil War general?
... 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?
... that after the Little Rock campaign, Union forces held three-quarters of Arkansas?