Portal:American Civil War

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The American Civil War Portal

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 Long Bridge and two of its guards, as seen from the Washington side of the Potomac River.

Fort Jackson was an American Civil War-era fortification in Virginia that defended the southern end of the Long Bridge, near Washington, D.C. Long Bridge connected Washington, D.C. to Northern Virginia and served as a vital transportation artery for the Union Army during the war. Fort Jackson was named for Jackson City, a seedy suburb of Washington that had been established on the south side of the Long Bridge in 1835. It was built in the days immediately following the Union Army's occupation of Northern Virginia in May 1861. The fort was initially armed with four cannon used to protect the bridge, but these were removed after the completion of the Arlington Line, a line of defenses built to the south. After 1862, the fort lacked weapons except for small arms and consisted of a wooden palisade backed by earthworks. Two cannon were restored to the fort in 1864 following the Battle of Fort Stevens. The garrison consisted of a single company of Union soldiers who inspected traffic crossing the bridge and guarded it from potential saboteurs.

Following the final surrender of the Confederate States of America in 1865, Fort Jackson was abandoned. The lumber used in its construction was promptly salvaged for firewood and construction materials and, due to its proximity to the Long Bridge, the earthworks were flattened in order to provide easier access to Long Bridge. In the early 20th century, the fort's site was used for the footings and approaches to several bridges connecting Virginia and Washington. Today, no trace of the fort remains, though the site of the fort is contained within Arlington County's Long Bridge Park, and a National Park Service 2004 survey of the site indicated some archaeological remnants may still remain beneath the park. (Full article...)

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Grand Parade of the States

Georgia was one of the original seven slave states that formed the Confederate States of America in February 1861, triggering the U.S. Civil War. The state governor, Democrat Joseph E. Brown, wanted locally raised troops to be used only for the defence of Georgia, in defiance of Confederate president Jefferson Davis, who wanted to deploy them on other battlefronts. When the Union blockade prevented Georgia from exporting its plentiful cotton in exchange for key imports, Brown ordered farmers to grow food instead, but the breakdown of transport systems led to desperate shortages.

There was not much fighting in Georgia until September 1863, when Confederates under Braxton Bragg defeated William S. Rosecrans at Chickamauga Creek. In May 1864, William T. Sherman started pursuing the Confederates towards Atlanta, which he captured in September, in advance of his March to the Sea. This six-week campaign destroyed much of the civilian infrastructure of Georgia, decisively shortening the war. When news of the march reached Robert E. Lee's army in Virginia, whole Georgian regiments deserted, feeling they were needed at home. The Battle of Columbus, fought on the Georgia-Alabama border on April 16, 1865, is reckoned by some criteria to have been the last battle of the war. (Full article...)

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Henry Cornelius Burnett (October 25, 1825 – October 1, 1866) was an American politician who served as a Confederate States senator from Kentucky from 1862 to 1865. From 1855 to 1861, Burnett served four terms in the United States House of Representatives. A lawyer by profession, Burnett had held only one public office—circuit court clerk—before being elected to Congress. He represented Kentucky's 1st congressional district immediately prior to the Civil War. This district contained the entire Jackson Purchase region of the state, which was more sympathetic to the Confederate cause than any other area of Kentucky. Burnett promised the voters of his district that he would have President Abraham Lincoln arraigned for treason. Unionist newspaper editor George D. Prentice described Burnett as "a big, burly, loud-mouthed fellow who is forever raising points of order and objections, to embarrass the Republicans in the House".

Besides championing the secession in Congress, Burnett also worked within Kentucky to bolster the state's support of the Confederacy. He presided over a sovereignty convention in Russellville in 1861 that formed a Confederate government for the state. The delegates to this convention chose Burnett to travel to Richmond, Virginia to secure Kentucky's admission to the Confederacy. Burnett also raised a Confederate regiment at Hopkinsville, Kentucky, and briefly served in the Confederate States Army. Camp Burnett, a Confederate recruiting post two miles west of Clinton in Hickman County, Kentucky, was named after him. (Full article...)

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

Did you know...

... that in the aftermath of the American Civil War, the only Black-led organization providing teachers to formerly enslaved people was the African Civilization Society?
... that after the Little Rock campaign, Union forces held three-quarters of Arkansas?
... 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 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 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?