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Compromise of 1850
A compromise made by Senator Henry Clay to avert a crisis between the North and South. Slave trade was abolished in Washington DC and the Fugitive Slave Act was amended. -
The Kansas Nebraska Act
An act that allowed the people in the Kansas and Nebraska territories to decide whether or not slavery was allowed in their borders. -
Bleeding Kansas
Bleeding Kansas was a small war fought between proslavery and antislavery advocates for control of the new territory in Kansas under the doctrine of popular sovereignty. -
The Dred Scott Decision
A legal case in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a slave (Dred Scott) who had resided in a free state and territory was not thereby entitled to his freedom. -
Lincoln-Douglas Debates
A series of several debates between the Democratic senator Stephen Douglas and Republican challenger Abraham Lincoln during the 1858 Illinois senatorial campaign largely concerning the issue of slavery expansion to the territories -
Harpers Ferry
Harpers Ferry had a U.S. military arsenal that was the target of an assault by an armed band of abolitionists led by John Brown. The raid was intended to be the first stage of an elaborate plan to establish an independent stronghold of freed slaves in the mountains of Maryland and Virginia. -
Lincoln's Election
Abraham Lincoln is elected the 16th president of the United States over a deeply divided Democratic Party, becoming the first Republican to win the presidency. -
Fort Sumter
Fort Sumter is most famous for being the site of the first shots of the Civil War. -
Bull Run
The Bull Run was the first major land battle in the Civil War, the engagement began when about 35,000 Union troops marched from the federal capital in Washington, D.C. to strike a Confederate force of 20,000 along a small river known as Bull Run. -
Battle of Antietam
Generals Robert E. Lee and George McClellan faced off near Antietam creek in Sharpsburg, Maryland, in the the first battle of the American Civil War to be fought on northern soil, this tactical victory provided Abraham Lincoln the political cover he needed to issue his Emancipation Proclamation. -
Emancipation Proclamation
The Emancipation Proclamation declared that all slaves in the rebellious states “shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free.” While the Emancipation Proclamation did not free a single slave, it was an important turning point in the war, transforming the fight to preserve the nation into a battle for human freedom. -
Gettysburg and Gettysburg Address
Gettysburg Pennsylvania was one of the bloodiest battles in the Civil War. Abraham Lincoln was invited to deliver remarks, which later became known as the Gettysburg Address. In the speech he invoked the principles of human equality contained in the Declaration of Independence and connected the sacrifices of the Civil War with the desire for “a new birth of freedom,” as well as the all-important preservation of the Union created in 1776 and its ideal of self-government. -
Andersonville Prison
The Andersonville Prison was the South’s largest prison for captured Union soldiers and known for its unhealthy conditions and high death rate. In all, approximately 13,000 Union prisoners were perished. -
Surrender at Appomattox Court House
Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered his Army of Northern Virginia to Union General Ulysses S. Grant. Days earlier, Lee had abandoned the Confederate capital of Richmond and the city of Petersburg; his goal was to rally the remnants of his beleaguered troops, meet Confederate reinforcements in North Carolina and resume fighting. But the resulting Battle of Appomattox Court House, which lasted only a few hours, effectively brought the four-year Civil War to an end -
Assassination of Abraham Lincoln
a famous actor and Confederate sympathizer, assassinated President Abraham Lincoln 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. -
Reconstruction
Reconstruction was the period that followed the American Civil War and during which attempts were made to redress the inequities of slavery and its political, social, and economic legacy and to solve the problems arising from the readmission to the Union of the 11 states that had seceded at or before the outbreak of war.
