Download The United States Civil War

The United States Civil War
By Rick Redinger
ED 417
Why we fought
• North Manufacture based
• South Agriculture based
• North had abundance of
workers
• South needed slave labor
Why we fought (cont’d)
• North wanted western
expansion not to include
slavery
• South wanted western
expansion to include slavery
Why expansion was an issue
• As the U.S. expanded westward, new states
added Senate and Congress representation
to an already close North/South split
• The addition of all non-slave or all slave
states would tip the balance
• Neither the North or the South wanted to
lose influence in the Federal Government
A Nation Divided
• Tensions were high
and the country was
clearly becoming
divided between the
North and the South
• The situation would
soon explode
The Civil War Begins
• April 12, 1861, 4:30 am. General
Pierre Beauregard leads a Confederate
group with fifty cannons that opens fire
on Fort Sumpter, South Carolina.
• The only war fought on American soil
by Americans had begun
THE UNION 1861
• Abraham Lincoln is
President
• The Capitol is in
Washington DC
• Consists of states
north of approx. 39’
latitude
THE CONFEDERACY 1861
• Jefferson Davis is
named President
• Richmond, Virginia
becomes the Capitol
City
• Consists of 11 states
south of
approximately 39’
latitude
The United States Civil War
• Over three million people
fought against their own
countrymen
• Over 600,000 persons died
Bull Run
• July 1861 Union troops are
repelled at Bull Run, 25 miles
south of Washington, DC
• Confederate General Thomas J.
Jackson acquires the nickname
“Stonewall”
A future President is made
• February 1862 General Ulysses S. Grant
captures two Tennessee forts in a ten day
span, earning the nickname “Unconditional
Surrender” Grant
• Soon after the war he would become
President of the United States of America
Naval History is made 1862
• Confederate ironclad
Merrimac sinks two
wooden Union ships
then battles ironclad
Monitor to a draw
• Naval warfare is
forever changed,
making wooden ships
obsolete
“Damn the torpedoes…”
• April 1862 Flag
Officer David
Garragut takes New
Orleans, the South’s
largest seaport
• Sailing through a rebel
minefield he utters
“Damn the torpedoes,
full speed ahead”.
The Bloodiest Day in History
• September 17, 1862 General Robert E.
Lee’s Confederate troops are stopped at
Antietam, Maryland
• By nightfall over 26,000 men are dead,
wounded, or missing
• The was the bloodiest single day of this, or
any, war in United States history
Emancipation Proclamation
• January 1, 1863 Union President Abraham
Lincoln issues the Emancipation
Proclamation, declaring all slaves in the
Confederate states free and emphasizing
their enlistment in the Union army
• The war becomes a revolutionary struggle
to abolish slavery
South loses a leader
• May 10 the Confederates suffer a huge
blow when “Stonewall” Jackson dies 6
days after suffering injuries at the
battle of Chancellorville, Virginia
• The fatal wounds were accidentally
inflicted by his own troops
Battle of Gettysburg
• The tide of the war
turns for the North
as the South suffers
a defeat at
Gettysburg
• This was the
northernmost battle
of the war
Lincoln meets Douglas
• August 10
President Lincoln
meets with
abolitionist
Frederick Douglas
who pushes for full
equality for Union
“Negro troops”
Cemetery Dedication
• November 19, 1863 President Lincoln
delivers a two minute speech
dedicating a Cemetery at Gettysburg,
Pennsylvania
• This would forever be known at The
Gettysburg Address
Grant’s march to Richmond
• May 1864 General Grant takes an army of
120,000 Union troops toward Richmond to
attack General Robert E. Lee’s troops, now
numbering 64,000
• Major battles ensue at Wilderness and
Spotsylvania, Virginia leading up to the
battle at Cold Harbor
Grant’s error
• General Grant
makes tactical error
while attacking
well fortified Cold
Harbor resulting
loss of 7000 troops
in twenty minutes
Sherman takes Atlanta
• September 2, 1864
Union General
Sherman captures
Atlanta
• November 15 before
his march to the sea he
destroys Atlanta’s
warehouses and
railroad yards
March to the Sea
• December 21, 1864 General Sherman
arrives at Savannah, Georgia leaving a
300 mile path of destruction over 60
miles wide in his wake
• Sherman offers President Lincoln
Savannah as “a Christmas present”
The 13th Amendment
• January 31, 1865 Congress
approves the 13th Amendment to
the United States Constitution, to
abolish slavery
• It is sent to the states for
ratification
Richmond Abandoned
• April 2, 1865 Grant
breaks through
Lee’s troops at
Petersburg, Virginia
• Confederates
abandon Capital at
Richmond
Confederate Surrender
• April 9, 1865 General Robert E.
Lee surrenders his troops to
General Grant at Appomattox
Court House, Virginia
Lincoln Assassinated
• April 14, 1865 At
10:13pm while
watching the third act
of the play “Our
American Cousin”
with his wife Mary,
President Lincoln is
shot and killed by
John Wilkes Boothe
The War Ends
• May 1865 The remaining
Confederate troops surrender
reuniting a country after four
years and 620,000 deaths