Portal:American Civil War

Portal topics: Activities; Culture; Geography; Health; History; Mathematics; Nature; People; Philosophy; Religion; Society; Technology; Random portal

The American Civil War Portal

The 54th Massachusetts assaulted Fort Wagner

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)

Refresh with new selections below (purge)

Featured article

The regimental monument of the 22nd Massachusetts on Sickles Road, near the Wheatfield, on the Gettysburg Battlefield

The 22nd Regiment Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry was an infantry regiment in the Union army during the American Civil War. The 22nd Massachusetts was organized by Senator Henry Wilson (future Vice-president during the Ulysses Grant administration) and was therefore known as "Henry Wilson's Regiment." It was formed in Boston, Massachusetts, and established on September 28, 1861, for a term of three years.

Arriving in Washington in October 1861, the regiment spent the following winter in camp at Hall's Hill, near Arlington in Virginia. It became part of the Army of the Potomac, with which it would be associated for its entire term of service. The regiment saw its first action during the siege of Yorktown in April 1862. It was involved in the Peninsular campaign, particularly the Battle of Gaines' Mill during which it suffered its worst casualties (numerically) of the war. Their worst casualties in terms of percentages took place during the Battle of Gettysburg (60 percent). The 22nd Massachusetts was present for virtually all of the major battles in which the Army of the Potomac fought, including the Second Battle of Bull Run, the Battle of Antietam, the Battle of Fredericksburg, the Battle of Chancellorsville, the Battle of Gettysburg and Lieutenant General Ulysses Grant's Overland campaign. The 22nd was especially proficient in skirmish drill and was frequently deployed in that capacity throughout the war. (Full article...)

More featured articles

Grand Parade of the States

During the American Civil War, Arkansas was a Confederate state, though it had initially voted to remain in the Union. Following the capture of Fort Sumter in April 1861, Abraham Lincoln called for troops from every Union state to put down the rebellion, and Arkansas along several other southern states seceded. For the rest of the civil war, Arkansas played a major role in controlling the Mississippi River, a major waterway.

Arkansas raised 48 infantry regiments, 20 artillery batteries, and over 20 cavalry regiments for the Confederacy, mostly serving in the Western Theater, though the Third Arkansas served with distinction in the Army of Northern Virginia. Major-General Patrick Cleburne was the state's most notable military leader. The state also supplied four infantry regiments, four cavalry regiments and one artillery battery of white troops for the Union and six infantry regiments and one artillery battery of "U.S. Colored Troops." (Full article...)

More states articles

Featured biography

Anderson c. 1864

William T. Anderson (c. 1840 – October 26, 1864), known by the nickname "Bloody Bill" Anderson, was a soldier who was one of the deadliest and most notorious Confederate guerrilla leaders in the American Civil War. Anderson led a band of volunteer partisan raiders who targeted Union loyalists and federal soldiers in the states of Missouri and Kansas.

Raised by a family of Southerners in Kansas, Anderson began to support himself by stealing and selling horses in 1862. After a former friend and secessionist turned Union loyalist judge killed his father, Anderson killed the judge and fled to Missouri. There he robbed travelers and killed several Union soldiers. In early 1863 he joined Quantrill's Raiders, a group of Confederate guerrillas which operated along the Kansas–Missouri border. He became a skilled bushwhacker, earning the trust of the group's leaders, William Quantrill and George M. Todd. Anderson's bushwhacking marked him as a dangerous man and eventually led the Union to imprison his sisters. After a building collapse in the makeshift jail in Kansas City, Missouri, left one of them dead in custody and the other permanently maimed, Anderson devoted himself to revenge. He took a leading role in the Lawrence Massacre and later took part in the Battle of Baxter Springs, both in 1863. (Full article...)

More featured biographies

WikiProjects

edit

Featured picture

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

Did you know...

... that Dubuque, Arkansas, was destroyed in the American Civil War and is now covered by the waters of Bull Shoals Lake?
... 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 Enoch Marvin Banks resigned from the University of Florida because of public outrage over his belief that the American Civil War was caused by slavery?
... that Byron Root Pierce was Michigan's last living Civil War general?
... that the only functioning secondary school in Mississippi during the American Civil War was founded by Thomas S. Gathright?
... 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?