Civil War Timeline

 

 

PRE-CIVIL WAR:

  • 1854: Congress passes the Kansas-Nebraska Act which established the Kansas and Nebraska territories.  Kansas was a slave state which opened up the possibility of slavery.  Nebraska became a free state.
  • 1857: The Dred Scott Case- Dred Scott moved from a slave state to a free state while enslaved, but when his master died, he wanted to become free, yet the Supreme Court denied it because the Supreme Court was proslavery.
  • 1859: John Brown led an anti-slavery revolt at Harper’s Ferry.  The revolt was generally politicians vs. population.
  • 1860: South Carolina seceded from the Union on December 20, 1860.  The proslavery states (The South) didn’t like the antislavery states (the North).
  • 1861: Abraham Lincoln is inaugurated as the 16th president.  During the Civil War he had a big say in it since he was president.  He was antislavery.

 

CIVIL WAR:

  • 1861: The Emancipation Proclamation was hoped that it would serve as an opening wedge in depleting the South’s great manpower reserve in slaves and, equally important, would enhance the Union cause in the eyes of Europeans, especially the British.
  • 1861: Confederates attack Ft. Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina, marking the start of the war.
  • 1862: The Homestead Act is passed by the U.S. Congress.  It provided for the transfer of 160 acres of unoccupied pubic land to each homesteader.  As the West became politically stronger, pressure was increased upon Congress to guarantee free land to settlers.
  • 1863: The Battle of Gettysburg was a series of decisive battles of the U.S. Civil War.  In the Gettysburg Address, Lincoln spoke for two minutes and made the battlefield a national cemetery.
  • 1865: Gen. Ulysses S. Grant captures Richmond, Va., the capital of the Confederacy.
  • 1865: The Thirteenth Amendment is ratified which prohibited slavery.
  • 1865: Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrenders to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Courthouse, Virginia.
  • 1868: The Fourteenth Amendment is ratified which defines citizenship and the privileges of citizens.
  • 1869: Ulysses S. Grant is inaugurated as the 18th president.
  • 1870: The Fifteenth Amendment is ratified which gave blacks the right to vote.

 

 

 

Works Cited:

 

Muzzy, Cathy. "Civil War." Online posting. 15 Apr. 2004
<http://www.serraschool.org/Virtual_Library/Civil_War/Civil_War_Webquest.htm&
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