Portal:American Civil War

The American Civil War Portal

Reenactor discharging his musket

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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USS Dictator was a single-turreted ironclad monitor, designed for speed, and to sail on the open sea. Originally to be named Protector, the Navy Department preferred a more aggressive name, and she was renamed Dictator. Despite her being designed for speed, design problems limited her to a maximum of 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph). She served in two different periods; from 1864 to 1865, serving with the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron, and from 1869 to 1877, with the North Atlantic Fleet. After her final decommissioning in 1877, she was sold for scrap in 1883. (Full article...)

Grand Parade of the States

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John Milton Hay (October 8, 1838 – July 1, 1905) was an American statesman and official whose career in government stretched over almost half a century. Beginning as a private secretary for Abraham Lincoln, he became a diplomat. He served as United States Secretary of State under Presidents William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt. Hay was also a biographer of Lincoln, and wrote poetry and other literature throughout his life.

Born in Salem, Indiana to an anti-slavery family that moved to Warsaw, Illinois, Hay showed great potential from an early age, and his family sent him to Brown University. After graduation in 1858, Hay read law in his uncle's office in Springfield, Illinois, adjacent to that of Lincoln. Hay worked for Lincoln's successful presidential campaign and became one of his private secretaries in the White House. Throughout the American Civil War, Hay was close to Lincoln and stood by his deathbed after the President was shot. In addition to his other literary works, Hay co-authored, with John George Nicolay, Lincoln's other private secretary, a ten-volume biography of Lincoln that helped shape the assassinated president's historical image. (Full article...)

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Featured picture

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

Did you know...

... that Edward W. Gantt was a Confederate soldier who defected to the Union during the American Civil War?
... that Dethloff Willrodt fought for the Union army on the first day of the Battle of Gettysburg on July 1, 1863, having previously been a soldier in the Confederate army?
... 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 Charles Herman Allen, university administrator and American Civil War captain, opened the University of Wisconsin to female enrollment in 1863?
... that the Union Navy, despite being embroiled in the American Civil War, built the Wampanoag-class frigates for a planned war against Great Britain?
... that Nereus Mendenhall led a delegation to the Confederate States Congress in April 1862 to allow military exemption in the Confederate Army for Quakers?

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American Civil War

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Aftermath of the American Civil War

Confederate States of America

Cultural history of the American Civil War

Economic history of the American Civil War

Military awards and decorations of the American Civil War

Military history of the American Civil War

Military units and formations of the American Civil War

American Civil War on the National Register of Historic Places

Origins of the American Civil War

Politics of the American Civil War

Social history of the American Civil War

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Union (American Civil War)

War crimes in the American Civil War

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Attention needed: ...to referencing and citation • ...to coverage and accuracy • ...to structure • ...to grammar • ...to supporting materials
Popular pages: Full list
Cleanup needed: The West Tennessee Raids
Requested articles: Benjamin D. Fearing • James B. Speers • Charles S. Steedman • Battle of Barton's Station • Lawrence P. Graham • Frederick S. Sturmbaugh • Mexico and the American Civil War • Savannah Campaign Confederate order of battle • Battle of Lafayette • Battle of Sunshine Church • Tangier Difficulty • Requested American Civil War Medal of Honor recipients • Battle of Tazewell • John T. Sprague
Expansion needed: Battle of Boonsborough • Battle of Guard Hill • Battle of Rice's Station • Battle of Simmon's Bluff • Battle of Summit Point • Charleston Arsenal • Edenton Bell Battery • First Battle of Dalton • Blackshear Prison • Edwin Forbes • Hiram B. Granbury • Henry Thomas Harrison • Louis Hébert (colonel) • Benjamin G. Humphreys • Maynard Carbine • Hezekiah G. Spruill • Smith carbine • Edward C. Walthall • Confederate States Secretary of the Navy • Confederate States Secretary of the Treasury • David Henry Williams • Battle of Rome Cross Roads • Delaware in the American Civil War • Ironclad Board • United States Military Railroad • Kansas in the American Civil War • Rufus Daggett • Ebenezer Magoffin • Confederate Quartermaster-General's Department • First Corps, Army of Northern Virginia • Francis Laurens Vinton • Henry Maury • Smith's Expedition to Tupelo • Ambrose Dudley Mann • Patrick Neeson Lynch • Stone Fleet (add international reactions and diplomacy) • Other American Civil War battle stubs • Other American Civil War stubs
Images needed: Preston Pond, Jr. • Melancthon Smith
Merging needed: 1st Regiment New York Mounted Rifles and 7th Regiment New York Volunteer Cavalry
Citations needed: 1st Alabama Cavalry Regiment (Union) • 4th Maine Battery • 33rd Ohio Infantry • 110th New York Volunteer Infantry • Battle of Hatcher's Run • Camp Dennison • Confederate colonies • CSS Resolute • Dakota War of 1862 • Florida in the American Civil War • Ethan A. Hitchcock (general) • Fort Harker (Alabama) • Gettysburg (1993 film) • Iowa in the American Civil War • Second Battle of Fort Sumter • Samuel Benton
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