Download Important People of the Civil War

Robert E. Lee
 Member of a wealthy Virginia family – was a slaveholder
 distinguished himself as a leader during the Mexican-American
War
 Commander of the Confederate Army
 Greatest victories = Seven Days Battles, the Second Battle of Bull
Run, the Battle of Fredericksburg and the Battle of Chancellorsville,
but both of his campaigns to invade the North ended in failure.
 Also served as a senior military advisor to Jefferson Davis,
President of the Confederacy.
1. During which war did Robert E. Lee rise to military
prominence?
2. Which army did Lee command during the Civil War?
Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson
 Respected leader of the Confederacy
 Earned his nickname during the Battle of Bull Run when he
seemed to stand like a stone among the fighting.
 Was wounded during Battle of Bull Run died from
complications in 1863.
 Death = a devastating blow to both military expertise and
morale of the Confederate Army.
 Military historians consider Jackson to be one of the most
gifted tactical commanders in United States history. His
campaigns and military strategies are studied worldwide even
today as examples of innovative and bold leadership.
3. Describe Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson.
Ulysses S. Grant
 A northern abolitionist
 Chosen by Lincoln to lead the Union Army
 Served two terms as President of the United States, from 1869 to
1877.
 Grant first reached prominence by taking Forts Henry and
Donelson in 1862 in the first major Union victories of the war.
 Turned the tide of the war in favor of the North when he secured
Union control of the Mississippi by capturing Vicksburg
 Elected to the Presidency as a Republican
 Led radical reconstruction in the South. Tried to reduce violence by
groups like the Ku Klux Klan.
4. Which army did Ulysses S. Grant command?
5. Describe Grant’s political career.
William T. Sherman
 A Union general during the American Civil War
 Praised for his outstanding command of military strategy
 Criticized for the harshness of his "scorched earth" policies that he
implemented in conducting total war against the Confederate
States.
 In 1864, Sherman captured of the city of Atlanta, a military success
that contributed to the re-election of President Abraham Lincoln.
 Sherman's march through Georgia and the Carolinas further
undermined the Confederacy's ability to continue fighting.
 Accepted the surrender of all the Confederate armies in the
Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida in April 1865.
6. Why was Sherman’s capture of Atlanta and his march through
Georgia and the Carolinas regarded as an important victory for
the Union?
President Abraham Lincoln
 Elected President in 1860 after a controversial election (he was also
the 1st Republican President – Southern states almost immediately
began to secede.
 Issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, which freed slaves
in the Confederate states that had not rejoined the Union-could not
be enforced, but it did allow freed slaves to join the Union Army.
He hoped to give the war a moral focus beyond saving the Union.
 He used the emergency power of suspending the writ of habeas
corpus, which allowed the government to hold individuals in
defiance in prison indefinitely. (Later deemed unconstitutional).
 In 1865, he was reelected and in his inauguration speech,
encouraged the country to come together and to not punish the
South for the war.
 Assassinated on April 15, 1865
7. Why was the Emancipation Proclamation limited in its scope?
8. Did it seem through his actions that Lincoln did everything he could
to preserve the Union/get it back together again?