The Civil War and Reconstruction 1861-1877

Southern States Secede

Dec 20, 1860

South Carolina- Dec 20, 1860
Mississippi- Jan 9, 1861
Florida- Jan 10, 1861
Alabama- Jan 11, 1861
Georgia- Jan 19, 1861
Louisana- Jan 26 1861
Texas- Feb 1, 1861
Virgina- Apr 17, 1861
Arkansas- May 6, 1861
North Carolina- May 20, 1861
Tennessee- Jun 8, 1861

Fort Sumter Battle

Apr 12, 1861

The cannon of the Carolinians opened fire on Fort Sumter, while the crowds in charleston applauded and waved handkerchiefs

Lincoln issued a call

Apr 15, 1861

Lincoln issued a call to the states for seventy-five thousand militiamen, and volunteers sprang to the call and some of them were actually denied access to the military. A mistake that would haunt them in the long run.

Lincoln proclaimed a blockade of southern seaports

Apr 19, 1861

This blockade made the Conferderate states unable to trade wit hother countries. This crippled the Confederacy's economy.

The Civil War

May 23, 1861

(1861-1865) This is a video about the civil war. the link a video did not work, so I will give you the link instead. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gfl6rHFUuQ

First Battle of Bull Run

Jul 21, 1861

This was also known as the First battle of Manassas by th econfederate troops. This battle was the first known battle of the Civil War. Colonel Thomas J. Jackson received his nickname during this battle, "Stonewall" Jackson, because his brigade stood their ground during the battle "like a stone wall." Both sides realized, becasue of the way that the south had fought, that this would be a long and bloody war.

Trent Affair

Nov 8, 1861

A Union warship crusing on the high seas north of Cuba stopped a British mail steamer, the Trent, and forcibly removed two Confederate diplomats bound for Europe.

McClellan loses command of the Union Army

Mar 8, 1862

President Lincoln, impatient with General McClellan's inactivity, issued an order reorganizing the Army of Virginia and relieving McClellan of supreme command.

Battle of Shiloh

Apr 8, 1862

A Union army under Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant had moved via the Tennessee River deep into Tennessee and was encamped principally at Pittsburg Landing on the west bank of the river. 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.

Henry Halleck was named general-in-chief of the Union army

Jul 11, 1862

Second Battle of Bull Run

Aug 28, 1862

This battle was a Confederate victory. General Lee defeated Maj. Gen. John Pope's Army of Virginia.

Battle of Harper's Ferry

Sep 12, 1862

This battle was a Confederate victory. Stonewall Jackson captured Union garrison. Union General McClellan defeated Confederate General Lee at South Mountain and Crampton's Gap in September, but did not move quickly enough to save Harper's Ferry, which fell to Confederate General Jackson on September 15, along with a great number of men and a large body of supplies.

Battle of Antietam

Sep 17, 1862

This battle was inconclusive. It was a strategic union victory. McClellan ends Lee's invasion of North. It was the bloodiest day of the war.

Emancipation Proclamation

Jan 1, 1863

This Proclamation was issued by President Abraham Lincoln. He declared that all slaves in areas still in rebellion were, in the eyes of the federal government, free. This proclamation did not do much since all the slaves that were freed were in the union, the slaves were not freed in the Confederacy

First Conscription Act

Mar 21, 1863

(Not sure about date, sure about year) Because of recruiting difficulties, this act was passed, making all men between the ages of 20 and 45 liable to be called for military service. There was also a 300 fee if you wanted to before exempt from the draft.

West Virginia became a state

Jun 20, 1863

Battle of Gettysburg

Jul 1, 1863

This battle took place in Pennsylvania. This was a Union victory: Lee lost to Meade, Pickett's Charge failed and it ended the second invasion of the North

New York Draft Riots

Jul 13, 1863

The people of New York were angry about the draft so, the union denied their access into the military. There was 100 black deaths in these riots.

Battle of Chattanooga

Nov 23, 1863

Union forces pushed Confederate troops away from Chattanooga. The victory set the stage for General Sherman's Atlanta Campaign.

10 percent plan

Dec 8, 1863

Lincoln issues a Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction, which comes to be known as his 10 Percent Plan. If 10 percent of the southerners vote, most of them would recieve full pardon and their property would be retained.

Seige of Petersburg

Jun 15, 1864

Ulysses S. Grant surrounds Petersburg for nine-months and dug miles of trenches that would prevent the supply of Lee's forces. This everntually causes the surrender of Lee at Appomattox.

Wade-Davis Bill

Jul 8, 1864

Republicans in Congress propose the Wade Davis Bill as an alternative to Lincoln's 10 Percent Plan. Lincoln pocket-vetoes it.

Abraham Lincoln is re-elected

Nov 8, 1864

Sand Creek Massacre

Nov 29, 1864

this was also known as the Colorado War. The U.S. forces massacre the Cheyenne and Arapaho.

Military Gives 40 Acres

Jan 16, 1865

General William T. Sherman issues Special Field Order 15, setting aside confiscated plantation land in the Sea Islands and along the coast of South Carolina and Georgia for black families to settle in 40-acre plots. Some 40,000 freedmen and women are living on the land by June.

Fall of the Confederacy

Jan 21, 1865

Transportation problems and successful blockades caused severe shortages of food and supplies in the South. Starving soldiers began to desert Lee's forces, and although President Jefferson Davis approved the arming of slaves as a means of augmenting the shrinking army, the measure was never put into effect.

Sherman marches through North and South Carolina

Feb 21, 1865

Union General Sherman moved from Georgia through South Carolina, destroying almost everything in his path.

Freedman Savings Bank

Mar 3, 1865

Congress also charters the Freedmen's Savings and Trust Company, commonly called the Freedmen's Savings Bank.

Freedmen's Bureau Established

Mar 21, 1865

(not sure about the date) It was established in order to provide assistance to the emancipated slaves.

Battle of Appomattox Court House

Apr 9, 1865

This was a Union victory. General Lee's forces were surrounded. He subsequently surrenders. This ended the Civil War.

Lincoln Assination

Apr 14, 1865

John Wilkes Booth shot President Lincoln in Ford’s Theatre in Washington D.C. He died the next morning. Lincoln was the first president to be assassinated. John Wilkes Booth was an actor who was quite well-known even before he shot the President. Booth’s plans were to throw the Union government into disarray.

Reconstruction

May 23, 1865

(1865-1877) This is a video about reconstruction. The link did not work, so I will give you the link. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_1KIENdWp5M

13th ammendment Ratified

Dec 6, 1865

This offically ended the institution of slavery.

Black Codes enacted in Mississippi

Dec 6, 1865

Attempted to limit the civil rights and civil liberties of blacks.

KKK established in Tennessee

Dec 24, 1865

The Klu Klux Klan has advocated extremist reactionary currents such as white supremacy, white nationalism, and anti-immigration.

Douglass meets Johnson

Feb 2, 1866

A black delegation led by Frederick Douglass meets with President Andrew Johnson at the White House to advocate black suffrage. The president expresses his opposition, and the meeting ends in controversy.

Memphis riot

May 1, 1866

The racial violence was ignited by tensions during Reconstruction following the American Civil War. After a shooting altercation between white policemen and black soldiers recently mustered out of the Union Army, mobs of white civilians and policemen rampaged through black neighborhoods and the houses of freed slaves. Federal troops were sent to quell the violence and peace was restored on the third day.

New Orleans Riot

Jul 30, 1866

This was a violent conflict outside of the Mechanics Institute in New Orleans during the reconvened Louisiana Constitutional Convention. The Radical Republicans in Louisiana, who reconvened the Constitutional Convention, were angered by the enactment of the Black Codes in Louisiana and by the legislature's refusal to give black men the vote.

Black Man Vote in DC

Jan 8, 1867

Overriding President Johnson's veto, Congress grants black male citizens in the District of Columbia the right to vote.

Second Reconstruction Act

Mar 23, 1867

Military commanders in each southern district are to register all qualified adult males to vote.

Seward's Folly

Mar 30, 1867

The U.S. buys Alaska from Russia for $7.2 million (1.9¢ per acre); this is dubbed a foolish purchase at the time, named "Seward's Folly" after the Secretary of State (William Henry Seward) who negotiated it.

Tenure of Office Act

Aug 12, 1867

Johnson intentionally violates the Tenure of Office Act when he suspends Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton and replaces him with General Ulysses S. Grant during a congressional recess. The Senate refuses to confirm the action, Grant returns the office to Stanton, but the President names Gen. Lorenzo Thomas to the post instead. Impeachment proceedings follow in 1868.

Senate fails to impeach Johnson

Mar 21, 1868

By one vote, the U.S. Senate fails to remove the president from office.

Southern States Re-admitted

Jun 25, 1868

Louisiana, Florida, North Carolina and South Carolina are readmitted to the Union. Georgia, Mississippi, Texas, and Virginia had trouble passing their new state constitution. As a result, they were not readmitted until 1870.

14th amendment adopted

Jul 9, 1868

This amendment made the black people citizens of the United States

Fourteenth amendment ratified

Jul 24, 1868

This guarantees due process and equal protection under the law to African Americans.

Black Officials Ousted

Sep 1, 1868

Black elected officials are ousted from the Georgia state legislature; "The Negro is unfit to rule the State," the Atlanta Constitution declares. The black legislators appeal to President Grant to intervene to get them readmitted, which takes a year.

Opelousas Massacre

Sep 28, 1868

The Opelousas Massacre in Louisiana. An estimated 200 to 300 black Americans were killed.

Ulysses S. Grant elected into president

Nov 3, 1868

The former Union general becomes the 18th president. Grant (Republican) was up against Horatio Seymour (Democrat). The electoral votes for this election were 213-80, Grant had teh clear advantage.

Texas v. White

Apr 1, 1869

In its 5-3 Texas v. White decision, the U.S. Supreme Court declares Radical Reconstruction constitutional, stating that secession from the Union is illegal.

Black Friday

Sep 24, 1869

Black Friday on the New York gold exchange. Financiers Jay Gould and Jim Fisk attempt to corner the available gold supply, and try unsuccessfully to involve President Grant in the illegal plan.

First Black senator elected

Feb 23, 1870

Hiram Revels of Mississippi elected to U. S. Senate as the first black senator. He only served for one year.

Fifteenth amendment ratified

Mar 30, 1870

Extends the vote to all male citizens regardless of race or previous condition of servitude.

Forty-Second Congress

May 21, 1871

Five black members in the House of Representatives: Benjamin S. Turner of Alabama; Josiah T. Walls of Florida; and Robert Brown Elliot, Joseph H. Rainey and Robert Carlos DeLarge of South Carolina.

Martial Law Declared in South Carolina

Oct 17, 1871

Grant declares martial law in South Carolina; mass arrests follow, and by the following month, prosecutors are indicting Klan members under the Klan and Enforcement Acts (the testimony of freed slaves is solicited).

Amnesty Act

May 22, 1872

Grant signs the Amnesty Act, although the final legislation is less generous than he had wanted. Now only a few hundred former Confederates are excluded from political privileges.

Freedman's Bureau Abloished

Jun 20, 1872

(Not sure about the month and day, I'm sure about the year.)

First African American Governor

Aug 21, 1872

P. B. S. Pinchback, acting governor of Louisiana from December 9, 1872 to January 13, 1873. Pinchback, a black politician, was the first black to serve as a state governor, although due to white resistance, his tenure is extremely short.

Credit Mobilier Scandal

Sep 5, 1872

The New York Sun charges that Vice President Schuyler Colfax, vice-presidential nominee Henry Wilson, James Garfield, and other prominent politicians are involved in the operations of the Crédit Mobilier, a corporation established by the promoters of the Union Pacific railroad to siphon off the profits of transcontinental railroad construction. Ultimately, two congressmen will be censured for their part in the swindle and many other politicians will be damaged in reputation.

Panic of 1873

Sep 18, 1873

The failure of Jay Cooke and company, railroads, and other banks helped this panic last for 7 years. This also caused the reduction in demand for silver.

Democrats control the forty-third congress

Mar 24, 1874

For the first time since before the Civil War, Democrats control both houses of Congress. Robert Smalls, black hero of the Civil War, elected to Congress as representative of South Carolina. Blanche K. Bruce elected to U. S. Senate.

Whisky Ring Scandal

May 10, 1875

The Whisky Ring scandal is exposed; a group of public officials and liquor distillers have defrauded the federal government of millions by bribing liquor tax collectors. Orville E. Babcock, Grant's private secretary, was involved in the scandal and only acquitted through the personal intervention of the president.

Civil Rights Act

May 21, 1875

It guaranteed African Americans equal treatment in public accommodations, public transportation, and prohibited exclusion from jury service.

Clinton Massacre

Sep 4, 1875

More than twenty black Americans are killed in a massacre in Clinton, Mississippi.

United States v. Cruikshank

Oct 1, 1875

In the United States v. Cruikshank: the Supreme Court asserts that, Fifteenth Amendment notwithstanding, the Constitution "has not conferred the right of suffrage upon anyone." The decision emphasizes that the right to vote in the U.S. comes from the states, though "the right of exemption from the prohibited discrimination" comes from the federal government. This decision echoes Minor v. Happersett, which is passed the same year.

Wade Hampton inaugurated as governor of South Carolina

May 21, 1876

The election of Hampton, a leader in the Confederacy, confirms fears that the South is not committed to Reconstruction.

Election of 1876

Nov 7, 1876

Rutherford B. Hayes (Republican) was pinned against Samuel Tilden (Democrat). Hayes won the election soley on the passage of the Compromise of 1877. This caused controversey becasue Tilden had the majority of the votes. this election is still disputed today.

Rutherford B. Hayes inaugurated President.

Mar 5, 1877

Electoral Commission awards disputed electoral votes tot he republican candidate.

Reconstruction ends

Oct 16, 1877

President Rutherford Hayes withdraws federal troops from the South protecting the Civil Rights of African Americans.

Works Cited

Dec 31, 1877

"America's Reconstruction: People and Politics After the Civil War." America's Reconstruction: People and Politics After the Civil War. N.p., 2003. Web. 26 May 2013.
American Civil War: Lee vs. Grant. Dir. Winston Groom. YouTube, 2013. TV. American Civil War: Lee vs. Grant. History Channel, 10 Jan. 2013. Web. 27 May 2013.
Carr, F. L. "Reconstruction Timeline." Reconstruction Timeline. N.p., 23 June 1998. Web. 22 May 2013.
"Dipity." Dipity. Underlying, 10 May 2011. Web. 22 May 2013.
Kennedy,

Works Cited

Dec 31, 1877

David M., Lizabeth Cohen, and Thomas A. Bailey. The American Pageant: A History of the Republic. 12th ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2001.
"List of American Civil War Battles." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 23 May 2013. Web. 27 May 2013.
Morris, Richard B. "Time Line of The Civil War, 1865." Time Line of The Civil War. N.p., n.d. Web. 22 May 2013.
Reconstruction Lesson. Dir. Klaff. Perf. Mr. Klaff. Reconstruction Lesson. YouTube, 17 July 2012. Web. 5 May 2013.
"Reconstruction Timeline.

Works Cited

Dec 31, 1877

Reconstruction Lesson. YouTube, 17 July 2012. Web. 5 May 2013.
"Reconstruction Timeline." Shmoop. N.p., n.d. Web. 22 May 2013.