Portal:American Civil War

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The American Civil War Portal

Allan Pinkerton and his detectives at Antietam

The American Civil War (1861–1865) was a sectional rebellion against the United States of America by the Confederate States, formed of eleven southern states' governments which moved to secede from the Union after the 1860 election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States. The Union's victory was eventually achieved by leveraging advantages in population, manufacturing and logistics and through a strategic naval blockade denying the Confederacy access to the world's markets.

In many ways, the conflict's central issues – the enslavement of African Americans, the role of constitutional federal government, and the rights of states – are still not completely resolved. Not surprisingly, the Confederate army's surrender at Appomattox on April 9,1865 did little to change many Americans' attitudes toward the potential powers of central government. The passage of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments to the Constitution in the years immediately following the war did not change the racial prejudice prevalent among Americans of the day; and the process of Reconstruction did not heal the deeply personal wounds inflicted by four brutal years of war and more than 970,000 casualties – 3 percent of the population, including approximately 560,000 deaths. As a result, controversies affected by the war's unresolved social, political, economic and racial tensions continue to shape contemporary American thought. The causes of the war, the reasons for the outcome, and even the name of the war itself are subjects of much discussion even today. (Full article)

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Osage at anchor

USS Osage was a single-turreted Neosho-class monitor built for the Union Navy during the American Civil War. After completion in mid-1863 by Edward Hartt, the ship patrolled the Mississippi River against Confederate raids and ambushes as part of Rear Admiral David Porter's Mississippi Squadron. Osage participated in the Red River Campaign in March–May 1864, during which she supported the capture of Fort DeRussy in March and participated in the Battle of Blair's Landing in April. The ship was grounded on a sandbar for six months after the end of the campaign and badly damaged. Osage, after being refloated and repaired, was transferred to the West Gulf Blockading Squadron in early 1865 for the campaign against Mobile, Alabama. During the Battle of Spanish Fort in March 1865 she struck a mine and rapidly sank. The ship was later salvaged and sold in 1867. (Full article...)

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Grand Parade of the States

South Carolina was the first state to secede from the Union in December 1860, and was one of the founding member states of the Confederacy in February 1861. The bombardment of the beleaguered U.S. garrison at Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor on April 12, 1861, is generally recognized as the first military engagement of the war. The retaking of Charleston in February 1865, and raising the flag (the same flag) again at Fort Sumter, was used for the Union symbol of victory.

South Carolina provided around 60,000 troops for the Confederate Army. As the war progressed, former slaves and free blacks of South Carolina joined U.S. Colored Troops regiments for the Union Army (most Blacks in South Carolina were enslaved at the war's outset). The state also provided uniforms, textiles, food, and war material, as well as trained soldiers and leaders from The Citadel and other military schools. In contrast to most other Confederate states, South Carolina had a well-developed rail network linking all of its major cities without a break of gauge. (Full article...)

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Prince Romerson (c. 1840 – March 30, 1872) was a Union Army soldier of Native Hawaiian descent. One of the "Hawaiʻi Sons of the Civil War", he was among a group of more than 100 documented Native Hawaiian and Hawaii-born combatants who fought in the American Civil War while the Kingdom of Hawaii was still an independent nation.

Living in the American Northeast before the war, Romerson enlisted in the Union Navy in 1863 as part of the Blockading Squadrons responsible for maintaining the blockade of the ports of the Confederacy. After being discharged from naval service, he reenlisted in the Union Army under the 5th Regiment Massachusetts Colored Volunteer Cavalry, a United States Colored (USCT) regiment, and was promoted to the rank of sergeant on June 1, 1864. Romerson fought with the 5th USCC until the end of the war. Illness prevented him from continuing with his regiment's reassignment to Clarksville, Texas, and he was mustered out in 1865. After the war, like many former USCT veterans, he remained in the army on the frontier as one of the Buffalo Soldiers. He died in 1872. (Full article...)

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Image 1Ambrose Burnside, by Matthew Brady
Image 2Christian Fleetwood
Image 3Daniel McCallum, by the Brady National Photographic Art Gallery
Image 4George Armstrong Custer, by George L. Andrews
Image 5Battle of Kennesaw Mountain, by Alfred Waud
Image 6Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, by Thure de Thulstrup
Image 7Lithographic facsimile of the Bixby letter, by Huber's Museum
Image 8Abraham Lincoln's private secretary and biographer John Hay
Image 9Battle of Fort Sanders, by Kurz and Allison
Image 10The burning of Columbia at Columbia, South Carolina in the American Civil War, by William Waud
Image 11Assassination of Abraham Lincoln
Image 12The print version of Sherman in South Carolina: The burning of McPhersonville at McPhersonville, South Carolina, by William Waud
Image 13Battle of Harpers Ferry, by Robert Knox Sneden
Image 14First Battle of Bull Run map
Image 15Quaker guns, by George Barnard and James F. Gibson
Image 16Harriet Tubman
Image 17Siege of Yorktown, by James F. Gibson
Image 18John Lorimer Worden, by Mathew Brady
Image 19William H. Seward, United States Secretary of State during the American Civil War
Image 20Ulysses S. Grant, by Thure de Thulstrup
Image 21Military execution of the conspirators in the Abraham Lincoln assassination
Image 22African-American Civil War soldiers
Image 23David Dixon Porter, by Mathew Brady
Image 24Braxton Bragg
Image 25Abner Doubleday
Image 26The Chickahominy – Sumner's Upper Bridge at Peninsula campaign, by William McIlvaine
Image 27President Rutherford B. Hayes was the 19th President of the USA
Image 28John A. Dahlgren, by Mathew Brady
Image 29Confederate casualties at Chancellorsville during the American Civil War, by the National Archives and Records Administration
Image 30Atlanta roundhouse ruin at History of Atlanta, by George Barnard
Image 31John F. Reynolds, by Alfred Rudolph Waud
Image 32Pickett's Charge, by Thure de Thulstrup
Image 33Charles Griffin
Image 34Richmond, Virginia after the American Civil War
Image 35Allan Pinkerton, President Lincoln, and John A. McClernand in 1862 by Alexander Gardner
Image 36Robert E. Lee, by Levin Corbin Handy
Image 37United States President (and former Brigadier-General) Benjamin Harrison
Image 38George Atzerodt, by Alexander Gardner
Image 39Christopher Raymond Perry Rodgers
Image 40Francis B. Spinola, Brigadier General for the Union in the American Civil War, and Congressman from New York
Image 41The original sketch of Sherman in South Carolina: The burning of McPhersonville, at and by William Waud
Image 42William Birney
Image 43Andersonville Prison at Andersonville National Historic Site, by John L. Ransom
Image 44Andersonville survivor
Image 45Charles Pomeroy Stone
Image 46Battle of Franklin, by Kurz and Allison

Did you know...

... that Emma Dean Powell received a pass from General Ulysses S. Grant to accompany her husband to battlefield camps during the American Civil War after he lost his arm?
... that Chinese-born Joseph Pierce enlisted as a Union Army soldier, fought at the Battle of Gettysburg during the American Civil War, and was made a corporal?
... that at the Battle of La Haye-du-Puits in July 1944, a Confederate flag dating to the American Civil War was raised over the town?
... that Colonel Bradley Winslow was brevetted by US president Abraham Lincoln for "brave and gallant conduct" during the siege of Petersburg in the American Civil War?
... that in the aftermath of the American Civil War, the only Black-led organization providing teachers to formerly enslaved people was the African Civilization Society?
... that The Land We Love, a little magazine that merged into Southern Magazine, printed American Civil War recollections, poetry, agricultural material, and many works by female authors?