The War Between The StatesThe War Between The States

A Timeline of the Civil War

1860

Dec. 20, 1860 – So. Car. secedes after the election of Lincoln–Followed by Miss, Fla, Ala, GA,

LA, and TX

1861

Feb. 9 – Confederate States of America formed

–Jefferson Davis – President April 12 – Fort Sumter (S.C.)

attacked by Confed. forces

–Civil War begins

1861

April 15 – Lincoln calls for 75K volunteers for the Union army– Command of Army offered to Robert

E. Lee of VA. He refuses April 17 – VA, AR, TN, NC join the

Confederacy

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

1861 July 21 – Union forces under Irwin

McDowell defeated at Bull Run (Manassas) – Conf. General Thomas J. (Stonewall) Jackson a hero of the battle.Union troops & spectators flee

back to Washington D.C.

1861 July 27 – Gen. George B.

McClellan given command of Union Army of the PotomacMcClellan soon given command

of all Union forces Nov. 8 – The Trent Affair - 2

Confed. diplomats captured enroute to England to get British support – Lincoln lets them free after threats of war by England

1862

February – Union General Ulysses S. Grant wins victories in west at Ft. Henry & Ft. Donelson – part of a push to divide the Confed.

–Earns nickname – Unconditional Surrender Grant

1862

March 8/9 – Confed. Merrimac & Union Monitor fight to a draw in 1st battle of the Ironclads

–Changes naval battle forever

1862

March – McClellan begins Peninsular Campaign to take Confed. capital city of Richmond, VA – typical slow, cautious advance by McClellan

April 6/7 – Grant’s forces attacked at Shiloh (TN) – 23K casualties

–Lincoln reluctantly relieves Grant of command

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

1862 Aug. 29/30 – 75K Union forces

under Gen. John Pope defeated by 55K Confed. troops under Jackson & Longstreet at 2nd Bull Run

Union Gen. John Pope Confederate Gen. James Longstreet

1862

Sept. – Lee invades North (MD) & threatens Washington – McClellan pursues with copies of Lee’s battle plans

Sept. 17 – Antietam – bloodiest day in U.S. military history

–26K casualties – Lee forced to retreat to VA – McClellan fails to pursue Lee

Confederate dead at the Sunken Road

1862

Sept. 23 – Lincoln’s Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation –Sets January 1, 1863 as effective

date

“...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

1862

Nov. 7 – McClellan relieved of command – New Gen. is Ambrose Burnside

Dec. 13 – Burnside’s forces suffer terrible defeat at Fredericksburg, VA after 14 futile assaults on entrenched Confeds.

"If you don't want to use the army, I should like to borrow it for a while.” - Lincoln

"We might as well have tried to take hell.” - Union soldier at Fredricksburg

"It is well that war is so terrible - we should grow too fond of it," states Lee during the fighting.

12,600 Union dead vs. 5300 Confederates

1863

Jan. 1 – Emancipation Proclamation goes into effect - freeing all slaves in Confed. held territory

War to preserve Union becomes struggle to end slavery

1863 Jan. 25 – Burnside replaced by

Gen. Joseph Hooker Jan. 29 – Grant placed in command

of Army of the West

–Told to take Vicksburg on Miss. River

March 3 – Congress enacts the military draft

–Those who could pay $300 could hire a substitute

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

Union Gen. George Meade

1863

July 1-3 – The Battle of Gettysburg – Union forces under Meade defeat Lee, forcing the Confeds. to retreat to VA – Meade fails to pursue and destroy the battered Confederate ArmyThe battle is the turning point of

the war

Union dead at Gettysburg

Little Round Top - Gettysburg

A dead Confederate Sharpshooter - Little Round Top

Confederate dead in the

“Devil’s Den”

Amputation being

performed at a Union field

Hospital

1863

July 4 – Grant takes Vicksburg and takes control of the Miss. River

Confederacy is split in two July 13-16 – Violent anti-draft riots

in NYC

1863

Sept.19/20 – Union forces defeated at Chickamauga, TN – Union Gen. Rosecrans’ troops trapped in Chattanooga, TN

Oct. 16 – Grant given control of all western armies

1863

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

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.

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

1863

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

1864 March 9 – Grant given command of

Union Army – Gen. William T. Sherman given control of armies of the west

May – Coordinated campaign of all Union forces begins. 120K Union troops under Grant begin moving toward Richmond & Gen. LeeBeginning of a war of attrition

Union Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman

1864

June 3 – Battle of Cold Harbor (VA) – Grant foolishly attacks a strongly held Confed. position – loses 7K men in 20 mins.

Planning the Cold Harbor Assault

Union Gen. Ulysses Simpson Grant

1864

June 15 – Siege of Petersburg begins – Lee’s forces surrounded

July 20 – Sherman reaches Atlanta – begins a 3-month struggle to take the vital southern city

The 13-inch Union mortar "Dictator" mounted on a railroad flatcar at Petersburg. Its 200-pound shells had a range of over 2 miles

1864 Aug. 29 – Democrats nominate

McClellan to run against Lincoln The Republicans ran as the

National Union Party Andrew Johnson (D-TN) chosen to

balance the ticket

1864 Sept. 2 – Sherman captures Atlanta – a

boost for Lincoln’s re-election campaignSherman destroys Atlanta’s warehouses

and railroads Nov. 8 – Lincoln re-elected president Nov. 15 – Sherman begins his “March

to the Sea” Dec. 21 – Sherman reaches Savannah,

GA, leaving behind scorched earth in his wake

General Sherman (Rt) surveys the damage at Atlanta (below and next slide)

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

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

1865

April 2 - Lee evacuates Petersburg - Richmond also evacuated - Grant's forces advance

April 4 - Lincoln tours Richmond & Confederate White House

Union troops at Petersburg (left) and Richmond (below)

The Confederate “White House” in Richmond

1865

April 9 - Lee surrenders at Appomatox Courthouse, VA

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

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.

Lee, shortly after his

surrender

1865

April 14 - Lincoln shot at Ford's Theater

The Presidential Box at Ford’s Theater