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January 1863 Emancipation Proclamation is issued
The proclamation declared “that all person held as slaves’ within the rebellious states ‘are, and henceforward shall be free’’ Despite this expansive wording, the Emancipation Proclamation was limited in many ways. It applied only to states that had seceded from the Union, leaving slavery untouched in the loyal border states. -
March 1863 -- The First Conscription Act
During the Civil War, the U.S. Congress passes a conscription act that produces the first wartime draft of U.S. citizens in American history. The act called for registration of all males between the ages of 20 and 45, including aliens with the intention of becoming citizens, by April 1. Exemptions from the draft could be bought for $300 or by finding a substitute draftee. -
54th Massachusetts Regiment
The 54th Massachusetts Regiment was the first black regiment recruited in the North. Col. Robert Gould Shaw, the 25 year old son of very wealthy abolitionist parents, was chosen to command. On May 28, the well-equipped and drilled 54th paraded through the streets of Boston and then boarded ships bound for the coast of South Carolina. Their first conflict with Confederate soldiers came on July 16, when the regiment repelled an attack on James Island -
Resistance by Slaves
Enslaved African Americans resisted slavery in a variety of active and passive ways. "Day-to-day resistance" was the most common form of opposition to slavery. Breaking tools, feigning illness, staging slowdowns, and committing acts of arson and sabotage--all were forms of resistance and expression of slaves' alienation from their masters. -
Civil War Prison Camps
Prisons often engendered conditions more horrible than those on the battlefield. The Union's Fort Delaware was dubbed "The Fort Delaware Death Pen," while Elmira prison in New York saw nearly a 25 percent mortality rate. The South's infamous Camp Sumter, or Andersonville prison, claimed the lives of 29 percent of its inmates. -
July 1863 – the Battle of Gettysburg
In July of 1863, General Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia of 75,000 men and the 97,000 man Union Army of the Potomac, under George G. Meade, concentrated together at Gettysburg and fought the Battle of Gettysburg. -
November 19, 1863 – The Gettysburg Address
Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address is the most quoted speech in American history. Only two minutes long, the speech captures the essence of America and its principles as put forth in the Declaration of Independence. Delivered on November 19, 1863, as a part of a dedication ceremony, the speech transformed the U.S. Civil War from a conflict about slavery to a conflict about being true to the principles upon which the United States was founded. Which the United States was founded. -
July 4, 1863 – The siege of Vicksburg
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. -
March 1964 – General Grant commander of all the Union Armies
(Born April 27, 1822, Point Pleasant, Ohio, U.S. — died July 23, 1885, Mount McGregor, N.Y.) U.S. general and 18th president of the U.S. (1869 – 77). He served in the Mexican War (1846 – 48) under Zachary Taylor. After two years' service on the Pacific coast (1852 – 54), during which he attempted to supplement his army pay with ultimately unsuccessful business ventures, he resigned his commission. -
July 1864 -- Confederate Troops Approach Washington, D.C.
The Army of the Valley was a detachment of Confederate forces, commanded by Jubal A. Early, which Robert E. Lee ordered to the Shenandoah Valley in 1864 for independent operations? As Union general-in-chief Ulysses S. Grant and the Army of the Potomac pressed Lee's Army of Northern Virginia in the Overland Campaign, Lee desperately needed to relieve pressure on his dwindling Confederate forces, divert attention away from the capital at Richmond, and open a second front in Virginia.