Portal:American Civil War

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The American Civil War Portal

Confederate batteries bombard Fort Sumter

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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USS De Soto in the harbor of Ponce, Puerto Rico, in 1868. The original print is mounted on a carte de visite.

USS De Soto was a fast wooden-hulled sidewheel steamship that saw service as a U.S. Navy gunboat during the American Civil War.

De Soto was originally a privately owned vessel, built for passenger service between New York and New Orleans. With the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861, she was purchased by the Navy, commissioned as USS De Soto, and sent to assist with the blockade of Confederate ports. De Soto's speed made her an effective pursuit ship, and she would capture or bring about the destruction of a total of eighteen blockade runners during the war. (Full article...)

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Grand Parade of the States

Michigan made a substantial contribution to the Union during the American Civil War. While the state itself was far removed from the combat theaters of the war, Michigan supplied many troops and several generals, including George Armstrong Custer. When, at the beginning of the war, Michigan was asked to supply no more than one regiment, Governor Austin Blair sent seven. (Full article...)

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Hay in 1897

John Milton Hay (October 8, 1838 – July 1, 1905) was an American statesman and official whose career in government stretched over almost half a century. Beginning as a private secretary and an assistant for Abraham Lincoln, he became a diplomat. He served as United States Secretary of State under Presidents William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt. Hay was also a biographer of Lincoln, and wrote poetry and other literature throughout his life.

Born in Salem, Indiana to an anti-slavery family that moved to Warsaw, Illinois, Hay showed great potential from an early age, and his family sent him to Brown University. After graduation in 1858, Hay read law in his uncle's office in Springfield, Illinois, adjacent to that of Lincoln. Hay worked for Lincoln's successful presidential campaign and became one of his private secretaries in the White House. Throughout the American Civil War, Hay was close to Lincoln and stood by his deathbed after the President was shot. In addition to his other literary works, Hay co-authored, with John George Nicolay, a ten-volume biography of Lincoln that helped shape the assassinated president's historical image. (Full article...)

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

Did you know...

... that Enoch Marvin Banks resigned from the University of Florida because of public outrage over his belief that the American Civil War was caused by slavery?
... 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 The Land We Love, a little magazine that merged into Southern Magazine, printed American Civil War recollections, poetry, agricultural material, and many works by female authors?
... that Emma Dean Powell received a pass from General Ulysses S. Grant to accompany her husband to battlefield camps during the American Civil War after he lost his arm?
... 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?