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During this time, America had new expeditions all around the undiscovered west coast. Manifest Destiny proposed that Americans settle across North America in its entirety. Manifest Destiny caused many Americans to want to move westward and get rid of the natives.

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Manifest Destiny changed popular ideas of American identity and motivated territorial expansionism by influencing the belief that Americans were supposed to settle across the West, which powered up the need for territorial expansionism.

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The Purchase of the Louisiana Territory relates to my thesis because it was the prerequisite for the Lewis and Clark Expedition and solidified our aspirations to begin settling and exploring the West.

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Milestones: 1801–1829 - Office of the Historian

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While both economies were flourishing between the North and the South, contradicting interests in their separate economies divided the sides. Around the mid-1900s, the North had become a great power in industrialization, as the South was highly dependent on slavery due to its better farmland for agriculture. The major contrasts in these regions including state rights, slavery, and westward expansion led to the Civil War beginning in 1861.

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Once the Civil War ended, a time of "Reconstruction" started to repair America's divided sides, to help heal the South, and to accept millions of formerly enslaved and now-freed African Americans into American society. Under the 13th Amendment, the Southern people were forced to make new and significant adaptations to their revolutionized economy. Although new railroads were being built across the Western and Southern parts of the US, political disputes arose and racism against the newly freed African Americans slowed the progress of Westward expansion.

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The end of slavery, immigration, and new advances in technology resulted in the urbanization of the American South and West greatly because the South wouldn't have looked into technologically developing their economy. After all, it was already thriving as it was.

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The growth of Northern manufacturing and the Southern cash crop economy resulted in the American Civil War because of the various major differences between their economies, with the largest difference being slavery.

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Event- Election of Abraham Lincoln {March 4, 1861}

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Event- Election of Abraham Lincoln {March 4, 1861}

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The Election supports my thesis because he was a man for the North, and very controversial to the South due to his opinions on slavery. This election led to immediate rebellion and clearly shows how divided the sides were.

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Updated November 1, 2024 • October 16, 2024

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The Election of 1860 occurred on the brink of the American Civil War.

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Primary Source- The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave by Frederick Douglass {1945}

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Primary Source- The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave by Frederick Douglass {1945}

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This story supports my thesis because it shows how certain African Americans were freed and respected while others were stuck at plantations but they helped each other throughout the worst.

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Frederick Douglass: Abolitionist, Journalist, Reformer, 1818 - 1895

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By Dr. Noelle Trent Director of Interpretation, Collections and Education Frederick Douglass, an icon of American history, was born Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey in Talbot County, Maryland in 1818. Born a slave, Douglass escaped to freedom in his early twenties. He rose to fame with the 1845 publication of his first book The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, Written By Himself. He fought throughout most of his career for the abolition of slavery and worked with notable abolitionists like William Lloyd Garrison and Gerrit Smith. However, Douglass’s fight for reform extended beyond the fight for abolition. In 1848 he was one of a few men to attend the Woman’s Rights Convention in Seneca Falls, New York. Led by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, this convention gave birth to the women’s movement in the United States. During the Civil War, he advocated for the use of African American soldiers in the Union Army and would later become a recruiter for the United States Colored Troops. Douglass regarded the Civil War as the fight to end slavery, but like many free blacks he urged President Lincoln to emancipate the slaves as a means of insuring that slavery would never again exist in the United States. Immediately after the war, Douglass advocated for Constitutional amendments that would permanently change the status of African Americans in the United States. The change in the status of African Americans came in the form of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments which granted African Americans citizenship and the right to vote. One of the major ways Douglass advocated for change was through his newspapers. In the early part of his career he worked for William Lloyd Garrison’s abolitionist newspaper, The Liberator. In 1847 Douglass moved to Rochester, New York to publish his own newspaper The North Star. Through a merger in 1851, Douglass created a new newspaper entitled Frederick Douglass’ Paper. In 1859, he began publishing a monthly paper entitled Douglass’s Monthly. Due to the Civil War and his efforts to recruit black soldiers for the Union Army, Douglass stopped printing his newspapers in 1863. His last newspaper, The New National Era, was published from 1870 to 1874. During and beyond Reconstruction, Douglass’s advocacy would take on a different form as he used his appointments to demonstrate the capabilities of African Americans. In 1874, Douglass was appointed President of the Freedman’s Savings & Trust Co., also known as the Freedman’s Bank. Freedman’s Bank was a private corporation chartered by Congress to educate and handle the finances of recently freed people. When Douglass became president, he was unaware of the bank’s internal mismanagement; the bank closed four months into his presidency. Despite the bank’s failure, Douglass believed that it demonstrated the willingness and ability of African Americans to manage their personal finances. In 1877, Douglass was appointed U.S. Marshal for the District of Columbia. From 1889 – 1891 he served as U.S. Minister Resident and Consul General to the Republic of Haiti. All of his positions, regardless of their successes and failures demonstrated African Americans could serve in the higher levels of government. Douglass’s advocacy for all people continued until his death in 1895. On February 20, 1895 after speaking at a local women’s convention, he passed away in his mansion in Washington, DC. The legacy of Frederick Douglass was captured by President John F. Kennedy in 1961. “The life of Frederick Douglass is part of the legend of America. As a successful fighter for freedom a century ago, he can give inspiration to people all around the world who are still struggling to secure their full human rights. That struggle must go on until those rights are everywhere secured. By advancing that cause through law, democratic methods and peaceful action, we in America can give an example of the freedom which Frederick Douglass symbolizes.” On Friday, February 5, at 6:00pm, the National Civil Rights Museum presents “Frederick Douglass: The Making of an American Prophet,” a concert theatrical about the great American abolitionist and social reformer, Frederick Douglass. The dramatization is preceded by a reception at 5:30, and followed by a panel discussion with Rhodes College History professor, Tim Huebner, and the museum’s Director of Interpretation, Collections and Education and Frederick Douglass scholar, Dr. Noelle Trent. The performance is a powerful story of Frederick Douglass, the American slave who escaped to freedom and became one of the most prominent abolitionists of his day, famous for his fiery oratory. It details Douglass’ early years as a slave and the relationship to his later vision. The production is free and open to the public. Online registration is encouraged. Sources Benjamin Quarles, Frederick Douglass, New York: Atheneum, 1968. Philip Foner, Frederick Douglass, A Biography, New York: Citadel Press, 1964. Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave Written by Himself, 1845. Frederick Douglass, The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass: His Early Life as a Slave, His Escape from Bondage, and His Complete History, 1881. Frederick Douglass, My Bondage and My Freedom, 1855.

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Event- Lewis and Clark Expedition {May 14, 1804 – Sep 23, 1806}

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Event- Lewis and Clark Expedition {May 14, 1804 – Sep 23, 1806}

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The Lewis and Clark Expedition Relates to my thesis because its sole purpose was purely for Westward Expansion and paving a way into the undiscovered Western world after the Louisiana Purchase.

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Español
In 1803 President Thomas Jefferson guided a splendid piece of foreign diplomacy through the U.S. Senate: the purchase of Louisiana territory from France. After the Louisiana Purchase Treaty was made, Jefferson initiated an exploration of the newly purchased land and the territory beyond the "great rock mountains" in the West. He chose Meriwether Lewis to lead an expedition, who in turn solicited the help of William Clark. Together they formed a diverse military Corps of Discovery that would undertake a two-year journey to the great ocean. Read More...

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Meriwether Lewis was an intelligent and literate man who also possessed skills as a frontiersman. Lewis solicited the help of William Clark due to Clark's abilities as a draftsman and frontiersman, which were even stronger than Lewis's. Lewis so respected Clark that he made him a co-commanding captain of the Expedition, even though Clark was never recognized as such by the government.

Jefferson hoped that Lewis and Clark would find a water route linking the Columbia and Missouri rivers. This water link would connect the Pacific Ocean with the Mississippi River system, thus giving the new western land access to port markets out of the Gulf of Mexico and to eastern cities along the Ohio River and its minor tributaries. At the time, American and European explorers had only penetrated what would become each end of the Lewis and Clark Trail up the Missouri several miles to the trapper headquarters at Fort Mandan and up the Columbia just a bit over a hundred miles to a point a little beyond present-day Portland, Oregon.

The Lewis and Clark Expedition paddled its way down the Ohio as it prepared the Expedition to be launched officially from Camp Wood, just outside St. Louis, in the summer of 1804. That summer and fall the company of explorers paddled and pulled themselves upstream, northwest on the Missouri River to Fort Mandan, a trading post, where Corps of Discovery set up camp, wintered, and prepared for the journey to the Pacific.

When the spring of 1805 brought high water and favorable weather, the Lewis and Clark Expedition set out on the next leg of its journey. They traveled up the Missouri to present-day Three Forks, Montana, following the western-most tributary, the Jefferson River. This route delivered the explorers to the doorstep of the Shoshone tribe, who were skilled at traversing the great rock mountains with horses. Once over the Bitterroot Mountains, the Corps of Discovery shaped canoe-like vessels that transported them swiftly downriver to the mouth of the Columbia, where they wintered (1805-1806) at Fort Clatsop, on the present-day Oregon side of the river.

With journals in hand, Lewis, Clark, and the other members of the Expedition returned to St. Louis by September 1806 to report their findings to Jefferson. Along the way, they continued to trade what few goods they still had and set up diplomatic relations with Native American tribes. Additionally, they recorded their contact and described (and at times drew) the shape of the landscape and the creatures of this western world that were new to them. In doing so, they fulfilled many of Jefferson's wishes for the Expedition. Along the way, William Clark drew a series of maps that were remarkably detailed, noting and naming rivers and creeks, significant points in the landscape, the shape of river shore, and spots where the Corps spent each night or camped or portaged for longer periods of time. Later explorers used these maps to further probe the western portion of the continent.

The Expedition of the Corps of Discovery shaped a crude route to the waters of the Pacific and marked an initial pathway for the new nation to spread westward from ocean to ocean, fulfilling what many Americans would claim to be their obvious destiny.

Over the next two centuries, new Americans and many immigrants would wash across the central and western portions of what would eventually become the contiguous 48 United States. This wave of settlement would significantly transform virgin forests and grasslands into a landscape of cities, farms, and harvested forests - displacing fauna such as the buffalo and squeezing the Native American tribes who survived onto reservations.
This text was adapted from an article written by Linda Darus Clark, a teacher at Padua Franciscan High School in Parma, Ohio. Materials created by the National Archives and Records Administration are in the public domain.

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Español In 1803 President Thomas Jefferson guided a splendid piece of foreign diplomacy through the U.S. Senate: the purchase of Louisiana territory from France. After the Louisiana Purchase Treaty was made, Jefferson initiated an exploration of the newly purchased land and the territory beyond the "great rock mountains" in the West.

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Event- War Begins at Fort Sumter {April 12, 1861}

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Event- War Begins at Fort Sumter {April 12, 1861}

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This supports my thesis because it shows the South didn't like the path that it seemed the US was going to take, which relates to my thesis. After all, they didn't agree with Lincoln's actions/opinions on slavery.

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Battle of Fort Sumter, (April 12-14, 1861), the opening engagement of the American Civil War, at the entrance to the harbour of Charleston, South Carolina. Although Fort Sumter held no strategic value to the North-it was unfinished and its guns faced the sea rather than Confederate shore batteries-it held enormous value as a symbol of the Union.

The United States Army began building Fort Sumter on an artificial island at the entrance to Charleston Harbor in 1829. The fort was named for Thomas Sumter, a general who had won key victories against the British in the Carolinas during the American Revolution. The fort was still under construction during the last months of Pres. James Buchanan's term, when a succession of events occurred that brought the contending regions of the United States to the verge of armed conflict. Soon after the election of Abraham Lincoln in November 1860, the state of South Carolina called a convention that passed an ordinance of secession (December 20, 1860), and Gov. Francis Pickens sent commissioners to Washington, D.C., to claim possession of the forts in Charleston Harbor and all other U.S. property in his state.

On December 26, 1860, Maj. Robert Anderson, commanding officer of the Federal garrison at Charleston, secretly transferred his two weak companies from Fort Moultrie-which was located on a peninsula on the east side of the harbour and was untenable against a land attack-to Fort Sumter in the mouth of the harbour. Pickens seized the arsenal and other forts around the harbour and began throwing up batteries against Sumter. Meanwhile, his commissioners in Washington requested the recall of the Federal troops from Charleston. Buchanan refused this request. In a message to Congress on December 3, Buchanan had already denied the right of secession, but he asserted that the Constitution gave him no right to attempt coercion. He hoped for compromise, and a committee of Congress considered various proposals for adjustment. A peace conference, called by Virginia, also met in Washington and suggested amendments to the Constitution that would satisfy Southern grievances. Lincoln and the leaders of the Republican Party refused to accept the adjustments that the Southerners demanded. In the meantime, Buchanan sent an unarmed commercial steamer, Star of the West, with supplies and reinforcements to Sumter, but it turned back when it was fired upon in the harbour on January 9, 1861.

Between January 9 and February 1 six other states ( Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas) followed South Carolina's example. Without attempting negotiation, their governors seized all the forts and arsenals in their respective states except Fort Pickens in the harbour of Pensacola, Florida. Delegates from the seceding states met at Montgomery, Alabama, organized the Confederate States of America, and set up a provisional government with Jefferson Davis as president. Davis's inauguration took place on February 18. The Confederate government then assumed control of the negotiations about Sumter. Neither Buchanan nor Davis was eager to precipitate a crisis. Buchanan's fervent desire apparently was to leave the solution of the whole problem to his successor; Davis was chiefly concerned with getting his own administration in working order. He sent Gen. P.G.T. Beauregard, an engineer officer of distinction, to Charleston to complete the defenses of the harbour. The day after Beauregard reached Charleston, Lincoln was inaugurated in Washington, D.C. (March 4).

A difficult problem confronted the new president. Seven slave states had seceded, but eight still remained in the Union. Any attempt at coercion would throw all these states, except Delaware (which practically counted as a Northern state), into the arms of the Confederacy. At this stage neither side wanted war. This was certainly true of the North, where a strong feeling was growing in favour of "letting the erring sisters depart in peace." The South had assumed a defensive role, that of a newborn country asking only to be left alone. Lincoln's inaugural speech was really addressed to the slave states still in the Union. To the Confederate states it sounded like a declaration of war, but they sought to avoid the responsibility of striking the first blow.

The South hoped to force Lincoln's hand over Sumter. Anderson's position there was daily growing more difficult. He would have gladly evacuated the fort to avert a civil war, but his duty as a soldier compelled him to sit with folded hands while the enemy was completing its preparations. His provisions would be exhausted by mid-April. The Confederate batteries had made such progress that he doubted whether it was still possible to relieve the fort unless possession of the whole harbour were secured, and for that purpose he estimated that 20,000 men would be required. The whole U.S. Army numbered only about 17,000 men, most of whom were scattered in small posts on the Western frontier, whence they could not be hastily withdrawn.

Only on March 5 did Lincoln learn that Anderson might be starved into surrender. Gen. Winfield Scott, the president's chief military adviser, urged evacuation on military grounds. However, Lincoln had pledged himself "to hold, occupy and possess the property and places belonging to the Government." It would be fatal to the prestige of his administration to start by going back on his word, and evacuation might seem a virtual recognition of the Confederacy. Against the advice of a majority of his cabinet, he determined to send a relief expedition, carrying only food supplies, to Sumter. If the Federal flag should be fired upon, that would constitute a casus belli, and the responsibility for beginning the war would rest on the Confederates.

Although he did not inform Anderson, Lincoln gave Pickens precise information regarding his intention. He must have foreseen the actual event. Through war, the Union could be restored, and the North, which was not agreed on policy, could be united. Pickens promptly informed the Montgomery government, and Davis ordered Beauregard to reduce Sumter. Upon Anderson's refusal to evacuate, the batteries opened fire at 4:30 am on April 12. The next afternoon Anderson agreed to surrender and evacuated the fort at noon on April 14. When the U.S. troops marched out of the fort, they waved the U.S. flag and carried out a gun salute. On the 50th round of the 100-gun salute, an explosion occurred, causing the only death of the engagement. Pvt. Daniel Hough of the 1st U.S. Artillery regiment was the first of as many as 850,000 Americans who would perish before the cessation of hostilities.

The Confederate leaders' ready acceptance of Lincoln's challenge may have been due to a fear that without a collision the ardour of the Southern people, many of whom had opposed secession, might abate. Neither Lincoln nor Davis could have foreseen the dimensions the war would assume.

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Battle of Fort Sumter | Location, Significance, & Map

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The Battle of Fort Sumter was the opening engagement of the American Civil War.

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Event- Addition of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution {1865}

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Event- Addition of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution {1865}

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The 13th Amendment supports my thesis because it abolished slavery, freed all African Americans, and technically forced the Southerners to recreate their economy.

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Passed by Congress on January 31, 1865, and ratified on December 6, 1865, the 13th Amendment abolished slavery in the United States.
In 1863 President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation declaring "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." Nonetheless, the Emancipation Proclamation did not end slavery in the nation since it only applied to areas of the Confederacy currently in a state of rebellion (and not even to the loyal "border states" that remained in the Union). Lincoln recognized that the Emancipation Proclamation would have to be followed by a constitutional amendment in order to guarantee the abolishment of slavery.

The 13th Amendment was passed at the end of the Civil War before the Southern states had been restored to the Union, and should have easily passed in Congress. However, though the Senate passed it in April 1864, the House initially did not. At that point, Lincoln took an active role to ensure passage through Congress. He insisted that passage of the 13th Amendment be added to the Republican Party platform for the upcoming 1864 Presidential election. His efforts met with success when the House passed the bill in January 1865 with a vote of 119-56.

On February 1, 1865, President Abraham Lincoln approved the Joint Resolution of Congress submitting the proposed amendment to the state legislatures. The necessary number of states (three-fourths) ratified it by December 6, 1865. The 13th Amendment to the United States Constitution provides that "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."

With the adoption of the 13th Amendment, the United States found a final constitutional solution to the issue of slavery. The 13th Amendment, along with the 14th and 15th, is one of the trio of Civil War amendments that greatly expanded the civil rights of Americans.

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13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: Abolition of Slavery (1865)

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EnlargeDownload Link Citation: The House Joint Resolution Proposing the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, January 31, 1865; Enrolled Acts and Resolutions of Congress, 1789-1999; General Records of the United States Government; Record Group 11; National Archives.

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Event- Capture of New Orleans {April 1862}

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Event- Capture of New Orleans {April 1862}

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This supports my thesis because it shows the North was not going to let the South walk over them. This was a huge turning point in the War that showed the North was not to be messed with.

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The Capture of New Orleans - Essential Civil War Curriculum

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Author: Charles J. Wexler. Title: The Capture of New Orleans. The capture of New Orleans on April 29, 1862 gave Union forces under Flag Officer David Glasgow Farragut and Major General Benjamin Franklin Butler control of the Confederacy’s largest port on the Mississippi River.

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Event- Assassination Of Abraham Lincoln {July 14, 1865}

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Event- Assassination Of Abraham Lincoln {July 14, 1865}

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This supports my thesis because although the war had ended, there were still major issues between the North and South, and those issues were significant enough for John Wilkes Booth to murder the President.

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On the evening of April 14, 1865, while attending a special performance of the comedy, "Our American Cousin," President Abraham Lincoln was shot. Accompanying him at Ford's Theatre that night were his wife, Mary Todd Lincoln, a twenty-eight year-old officer named Major Henry R. Rathbone, and Rathbone's fiancée, Clara Harris. After the play was in progress, a figure with a drawn derringer pistol stepped into the presidential box, aimed, and fired. The president slumped forward.

The Martyr of liberty... [n. p., n. d.] (Library of Congress, Stern Collection, Rare Book and Special Collections Division.)

The assassin, John Wilkes Booth, dropped the pistol and waved a dagger. Rathbone lunged at him, and though slashed in the arm, forced the killer to the railing. Booth leapt from the balcony and caught the spur of his left boot on a flag draped over the rail, and broke a bone in his leg on landing. Though injured, he rushed out the back door, and disappeared into the night on horseback.

A doctor in the audience, Dr. Charles Leale, immediately went upstairs to the box. The bullet had entered through Lincoln's left ear and lodged behind his right eye. He was paralyzed and barely breathing. He was carried across Tenth Street, to a boarding-house opposite the theater, but the doctors' best efforts failed. Nine hours later, at 7:22 a.m. on April 15th, Lincoln died.

President Lincoln's funeral procession in New York City. From Harper's Weekly, May 13, 1865. (Library of Congress, Stern Collection, Rare Book and Special Collections Division. )

At almost the same moment Booth fired the fatal shot, his accomplice, Lewis Powell (alias Lewis Paine, Lewis Payne), attacked Lincoln's secretary of state, William Henry Seward, at his home on Lafayette Square. Seward lay in bed, recovering from a carriage accident. Powell entered the mansion, claiming to have a delivery of medicine from the secretary's doctor. Seward's son, Frederick, was brutally beaten while trying to keep Powell from his father's door. Powell slashed the secretary's throat twice, then fought his way past Seward's son Augustus, an attending hospital corps veteran, and a State Department messenger.

Powell escaped into the night, believing his deed complete. However, a metal surgical collar saved Seward from certain death. The secretary lived another seven years, during which he retained his seat with the Johnson administration, and purchased Alaska from Russia in 1867.

There were at least four conspirators in addition to Booth involved in the mayhem. Booth was shot and captured while hiding in a barn near Bowling Green, Virginia, and died later the same day, April 26, 1865. Four co-conspirators, Powell, George Atzerodt, David Herold, and Mary Surratt, were hanged at the gallows of the Old Penitentiary, on the site of present-day Fort McNair, on July 7, 1865.

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Assassination of President Abraham Lincoln | Articles and Essays | Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress | Digital Collections | Library of Congress

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On the evening of April 14, 1865, while attending a special performance of the comedy, "Our American Cousin," President Abraham Lincoln was shot. Accompanying him at Ford's Theatre that night were his wife, Mary Todd Lincoln, a twenty-eight year-old officer named Major Henry R. Rathbone, and Rathbone's fiancée, Clara Harris.

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The Indian Removal Act relates to my thesis because it permitted Americans to settle on the Native's former land, specifically the Cherokee's, and make money off of their land and gold.

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The Indian Removal Act was signed into law by President Andrew Jackson on May 28, 1830, authorizing the president to grant lands west of the Mississippi in exchange for Indian lands within existing state borders. A few tribes went peacefully, but many resisted the relocation policy. During the fall and winter of 1838 and 1839, the Cherokees were forcibly moved west by the United States government. Approximately 4,000 Cherokees died on this forced march, which became known as the "Trail of Tears."

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Research Guides: Indian Removal Act: Primary Documents in American History: Introduction

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This guide contains digital materials at the Library of Congress related to the Indian Removal Act of 1830 and its after-effects, as well as links to external websites and a selected print bibliography.

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An effect of the Indian Removal Act, the Trail of Tears supports my thesis because it shows the ideology that Americans were entitled to all of North American land.

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The 'Indian Problem'

White Americans, particularly those who lived on the western frontier, often feared and resented the Native Americans they encountered: To them, American Indians seemed to be an unfamiliar, alien people who occupied land that white settlers wanted (and believed they deserved).

Some officials in the early years of the American republic, such as President George Washington, believed that the best way to solve this "Indian problem" was to simply "civilize" the Native Americans. The goal of this civilization campaign was to make Native Americans as much like white Americans as possible by encouraging them convert to Christianity, learn to speak and read English and adopt European-style economic practices such as the individual ownership of land and other property (including, in some instances in the South, enslaved persons).

In the southeastern United States, many Choctaw, Chickasaw, Seminole, Creek and Cherokee people embraced these customs and became known as the "Five Civilized Tribes."

Did you know? Indian removal took place in the Northern states as well. In Illinois and Wisconsin, for example, the bloody Black Hawk War in 1832 opened to white settlement millions of acres of land that had belonged to the Sauk, Fox and other native nations.

But the Native Americans' land, located in parts of Georgia, Alabama, North Carolina, Florida and Tennessee, was valuable, and it grew to be more coveted as white settlers flooded the region. Many of these whites yearned to make their fortunes by growing cotton, and often resorted to violent means to take land from their Indigenous neighbors. They stole livestock; burned and looted houses and towns; committed mass murder; and squatted on land that did not belong to them.

Worcester v. Georgia

State governments joined in this effort to drive Native Americans out of the South. Several states passed laws limiting Native American sovereignty and rights and encroaching on their territory.

In Worcester v. Georgia (1832), the U.S. Supreme Court objected to these practices and affirmed that native nations were sovereign nations "in which the laws of Georgia [and other states] can have no force."

Even so, the maltreatment continued. As President Andrew Jackson noted in 1832, if no one intended to enforce the Supreme Court's rulings (which he certainly did not), then the decisions would "[fall]...still born." Southern states were determined to take ownership of Indian lands and would go to great lengths to secure this territory.

Indian Removal Act

Andrew Jackson had long been an advocate of what he called "Indian removal." As an Army general, he had spent years leading brutal campaigns against the Creeks in Georgia and Alabama and the Seminoles in Florida-campaigns that resulted in the transfer of hundreds of thousands of acres of land from Indian nations to white farmers.

As president, he continued this crusade. In 1830, he signed the Indian Removal Act, which gave the federal government the power to exchange Native-held land in the cotton kingdom east of the Mississippi for land to the west, in the "Indian colonization zone" that the United States had acquired as part of the Louisiana Purchase. This "Indian territory" was located in present-day Oklahoma.

The law required the government to negotiate removal treaties fairly, voluntarily and peacefully: It did not permit the president or anyone else to coerce Native nations into giving up their ancestral lands. However, President Jackson and his government frequently ignored the letter of the law and forced Native Americans to vacate lands they had lived on for generations.

Trail of Tears

In the winter of 1831, under threat of invasion by the U.S. Army, the Choctaw became the first nation to be expelled from its land altogether. They made the journey to Indian Territory on foot (some "bound in chains and marched double file," one historian writes), and without any food, supplies or other help from the government.

Thousands of people died along the way. It was, one Choctaw leader told an Alabama newspaper, a "trail of tears and death."

The Indian-removal process continued. In 1836, the federal government drove the Creeks from their land for the last time: 3,500 of the 15,000 Creeks who set out for Oklahoma did not survive the trip.

Treaty of New Echota

The Cherokee people were divided: What was the best way to handle the government's determination to get its hands on their territory? Some wanted to stay and fight. Others thought it was more pragmatic to agree to leave in exchange for money and other concessions.

In 1835, a few self-appointed representatives of the Cherokee nation negotiated the Treaty of New Echota, which traded all Cherokee land east of the Mississippi - roughly 7 million acres - for $5 million, relocation assistance and compensation for lost property.

To the federal government, the treaty (signed in New Echota, Georgia) was a done deal, but a majority of the Cherokee felt betrayed. Importantly, the negotiators did not represent the tribal government or anyone else. Most Cherokee people considered the Treaty of New Echota fraudulent, and the Cherokee National Council voted in 1836 to reject it.

John Ross

"The instrument in question is not the act of our nation," wrote the nation's principal chief, John Ross, in a letter to the U.S. Senate protesting the Treaty of New Echota. "We are not parties to its covenants; it has not received the sanction of our people." Nearly 16,000 Cherokees signed Ross's petition, but Congress approved the treaty anyway.

By 1838, only about 2,000 Cherokees had left their Georgia homeland for Indian Territory. President Martin Van Buren sent General Winfield Scott and 7,000 soldiers to expedite the removal process. Scott and his troops forced the Cherokee into stockades at bayonet point while his men looted their homes and belongings.

Then, they marched the Indians more than 1,200 miles to Indian Territory. Whooping cough, typhus, dysentery, cholera and starvation were epidemic along the way. Historians estimate that more than 5,000 Cherokee died as a result of the journey.

Legacy of the Trail of Tears

By 1840, tens of thousands of Native Americans had been driven off of their land in the southeastern states and forced to move across the Mississippi to Indian Territory. The federal government promised that their new land would remain unmolested forever, but as the line of white settlement pushed westward, "Indian Country" shrank and shrank. In 1907, Oklahoma became a state and Indian Territory was considered lost.

A 2020 decision by the Supreme Court, however, highlighted ongoing interest in Native American territorial rights. In a 5-4 decision, the Court ruled that a huge area of Oklahoma is still considered an American Indian reservation.

This decision left the state of Oklahoma unable to prosecute Native Americans accused of crimes on those tribal lands - only federal and tribal law enforcement can prosecute such crimes. (A later 2022 Supreme Court decision rolled back some provisions of the 2020 court finding.)

The Trail of Tears - actually a network of different routes - is over 5,000 miles long and covers nine states: Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Missouri, North Carolina, Oklahoma and Tennessee. Today, the Trail of Tears National Historic Trail is run by the National Park Service and portions of it are accessible on foot, by horse, by bicycle or by car.

Sources

Trail of Tears. NPS.gov.
Trail of Tears. Museum of the Cherokee Indian.
The Treaty of New Echota and the Trail of Tears. North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.
The Treaty That Forced the Cherokee People from Their Homelands Goes on View. Smithsonian Magazine.
Justices rule swath of Oklahoma remains tribal reservation. Associated Press.
Justices limit 2020 ruling on tribal lands in Oklahoma. Associated Press.

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Trail of Tears: Definition, Date & Cherokee Nation - HISTORY

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The Trail of Tears was the deadly route Native Americans were forced to follow when they were pushed off their ancestral lands and into Oklahoma by the Indian Removal Act of 1830.

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Primary Source- John O'Sullivan Declaring Manifest Destiny {1845}

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Primary Source- John O'Sullivan Declaring Manifest Destiny {1845}

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This document supports my thesis because it jumpstarts the ideology that America is supposed to settle in all of North America.

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John O'Sullivan Declares America's Manifest Destiny, 1845
John Louis O'Sullivan, a popular editor and columnist, articulated the long-standing American belief in the God-given mission of the United States to lead the world in the transition to democracy. He called this America's "manifest destiny." This idea motivated wars of American expansion. He explained this idea in the following essay where he advocated adding Texas to the United States.
Texas is now ours... Her star and her stripe may already be said to have taken their place in the glorious blazon of our common nationality; and the sweep of our eagle's wing already includes within its circuit the wide extent of her fair and fertile land. She is no longer to us a mere geographical space-a certain combination of coast, plain, mountain, valley, forest and stream. She is no longer to us a mere country on the map. She comes within the dear and sacred designation of Our Country... other nations have undertaken to intrude themselves ... in a spirit of hostile interference against us, for the avowed object of thwarting our policy and hampering our power, limiting our greatness and checking the fulfillment of our manifest destiny to overspread the continent allotted by Providence for the free development of our yearly multiplying millions. This we have seen done by England, our old rival and enemy; and by France, strangely coupled with her against us....

The independence of Texas was complete and absolute. It was an independence, not only in fact, but of right. No obligation of duty towards Mexico tended in the least degree to restrain our right to effect the desired recovery of the fair province once our own-whatever motives of policy might have prompted a more deferential consideration of her feelings and her pride, as involved in the question. If Texas became peopled with an American population; it was by no contrivance of our government, but on the express invitation of that of Mexico herself...

California will, probably, next fall away from the loose adhesion which, in such a country as Mexico, holds a remote province in a slight equivocal kind of dependence on the metropolis. Imbecile and distracted, Mexico never can exert any real governmental authority over such a country. The impotence of the one and the distance of the other, must make the relation one of virtual independence; unless, by stunting the province of all natural growth, and forbidding that immigration which can alone develop its capabilities and fulfil the purposes of its creation, tyranny may retain a military dominion, which is no government in the, legitimate sense of the term. In the case of California this is now impossible. The Anglo-Saxon foot is already on its borders. Already the advance guard of the irresistible army of Anglo-Saxon emigration has begun to pour down upon it, armed with the plough and the rifle, and marking its trail with schools and colleges, courts and representative halls, mills and meeting-houses. A population will soon be in actual occupation of California, over which it will be idle for Mexico to dream of dominion. They will necessarily become independent. All this without agency of our government, without responsibility of our people-in the natural flow of events, the spontaneous working of principles, and the adaptation of the tendencies and wants of the human race to the elemental circumstances in the midst of which they find themselves placed. And they will have a right to independence-to self-government-to the possession of the homes conquered from the wilderness by their own labors and dangers, sufferings and sacrifices-a better and a truer right than the artificial tide of sovereignty in Mexico, a thousand miles distant, inheriting from Spain a title good only against those who have none better. Their right to independence will be the natural right of self-government belonging to any community strong enough to maintain it-distinct in position, origin and character, and free from any mutual obligations of membership of a common political body, binding it to others by the duty of loyalty and compact of public faith. This will be their title to independence; and by this title, there can be no doubt that the population now fast streaming down upon California win both assert and maintain that independence. Whether they will then attach themselves to our Union or not, is not to be predicted with any certainty. Unless the projected railroad across the continent to the Pacific be carried into effect, perhaps they may not; though even in that case, the day is not distant when the Empires of the Atlantic and Pacific would again flow together into one, as soon as their inland border should approach each other. But that great work, colossal as appears the plan on its first suggestion, cannot remain long unbuilt. Its necessity for this very purpose of binding and holding together in its iron clasp our fast-settling Pacific region with that of the Mississippi valley-the natural facility of the route-the ease with which any amount of labor for the construction can be drawn in from the overcrowded populations of Europe, to be paid in die lands made valuable by the progress of the work itself-and its immense utility to the commerce of the world with the whole eastern Asia, alone almost sufficient for the support of such a road-these coast of considerations give assurance that the day cannot be distant which shall witness the conveyance of the representatives from Oregon and California to Washington within less time than a few years ago was devoted to a similar journey by those from Ohio; while the magnetic telegraph will enable the editors of the "San Francisco Union," the "Astoria Evening Post," or the "Nootka Morning News," to set up in type the first half of the President's Inaugural before the echoes of the latter half shall have died away beneath the lofty porch of the Capitol, as spoken from his lips.

Away, then, with all idle French talk of balances of power on the American Continent. There is no growth in Spanish America! Whatever progress of population there may be in the British Canadas, is only for their own early severance of their present colonial relation to the little island three thousand miles across the Atlantic; soon to be followed by Annexation, and destined to swell the still accumulating momentum of our progress. And whosoever may hold the balance, though they should cast into the opposite scale all the bayonets and cannon, not only of France and England, but of Europe entire, how would it kick the beam against the simple, solid weight of the two hundred and fifty, or three hundred millions-and American millions-destined to gather beneath the flutter of the stripes and stars, in the fast hastening year of the Lord 1945!

John O'Sullivan, "Annexation," The United States Magazine and Democratic Review, Volume 17 (New York: 1845), 5-6, 9-10.
Available through Google Books

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John O'Sullivan Declares America's Manifest Destiny, 1845

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John Louis O'Sullivan, a popular editor and columnist, articulated the long-standing American belief in the God-given mission of the United States to lead the world in the transition to democracy. He called this America's "manifest destiny." This idea motivated wars of American expansion.

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Event- Mexican-American War {Apr 25, 1846 – Feb 2, 1848}

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Event- Mexican-American War {Apr 25, 1846 – Feb 2, 1848}

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The Mexican-American War was a major part of Manifest Destiny and also relates to my thesis because it showed how committed and determined the Americans were to fulfill Manifest Destiny and their plan to settle Westward.

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Ulysses S. Grant | Article

Print shows a scene from the Battle of Monterrey, led by General Zachary Taylor and General William J. Worth, during the Mexican-American War.1855. Library of Congress.

In 1844, President James K. Polk ran on a Democratic platform that supported manifest destiny, the idea that Americans were predestined to occupy the entire North American continent. The last act of Polk's predecessor, John Tyler, had been to annex the Republic of Texas in 1845. Polk wanted to lay claim to California, New Mexico, and land near the disputed southern border of Texas. Mexico, however, was not so eager to let go of these territories.

Polk started out by trying to buy the land. He sent an American diplomat, John Slidell, to Mexico City to offer $30 million for it. But the Mexican government refused to even meet with Slidell. Polk grew frustrated. Determined to acquire the land, he sent American troops to Texas in January of 1846 to provoke the Mexicans into war.

When the Mexicans fired on American troops in April 25, 1846, Polk had the excuse he needed. He declared, "[Mexico] has invaded our territory and shed American blood upon American soil," and sent the order for war to Congress on May 11.

The act was a questionable one. Many Northerners believed that Polk, a Southerner, was trying to gain land for the slaveholding South. Other Americans simply thought it was wrong to use war to take land from Mexico. Among those was Second Lieutenant Ulysses S. Grant. Although during the war he expressed no reservations about it, he would later call the war "one of the most unjust ever waged by a stronger against a weaker nation. It was an instance of a republic following the bad example of European monarchies, in not considering justice in their desire to acquire additional territory."

Despite arguments over whether the war was right, Americans had tremendous success on the battlefield. Young officers like Grant and Robert E. Lee, who would later lead armies against one another in the Civil War, had their first combat experiences in Mexico. Generals Zachary Taylor and Winfield Scott won a series of remarkable victories against the Mexican armies. This success was in spite of the fact that Mexican troops outnumbered the Americans in most cases. In September of 1847, after a masterful overland campaign, American troops under Scott captured Mexico's capital, Mexico City, and the fighting ended.

The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo sealed the American victory in 1848. In return for $15 million and the assumption of Mexican debts to Americans, Mexico gave up its hold over New Mexico and California. The enormous territory included present-day California, Nevada, Utah, and parts of Arizona, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Colorado and Wyoming. Mexico also agreed to finally relinquish all of Texas, including the disputed area along the border. The U.S. Congress approved the treaty on March 10.

Although the Mexican War had been won, the conflict over what to do with the vast amounts of territory gained from the war sparked further controversy in the U.S. The question over whether slavery would spread to these new territories would drive North and South even further apart.

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The Mexican American War | American Experience | PBS

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Determined to acquire the land, Polk sent American troops to Texas in January of 1846 to provoke the Mexicans into war.

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President James K. Polk's ideals support my thesis because, during his only term for the US, he believed that slavery needed to spread and expand along with the United States.

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James K. Polk was born on November 2, 1795, in a log cabin in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina. The oldest of ten children, James moved to Middle…

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John O'Sullivan supports my thesis because he was the man who "invented" the idea of Manifest Destiny and the cause of this was that many other Americans had the will to move Westward and settle throughout all of North America.

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John L. O'Sullivan | American journalist | Britannica

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Other articles where John L. O'Sullivan is discussed: Manifest Destiny: Origin of the term: John L. O'Sullivan, the editor of a magazine that served as an organ for the Democratic Party and of a partisan newspaper, first wrote of "manifest destiny" in 1845, but at the time he did not think the words profound.

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Event- Emancipation Proclamation {January 1, 1863}

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Event- Emancipation Proclamation {January 1, 1863}

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The Emancipation Proclamation supports my thesis because Lincoln declared all of the enslaved people in Confederate states to be free which enraged the Confederacy even more.

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1864

February 9, 1864- Escape from Libby Prison, Richmond. After weeks of digging, 109 United States officers made their escape from the notorious Libby Prison, the largest and most sensational escape of the war. Though 48 of the escapees were later captured and two drowned, 59 were able to make their way into US lines.

February 27, 1864- In Georgia, Camp Sumter Prison Camp opens. Universally referred to as Andersonville Prison Camp, it will become notorious for overcrowded conditions and a high death rate among its inmates.

February 14-20, 1864- Federal capture and occupation of Meridian, Mississippi. Federal forces under William T. Sherman enter the city of Meridian, Mississippi after a successful month of campaigning through the central part of the state. The capture of this important Southern town, well known for its industry and storage capabilities, severely hampers the efforts of Confederate commanders to sustain their armies in the Deep South, Georgia and west of the Mississippi River.

February 17, 1864- First successful submarine attack of the Civil War. The CSS H.L. Hunley, a seven-man submergible craft, attacked the USS Housatonic outside of Charleston, South Carolina. Struck by the submarine's torpedo, the Housatonic broke apart and sank, taking all but five of her crew with her. Likewise, the Hunley was also lost and never heard from again until discovered in 1995 at the spot where it sank after the attack.

March 2, 1864- US General Ulysses S. Grant is appointed lieutenant general, a rank revived at the request of President Lincoln. Grant assumes command of all United States Armies in the field the following day.

March 10, 1864- The Red River Campaign begins. As part of an overall Federal strategy to strike deep into various parts of the Confederacy, a combined force of army and navy commands under General Nathaniel Banks begins a campaign on the Red River in Louisiana.

April 8, 1864- Battle of Sabine Crossroads or Mansfield, Louisiana, the first major battle of the Red River Campaign in Louisiana.

April 9, 1864- Battle of Pleasant Hill, Louisiana. The United States Army under Banks defeats the attempt by Confederate forces under General Richard Taylor to drive them out of Louisiana. The result of the campaign would be less than desired as it drew to a close in the first week of May with Confederates still in control of most of the state.

April 12, 1864- Capture of Fort Pillow, Tennessee. After a rapid raid through central and western Tennessee, Confederate cavalry under Nathan Bedford Forrest attacked and overwhelmed the Federal garrison at Fort Pillow, located on the Mississippi River. Forrest's troops murdered nearly 300 United States soldiers after they had surrendered, most of whom were African American. Congress investigated the affair and while Confederate authorities denied any wrongdoing, the events at Fort Pillow cast a pall over Forrest's reputation and remained an emotional issue throughout the remainder of the war and after.

April 17, 1864- Grant forbids prisoner exchange talks to progress unless Confederate authorities agree to treat black soldiers the same as white and until Confederates release enough US soldiers to make up for the large number of Confederates paroled at Vicksburg and Port Hudson.

May 5-6, 1864- Battle of the Wilderness, Virginia, the opening battle of the Overland Campaign. US General Ulysses S. Grant, accompanying the Army of the Potomac under General Meade, issued orders for the campaign to begin on May 3. Lee responded by attacking the Federal column in the dense woods and underbrush of an area known as the Wilderness, west of Fredericksburg, Virginia.

May 7, 1864- Beginning of the Atlanta Campaign. With three US Armies under his command, General William T. Sherman marched south from Tennessee into Georgia against the Confederate Army of Tennessee under General Joseph Johnston, the objective being the city of Atlanta.

May 8-21, 1864- Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, Virginia. Lee successfully stalls Grant's drive toward Richmond.

May 11, 1864- Battle of Yellow Tavern. Six miles north of Richmond, Confederate cavalry under General J.E.B. Stuart block Federal cavalry under General Philip Sheridan. General Stuart was mortally wounded during the encounter.

May 14-15, 1864- Battle of Resaca, Georgia. General Sherman's armies are blocked at Resaca by General Johnston's Army of Tennessee. After two days of maneuvering and intense fighting, Johnston withdraws. Sherman will advance but take precautions against ordering any further massed assaults where high casualties may occur.

June 1-3, 1864- Battle of Cold Harbor, Virginia. Relentless and bloody US attacks fail to dislodge Lee's army from its strong line of defensive works northeast of Richmond.

June 8, 1864- Abraham Lincoln is nominated for a second term as president.

June 10, 1864- Battle of Brice's Crossroads, Mississippi- In spite of being outnumbered almost two to one, Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest attacks and routs the Federal command under General Samuel Sturgis.

June 15-18, 1864- Assault on Petersburg, Virginia. After withdrawing from the lines at Cold Harbor, the Army of the Potomac crossed the James River and with troops from the Army of the James attacked the outer defenses of Petersburg, the primary junction for several southern railroads. After four days of bloody attacks, Grant accepts that only a siege can systematically isolate the city and cut off Confederate supplies to the capital of Richmond.

June 19, 1864- The USS Kearsarge sinks the Confederate raider CSS Alabama near Cherbourg, France.

June 27, 1864- Battle of Kennesaw Mountain, Georgia. After weeks of maneuvering and battles, Sherman's Army of the Cumberland and Army of the Tennessee smash headlong into Johnston's carefully planned defenses at Big and Little Kennesaw. Johnston remains on this line until July 2, when he retreats at the threat being flanked by Sherman's mobile force.

July 9, 1864- Battle of Monocacy, Maryland. In an attempt to draw Federal troops away from the ongoing siege of Petersburg and Richmond, a Confederate force under Jubal Early quietly moved north into Maryland. Early had made excellent progress until he reached Frederick, Maryland, where a force of 6,000 Federal troops under General Lew Wallace, was arrayed to delay his advance. Though the battle was a US defeat, it was also touted as "the battle that saved Washington" for it succeeded in holding back Early's march until troops could be sent to the capital's defense.

July 11-12, 1864- Attack on the Defenses of Washington. Jubal Early's troops arrive on the outskirts of Washington, DC, and trade cannon fire with a token Federal force remaining in the forts around the city. President Lincoln observes the skirmishing from Fort Stevens as reinforcements from the Army of the Potomac arrive and quickly fill in the works. Early withdraws that evening.

July 14-15, 1864- Battles near Tupelo, Mississippi. The US defeat of Nathan Bedford Forrest secured the supply lines to Sherman's armies operating against Atlanta, Georgia.

July 17, 1864- General John Bell Hood replaces General Joseph Johnston as commander of the Army of Tennessee. This change in command signals a new Confederate strategy to thwart Sherman's campaign, though the end result will be disastrous for the Confederate cause.

July 20, 1864- Battle of Peachtree Creek, Georgia, the first major battle around the city of Atlanta. General Hood sends his army out of the city's defenses to attack the approaching Federal troops under George Thomas. After several hours of fierce fighting, Hood withdrew back to his own defensive works.

July 21, 1864- The Battle of Atlanta. Hood's second effort to throw back Federal forces under Sherman brings him heavy casualties with no positive results. General James McPherson, commander of the US Army of the Tennessee, is killed during the fighting.

July 30, 1864- The Battle of the Crater at Petersburg, Virginia. After a month of tunneling by soldiers of the 48th Pennsylvania Infantry, a Federal forces explode a massive mine under a Confederate fort in the Petersburg siege lines. The infantry charge that followed was poorly coordinated and by day's end, Confederate counterattacks had driven out the US troops and the siege lines remained unchanged.

August 5, 1864- Battle of Mobile Bay. A US fleet under Admiral David Farragut steamed into Mobile Bay outside the city of Mobile, Alabama, defended by two strong forts and a small southern flotilla, including the formidable ironclad CSS Tennessee. Farragut's ships defeated the Confederate ships and bypassed the forts, capturing the important Southern port.

August 18-19, 1864- Battles on the Weldon Railroad near Petersburg, Virginia. US attempts to capture this important railroad into Petersburg were stopped by Confederate counterattacks. Despite Confederate efforts, the US remained in firm possession of their gains and the railroad.

August 25, 1864- Battle of Ream's Station, near Petersburg, Virginia. A surprise Confederate counterattack briefly stopped Federal destruction of the Weldon Railroad near Ream's Station, though failed to release the Federal grip on this important supply line into Petersburg.

August 31- September 1, 1864- Battle of Jonesborough, Georgia. The final Confederate counterattack against United States troops outside the city of Atlanta fails.

September 1, 1864- Fall of Atlanta, Georgia. Confederate troops under General Hood evacuate the city of Atlanta. General Sherman's army occupies the city and its defenses the following day.

September 19, 1864- Third Battle of Winchester, Virginia. US forces under General Philip Sheridan attacked the Confederate army under Jubal Early near the city of Winchester and drove them southward, up the Shenandoah Valley.

September 22, 1864- Battle of Fisher's Hill, Virginia. The US Army of the Shenandoah under General Philip Sheridan attacked Jubal Early's Confederates near Fisher's Hill, overpowering the Confederates and again forcing them to flee the battlefield. United States officers and officials in Washington believe this to be the final battle in the Shenandoah Valley.

September 29-30, 1864- Battle of Fort Harrison near Richmond, Virginia. In a sweeping assault, the Confederate stronghold known as Fort Harrison falls to the Army of the James. Confederate efforts to retake the fort fail.

October 19, 1864- The Battle of Cedar Creek, Virginia. In an early morning surprise attack, Jubal Early's Confederates successfully attack and drive troops of the Army of the Shenandoah from their camps on the banks of Cedar Creek south of Middletown, Virginia. Hearing the fight from his headquarters at Winchester, General Philip Sheridan rides southward, rallying dispirited troops who return to the battlefield. By day's end, Early's forces are put to flight. Despite several attempts to disrupt the US advance in the coming weeks, the struggle for control of the Shenandoah Valley is over.

November 8, 1864- Abraham Lincoln is reelected president of the United States.

November 16, 1864- General Sherman's Army of Georgia begins the March to the Sea.

November 30, 1864- Battle of Franklin, Tennessee. After a month of raiding Sherman's supply lines and attacking Federal outposts, John Bell Hood's army confronts US troops from General John Schofield's command, who they had encountered the day before near Spring Hill, Tennessee. A massive frontal assault on the well entrenched Federal line meets with disaster. Despite some taking of outside works and defenses, the toll for Hood's forces is too heavy including the loss of six of his generals. US troops retreat in the direction of Nashville.

December 10, 1864- Harassed only by scattered Georgia militia, Sherman's Army of Georgia arrives at Savannah, Georgia, completing the famous March to the Sea. At Savannah, his troops will take Fort McAllister and force Confederate defenders to evacuate the city.

December 15-16, 1864- The Battle of Nashville, Tennessee. The Confederate Army under John Bell Hood is thoroughly defeated and the threat to Tennessee ends.

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Civil War Timeline - Gettysburg National Military Park (U.S. National Park Service)

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February 9, 1864- Escape from Libby Prison, Richmond. After weeks of digging, 109 United States officers made their escape from the notorious Libby Prison, the largest and most sensational escape of the war. Though 48 of the escapees were later captured and two drowned, 59 were able to make their way into US lines.

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Event- Battle of Gettysburg {July 1-3, 1863}

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Event- Battle of Gettysburg {July 1-3, 1863}

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This relates to my thesis because the South were relentless in their actions towards fighting for slavery. Slavery is gravely wrong, however, you must give them credit for them fighting back and being determined for what they thought was right.

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T he Battle of Gettysburg was fought July 1-3, 1863, in and around the town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, by Union and Confederate forces during the American Civil War. The battle involved the largest number of casualties of the entire war and is often described as the war's turning point. Union Maj. Gen. George Meade's Army of the Potomac defeated attacks by Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia, ending Lee's attempt to invade the North.

After his success at Chancellorsville in Virginia in May 1863, Lee led his army through the Shenandoah Valley to begin his second invasion of the North-the Gettysburg Campaign. With his army in high spirits, Lee intended to shift the focus of the summer campaign from war-ravaged northern Virginia and hoped to influence Northern politicians to give up their prosecution of the war by penetrating as far as Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, or even Philadelphia. Prodded by President Abraham Lincoln, Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker moved his army in pursuit, but was relieved of command just three days before the battle and replaced by Meade.

Elements of the two armies initially collided at Gettysburg on July 1, 1863, as Lee urgently concentrated his forces there, his objective being to engage the Union army and destroy it. Low ridges to the northwest of town were defended initially by a Union cavalry division under Brig. Gen. John Buford, and soon reinforced with two corps of Union infantry. However, two large Confederate corps assaulted them from the northwest and north, collapsing the hastily developed Union lines, sending the defenders retreating through the streets of town to the hills just to the south.

On the second day of battle, most of both armies had assembled. The Union line was laid out in a defensive formation resembling a fishhook. In the late afternoon of July 2, Lee launched a heavy assault on the Union left flan k, and fierce fighting raged at Little Round Top, the Wheatfield, Devil's Den, and the Peach Orchard. On the Union right, Confederate demonstrations escalated into full-scale assaults on Culp's Hill and Cemetery Hill. All across the battlefield, despite significant losses, the Union defenders held their lines.

On the third day of battle, fighting resumed on Culp's Hill, and cavalry battles raged to the east and south, but the main event was a dramatic infantry assault by 12,500 Confederates against the center of the Union line on Cemetery Ridge, known as Pickett's Charge. The charge was repulsed by Union rifle and artillery fire, at great loss to the Confederate army.

Lee led his army on a torturous retreat back to Virginia. Between 46,000 and 51,000 soldiers from both armies were casualties in the three-day battle, the most costly in US history.

On November 19, President Abraham Lincoln used the dedication ceremony for the Gettysburg National Cemetery to honor the fallen Union soldiers and redefine the purpose of the war in his historic Gettysburg Address.

Shortly after the Army of Northern Virginia won a major victory over the Army of the Potomac at the Battle of Chancellorsville (April 30 - May 6, 1863), Robert E. Lee decided upon a second invasion of the North (the first was the unsuccessful Maryland Campaign of September 1862, which ended in the bloody Battle of Antietam). Such a move would upset U.S. plans for the summer campaigning season and possibly reduce the pressure on the besieged Confederate garrison at Vicksburg. The invasion would allow the Confederates to live off the bounty of the rich Northern farms while giving war-ravaged Virginia a much-needed rest. In addition, Lee's 72,000-man army could threaten Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington, and possibly strengthen the growing peace movement in the North.
Initial Movements to Battle
Thus, on June 3, Lee's army began to shift northward from Fredericksburg, Virginia. Following the death of Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson, Lee reorganized his two large corps into three new corps, commanded by Lt. Gen. James Longstreet (First Corps), Lt. Gen. Richard S. Ewell (Second), and Lt. Gen. A.P. Hill (Third); both Ewell and Hill, who had formerly reported to Jackson as division commanders, were new to this level of responsibility. The Cavalry Division remained under the command of Maj. Gen. J.E.B. Stuart.

The Union Army of the Potomac, under Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker, consisted of seven infantry corps, a cavalry corps, and an Artillery Reserve, for a combined strength of more than 100,000 men.

The first major action of the campaign took place on June 9 between cavalry forces at Brandy Station, near Culpeper, Virginia. The 9,500 Confederate cavalrymen under Stuart were surprised by Maj. Gen. Alfred Pleasonton's combined arms force of two cavalry divisions (8,000 troopers) and 3,000 infantry, but Stuart eventually repulsed the Union attack. The inconclusive battle, the largest predominantly cavalry engagement of the war, proved for the first time that the Union horse soldier was equal to his Southern counterpart.

By mid-June, the Army of Northern Virginia was poised to cross the Potomac River and enter Maryland. After defeating the U.S. garrisons at Winchester and Martinsburg, Ewell's Second Corps began crossing the river on June 15. Hill's and Longstreet's corps followed on June 24 and 25. Hooker's army pursued, keeping between the U.S. capital and Lee's army. The U.S. crossed the Potomac from June 25 to 27.

Lee gave strict orders for his army to minimize any negative impacts on the civilian population. Food, horses, and other supplies were generally not seized outright, although quartermasters reimbursing Northern farmers and merchants with Confederate money were not well received. Various towns, most notably York, Pennsylvania, were required to pay indemnities in lieu of supplies, under threat of destruction. During the invasion, the Confederates seized some 40 northern African Americans. A few of them were escaped fugitive slaves, but most were freemen; all were sent south into slavery under guard.

On June 26, elements of Maj. Gen. Jubal Early's division of Ewell's Corps occupied the town of Gettysburg after chasing off newly raised Pennsylvania militia in a series of minor skirmishes. Early laid the borough under tribute but did not collect any significant supplies. Soldiers burned several railroad cars and a covered bridge, and destroyed nearby rails and telegraph lines. The following morning, Early departed for adjacent York County.

Meanwhile, in a controversial move, Lee allowed Jeb Stuart to take a portion of the army's cavalry and ride around the east flank of the Union army. Lee's orders gave Stuart much latitude, and both generals share the blame for the long absence of Stuart's cavalry, as well as for the failure to assign a more active role to the cavalry left with the army. Stuart and his three best brigades were absent from the army during the crucial phase of the approach to Gettysburg and the first two days of battle. By June 29, Lee's army was strung out in an arc from Chambersburg (28 miles (45 km) northwest of Gettysburg) to Carlisle (30 miles (48 km) north of Gettysburg) to near Harrisburg and Wrightsville on the Susquehanna River.

In a dispute over the use of the forces defending the Harpers Ferry garrison, Hooker offered his resignation, and Abraham Lincoln and General-in-Chief Henry W. Halleck, who were looking for an excuse to get rid of him, immediately accepted. They replaced Hooker early on the morning of June 28 with Maj. Gen. George Gordon Meade, then commander of the V Corps.

On June 29, when Lee learned that the Army of the Potomac had crossed the Potomac River, he ordered a concentration of his forces around Cashtown, located at the eastern base of South Mountain and eight miles (13 km) west of Gettysburg. On June 30, while part of Hill's Corps was in Cashtown, one of Hill's brigades, North Carolinians under Brig. Gen. J. Johnston Pettigrew, ventured toward Gettysburg. In his memoirs, Maj. Gen. Henry Heth, Pettigrew's division commander, claimed that he sent Pettigrew to search for supplies in town-especially shoes.

When Pettigrew's troops approached Gettysburg on June 30, they noticed Union cavalry under Brig. Gen. John Buford arriving south of town, and Pettigrew returned to Cashtown without engaging them. When Pettigrew told Hill and Heth what he had seen, neither general believed that there was a substantial U.S. force in or near the town, suspecting that it had been only Pennsylvania militia. Despite General Lee's order to avoid a general engagement until his entire army was concentrated, Hill decided to mount a significant reconnaissance in force the following morning to determine the size and strength of the enemy force in his front. Around 5 a.m. on Wednesday, July 1, two brigades of Heth's division advanced to Gettysburg.

The Army of the Potomac, initially under Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker (Maj. Gen. George G. Meade replaced Hooker in command on June 28), consisted of more than 100,000 men in the following organization:

I Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. John F. Reynolds, with divisions commanded by Brig. Gen. James S. Wadsworth, Brig. Gen. John C. Robinson, and Maj. Gen. Abner Doubleday.

II Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. Winfield S. Hancock, with divisions commanded by Brig. Gens. John C. Caldwell, John Gibbon, and Alexander Hays.

III Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. Daniel E. Sickles, with divisions commanded by Maj. Gen. David B. Birney and Maj. Gen. Andrew A. Humphreys.

V Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. George Sykes (George G. Meade until June 28), with divisions commanded by Brig. Gens. James Barnes, Romeyn B. Ayres, and Samuel W. Crawford.

VI Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick, with divisions commanded by Brig. Gen. Horatio G. Wright, Brig. Gen. Albion P. Howe, and Maj. Gen. John Newton.

XI Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. Oliver O. Howard, with divisions commanded by Brig. Gen. Francis C. Barlow, Brig. Gen. Adolph von Steinwehr, and Maj. Gen. Carl Schurz.

XII Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. Henry W. Slocum, with divisions commanded by Brig. Gens. Alpheus S. Williams and John W. Geary.

Cavalry Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. Alfred Pleasonton, with divisions commanded by Brig. Gens. John Buford, David McM. Gregg, and H. Judson Kilpatrick.

Artillery Reserve, commanded by Brig. Gen. Robert O. Tyler. (The preeminent artillery officer at Gettysburg was Brig. Gen. Henry J. Hunt, chief of artillery on Meade's staff.)

During the advance on Gettysburg, Maj. Gen. Reynolds was in operational command of the left, or advanced, wing of the Army, consisting of the I, III, and XI Corps. Note that many other Union units (not part of the Army of the Potomac) were actively involved in the Gettysburg Campaign, but not directly involved in the Battle of Gettysburg. These included portions of the Union IV Corps, the militia and state troops of the Department of the Susquehanna, and various garrisons, including that at Harpers Ferry.

In reaction to the death of Lt. Gen. Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson after Chancellorsville, Lee reorganized his Army of Northern Virginia (75,000 men) from two infantry corps into three.

First Corps, commanded by Lt. Gen. James Longstreet, with divisions commanded by Maj. Gens. Lafayette McLaws, George E. Pickett, and John Bell Hood.

Second Corps, commanded by Lt. Gen. Richard S. Ewell, with divisions commanded by Maj. Gens. Jubal A. Early, Edward "Allegheny" Johnson, and Robert E. Rodes.

Third Corps, commanded by Lt. Gen. A.P. Hill, with divisions commanded by Maj. Gens. Richard H. Anderson, Henry Heth, and W. Dorsey Pender.

Cavalry division, commanded by Maj. Gen. J.E.B. Stuart, with brigades commanded by Brig. Gens. Wade Hampton, Fitzhugh Lee, Beverly H. Robertson, Albert G. Jenkins, William E. "Grumble" Jones, and John D. Imboden, and Col. John R. Chambliss.

First Day of Battle (July 1, 1863) Herr Ridge, McPherson Ridge and Seminary Ridge
Anticipating that the Confederates would march on Gettysburg from the west on the morning of July 1, Buford laid out his defenses on three ridges west of the town: Herr Ridge, McPherson Ridge and Seminary Ridge. These were appropriate terrain for a delaying action by his small cavalry division against superior Confederate infantry forces, meant to buy time awaiting the arrival of Union infantrymen who could occupy the strong defensive positions south of town at Cemetery Hill, Cemetery Ridge, and Culp's Hill. Buford understood that if the Confederates could gain control of these heights, Meade's army would have difficulty dislodging them.

Heth's division advanced with two brigades forward, commanded by Brig. Gens. James J. Archer and Joseph R. Davis. They proceeded easterly in columns along the Chambersburg Pike. Three miles (5 km) west of town, about 7:30 a.m. on July 1, the two brigades met light resistance from vedettes of Union cavalry, and deployed into line. According to lore, the Union soldier to fire the first shot of the battle was Lt. Marcellus Jones. In 1886 Lt. Jones returned to Gettysburg to mark the spot where he fired the first shot with a monument. Eventually, Heth's men reached dismounted troopers of Col. William Gamble's cavalry brigade, who raised determined resistance and delaying tactics from behind fence posts with fire from their breechloading carbines. Still, by 10:20 a.m., the Confederates had pushed the Union cavalrymen east to McPherson Ridge, when the vanguard of the I Corps (Maj. Gen. John F. Reynolds) finally arrived.

North of the pike, Davis gained a temporary success against Brig. Gen. Lysander Cutler's brigade but was repulsed with heavy losses in an action around an unfinished railroad bed cut in the ridge. South of the pike, Archer's brigade assaulted through Herbst (also known as McPherson's) Woods. The U.S. Iron Brigade under Brig. Gen. Solomon Meredith enjoyed initial success against Archer, capturing several hundred men, including Archer himself.

General Reynolds was shot and killed early in the fighting while directing troop and artillery placements just to the east of the woods. Shelby Foote wrote that the Union cause lost a man considered by many to be "the best general in the army." Maj. Gen. Abner Doubleday assumed command. Fighting in the Chambersburg Pike area lasted until about 12:30 p.m. It resumed around 2:30 p.m., when Heth's entire division engaged, adding the brigades of Pettigrew and Col. John M. Brockenbrough.

As Pettigrew's North Carolina Brigade came on line, they flanked the 19th Indiana and drove the Iron Brigade back. The 26th North Carolina (the largest regiment in the army with 839 men) lost heavily, leaving the first day's fight with around 212 men. By the end of the three-day battle, they had about 152 men standing, the highest casualty percentage for one battle of any regiment, North or South. Slowly the Iron Brigade was pushed out of the woods toward Seminary Ridge. Hill added Maj. Gen. William Dorsey Pender's division to the assault, and the I Corps was driven back through the grounds of the Lutheran Seminary and Gettysburg streets.

As the fighting to the west proceeded, two divisions of Ewell's Second Corps, marching west toward Cashtown in accordance with Lee's order for the army to concentrate in that vicinity, turned south on the Carlisle and Harrisburg roads toward Gettysburg, while the Union XI Corps (Maj. Gen. Oliver O. Howard) raced north on the Baltimore Pike and Taneytown Road. By early afternoon, the U.S. line ran in a semicircle west, north, and northeast of Gettysburg.

However, the U.S. did not have enough troops; Cutler, who was deployed north of the Chambersburg Pike, had his right flank in the air. The leftmost division of the XI Corps was unable to deploy in time to strengthen the line, so Doubleday was forced to throw in reserve brigades to salvage his line.

Around 2 p.m., the Confederate Second Corps divisions of Maj. Gens. Robert E. Rodes and Jubal Early assaulted and out-flanked the Union I and XI Corps positions north and northwest of town. The Confederate brigades of Col. Edward A. O'Neal and Brig. Gen. Alfred Iverson suffered severe losses assaulting the I Corps division of Brig. Gen. John C. Robinson south of Oak Hill. Early's division profited from a blunder by Brig. Gen. Francis C. Barlow, when he advanced his XI Corps division to Blocher's Knoll (directly north of town and now known as Barlow's Knoll); this represented a salient in the corps line, susceptible to attack from multiple sides, and Early's troops overran Barlow's division, which constituted the right flank of the Union Army's position. Barlow was wounded and captured in the attack.

As U.S. positions collapsed both north and west of town, Gen. Howard ordered a retreat to the high ground south of town at Cemetery Hill, where he had left the division of Brig. Gen. Adolph von Steinwehr in reserve. Maj. Gen. Winfield S. Hancock assumed command of the battlefield, sent by Meade when he heard that Reynolds had been killed. Hancock, commander of the II Corps and Meade's most trusted subordinate, was ordered to take command of the field and to determine whether Gettysburg was an appropriate place for a major battle. Hancock told Howard, "I think this the strongest position by nature upon which to fight a battle that I ever saw." When Howard agreed, Hancock concluded the discussion: "Very well, sir, I select this as the battle-field." Hancock's determination had a morale-boosting effect on the retreating Union soldiers, but he played no direct tactical role on the first day.

General Lee understood the defensive potential to the Union if they held this high ground. He sent orders to Ewell that Cemetery Hill be taken "if practicable." Ewell, who had previously served under Stonewall Jackson, a general well known for issuing peremptory orders, determined such an assault was not practicable and, thus, did not attempt it; this decision is considered by historians to be a great missed opportunity.

The first day at Gettysburg, more significant than simply a prelude to the bloody second and third days, ranks as the 23rd biggest battle of the war by number of troops engaged. About one quarter of Meade's army (22,000 men) and one third of Lee's army (27,000) were engaged.
Second Day of Battle (July 2, 1863)
Little Round Top, Culp's Hill and Cemetery Hill
Plans and Movement to Battle
Throughout the evening of July 1 and morning of July 2, most of the remaining infantry of both armies arrived on the field, including the Union II, III, V, VI, and XII Corps. Longstreet's third division, commanded by Maj. Gen. George Pickett, had begun the march from Chambersburg early in the morning; it did not arrive until late on July 2.

The Union line ran from Culp's Hill southeast of the town, northwest to Cemetery Hill just south of town, then south for nearly two miles (3 km) along Cemetery Ridge, terminating just north of Little Round Top. Most of the XII Corps was on Culp's Hill; the remnants of I and XI Corps defended Cemetery Hill; II Corps covered most of the northern half of Cemetery Ridge; and III Corps was ordered to take up a position to its flank. The shape of the Union line is popularly described as a "fishhook" formation. The Confederate line paralleled the Union line about a mile (1,600 m) to the west on Seminary Ridge, ran east through the town, then curved southeast to a point opposite Culp's Hill. Thus, the Union army had interior lines, while the Confederate line was nearly five miles (8 km) long.

Lee's battle plan for July 2 called for Longstreet's First Corps to position itself stealthily to attack the Union left flank, facing northeast astraddle the Emmitsburg Road, and to roll up the U.S.line. The attack sequence was to begin with Maj. Gens. John Bell Hood's and Lafayette McLaws's divisions, followed by Maj. Gen. Richard H. Anderson's division of Hill's Third Corps. The progressive en echelon sequence of this attack would prevent Meade from shifting troops from his center to bolster his left. At the same time, Maj. Gen. Edward "Allegheny" Johnson's and Jubal Early's Second Corps divisions were to make a demonstration against Culp's and Cemetery Hills (again, to prevent the shifting of U.S. troops), and to turn the demonstration into a full-scale attack if a favorable opportunity presented itself.
Attacks on the Union Right Flank
Lee's plan, however, was based on faulty intelligence, exacerbated by Stuart's continued absence from the battlefield. Instead of moving beyond the U.S. left and attacking their flank, Longstreet's left division, under McLaws, would face Maj. Gen. Daniel Sickles's III Corps directly in their path. Sickles had been dissatisfied with the position assigned him on the southern end of Cemetery Ridge. Seeing higher ground more favorable to artillery positions a half mile (800 m) to the west, he advanced his corps-without orders-to the slightly higher ground along the Emmitsburg Road. The new line ran from Devil's Den, northwest to the Sherfy farm's Peach Orchard, then northeast along the Emmitsburg Road to south of the Codori farm. This created an untenable salient at the Peach Orchard; Brig. Gen. Andrew A. Humphreys's division (in position along the Emmitsburg Road) and Maj. Gen. David B. Birney's division (to the south) were subject to attacks from two sides and were spread out over a longer front than their small corps could defend effectively.

About 7:00 p.m., the Second Corps' attack by Johnson's division on Culp's Hill got off to a late start. Most of the hill's defenders, the Union XII Corps, had been sent to the left to defend against Longstreet's attacks, and the only portion of the corps remaining on the hill was a brigade of New Yorkers under Brig. Gen. George S. Greene. Because of Greene's insistence on constructing strong defensive works, and with reinforcements from the I and XI Corps, Greene's men held off the Confederate attackers, although the Southerners did capture a portion of the abandoned U.S. works on the lower part of Culp's Hill.

Just at dark, two of Jubal Early's brigades attacked the Union XI Corps positions on East Cemetery Hill where Col. Andrew L. Harris of the 2nd Brigade, 1st Division, came under a withering attack, losing half his men; however, Early failed to support his brigades in their attack, and Ewell's remaining division, that of Maj. Gen. Robert E. Rodes, failed to aid Early's attack by moving against Cemetery Hill from the west. The Union army's interior lines enabled its commanders to shift troops quickly to critical areas, and with reinforcements from II Corps, the U.S. troops retained possession of East Cemetery Hill, and Early's brigades were forced to withdraw.

Jeb Stuart and his three cavalry brigades arrived in Gettysburg around noon but had no role in the second day's battle. Brig. Gen. Wade Hampton's brigade fought a minor engagement with newly promoted 23-year-old Brig. Gen. George Armstrong Custer's Michigan cavalry near Hunterstown to the northeast of Gettysburg.

Longstreet's attack was to be made as early as practicable; however, Longstreet got permission from Lee to await the arrival of one of his brigades, and while marching to the assigned position, his men came within sight of a Union signal station on Little Round Top. Countermarching to avoid detection wasted much time, and Hood's and McLaws's divisions did not launch their attacks until just after 4 p.m. and 5 p.m., respectively.
Lee's Plan
Culp's Hill, Pickett's Charge and Cavalry Battles
Largest Artillery Bombardment of the War
General Lee wished to renew the attack on Friday, July 3, using the same basic plan as the previous day: Longstreet would attack the U.S. left, while Ewell attacked Culp's Hill. However, before Longstreet was ready, Union XII Corps troops started a dawn artillery bombardment against the Confederates on Culp's Hill in an effort to regain a portion of their lost works. The Confederates attacked, and the second fight for Culp's Hill ended around 11 a.m. Harry Pfanz judged that, after some seven hours of bitter combat, "the Union line was intact and held more strongly than before."

Lee was forced to change his plans. Longstreet would command Pickett's Virginia division of his own First Corps, plus six brigades from Hill's Corps, in an attack on the U.S. II Corps position at the right center of the Union line on Cemetery Ridge. Prior to the attack, all the artillery the Confederacy could bring to bear on the U.S. positions would bombard and weaken the enemy's line.

Around 1 p.m., from 150 to 170 Confederate guns began an artillery bombardment that was probably the largest of the war. In order to save valuable ammunition for the infantry attack that they knew would follow, the Army of the Potomac's artillery, under the command of Brig. Gen. Henry Jackson Hunt, at first did not return the enemy's fire. After waiting about 15 minutes, about 80 U.S. cannons added to the din. The Army of Northern Virginia was critically low on artillery ammunition, and the cannonade did not significantly affect the Union position.
Casualties
Around 3 p.m., the cannon fire subsided, and 12,500 Southern soldiers stepped from the ridgeline and advanced the three-quarters of a mile (1,200 m) to Cemetery Ridge in what is known to history as "Pickett's Charge". As the Confederates approached, there was fierce flanking artillery fire from Union positions on Cemetery Hill and north of Little Round Top, and musket and canister fire from Hancock's II Corps. In the Union center, the commander of artillery had held fire during the Confederate bombardment (in order to save it for the infantry assault, which Meade had correctly predicted the day before), leading Southern commanders to believe the Northern cannon batteries had been knocked out. However, they opened fire on the Confederate infantry during their approach with devastating results. Nearly one half of the attackers did not return to their own lines. Although the U.S. line wavered and broke temporarily at a jog called the "Angle" in a low stone fence, just north of a patch of vegetation called the Copse of Trees, reinforcements rushed into the breach, and the Confederate attack was repulsed. The farthest advance of Brig. Gen. Lewis A. Armistead's brigade of Maj. Gen. George Pickett's division at the Angle is referred to as the "High-water mark of the Confederacy", arguably representing the closest the South ever came to its goal of achieving independence from the Union via military victory. Union and Confederate soldiers locked in hand-to-hand combat, attacking with their rifles, bayonets, rocks and even their bare hands. Armistead ordered his Confederates to turn two captured cannons against Union troops, but discovered that there was no ammunition left, the last double canister shots having been used against the charging Confederates. Armistead was shortly after wounded three times.

There were two significant cavalry engagements on July 3. Stuart was sent to guard the Confederate left flank and was to be prepared to exploit any success the infantry might achieve on Cemetery Hill by flanking the U.S. right and hitting their trains and lines of communications. Three miles (5 km) east of Gettysburg, in what is now called "East Cavalry Field" (not shown on the accompanying map, but between the York and Hanover Roads), Stuart's forces collided with U.S. cavalry: Brig. Gen. David McMurtrie Gregg's division and Brig. Gen. Custer's brigade. A lengthy mounted battle, including hand-to-hand sabre combat, ensued. Custer's charge, leading the 1st Michigan Cavalry, blunted the attack by Wade Hampton's brigade, blocking Stuart from achieving his objectives in the U.S. rear. Meanwhile, after hearing news of the day's victory, Brig. Gen. Judson Kilpatrick launched a cavalry attack against the infantry positions of Longstreet's Corps southwest of Big Round Top. Brig. Gen. Elon J. Farnsworth protested against the futility of such a move, but obeyed orders. Farnsworth was killed in the attack, and his brigade suffered significant losses.
Confederate Retreat
The two armies suffered between 46,000 and 51,000 casualties. Union casualties were 23,055 (3,155 killed, 14,531 wounded, 5,369 captured or missing), while Confederate casualties are more difficult to estimate. Many authors have referred to as many as 28,000 Confederate casualties, and Busey and Martin's more recent 2005 work, Regimental Strengths and Losses at Gettysburg, documents 23,231 (4,708 killed, 12,693 wounded, 5,830 captured or missing). Nearly a third of Lee's general officers were killed, wounded, or captured. The casualties for both sides during the entire campaign were 57,225.

The following tables summarize casualties by corps for the Union and Confederate forces during the three-day battle.

The armies stared at one another in a heavy rain across the bloody fields on July 4, the same day that the Vicksburg garrison surrendered to Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant. Lee had reformed his lines into a defensive position on Seminary Ridge the night of July 3, evacuating the town of Gettysburg. The Confederates remained on the battlefield, hoping that Meade would attack, but the cautious Union commander decided against the risk, a decision for which he would later be criticized. Both armies began to collect their remaining wounded and bury some of the dead. A proposal by Lee for a prisoner exchange was rejected by Meade.

Lee started his Army of Northern Virginia in motion late the evening of July 4 towards Fairfield and Chambersburg. Cavalry under Brig. Gen. John D. Imboden was entrusted to escort the miles-long wagon train of supplies and wounded men that Lee wanted to take back to Virginia with him, using the route through Cashtown and Hagerstown to Williamsport, Maryland. Meade's army followed, although the pursuit was half-spirited. The recently rain-swollen Potomac trapped Lee's army on the north bank of the river for a time, but when the Union troops finally caught up, the Confederates had forded the river. The rear-guard action at Falling Waters on July 14 added some more names to the long casualty lists, including General Pettigrew, who was mortally wounded.

In a brief letter to Maj. Gen. Henry W. Halleck written on July 7, Lincoln remarked on the two major Union victories at Gettysburg and Vicksburg. He continued:

Now, if Gen. Meade can complete his work so gloriously prosecuted thus far, by the literal or substantial destruction of Lee's army, the rebellion will be over.

Halleck then relayed the contents of Lincoln's letter to Meade in a telegram. Despite repeated pleas from Lincoln and Halleck, which continued over the next week, Meade did not pursue Lee's army aggressively enough to destroy it before it crossed back over the Potomac River to safety in the South. The campaign continued into Virginia with light engagements until July 23, in the minor Battle of Manassas Gap, after which Meade abandoned any attempts at pursuit and the two armies took up positions across from each other on the Rappahannock River.

The news of the Union victory electrified the North. A headline in The Philadelphia Inquirer proclaimed "VICTORY! WATERLOO ECLIPSED!" New York diarist George Templeton Strong wrote:

The results of this victory are priceless. ... The charm of Robert E. Lee's invincibility is broken. The Army of the Potomac has at last found a general that can handle it, and has stood nobly up to its terrible work in spite of its long disheartening list of hard-fought failures. ... Copperheads are palsied and dumb for the moment at least. ... Government is strengthened four-fold at home and abroad.
- George Templeton Strong, Diary, p. 330.

However, the Union enthusiasm soon dissipated as the public realized that Lee's army had escaped destruction and the war would continue. Lincoln complained to Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles that "Our army held the war in the hollow of their hand and they would not close it!" Brig. Gen. Alexander S. Webb wrote to his father on July 17, stating that such Washington politicians as "Chase, Seward and others," disgusted with Meade, "write to me that Lee really won that Battle!"

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Note: Much of the narrative below is sourced via WikipediaThe Battle of Gettysburg was fought July 1-3, 1863, in and around the town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, by Union and Confederate forces during the American Civil War. The battle involved the largest number of casualties of the entire war and is often described as the war's turning point.

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Primary Source- Rise and Fall of the confederate Government by Jefferson Davis {Published in 1881}

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Primary Source- Rise and Fall of the confederate Government by Jefferson Davis {Published in 1881}

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This book supports my thesis because Jefferson Davis apologizes for his actions that caused the Civil War. This shows it took time for most Southerners to realize what they were doing was unjust.

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The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government (abridged for the Modern reader) by Davis, Jefferson; Miers, Earl Schenck and a great selection of related books, art and collectibles available now at AbeBooks.com.

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Abraham Lincoln supports my thesis because he caused major controversy between the North and South and was the main reason the slaves were freed from the Confederacy.

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Abraham Lincoln became the United States' 16th President in 1861, issuing the Emancipation Proclamation that declared forever free those slaves within the Confederacy in 1863.

Lincoln warned the South in his Inaugural Address: "In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The government will not assail you.... You have no oath registered in Heaven to destroy the government, while I shall have the most solemn one to preserve, protect and defend it."

Lincoln thought secession illegal, and was willing to use force to defend Federal law and the Union. When Confederate batteries fired on Fort Sumter and forced its surrender, he called on the states for 75,000 volunteers. Four more slave states joined the Confederacy but four remained within the Union. The Civil War had begun.

The son of a Kentucky frontiersman, Lincoln had to struggle for a living and for learning. Five months before receiving his party's nomination for President, he sketched his life:

"I was born Feb. 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky. My parents were both born in Virginia, of undistinguished families-second families, perhaps I should say. My mother, who died in my tenth year, was of a family of the name of Hanks.... My father ... removed from Kentucky to ... Indiana, in my eighth year.... It was a wild region, with many bears and other wild animals still in the woods. There I grew up.... Of course when I came of age I did not know much. Still somehow, I could read, write, and cipher ... but that was all."

Lincoln made extraordinary efforts to attain knowledge while working on a farm, splitting rails for fences, and keeping store at New Salem, Illinois. He was a captain in the Black Hawk War, spent eight years in the Illinois legislature, and rode the circuit of courts for many years. His law partner said of him, "His ambition was a little engine that knew no rest."

He married Mary Todd, and they had four boys, only one of whom lived to maturity. In 1858 Lincoln ran against Stephen A. Douglas for Senator. He lost the election, but in debating with Douglas he gained a national reputation that won him the Republican nomination for President in 1860.

As President, he built the Republican Party into a strong national organization. Further, he rallied most of the northern Democrats to the Union cause. On January 1, 1863, he issued the Emancipation Proclamation that declared forever free those slaves within the Confederacy.

Lincoln never let the world forget that the Civil War involved an even larger issue. This he stated most movingly in dedicating the military cemetery at Gettysburg: "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."

Lincoln won re-election in 1864, as Union military triumphs heralded an end to the war. In his planning for peace, the President was flexible and generous, encouraging Southerners to lay down their arms and join speedily in reunion.

The spirit that guided him was clearly that of his Second Inaugural Address, now inscribed on one wall of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D. C.: "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.... "

On Good Friday, April 14, 1865, Lincoln was assassinated at Ford's Theatre in Washington by John Wilkes Booth, an actor, who somehow thought he was helping the South. The opposite was the result, for with Lincoln's death, the possibility of peace with magnanimity died.

Learn more about Abraham Lincoln's spouse, Mary Todd Lincoln.

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Abraham Lincoln became the United States' 16th President in 1861, issuing the Emancipation Proclamation that declared forever free those slaves within the Confederacy in 1863. Lincoln warned the South in his Inaugural Address: "In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war.

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Jefferson Davis supports my thesis because he was the sole President of the Confederacy and a spokesperson for the South who backed the Confederacy's attacks against the North including Fort Sumter and The Battle of Gettysburg.

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This statue of Jefferson Davis was given to the National Statuary Hall Collection by Mississippi in 1931. Davis served the nation in many positions before being appointed president of the Confederate States during the Civil War, including Secretary of War, a member of the U.S. House of Representatives and a member of the U.S. Senate.

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The Civil Rights Act of 1966 supports my thesis because it forced the South to reconstruct their economy and add in the newly freed African Americans.

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Veterans of the Civil Rights Movement -- Civil Rights Act of 1966

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See Civil Rights Act of 1966 Killed by Senate Fillibuster for background.

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Event- Addition of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution {1868}

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Event- Addition of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution {1868}

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The 14th Amendment supports my thesis because it allowed African Americans to contribute to society and to heal the economy. It was very difficult for the white Americans to adjust.

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The Compromise of 1877 supports my thesis because it ended Northern control over the South. This compromise finally gave the South democracy after they got back on their feet.

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Contents

1. Compromise of 1877: The 1876 Election

2. Compromise of 1877: Election Results

3. Compromise of 1877: Congress Steps In

4. Compromise of 1877: The End of Reconstruction

The Compromise of 1877 was an informal agreement between southern Democrats and allies of the Republican Rutherford Hayes to settle the result of the 1876 presidential election and marked the end of the Reconstruction era.

Immediately after the presidential election of 1876, it became clear that the outcome of the race hinged largely on disputed returns from Florida, Louisiana and South Carolina-the only three states in the South with Reconstruction-era Republican governments still in power. As a bipartisan congressional commission debated over the outcome early in 1877, allies of the Republican Party candidate Rutherford Hayes met in secret with moderate southern Democrats in order to negotiate acceptance of Hayes' election.

The Democrats agreed not to block Hayes' victory on the condition that Republicans withdraw all federal troops from the South, thus consolidating Democratic control over the region. As a result of the so-called Compromise of 1877 (or Compromise of 1876), Florida, Louisiana and South Carolina became Democratic once again, effectively bringing an end to the Reconstruction era.

Compromise of 1877: The 1876 Election

By the 1870s, support was waning for the racially egalitarian policies of Reconstruction, a series of laws put in place after the Civil War to protect the rights of African Americans, especially in the South. Many southern whites had resorted to intimidation and violence to keep blacks from voting and restore white supremacy in the region.

Beginning in 1873, a series of Supreme Court decisions limited the scope of Reconstruction-era laws and federal support for the so-called Reconstruction Amendments, particularly the 14th Amendment and 15 Amendment, which gave African Americans the status of citizenship and the protection of the Constitution, including the all-important right to vote.

Did you know? After the most disputed election in American history, the Compromise of 1877 put Rutherford Hayes into office as the nation's 19th president; outraged northern Democrats derided Hayes as "His Fraudulency."

In addition, accusations of corruption within the administration of Ulysses S. Grant and an economic depression had heightened discontent with the Republican Party, which had been in the White House since 1861. As the 1876 presidential election approached, the Democrats chose Governor Samuel B. Tilden of New York as their candidate, while the Republicans nominated Rutherford B. Hayes, governor of Ohio. In his acceptance of the nomination, Hayes wrote that if elected, he would bring "the blessings of honest and capable local self-government" to the South-in other words, restrict federal enforcement of unpopular Reconstruction-era policies.

Compromise of 1877: Election Results

On Election Day that November, the Democrats appeared to come out on top, winning the swing states of Connecticut, Indiana, New York and New Jersey. By midnight, Tilden had 184 of the 185 electoral votes he needed to win and was leading the popular vote by 250,000. The Republicans refused to accept defeat, however, and accused Democratic supporters of intimidating and bribing African-American voters to prevent them from voting in three southern states- Florida, Louisiana and South Carolina. As of 1876, these were the only remaining states in the South with Republican governments.

In South Carolina, the election had been marred by bloodshed on both sides of the party line. Supporters of the Democratic gubernatorial candidate Wade Hampton, a former Confederate general, had used violence and intimidation to confront the African-American voting majority. A clash between black militia and armed whites in Hamburg in July ended in the death of five militiamen after their surrender, while at Camboy (near Charleston), six white men were killed when armed blacks opened fire in a political meeting.

With both sides accusing each other of electoral fraud, South Carolina, along with Florida and Louisiana, submitted two sets of election returns with different results. Meanwhile, in Oregon, the state's Democratic governor replaced a Republican elector with a Democrat (alleging that the Republican had been ineligible), thus throwing Hayes' victory in that state into question as well.

Compromise of 1877: Congress Steps In

To resolve the dispute, Congress set up an electoral commission in January 1877, consisting of five U.S. representatives, five senators and five Supreme Court justices. The commission's members included seven Democrats, seven Republicans and one independent, Justice David Davis. When Davis refused to serve, the moderate Republican Justice Joseph Bradley was chosen to replace him.

During the commission's deliberations, Hayes' Republican allies met in secret with moderate southern Democrats in hopes of convincing them not to block the official counting of votes through filibuster and effectively allow Hayes' election. In February, at a meeting held in Washington's Wormley Hotel, the Democrats agreed to accept a Hayes victory and to respect the civil and political rights of African Americans, on the condition that Republicans withdraw all federal troops from the South, thus consolidating Democratic control in the region.

Hayes would also have to agree to name a leading southerner to his cabinet and to support federal aid for the Texas and Pacific Railroad, a planned transcontinental line via a southern route. On March 2, the congressional commission voted 8-7 along party lines to award all the disputed electoral votes to Hayes, giving him 185 votes to Tilden's 184.

Compromise of 1877: The End of Reconstruction

Hayes appointed Tennessee's David Key as postmaster general but never followed through on the promised land grant for the Texas and Pacific. Within two months, however, Hayes had ordered federal troops from their posts guarding Louisiana and South Carolina statehouses, allowing Democrats to seize control in both those states. As Florida's Supreme Court had earlier declared a Democratic victory in the 1876 gubernatorial election, Democrats had been restored to power all across the South.

The Compromise of 1876 effectively ended the Reconstruction era. Southern Democrats' promises to protect the civil and political rights of Black people were not kept, and the end of federal interference in southern affairs led to widespread disenfranchisement of Black voters.

From the late 1870s onward, southern legislatures passed a series of laws requiring the separation of whites from "persons of color" on public transportation, in schools, parks, restaurants, theaters and other locations. Known as the " Jim Crow laws" (after a popular minstrel act developed in the antebellum years), these segregationist statutes governed life in the South through the middle of the next century, ending only after the hard-won successes of the civil rights movement in the 1960s.

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The Compromise of 1877 was an agreement that resolved the disputed 1876 presidential election between Democratic candidate Samuel Tilden and Republican candidate Rutherford B. Hayes. As part of the compromise, Democrats agreed that Hayes would become president in exchange for the withdrawal of federal troops from the South, effectively ending the Reconstruction era.

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Andrew Johnson supports my thesis because he was the President during Reconstruction and was in control of the South until they recovered from the Civil War.

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Andrew Johnson was born on December 29, 1808 in Raleigh, North Carolina. He grew up in poverty and was apprenticed to a tailor as a boy, but ran away. As an adult,...

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Frederick Douglass supports my thesis because he helped remove slavery along with Abraham Lincoln and helped people recover from the War.

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Frederick Douglass (born February 1818, Talbot county, Maryland, U.S.-died February 20, 1895, Washington, D.C.) was an African American abolitionist, orator, newspaper publisher, and author who is famous for his first autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Written by Himself. He became the first Black U.S. marshal and was the most photographed American man of the 19th century.

Early life and enslavement

Douglass was born enslaved as Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey on Holme Hill Farm in Talbot county, Maryland. Although the date of his birth was not recorded, Douglass estimated that he had been born in February 1818, and he later celebrated his birthday on February 14. (The best source for the events in Douglass's life is Douglass himself in his oratory and writings, especially his three autobiographies, the details of which have been checked when possible and have largely been confirmed, though his biographers have contributed corrections and clarifications.) Douglass was owned by Capt. Aaron Anthony, who was the clerk and superintendent of overseers for Edward Lloyd V (also known as Colonel Lloyd), a wealthy landowner and slaveholder in eastern Maryland. Like many other enslaved children, Douglass was separated from his mother, Harriet Bailey, when he was very young. He spent his formative years with his maternal grandmother, Betsey Bailey, who had the responsibility of raising young enslaved children.

Harriet Bailey worked as a field hand on a neighbouring plantation and had to walk more than 12 miles (about 19 km) to visit her son, whom she met with only a few times in his life. He described her as "tall and finely proportioned, of dark, glossy complexion, with regular features, and amongst the slaves was remarkably sedate and dignified." She died when he was about seven years old. As an adult, Douglass learned that his mother had been the only Black person in what was then Talbot county who could read, an extraordinarily rare achievement for a field hand.

When Douglass was age five or six, he was taken to live on Colonel Lloyd's home plantation, Wye House. Lloyd's plantation functioned like a small town. Young Douglass found himself among several other enslaved children competing for food and other comforts. In 1826 at approximately age eight, he was sent to live with Hugh and Sophia Auld at Fells Point, Baltimore. Hugh's brother Capt. Thomas Auld was the son-in-law of Douglass's owner, Aaron Anthony. Douglass's responsibility in Baltimore was to care for Hugh and Sophia's young son, Thomas. Sophia began teaching Douglass how to read, along with her son. The lessons ended abruptly, however, when Hugh discovered what had been going on and informed Sophia that literacy would "spoil" a slave. According to Douglass, Hugh stated that if a slave were given an inch, he would "take an ell [a unit of measure equal to about 45 inches]." In Maryland, as in many other slaveholding states, it was forbidden to teach enslaved people how to read and write. Douglass continued his learning in secret, by exchanging bread for lessons from the poor white boys he played with in the neighbourhood and by tracing the letters in Thomas's old schoolbooks.

In March 1832 Douglass was sent from Baltimore to St. Michaels, on Maryland's Eastern Shore. After both Aaron Anthony and his daughter Lucretia died, her husband, Capt. Thomas Auld, became Douglass's owner. Teenage Douglass experienced harsher living conditions with Auld, who was known for his abusive practices.

In January 1833 Douglass was leased to local farmer Edward Covey. Leasing or hiring out enslaved persons was a common revenue-generating practice. Farmers would pay slaveholders a monthly fee for enslaved people and take responsibility for their care, food, and lodging. Covey was known as a "slave breaker," someone who abused slaves physically and psychologically in order to make them more compliant. According to Douglass, Covey's abuse led to a climactic confrontation six months into Douglass's time with the farmer. One day Covey attacked Douglass, and Douglass fought back. The two men engaged in an epic two-hour-long physical struggle. Douglass ultimately won the fight, and Covey never attacked him again. Douglass emerged from the incident determined to protect himself from any physical assault from anyone in the future.

In January 1834 Douglass was sent to William Freeland's farm. Living and working conditions were better under Freeland; however, Douglass still desired his freedom. While living with Freeland, he started a Sabbath school at which he taught area Blacks how to read and write. Along with four other enslaved men, Douglass plotted to escape north by taking a large canoe up the coast of Maryland and to proceed to Pennsylvania, but their plot was discovered. Douglass and the other participants were arrested. Captain Auld then sent Douglass back to Baltimore to live again with Hugh and Sophia Auld and to learn a trade.

Hugh Auld hired out Douglass to local shipyards as a ship caulker. Now working as a skilled tradesman, Douglass was paid by the shipyards for his efforts. He would then submit his earnings to Auld, who gave Douglass a small percentage of the wages. Douglass would eventually hire out his own time, which meant that he paid Auld a set amount every week but was responsible for maintaining his own food and clothing. During this time, Douglass became more involved in Baltimore's Black community, which led him to meet Anna Murray, a freeborn Black woman, whom he would eventually marry.

Escape from slavery, life in New Bedford, and work with the American Anti-Slavery Society

Douglass moved about Baltimore with few restrictions, but that privilege came to an end when he decided to attend a religious meeting outside of Baltimore on a Saturday evening and postpone paying Auld his weekly fee. The following Monday, when Douglass returned, Auld threatened him. After that encounter, Douglass was determined to escape his bondage. He escaped in September 1838 by dressing as a sailor and traveling from Baltimore to Wilmington, Delaware, by train, then on to Philadelphia by steamboat, and from there to New York City by train. Black sailors in the 19th century traveled with documents granting them protection under the American flag. Douglass used such documents to secure his passage north with the help of Anna, who, according to family lore, had sold her feather bed to help finance his passage.

New York City was a dangerous place for enslaved people seeking freedom. Numerous slave catchers traveled to the city to track down those who had escaped. Many locals, Black and white, were willing, for money, to tell the authorities about people trying to escape enslavement. For his own protection, Douglass (still months from assuming that name) changed his name from Frederick Bailey to Frederick Johnson. A chance meeting with Black abolitionist David Ruggles led Douglass to safety. Anna arrived in New York several days later, and the two were married by the Reverend J.W.C. Pennington.

At Ruggles's recommendation, the couple quickly left New York City for New Bedford, Massachusetts. Ruggles had determined that New Bedford's shipping industry would offer Douglass the best chance to find work as a ship caulker. In New Bedford the couple stayed with a local Black married couple, Nathan and Polly Johnson. Because many families in New Bedford had the surname Johnson, Douglass chose to change his name again. Nathan Johnson suggested the name Douglass, which was inspired by the name of an exiled nobleman in Sir Walter Scott's poem The Lady of the Lake. The newly minted Frederick Douglass earned money for the first time as a free man. However, despite Douglass's previous work experience, racial prejudice in New Bedford prevented him from working as a ship caulker (white caulkers refused to work with Black caulkers). Consequently, Douglass spent his first years in Massachusetts working as a common labourer.

Douglass remained an avid reader throughout his adult life. When he escaped to New York, he carried with him a copy of The Columbian Orator. In New Bedford he discovered William Lloyd Garrison's abolitionist newspaper, The Liberator. Inspired by it, Douglass attended a Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society convention in Nantucket in the summer of 1841. At the meeting, abolitionist William C. Coffin, having heard Douglass speak in New Bedford, invited him to address the general body. Douglass's extemporaneous speech was lauded by the audience, and he was recruited as an agent for the group.

As an agent of both the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society and the American Anti-Slavery Society, Douglass traveled the country promoting abolition and the organizations' agenda. He and other persons who had escaped conditions of enslavement frequently described their own experiences under those conditions. The American Anti-Slavery Society supported "moral suasion" abolition, the belief that slavery was a moral wrong that should be resisted through nonviolent means. Douglass strongly promoted this philosophy during the early years of his abolitionist career. In his speech at the 1843 National Convention of Colored Citizens in Buffalo, New York, Black abolitionist and minister Henry Highland Garnet proposed a resolution that called for enslaved people to rise up against their masters. The controversial resolution ignited a tense debate at the convention, with Douglass rising in firm opposition. His belief in moral suasion would repeatedly place him at odds with other Black abolitionists during this phase of his career. Work as an agent provided Douglass with the means to support his family. He and Anna had five children: Rosetta (born 1839), Lewis (born 1840), Frederick, Jr. (born 1842), Charles (born 1844), and Annie (born 1849).

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, European travel, and The North Star

In 1845 Douglass published his first autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Written by Himself. Prior to its publication, audiences at Douglass's lectures had questioned his authenticity as an ex-slave because of his eloquence, refusal to use "plantation speak," and unwillingness to provide details about his origins. The Narrative settled these disputes by naming people and locations in Douglass's life. The book also challenged the conventional employment of ghostwriters for slave narratives by boldly acknowledging that Douglass wrote it himself. Douglass would publish two additional autobiographies: My Bondage and My Freedom (1855) and Life and Times of Frederick Douglass (1881). The Narrative quickly became popular, especially in Europe, but the book's success contributed to Hugh Auld's determination to return Douglass to the conditions of enslavement.

The threat of capture, as well as the book's excellent performance in Europe, prompted Douglass to travel abroad from August 1845 to 1847, and he lectured throughout the United Kingdom. His English supporters, led by Ellen and Anna Richardson, purchased Douglass from Hugh Auld, giving him his freedom. In the spring of 1847, Douglass returned to the United States a free man with the funding to start his own newspaper.

Douglass moved to Rochester, New York, to publish his newspaper, The North Star, despite objections from Garrison and others. Basing the newspaper in Rochester ensured that The North Star did not compete with the distribution of The Liberator and the National Anti-Slavery Standard in New England. The North Star's first issue appeared on December 3, 1847. In 1851 the paper merged with the Liberty Party Paper to form Frederick Douglass' Paper, which ran until 1860. Douglass would publish two additional newspapers during his life, Douglass' Monthly (1859-63) and New National Era (1870-74).

The move to Rochester surrounded Douglass with political abolitionists such as Gerrit Smith. During his first few years in Rochester, Douglass remained loyal to Garrison's philosophy, which promoted moral suasion, stated that the U.S. Constitution was an invalid document, and discouraged participation in American politics because it was a system corrupted by slavery. In 1851, however, Douglass announced his split from Garrison when he declared that the Constitution was a valid legal document that could be used on behalf of emancipation. Consequently, Douglass became more engaged in American politics and constitutional interpretation.

Involvement with John Brown, Abraham Lincoln, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Susan B. Anthony

The country's tension around slavery rapidly increased in the 1850s. Douglass's Rochester home was part of the Underground Railroad and hosted numerous fellow abolitionists. In 1859 Douglass met with abolitionist John Brown in a quarry in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania. Brown invited Douglass to participate in the planned raid on the federal arsenal in Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now in West Virginia), which Brown hoped would inspire a massive uprising by enslaved people. Douglass declined the invitation. Shortly after the raid (October 16-19), Douglass received word that the authorities were looking to arrest him as an accomplice. He quickly fled to Canada before heading to Europe for a scheduled lecture tour. Douglass returned home in April 1860 after learning that his youngest daughter, Annie, had died.

With the outbreak of the Civil War, Douglass strongly advocated for inclusion of Black soldiers in the Union army. He became a recruiter for the Massachusetts 54th, an all-Black infantry regiment in which his sons Lewis and Charles served. In 1863 Douglass visited the White House to meet with Pres. Abraham Lincoln to advocate for better pay and conditions for the soldiers. Lincoln then invited Douglass to the White House in 1864 to discuss what could be done for Blacks in the case of a Union loss. Douglass would meet with Lincoln a third time, after the president's second inauguration and about a month before his assassination.

The Emancipation Proclamation and the Union's victory presented a new reality: millions of Black people were free. Douglass dedicated himself to securing the community's rights to this new freedom. He strongly supported the Fourteenth Amendment, which granted Blacks citizenship, but he realized that this new citizenship status needed to be protected by suffrage. Initially Douglass supported a constitutional amendment supporting suffrage for all men and women. Having attended the 1848 women's rights convention in Seneca Falls, New York, he was a longtime supporter of women's rights, joining Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony in this stance. Reconstruction politics, however, indicated that a universal suffrage amendment would fail. Douglass then supported Black male suffrage with the idea that Black men could help women secure the right to vote later. This placed him at odds with Stanton and Anthony. Douglass hoped that the passage of the Fifteenth Amendment would encourage African Americans to stay in the South to consolidate their power as a voting bloc, but the region's high levels of violence against African Americans led him to support Black migration to safer areas of the country.

Move to Washington, D.C., the Freedman's Bank, government office-holding, and later years

After a fire destroyed his Rochester home, Douglass moved in 1872 to Washington, D.C., where he published his latest newspaper venture, New National Era. The newspaper folded in 1874 because of its poor fiscal health. That same year Douglass was appointed president of the Freedman's Savings & Trust, also known as the Freedman's Bank. The bank failed four months after he became president because of the years of corruption that predated his association with the bank. The bank's failure harmed his reputation, but Douglass worked with the U.S. Congress to remedy the damage caused by the bank.

After the Freedman's Bank debacle, Douglass held numerous government appointments. He became the first Black U.S. marshal in 1877 when he was appointed to that post for the District of Columbia by Pres. Rutherford B. Hayes. He served in that capacity until 1881, when Pres. James A. Garfield appointed him to the high-paying position of recorder of deeds for the District of Columbia. In 1889 Pres. Benjamin Harrison selected Douglass as the U.S. minister resident and consul general to the Republic of Haiti. The major controversy during Douglass's tenure was the quest by the United States to acquire the port town of Môle Saint-Nicolas as a refueling station for the U.S. Navy. Douglass disagreed with the Harrison administration's approach, preferring to promote the autonomy of the Haitian government. He resigned the position in 1891 and returned to his home in Washington, D.C.

Douglass spent the last 17 years of his life at Cedar Hill, his home in the Anacostia neighbourhood of Washington, D.C., to which he had moved in 1878. On August 4, 1882, Anna Murray Douglass died in the home after suffering a stroke. In 1884 Douglass married Helen Pitts, his white secretary, who was about 20 years younger than her husband. The marriage was controversial for its time, and it resulted in Douglass's temporary estrangement from some friends and family.

During the latter years of his life, Douglass remained committed to social justice and the African American community. His prominence and work resulted in his being the most photographed American man in the 19th century. His distinguished photographs were deliberate contradictions to the visual stereotypes of African Americans at the time, which often exaggerated their facial features, skin colour, and physical bodies and demeaned their intelligence. He served on Howard University's board of trustees from 1871 to 1895. Douglass cultivated relationships with younger activists, most notably Ida B. Wells, who featured his letter to her in her book Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases. He also contributed to her pamphlet protesting the exclusion of exhibits dedicated to African American culture from the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition, The Reason Why the Colored American Is Not in the World's Columbian Exposition.

Douglass died in his Cedar Hill home on February 20, 1895. After his death, Helen Pitts Douglass established the Frederick Douglass Memorial and Historical Association to preserve his legacy. She bequeathed the home and its belongings to the organization in her will. Cedar Hill became part of the National Park system in 1962, and it was designated the Frederick Douglass National Historic Site in 1988. The U.S. Library of Congress digitized its holdings of Douglass's papers, which include letters, speeches, and personal documents.

At the end of his life, Douglass, an American icon who fought for social justice and equity, became known as the "Lion of Anacostia." Through his writings, speeches, and photographs, he boldly challenged the racial stereotypes of African Americans. Douglass's contributions to the Black American community and American history were recognized in the early 20th century during Negro History Week, the predecessor of Black History Month, which many communities anchored to the day on which his birthday was celebrated, February 14. Today Douglass is renowned not just for his rise from slavery to the highest levels of American society but also for his dedication to challenging the country to recognize the rights of all people and be consistent with its ideals.

Noelle Trent

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Frederick Douglass | Biography, Accomplishments, & Facts

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Frederick Douglass, African American abolitionist, orator, newspaper publisher, and author who is famous for his first autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Written by Himself. He became the first Black U.S. marshal and was the most photographed American man of the 19th century.