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fort sumter
March 5, 1861 Attempts by the Confederate government to settle its differences with the Union were spurned by Lincoln, and the Confederacy felt it could no longer tolerate the presense of a foreign force in its territory. Believing a conflict to be inevitable, Lincoln ingeniously devised a plan that would cause the Confederates to fire the first shot and thus, he hoped, inspire the states that had not yet seceded to unite in the effort to restore the Union. -
Period: to
civil war
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first battle of bull run
July 21, 1861
By July 20, most of Johnston's men had arrived and were situated near Blackburn's Ford. Assessing the situation, Beauregard intended to attack north towards Centreville. This plan was preempted early on the morning of July 21 when Union guns began shelling his headquarters at the McLean House near Mitchell's Ford. Despite having crafted an intelligent plan, McDowell's attack was soon beset with issues due to poor scouting and the overall inexperience of his men. While Tyler's men -
Hampton Roads
March 8-9, 1862
One avenue that Mallory elected to follow was the development of ironclad, armored warships. The first of these, the French La Gloire and British HMS Warrior, had appeared in the last year. Consulting John M. Brooke, John L. Porter, and William P. Williamson, Mallory began pushing the ironclad program forward but found that the South lacked the industrial capacity to build the needed steam engines in a timely manner. Upon learning this, Williamson suggested using the engines and -
shiloh
April 6–7, 1862 On the first day of the battle, the Confederates struck with the intention of driving the Union defenders away from the river and into the swamps of Owl Creek to the west, hoping to defeat Grant's Army of the Tennessee before the anticipated arrival of Maj. Gen. Don Carlos Buell's Army of the Ohio. The Confederate battle lines became confused during the fierce fighting, and Grant's men instead fell back to the northeast, in the direction of Pittsburg Landing. A position on a slig -
antietam
September 16-18, 1862 On September 16, Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan confronted Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia at Sharpsburg, Maryland. At dawn September 17, Hooker’s corps mounted a powerful assault on Lee’s left flank that began the single bloodiest day in American military history. Attacks and counterattacks swept across Miller’s cornfield and fighting swirled around the Dunker Church. Union assaults against the Sunken Road eventually pierced the Confederate center, but the Federal advantage -
Fredricksburg
December 11-15, 1862 On November 14, Burnside, now in command of the Army of the Potomac, sent a corp to occupy the vicinity of Falmouth near Fredericksburg. The rest of the army soon followed. Lee reacted by entrenching his army on the heights behind the town. On December 11, Union engineers laid five pontoon bridges across the Rappahannock under fire. On the 12th, the Federal army crossed over, and on December 13 Burnside mounted a series of futile frontal assaults on Prospect Hill and Marye’ -
Chancellorsville
April 30-May 6, 1863 On April 27, Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker led the V, XI, and XII Corps on a campaign to turn the Confederate left flank by crossing the Rappahannock and Rapidan Rivers above Fredericksburg. Passing the Rapidan via Germanna and Ely’s Fords, the Federals concentrated near Chancellorsville on April 30 and May 1. The III Corps was ordered to join the army via United States Ford. Sedgwick’s VI Corps and Gibbon’s division remained to demonstrate against the Confederates at Fredericksbu -
siege of vicksburg
May 18-July 4, 1863 In May and June of 1863, Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant’s armies converged on Vicksburg, investing the city and entrapping a Confederate army under Lt. Gen. John Pemberton. On July 4, Vicksburg surrendered after prolonged siege operations. This was the culmination of one of the most brilliant military campaigns of the war. -
Gettysburg
july 1,2 and 3 General Robert E. Lee brought his troops up and fought on northern ground and lost -
chickamauga
September 19–20, 1863 The battle was fought between the Union Army of the Cumberland under Maj. Gen. William Rosecrans and the Confederate Army of Tennessee under Gen. Braxton Bragg, and was named for West Chickamauga Creek, which meanders near the battle area in northwest Georgia (and ultimately flows into the Tennessee River about 3.5 miles (5.6 km) northeast of downtown Chattanooga). After his successful Tullahoma Campaign, Rosecrans renewed the offensive, aiming to force the Confederates o -
wilderness
May 3, 1864
In the pre-dawn hours of May 4, Union forces began departing their camps near Culpeper Court House and marching south. Divided into two wings, the Federal advance saw Major General Winfield S. Hancock's II Corps cross the Rapidan at Ely's Ford before reaching camps near Chancellorsville around noon. To the west, Major General Gouverneur K. Warren's V Corps crossed over pontoon bridges at Germanna Ford, followed by Major General John Sedgwick's VI Corps. Marching five miles south, Wa -
Spotsylvania
May 8-21, 1864 After the Wilderness, Grant’s and Meade’s advance on Richmond by the left flank was stalled at Spotsylvania Court House on May 8. This two-week battle was a series of combats along the Spotsylvania front. The Union attack against the Bloody Angle at dawn, May 12-13, captured nearly a division of Lee’s army and came near to cutting the Confederate army in half. Confederate counterattacks plugged the gap, and fighting continued unabated for nearly 20 hours in what may well have been -
siege of petersburg
The Richmond–Petersburg Campaign was a series of battles around Petersburg, Virginia, fought from June 9, 1864, to March 25, 1865 -
Sherman's march to the sea
November 12-December 22, 1864 Late in 1864, General William Sherman left Atlanta to head towards the Atlantic Ocean. He moved through Macon and Augusta and ended up in Savannah. There were few troops to stop him and his forces on the way and they left destruction in their wake. -
Lincoln's Assassination
On April 14, 1865, John Wilkes Booth, a famous actor and Confederate sympathizer, fatally shot President Abraham Lincoln at a play at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. The attack came only five days after Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered his massive army at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, effectively ending the American Civil War.
