The War Between The States

1. The War Between The States A Timeline of the Civil War

2. 1861 • April 19 – Lincoln begins naval blockade of Confederate states • April 20 – Lee resigns from U.S. army – takes command of Confed. Forces in VA

3. 1861 • July 21: Bull Run (Manassas) • Generals: • Union: Irwin McDowell • Confederacy: P.G.T. Beauregard • Union troops & spectators flee back to Washington D.C. • Confederate victory… 5,000 casualties • Conf. General Thomas J. (Stonewall) Jackson a hero of the battle

4. 1861 • July 27: Leadership change for Union army • GeneralGeorge B. McClellan given command of Union Army of the Potomac • McClellan soon given command of all Union forces • Nov. 8 – The Trent Affair • 2 Confederate diplomats captured on their way to England to get British support • Lincoln lets them free after threats of war by England • Significance: England almost convinced to join war on side of Confederacy

5. 1862 • February 1862 • Union General Ulysses S. Grant wins victories in west at Ft. Henry & Ft. Donelson • part of a push to divide the Confederacy • Earns nickname Unconditional Surrender Grant

6. 1862 • March 8/9: Battle of the Ironclads • Confederate Merrimac& Union Monitor fight to a draw in 1st battle of the Ironclads • Significance: changes naval battle forever

7. 1862 • March: • McClellan begins Peninsular Campaign to take Confederate capital city of Richmond, VA • 100,000 Northern troops under McClellan vs. 50,000 Southern troops under Robert E. Lee • typical slow, cautious advance by McClellan • 7 days of battles… union army is stopped by Lee • 30,000 casualties

8. April 6/7: Battle of Shiloh • Confederate General: Sidney Johnston • Union General: Ulysses S. Grant • Grant’s forces attacked at Shiloh (TN)… 2 day battle • Northern victory • 13,000 Union casualties; 10,000 Southern casualties • Lincoln reluctantly relieves Grant of command

9. 1862 • April 24: • Union naval forces under David Farragut take New Orleans • June 1: • Robert E. Lee assumes command of Confederate forces • June 25-July 1 • Seven Days Battles – Lee forces McClellan to pull back to Washington

10. 1862 • Aug. 29/30: 2nd Bull Run • Union General: John Pope • Confederate Generals: Jackson and Longstreet • 75,000 Union forces defeated by 55,000 Confederate troops

11. 1862 • September • Confederates under Lee invade the North (Maryland)… threatens Washington D.C. • Union troops under McClellan pursue Confederates (using copies of Lee’s battle plans) • Sept. 17: Antietam • Bloodiest day in U.S. military history • 26,000 casualties…6,000 killed and 17,000 wounded • Lee forced to retreat to Virginia… McClellan fails to pursue Lee • Significance: leads Lincoln to issue Emancipation Proclamation • January 1, 1863 set as effective date • Freed all slaves in Confederate held territory • War to preserve Union becomes struggle to end slavery as well

12. “...on the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any State or designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free; and the Executive Government of the United States, including the military and naval authority thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of such persons, and will do no act or acts to repress such persons, or any of them, in any efforts they may make for their actual freedom.” Abraham Lincoln - Emancipation Proclamation

13. 1862 • Nov. 7: Change in leadership • Union General McClellan relieved of command… New General is Ambrose Burnside • Dec. 13: Fredericksburg • Union troops under Burnside = terrible defeat at Fredericksburg, VA • Attempted 14 futile assaults on entrenched Confederates • 12,600 Union casualties vs. 5,300 Confederate casualties "If you don't want to use the army, I should like to borrow it for a while.” - Lincoln

14. "We might as well have tried to take hell.” - Union soldier at Fredericksburg "It is well that war is so terrible - we should grow too fond of it," states Lee during the fighting.

15. 1863 • Jan. 1 – Emancipation Proclamation goes into effect - freeing all slaves in Confed. held territory • War to preserve Union becomes struggle to end slavery

16. 1863 • Jan. 25: Union change in leadership • Union General Burnside replaced by General Joseph Hooker • Jan. 29: Vicksburg • Grant placed in command of Army of the West • Told to take Vicksburg, MS on Mississippi River • March 3: Draft • Congress enacts the military draft • Those who could pay $300 could hire a substitute

17. 1863 • May1-4: • Hooker’s forces defeated by Lee at Chancellorsville, VA • “Stonewall” Jackson mortally wounded by his own troops • June 28: • Gen. George Meade replaces Joe Hooker

18. 1863 • July 1-3: Battle of Gettysburg • Union forces under General Meade defeat Confederates under Lee, forcing the Confederates to retreat to VA > Meade fails to pursue and destroy the battered Confederate Army • 28,000 Confed. vs. 23,000 Union casualties • This battle is the turning point of the war!

19. Confederate dead in the “Devil’s Den” Amputation being performed at a Union field Hospital

20. 1863 • July 4: Battle of Vicksburg • Siege begins May 22 • City is bombarded by 2,800 shells a day…47 days of shelling • Starvation becomes commonplace • General Grant takes Vicksburg and takes control of the Mississippi River • Significance: Confederacy is split in two

21. 1863 • July 13-16 • Violent anti-draft riots in NYC • Copperheads – vocal Northern Democrats who opposed the Civil War • Wanted immediate peace settlement with Confederates

22. 1863 • Nov. 19 • Lincoln delivers his Gettysburg Address to dedicate a cemetery on the site of the battlefield

23. The Gettysburg Address Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

24. But in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate - we cannot consecrate - we cannot hallow - this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us - that from these honored dead we may take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion - that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain - that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom - and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. Abraham Lincoln - November 19, 1863

25. 1863 • Nov. 23-25 • Grant’s forces break siege of Chattanooga – Union troops avenge the loss at Chickamauga

26. 1864 • March 9: Change in Union leadership • General Ulysses. S. Grant given control of Union Army • General William T. Sherman given control of armies in West • May: • Coordinated campaign of all Union forces • 120K Union troops under Grant begin moving toward Richmond, VA to face Confederates and Gen. Lee • Beginning of a war of attrition

27. 1864 • June 3: Battle of Cold Harbor (VA) • Union General Grant foolishly attacks a strongly held Confed. position • Union loses 7K men in 20 minutes

28. 1864 • June 15: Siege of Petersburg • Union troops surround General Lee’s forces • July 20: Sherman takes Atlanta • General Sherman begins 3-month struggle to take the vital southern city of Atlanta The 13-inch Union mortar "Dictator" mounted on a railroad flatcar at Petersburg. Its 200-pound shells had a range of over 2 miles

29. 1864 • Aug. 29: Political Changes • Democrats nominate General McClellan to run against Lincoln as “peace candidate” • Republicans ran as the National Union Party and re-nominated Lincoln • Hoped to attract those democrats who supported the war • Nominated Andrew Johnson (D-TN) to balance the ticket as vice president

30. 1864 • Sept. 2: Atlanta • Sherman captures Atlanta • Destroys Atlanta’s warehouses and railroads • Significance: Union victory over this major southern city provides a boost for Lincoln’s re-election campaign • Nov. 8: Election of 1864 • Lincoln re-elected president • Nov. 15: “March to the Sea” • General Sherman leads troops on march to Savannah, GA • Uses scorched earth policy… everything not used by Union Army = destroyed, such as railroads, bridges, factories, and harvest • Captures Savanna, GA on December 22

31. General Sherman surveys the damage at Atlanta

33. 1865 • Jan. 31 - 13th Amendment to the Constitution passed Congress & sent to states for ratification - outlaws slavery in the U.S. • “Neither Slavery, nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.” • March 4 - Lincoln inaugurated for 2nd term

34. Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address • “With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.” March 4, 1865

35. 1865 • April 2 - Lee evacuates Petersburg - Richmond also evacuated - Grant's forces advance • April 4 - Lincoln tours Richmond & Confederate White House

36. Surrender Terms at Appomattox, 1865 General R.E. Lee, Commanding C.S.A. APPOMATTOX Ct H., Va., April 9,1865, General; In accordance with the substance of my letter to you of the 8th inst., I propose to receive the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia on the following terms, to wit: Rolls of all officers and men to be made in duplicate, one copy to be given to an officer to be designated by me, the other to be retained by such officer or officers as you may designate. The officers to give their individual paroles not to take up arms against the Government of the United States until properly [exchanged], and each company or regimental commander to sign a like parole for the men of their commands. The arms, artillery, and public property to be parked, and stacked, and turned over to the officers appointed by me to receive them. This will not embrace the side-arms of the officers, nor their private horses or baggage. This done, each officer and man will be allowed to return to his home, not to be disturbed by the United States authorities so long as they observe their paroles, and the laws in force where they may reside. Very respectfully, U.S. Grant, Lieutenant-General 1865 • April 9 - Lee surrenders at Appomattox Courthouse, VA

37. Lee, shortly after his surrender The Civil War started on the property of Wilmer McLean in Manassas, VA and ended with the surrender of Lee’s forces in the parlor of McLean’s home in Appomatox Courthouse, VA.

38. 1865 • April 14 - Lincoln shot at Ford's Theater