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Missouri Compromise
Encyclopedia of the United States in the Nineteenth Century
The Missouri Territory wanted to annexed into the Union as a slave state. This conflicted with the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 applied to the territory east of the Mississippi. Nevertheless, in the debate over Missouri statehood, Congress decided to also admit Maine as a state to balance out the amount of slave and free states in the Union. The Missouri Compromise settled the issue of slavery in the territories for the next quarter century. -
Texas Annexation
Gale Encyclopedia of U.S. Economic History The United States was unwilling to annex Texas,so for almost a decade.There were several reasons for the United States' unwillingness to accept Texas' request to be admitted to the Union. Most importantly, its annexation would upset the delicate balance of slave states and non-slave states. Finally, with rising U.S. concern over Texas' future, officially became part of the Union. -
Wilmot Proviso
BritannicaWilmot Proviso, an important congressional proposal in the 1840s to prohibit the extension of slavery into the territories, acquired after the Mexican War. Democratic congressman from Pennsylvania named David Wilmot offered an amendment Aug. 8, 1846 forbidding slavery in the new territory. The Wilmot Proviso was never passed by both houses of Congress. -
Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
National ArchivesThe Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo brought an official end to the Mexican-American War was signed on February 2, 1848, at Guadalupe Hidalgo, a city north of the capital where the Mexican government had fled. -
Compromise of 1850
Dictionary of American History' > Dictionary of American History , 2003</a>Compromise of 1850, a designation commonly given to five statutes enacted in September 1850, to settled issue that arose after the Mexican War. Stephen Douglas orchestrated the compromise. It avoid war in the country for about 10 years. -
Uncle Tom's Cabin
Harriet Beecher Stowe CenterThe first installment of Uncle Tom's Cabin appeared on June 5, 1851 in the anti-slavery newspaper, The National Era. In 1852 the serial was published as a two volume book. Uncle Tom's Cabin changed forever how Americans viewed slavery. It chronicles the life of a loyal slave, that is sold and eventually beaten to death by his master. -
Gadsden Purchase
Britannica This transaction that followed the conquest of much of northern Mexico by the United States in 1848. It gave the United States nearly 30,000 additional square miles of northern Mexican territory in exchange for $10,000,000. It was prompted in part for a southern transcontinental railroad, for which the most practical route would pass through the acquired territory. -
Republican Party founded
History ChannelThe former members of the Whig Party meet to establish a new party to oppose the spread of slavery into the western territories. After the Whig Party,”died. -
Kansas-Nebraska Act
The Library of Congress The Kansas-Nebraska Act repealed the Missouri Compromise, allowing slavery in the territory north of the 36° 30´ latitude. Senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois, introduced the Kansas-Nebraska Act stipulating that the issue of slavery would be decided by popular sovereignty. -
Brooks-Sumner Incident
History ChannelSouthern Congressman Preston Brooks savagely beats Northern Senator Charles Sumner in the halls of Congress with a cane as tensions rise over the expansion of slavery. -
Harpers Ferry Raid
U*X*L Encyclopedia of U.S. HistoryJohn Brown planned an war on slavery beginning with a violent raid on the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia. Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry intensified the sectional bitterness that led to the American Civil War. The outraged South suspected all Northerners of participating in Brown's crime. -
Election of 1860
Encyclopedia of the Confederacy The election of 1860 ends with Abraham Lincoln, the first Republican candidate, as the victor. The platform opposed slavery's expansion into the territories and the reopening of the African slave trade.The election of 1860 also led to the secession of some of the states that formed the Confederate States of America. -
Firing on Fort Sumter
History ChannelThe beginning of the Civil War began when the Confederates attacked Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, South Carolina. -
First Battle of Bull Run
History Channel The First Battle of Bull Run was the first major land battle of the American Civil War. It was a victory of the Confederates that gave the South a surge of confidence and shocked many in the North. -
Monitor v. Merrimack
History ChannelThe battle was history's first duel between ironclad warships. the Battle of Hampton Roads, was part of a Confederate effort to break the Union blockade of Southern ports. -
Battle of Antietam
History ChannelIn this battle,Generals Robert E. Lee and George McClellan fought near Antietam creek in Sharpsburg, Maryland, this is the first battle of the American Civil War to be fought on northern soil.This victory for the north provided Abraham Lincoln the political cover he needed to issue his Emancipation Proclamation. Though the result of the battle was inconclusive, it remains the bloodiest single day in American history. -
Battle of Gettysburg
History ChannelThe Battle of Gettysburg, fought from July 1 to July 3, 1863, is considered the most important engagement of the American Civil War. The battle was part of the attempt by the army of the Confederate States of America to invade the northern states and discourage Union support. The clash at Gettysburg was the deadliest of the war. Union victory ended the Confederate march north, forcing its army to retreat. -
Sherman's March
History ChannelOn November 15,William T. Sherman led an army of sixty-two thousand men, with thirty-five thousand horses and twenty-five hundred wagons, on an overland march to Savannah cutting himself off from his line of supply and sustaining his army on the land. The results of this march together with Grant's victories in Virginia, destroyed the Confederacy's ability to carry on the war.Sherman took Savannah on December 21, 1864. -
Appomattox Court House
History ChannelConfederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered his troops to Union General Ulysses S. Grant in the front parlor of Wilmer McLean's home in Appomattox Courthouse, Virginia, effectively ending the American Civil War.
