events leading to the civil war essay

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By: History.com Editors

Updated: April 20, 2023 | Original: October 15, 2009

The Civil War in the United States began in 1861, after decades of simmering tensions between northern and southern states over slavery, states’ rights and westward expansion. The election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860 caused seven southern states to secede and form the Confederate States of America; four more states soon joined them. The War Between the States, as the Civil War was also known, ended in Confederate surrender in 1865. The conflict was the costliest and deadliest war ever fought on American soil, with some 620,000 of 2.4 million soldiers killed, millions more injured and much of the South left in ruin.

Causes of the Civil War

In the mid-19th century, while the United States was experiencing an era of tremendous growth, a fundamental economic difference existed between the country’s northern and southern regions.

In the North, manufacturing and industry was well established, and agriculture was mostly limited to small-scale farms, while the South’s economy was based on a system of large-scale farming that depended on the labor of Black enslaved people to grow certain crops, especially cotton and tobacco.

Growing abolitionist sentiment in the North after the 1830s and northern opposition to slavery’s extension into the new western territories led many southerners to fear that the existence of slavery in America —and thus the backbone of their economy—was in danger.

Did you know? Confederate General Thomas Jonathan Jackson earned his famous nickname, "Stonewall," from his steadfast defensive efforts in the First Battle of Bull Run (First Manassas). At Chancellorsville, Jackson was shot by one of his own men, who mistook him for Union cavalry. His arm was amputated, and he died from pneumonia eight days later.

In 1854, the U.S. Congress passed the Kansas-Nebraska Act , which essentially opened all new territories to slavery by asserting the rule of popular sovereignty over congressional edict. Pro- and anti-slavery forces struggled violently in “ Bleeding Kansas ,” while opposition to the act in the North led to the formation of the Republican Party , a new political entity based on the principle of opposing slavery’s extension into the western territories. After the Supreme Court’s ruling in the Dred Scott case (1857) confirmed the legality of slavery in the territories, the abolitionist John Brown’s raid at Harper’s Ferry in 1859 convinced more and more southerners that their northern neighbors were bent on the destruction of the “peculiar institution” that sustained them. Abraham Lincoln ’s election in November 1860 was the final straw, and within three months seven southern states—South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and Texas—had seceded from the United States.

Outbreak of the Civil War (1861)

Even as Lincoln took office in March 1861, Confederate forces threatened the federal-held Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina. On April 12, after Lincoln ordered a fleet to resupply Sumter, Confederate artillery fired the first shots of the Civil War. Sumter’s commander, Major Robert Anderson, surrendered after less than two days of bombardment, leaving the fort in the hands of Confederate forces under Pierre G.T. Beauregard. Four more southern states—Virginia, Arkansas, North Carolina and Tennessee—joined the Confederacy after Fort Sumter. Border slave states like Missouri, Kentucky and Maryland did not secede, but there was much Confederate sympathy among their citizens.

Though on the surface the Civil War may have seemed a lopsided conflict, with the 23 states of the Union enjoying an enormous advantage in population, manufacturing (including arms production) and railroad construction, the Confederates had a strong military tradition, along with some of the best soldiers and commanders in the nation. They also had a cause they believed in: preserving their long-held traditions and institutions, chief among these being slavery.

In the First Battle of Bull Run (known in the South as First Manassas) on July 21, 1861, 35,000 Confederate soldiers under the command of Thomas Jonathan “Stonewall” Jackson forced a greater number of Union forces (or Federals) to retreat towards Washington, D.C., dashing any hopes of a quick Union victory and leading Lincoln to call for 500,000 more recruits. In fact, both sides’ initial call for troops had to be widened after it became clear that the war would not be a limited or short conflict.

The Civil War in Virginia (1862)

George B. McClellan —who replaced the aging General Winfield Scott as supreme commander of the Union Army after the first months of the war—was beloved by his troops, but his reluctance to advance frustrated Lincoln. In the spring of 1862, McClellan finally led his Army of the Potomac up the peninsula between the York and James Rivers, capturing Yorktown on May 4. The combined forces of Robert E. Lee and Jackson successfully drove back McClellan’s army in the Seven Days’ Battles (June 25-July 1), and a cautious McClellan called for yet more reinforcements in order to move against Richmond. Lincoln refused, and instead withdrew the Army of the Potomac to Washington. By mid-1862, McClellan had been replaced as Union general-in-chief by Henry W. Halleck, though he remained in command of the Army of the Potomac.

Lee then moved his troops northwards and split his men, sending Jackson to meet Pope’s forces near Manassas, while Lee himself moved separately with the second half of the army. On August 29, Union troops led by John Pope struck Jackson’s forces in the Second Battle of Bull Run (Second Manassas). The next day, Lee hit the Federal left flank with a massive assault, driving Pope’s men back towards Washington. On the heels of his victory at Manassas, Lee began the first Confederate invasion of the North. Despite contradictory orders from Lincoln and Halleck, McClellan was able to reorganize his army and strike at Lee on September 14 in Maryland, driving the Confederates back to a defensive position along Antietam Creek, near Sharpsburg.

On September 17, the Army of the Potomac hit Lee’s forces (reinforced by Jackson’s) in what became the war’s bloodiest single day of fighting. Total casualties at the Battle of Antietam (also known as the Battle of Sharpsburg) numbered 12,410 of some 69,000 troops on the Union side, and 13,724 of around 52,000 for the Confederates. The Union victory at Antietam would prove decisive, as it halted the Confederate advance in Maryland and forced Lee to retreat into Virginia. Still, McClellan’s failure to pursue his advantage earned him the scorn of Lincoln and Halleck, who removed him from command in favor of Ambrose E. Burnside . Burnside’s assault on Lee’s troops near Fredericksburg on December 13 ended in heavy Union casualties and a Confederate victory; he was promptly replaced by Joseph “Fighting Joe” Hooker , and both armies settled into winter quarters across the Rappahannock River from each other.

After the Emancipation Proclamation (1863-4)

Lincoln had used the occasion of the Union victory at Antietam to issue a preliminary Emancipation Proclamation , which freed all enslaved people in the rebellious states after January 1, 1863. He justified his decision as a wartime measure, and did not go so far as to free the enslaved people in the border states loyal to the Union. Still, the Emancipation Proclamation deprived the Confederacy of the bulk of its labor forces and put international public opinion strongly on the Union side. Some 186,000 Black Civil War soldiers would join the Union Army by the time the war ended in 1865, and 38,000 lost their lives.

In the spring of 1863, Hooker’s plans for a Union offensive were thwarted by a surprise attack by the bulk of Lee’s forces on May 1, whereupon Hooker pulled his men back to Chancellorsville. The Confederates gained a costly victory in the Battle of Chancellorsville , suffering 13,000 casualties (around 22 percent of their troops); the Union lost 17,000 men (15 percent). Lee launched another invasion of the North in June, attacking Union forces commanded by General George Meade on July 1 near Gettysburg, in southern Pennsylvania. Over three days of fierce fighting, the Confederates were unable to push through the Union center, and suffered casualties of close to 60 percent.

Meade failed to counterattack, however, and Lee’s remaining forces were able to escape into Virginia, ending the last Confederate invasion of the North. Also in July 1863, Union forces under Ulysses S. Grant took Vicksburg (Mississippi) in the Siege of Vicksburg , a victory that would prove to be the turning point of the war in the western theater. After a Confederate victory at Chickamauga Creek, Georgia, just south of Chattanooga, Tennessee, in September, Lincoln expanded Grant’s command, and he led a reinforced Federal army (including two corps from the Army of the Potomac) to victory in the Battle of Chattanooga in late November.

Toward a Union Victory (1864-65)

In March 1864, Lincoln put Grant in supreme command of the Union armies, replacing Halleck. Leaving William Tecumseh Sherman in control in the West, Grant headed to Washington, where he led the Army of the Potomac towards Lee’s troops in northern Virginia. Despite heavy Union casualties in the Battle of the Wilderness and at Spotsylvania (both May 1864), at Cold Harbor (early June) and the key rail center of Petersburg (June), Grant pursued a strategy of attrition, putting Petersburg under siege for the next nine months.

Sherman outmaneuvered Confederate forces to take Atlanta by September, after which he and some 60,000 Union troops began the famous “March to the Sea,” devastating Georgia on the way to capturing Savannah on December 21. Columbia and Charleston, South Carolina, fell to Sherman’s men by mid-February, and Jefferson Davis belatedly handed over the supreme command to Lee, with the Confederate war effort on its last legs. Sherman pressed on through North Carolina, capturing Fayetteville, Bentonville, Goldsboro and Raleigh by mid-April.

Meanwhile, exhausted by the Union siege of Petersburg and Richmond, Lee’s forces made a last attempt at resistance, attacking and captured the Federal-controlled Fort Stedman on March 25. An immediate counterattack reversed the victory, however, and on the night of April 2-3 Lee’s forces evacuated Richmond. For most of the next week, Grant and Meade pursued the Confederates along the Appomattox River, finally exhausting their possibilities for escape. Grant accepted Lee’s surrender at Appomattox Court House on April 9. On the eve of victory, the Union lost its great leader: The actor and Confederate sympathizer John Wilkes Booth assassinated President Lincoln at Ford’s Theatre in Washington on April 14. Sherman received Johnston’s surrender at Durham Station, North Carolina on April 26, effectively ending the Civil War.

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From States’ Rights to Slavery: What Caused the American Civil War?

The Northern and Southern sections of the United States developed along different lines. The South remained a predominantly agrarian economy while the North became more and more industrialized. Different social cultures and political beliefs developed. All of this led to disagreements on issues such as taxes, tariffs and internal improvements as well as states’ rights versus federal rights. At the crux of it all, however, was the fight over slavery.

Causes of the Civil War

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The burning issue that led to the disruption of the union was the debate over the future of slavery. That dispute led to secession, and secession brought about a war in which the Northern and Western states and territories fought to preserve the Union, and the South fought to establish Southern independence as a new confederation of states under its own constitution.

The agrarian South utilized slaves to tend its large plantations and perform other duties. On the eve of the Civil War, some 4 million Africans and their descendants toiled as slave laborers in the South. Slavery was interwoven into the Southern economy even though only a relatively small portion of the population actually owned slaves. Slaves could be rented or traded or sold to pay debts. Ownership of more than a handful of slaves bestowed respect and contributed to social position, and slaves, as the property of individuals and businesses, represented the largest portion of the region’s personal and corporate wealth, as cotton and land prices declined and the price of slaves soared.

The states of the North, meanwhile, one by one had gradually abolished slavery. A steady flow of immigrants, especially from Ireland and Germany during the potato famine of the 1840s and 1850s, insured the North a ready pool of laborers, many of whom could be hired at low wages, diminishing the need to cling to the institution of slavery.

Th e Dred Scott Decision

Dred Scott was a slave who sought citizenship through the American legal system, and whose case eventually ended up in the Supreme Court. The famous Dred Scott Decision in 1857 denied his request stating that no person with African blood could become a U.S. citizen. Besides denying citizenship for African-Americans, it also overturned the Missouri Compromise of 1820, which had restricted slavery in certain U.S. territories.

States’ Rights

States’ Rights refers to the struggle between the federal government and individual states over political power. In the Civil War era, this struggle focused heavily on the institution of slavery and whether the federal government had the right to regulate or even abolish slavery within an individual state. The sides of this debate were largely drawn between northern and southern states, thus widened the growing divide within the nation.

Abolitionist Movement

By the early 1830s, those who wished to see that institution abolished within the United States were becoming more strident and influential. They claimed obedience to “higher law” over obedience to the Constitution’s guarantee that a fugitive from one state would be considered a fugitive in all states. The fugitive slave act along with the publishing of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin helped expand the support for abolishing slavery nationwide.

Harriet Beecher S towe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin

Harriet Beecher Stowe’s anti-slavery novel Uncle Tom’s Cabins was published in serial form in an anti-slavery newspaper in 1851 and in book format in 1852. Within two years it was a nationwide and worldwide bestseller. Depicting the evils of slavery, it offered a vision of slavery that few in the nation had seen before. The book succeeded at its goal, which was to start a wave of anti-slavery sentiment across the nation. Upon meeting Stowe, President Lincoln remarked, “So you’re the little woman who wrote the book that started this great war.”

The Underground Railroad

Some abolitionists actively helped runaway slaves to escape via “the Underground Railroad,” and there were instances in which men, even lawmen, sent to retrieve runaways were attacked and beaten by abolitionist mobs. To the slave holding states, this meant Northerners wanted to choose which parts of the Constitution they would enforce, while expecting the South to honor the entire document. The most famous activist of the underground railroad was Harriet Tubman , a nurse and spy in the Civil War and known as the Moses of her people.

The Missouri Compromise

Additional territories gained from the U.S.–Mexican War of 1846–1848 heightened the slavery debate. Abolitionists fought to have slavery declared illegal in those territories, as the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 had done in the territory that became the states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin. Advocates of slavery feared that if the institution were prohibited in any states carved out of the new territories the political power of slaveholding states would be diminished, possibly to the point of slavery being outlawed everywhere within the United States. Pro- and anti-slavery groups rushed to populate the new territories.

In Kansas, particularly, violent clashes between proponents of the two ideologies occurred. One abolitionist in particular became famous—or infamous, depending on the point of view—for battles that caused the deaths of pro-slavery settlers in Kansas. His name was John Brown. Ultimately, he left Kansas to carry his fight closer to the bosom of slavery.

The Raid On Harpers Ferry

On the night of October 16, 1859, Brown and a band of followers seized the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia), in what is believed to have been an attempt to arm a slave insurrection. (Brown denied this at his trial, but evidence indicated otherwise.) They were dislodged by a force of U.S. Marines led by Army lieutenant colonel Robert E. Lee.

Brown was swiftly tried for treason against Virginia and hanged. Southern reaction initially was that his acts were those of a mad fanatic, of little consequence. But when Northern abolitionists made a martyr of him, Southerners came to believe this was proof the North intended to wage a war of extermination against white Southerners. Brown’s raid thus became a step on the road to war between the sections.

T he Election Of Abraham Lincoln

Exacerbating tensions, the old Whig political party was dying. Many of its followers joined with members of the American Party (Know-Nothings) and others who opposed slavery to form a new political entity in the 1850s, the Republican Party. When the Republican candidate Abraham Lincoln won the 1860 presidential election, Southern fears that the Republicans would abolish slavery reached a new peak. Lincoln was an avowed opponent of the expansion of slavery but said he would not interfere with it where it existed.

Southern Secession

That was not enough to calm the fears of delegates to an 1860 secession convention in South Carolina. To the surprise of other Southern states—and even to many South Carolinians—the convention voted to dissolve the state’s contract with the United States and strike off on its own.

South Carolina had threatened this before in the 1830s during the presidency of Andrew Jackson , over a tariff that benefited Northern manufacturers but increased the cost of goods in the South. Jackson had vowed to send an army to force the state to stay in the Union, and Congress authorized him to raise such an army (all Southern senators walked out in protest before the vote was taken), but a compromise prevented the confrontation from occurring.

Perhaps learning from that experience the danger of going it alone, in 1860 and early 1861 South Carolina sent emissaries to other slave holding states urging their legislatures to follow its lead, nullify their contract with the United States and form a new Southern Confederacy. Six more states heeded the siren call: Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas. Others voted down secession—temporarily.

Fort Sumter

On April 10, 1861, knowing that resupplies were on their way from the North to the federal garrison at Fort Sumter in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina, provisional Confederate forces in Charleston demanded the fort’s surrender. The fort’s commander, Major Robert Anderson, refused. On April 12, the Confederates opened fire with cannons. At 2:30 p.m. the following day, Major Anderson surrendered.

War had begun. Lincoln called for volunteers to put down the Southern rebellion. Virginia, Arkansas, North Carolina and Tennessee, refusing to fight against other Southern states and feeling that Lincoln had exceeded his presidential authority, reversed themselves and voted in favor of session. The last one, Tennessee, did not depart until June 8, nearly a week after the first land battle had been fought at Philippi in Western Virginia. (The western section of Virginia rejected the session vote and broke away, ultimately forming a new, Union-loyal state, West Virginia. Other mountainous regions of the South, such as East Tennessee, also favored such a course but were too far from the support of Federal forces to attempt it.)

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11 Events That Led To The Civil War

The  American Civil War  is arguably the most important conflict that has taken place in United States history. While the Revolutionary War fought in the late 18th century for independence against the  British Empire  would lay the foundation for the United States, it was the Civil War that cemented the character and broad culture that would form modern-day America. While it is true that slavery was the main reason for the outbreak of the war, it would do the conflict a great injustice to not deeply explore the other complicated factors that existed on the peripheries that plunged the United States into the most devasting war that it ever fought. 

Industrialization

Soon after the  Industrial Revolution  first started to take hold in Great Britain in the late 18th century, it did not take long for these new ideas of manufacturing and business to take hold in the United States. By 1830, dozens of large cities in the United States resembled the smog-covered towns that were popping up all over  England . However, enthusiasm toward industry was not equally shared across the United States. The Northern states were more than happy to adopt the new discoveries made by the British, whereas the South was not so eager.

The South did not embrace heavy industry simply due to how its economy functioned. The South had always been a heavily agricultural and rural part of the nation that had little use in large factories, let alone large population centers in which to build them. The overwhelming amount of the Southern economy relied on cash crops like cotton, sugar, and tobacco. All of which were, of course, worked by enslaved people. 

As the North became more industrialized, the relative wealth gap between the two regions grew. On average, the Northern states were significantly richer than their Southern counterparts. This newfound wealth that the North now had over the South only fueled further resentment as the economic and cultural influence of the North started to manifest itself into political power. 

Sectionalism

Even today, it might be difficult to define one singular "American culture." A nation as big and diverse as the  United States  has always been a place of various lifestyles, all living within the same borders. This was even more evident in the 19th century in the lead-up to the Civil War. Since many people did not travel and lived their lives within the confines of their town or city, unique lifestyles and cultural attitudes sprung up in each state, city, town, and village. 

This often led many United States citizens to have a much closer attachment to their own local identity than any kind that existed on a national level. For example, it was not uncommon for someone born in Texas to think of themselves as a Texan first, a Southerner second, and an American last. This attitude only fueled the growing sense of disunity further. It was much easier for the North and South to fight one another considering how alien their customs, traditions, and day-to-day life were. Before the Civil War, a person in Alabama and New York probably had about as much in common as someone living in Mexico or  Quebec . 

Westward Expansion

Ever since the United States first became an independent nation, expanding its territorial holdings in the West was inevitable. As the United States started to settle in the West, more states would emerge out of the territory. While this was great for the United States from an economic standpoint, it was nothing short of a political disaster. The issue of slavery was already contentious by the beginning of the 19th century, and this problem was only made worse with the addition and formation of new states. 

Both the pro-slavery South and the anti-slavery North fought tooth and nail in  Washington  to make sure each new state was added to the Union and aligned with them on this issue. Both sides feared that if too many new states adopted the other side's position, it was only a matter of time before they would be fighting a lost cause. 

This problem was temporarily mended by the Compromise of 1850. As the United States government argued over whether or not the new territory seized in the Mexican-American War would outlaw slavery, it was agreed that  California  would join the Union as a free state, but it also ushered in much more robust and clear fugitive slave laws. This meant that any slave that escaped bondage to a free state must be returned to their enslaver by law. At the time, this compromise was hailed as a surefire way to avoid open conflict, but in reality, it only delayed the inevitable for another decade. Similar issues would arise in Kansas only a few years later with much more violent results. 

Bleeding Kansas

As the  Kansas  territory was nearing statehood in the late 1850s, both abolitionist and pro-slavery politicians jockeyed relentlessly for control of the state. The Kansas - Nebraska Act of 1854 set into law that both the new territories would be able to decide for themselves whether or not they would be a free state or a slave state. 

In theory, this was done to minimize bloodshed and reduce tension but in practice, it had the opposite effect. Armed groups from both sides of the fence swarmed into Kansas and enforced their political beliefs. In most cases, these mobs battled against one another, but this violence sometimes spilled over and affected newly arrived settlers who had little interest in the issue altogether. 

Between 1855 and 1859, around 55 people would be killed in these sporadic acts of violence. By the end of the 1850s, it was clear to most that the issue of slavery was not going to be solved by peaceful means and that some kind of conflict was not far away. 

Growing Abolitionist Movement

The Abolitionist Movement in the United States dates all the way back to colonial times in the early 1700s. Founded mostly by Christian sects like the Quakers , much of the early abolitionist movement was fueled by a religious justification that no man (both of whom were created by God) had any right to own another. By 1830, the abolitionist movement had gained traction across the Northern states and was starting to get more representation in the Senate and  Congress . As the name would suggest, abolitionists wanted the total eradication of slavery from the United States, something that was considered a radical position at the time.

Most Northern politicians, even if they wanted to, felt that slavery was something that could not be done away with and was something that could only be contained to the South. In the decades leading up to the Civil War, abolitionist groups became increasingly radical and even violent. In the eyes of the South, this only confirmed their deepest suspicions and paranoia that Northern anti-slavery zealots were indeed trying to rid them of an institution on which their entire economy and very way of life rested. 

The invention of the cotton gin in 1794 is often falsely credited as a device that began the slow death of slavery, but this is sadly not true. The cotton gin did not begin to phase out the need for slave-based labor but rather just increased the need for it.  Cotton  is a relatively easy crop to grow. It can be stored for long periods of time and does spoil or rot like wheat or corn. However, the most backbreaking work involved in harvesting cotton was the de-seeding. When done by hand, it would take a group of enslaved people multiple days to fully process 50 pounds of raw cotton. A single cotton gin was able to do the same amount of work in one day. 

It was hoped by some that since a hand-cranked machine now did the most arduous work of cotton harvested, the need for enslaved people would diminish. But enslavers did not see it that way. Many enslavers simply increased their production, profits, and, ultimately, the number of enslaved people they owned. Not only was slavery much more efficient due to the invention of the cotton gin, but it was now much more lucrative as well. 

Dred Scott Decision

Dred Scott was born into slavery in 1799 on a plantation in  Virginia . Scott moved around with his owner across many states but eventually ended up in  St. Louis  in 1830. Two years after he arrived in St. Louis, Scott's owner died, and he was sold to John Emerson, an army doctor who then took Scott to Illinois, a free state. 

Scott, his newlywed wife Harriet, and Emerson traveled through the United States for his work and other business. However, while in Iowa in 1846, Emerson died unexpectedly. When Emerson died, Scott and his entire family became the legal property of Emerson's wife, Irene. Scott tried to buy his freedom from Irine, but she was not interested. 

They eventually returned to St. Louis in 1846, and both Scott and Harriet filed a lawsuit against Irene for wrongful enslavement. They argued that since they had been taken to a free state, they were no longer enslaved and could not be thrown back into slavery. Both of them were illiterate but received an outpour of support from their church and abolitionists in the area. Even the original owners of Scott, the Blow family, offered assistance. 

They went to trial in 1847, and the judge ruled against them, but they were given a retrial and went to court once again in 1850, this time winning their freedom. This newfound liberty was short-lived, however, as they were taken to court once again by Irene and were forced back into slavery in 1853 under the authority of the Missouri Supreme Court. 

Scott and Irene continued to sue one another until the case was finally taken to the United States Supreme Court. After three years of legal battle, the United States Supreme Court ruled on the side of Irene and forced Scott and his entire family back into servitude. This decision outraged the abolitionists and drove them to take even more radical action. In many ways, it appeared as though violence was now the only solution to rid the United States of slavery once and for all. 

Raid On Harpers Ferry

One of the most famous and perhaps the most radical members of the abolitionist movement was the firebrand John Brown. Brown was deeply religious and thought that it was his God-given mission in life to erradicate slavery from the United States by any means necessary. Brown by no means shied away from bloodshed and was more than willing to kill enslavers and pro-slavery advocates if it led to total and complete abolition. In 1859, Brown, along with a small band consisting mostly of formerly enslaved people and his own sons, attacked the small town of Harpers Ferry in hopes of seizing the weapons and supplies that were stored at a small military depot. 

The attack was poorly coordinated, and Brown and his men were quickly surrounded as they stormed the armory. Unable to break out, they fought for another two days before surrendering to federal troops led by none other than future Confederate general  Robert E. Lee . When the dust settled, Brown and the remaining six men from his raiding party were all put to death for treason. Many Northerners disavowed the attack but it did not stop the South from using this as political ammunition. Many Southern politicians painted the entire abolitionist movement to be as violent and radical as Brown. Something that only drove the wedge deeper between the North and the South. 

The Southern Economy 

With the advent of the cotton gin and other labor-saving devices, the large plantations of the South were reaching new levels of productivity and profits. Despite the fact the import of new slaves from  Africa  was banned in 1808, the slave population in the South saw considerable growth in the decades leading up to the Civil War. The South's main exports, such as cotton, tobacco, and sugar, were made possible by a slave workforce that numbered close to 4 million in 1860. The Southern land-owning elite made an incalculable fortune off of this system.

It was very much in the interest of the land-owning elite to make sure that the institution of slavery was kept alive at all costs. Not only would the outlawing of slavery financially ruin the Southern elite, but it would also cause a ripple effect on the rest of the Southern economy as so many other industries were tied to it either directly or indirectly. Staring down total financial ruin, Southern aristocrats and politicians were totally unwilling to compromise, and this stubbornness eventually paved the road to war. 

Lincoln's Election 

In November 1860, the anti-slavery Republican candidate  Abraham Lincoln  was elected president of the United States. In the eyes of many Southern representatives, the election of Lincoln only ensured the eventual end of slavery and the total destruction of their economy and way of life. By the time Lincoln was sworn in as president in early 1861, seven Southern states had already seceded from the Union. This was something that Lincoln and the North never officially recognized as legitimate even as these rouge states continued to act entirely independently from the wishes of Washington DC. The election of Lincoln all but assured that there would be some sort of armed conflict over the issue of slavery. Something that came to fruition only a few months after he was inaugurated. 

Fort Sumter

In April 1861, the newly founded Confederacy marched a small group of soldiers to the walls of the Union-controlled  Fort Sumter  in South Carolina. The Confederates demanded the small Union garrison disband the fort and leave for friendly territory. When the Union commander refused, they were fired upon, and a small battle broke out between both sides. Heavily outnumbered and outgunned, the Union garrison surrendered not long after. Even though this "battle" was nothing short of a minor skirmish, it marked the first time the Union and Confederates engaged one another. Shortly after news of this battle broke, another seven states declared their allegiance to the Confederacy. The Civil War had officially begun. The attack on Fort Sumter is often cited as the one single event that kicked off the American Civil War. While this is technically true from a military standpoint, it was really just the culmination of decades worth of built-up tension and political ineptitude.

While it is true that the American Civil War was, at its core, about slavery, many other factors tied into why the issue of slavery could not be resolved peacefully. The problems that slavery had caused were not new but had actually plagued the United States since its inception. In many ways, it is incredible that the Civil War did not start sooner than it actually did. With both sides digging in their heels and refusing to budge, war was really the only conceivable way that slavery was ever going to be brought to an end. 

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The American Civil War: a Historical Overview

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Causes of the civil war, major events of the civil war, key figures and leaders, impact and consequences, legacy of the civil war, references:.

• McPherson, J. (1988). Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era. Oxford University Press.
• Foner, E. (2015). Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution, 1863-1877. Harper Perennial.
• Grose, H.R. (2019). Civil War Leadership and Mexican War Experience: Generals Zachary Taylor, Ulysses S. Grant, and Robert E. Lee. Routledge.

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Lesson Plan: Major Events Leading to the Civil War

Henry Clay and the Missouri Compromise

Harlow GIles Unger discussed the Missouri Compromise in 1820 and Henry Clay's role in postponing the Civil War.

Description

The American Civil War was fought from 1861 until 1865. Starting with the Missouri Compromise and ending with the election of Abraham Lincoln, this lesson discusses nine major events leading up to the war.

Have the students answer the following question before starting class. Discuss the students' answers with the class after they have had a chance to respond.

• What do you know about the events that led to the Civil War?

CONTENT/ASSIGNMENT:

Pass out the "Events Leading up to the Civil War Handout" (Google Doc) . Either individually or as a class, have the students view each of the video clips and complete the handout by describing each event and explain the significance. This assignment can also be altered by having the students answer guided questions (Google Doc) for each video.

Review the students' responses after giving students time to complete the videos.

VIDEO CLIP- The Missouri Compromise (5:20)

VIDEO CLIP- Nullification (1:54)

VIDEO CLIP- The Wilmot Proviso (3:16)

VIDEO CLIP- The Compromise of 1850 (6:18)

VIDEO CLIP- Uncle Tom’s Cabin and the Impact on the Nation (2:43)

VIDEO CLIP- The Kansas-Nebraska Act and Bleeding Kansas (4:05)

VIDEO CLIP- Dred and Harriet Scott and the Dred Scott Decision (4:37)

VIDEO CLIP- John Brown's 1859 Harpers Ferry Raid (8:14)

VIDEO CLIP- The Election of 1860 (2:02)

Have the students rank the nine events in order of significance. Students should be able to explain the reasons for their ranking. Students can also provide other events not included in the video clips.

Have the students answer the following question before exiting the class.

• In your opinion, was the Civil War inevitable? Explain why.

EXTENSION ACTIVITIES:

Create-a-Compromise- After the election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860, the South was quickly moving toward secession. Like the compromises in 1820 and 1850, develop a compromise that might appease the South and prevent the Civil War. What would each side have to give up to prevent secession? Which groups might be opposed to this compromise? How realistic do you think your compromise is?

Political Cartoon- Pick one of the events and create a political cartoon that explains the major issues involved.

Additional Resources

• Lesson Plan: The Mexican-American War
• Lesson Plan: Civil War Battles
• Lesson Plan: The Removal of Confederate Statues
• Events Leading up to the Civil War Handout - Google Docs
• Events Leading up to the Civil War Guided Questions - Google Docs
• Lesson Plan: Civil War Era and the Constitution
• Lesson Plan: Reconstruction Era
• Abolitionism
• Abraham Lincoln
• Bleeding Kansas
• Compromise Of 1850
• Dred Scott V. Sanford
• Election Of 1860
• Free States
• Fugitive Slave Laws
• Harpers Ferry
• Harriet Beecher Stowe
• Kansas- Nebraska Act
• Mexican- American War
• Nullification Crisis
• Political Party
• Popular Sovereignty
• President James Buchanan
• Steven A. Douglas
• Supreme Court
• Tariff Of 1828
• Tariff Of 1832
• Westward Expansion
• Wilmot Proviso

What Were the Top 4 Causes of the Civil War?

• M.A., History, University of Florida
• B.A., History, University of Florida

The question “what caused the U.S. Civil War ?” has been debated since the horrific conflict ended in 1865. As with most wars, however, there was no single cause.

Pressing Issues That Led to the Civil War

The Civil War erupted from a variety of long-standing tensions and disagreements about American life and politics. For nearly a century, the people and politicians of the Northern and Southern states had been clashing over the issues that finally led to war: economic interests, cultural values, the power of the federal government to control the states, and, most importantly, slavery in American society.

While some of these differences might have been resolved peacefully through diplomacy, the institution of slavery was not among them.

With a way of life steeped in age-old traditions of white supremacy and a mainly agricultural economy that depended on the labor of enslaved people, the Southern states viewed enslavement as essential to their very survival.

Slavery in the Economy and Society

At the time of the Declaration of Independence in 1776, the enslavement of people not only remained legal in all 13 British American colonies, but it also continued to play a significant role in their economies and societies.

Prior to the American Revolution, the institution of slavery in America had become firmly established as being limited to persons of African ancestry. In this atmosphere, the seeds of white supremacy were sown.

Even when the U.S. Constitution was ratified in 1789, very few Black people and no enslaved people were allowed to vote or own property.

However, a growing movement to abolish slavery had led many Northern states to enact abolitionist laws and abandon enslavement. With an economy based more on industry than agriculture, the North enjoyed a steady flow of European immigrants. As impoverished refugees from the potato famine of the 1840s and 1850s, many of these new immigrants could be hired as factory workers at low wages, thus reducing the need for enslaved people in the North.

In the Southern states, longer growing seasons and fertile soils had established an economy based on agriculture fueled by sprawling plantations owned by White people that depended on enslaved people to perform a wide range of duties.

When Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin in 1793, cotton became very profitable. This machine was able to reduce the time it took to separate seeds from the cotton. At the same time, the increase in the number of plantations willing to move from other crops to cotton created an even greater need for enslaved people. The Southern economy became a one-crop economy, depending on cotton and, therefore, on enslaved people.

Though it was often supported throughout the social and economic classes, not every White Southerner enslaved people. The population of the pro-slavery states was around 9.6 million in 1850   and only about 350,000 were enslavers.   This included many of the wealthiest families, a number of whom owned large plantations. At the start of the Civil War, at least 4 million enslaved people   were forced to live and work on the Southern plantations.

In contrast, industry ruled the economy of the North and less emphasis was on agriculture, though even that was more diverse. Many Northern industries were purchasing the South's raw cotton and turning it into finished goods.

This economic disparity also led to irreconcilable differences in societal and political views.

In the North, the influx of immigrants—many from countries that had long since abolished slavery—contributed to a society in which people of different cultures and classes lived and worked together.

The South, however, continued to hold onto a social order based on white supremacy in both private and political life, not unlike that under the rule of racial apartheid that persisted in South Africa for decades .

In both the North and South, these differences influenced views on the powers of the federal government to control the economies and cultures of the states.

States and Federal Rights

Since the time of the American Revolution , two camps emerged when it came to the role of government. Some people argued for greater rights for the states and others argued that the federal government needed to have more control.

The first organized government in the U.S. after the Revolution was under the Articles of Confederation. The 13 states formed a loose Confederation with a very weak federal government. However, when problems arose, the weaknesses of the Articles caused the leaders of the time to come together at the Constitutional Convention and create, in secret, the U.S. Constitution .

Strong proponents of states rights like Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry were not present at this meeting. Many felt that the new Constitution ignored the rights of states to continue to act independently. They felt that the states should still have the right to decide if they were willing to accept certain federal acts.

This resulted in the idea of nullification , whereby the states would have the right to rule federal acts unconstitutional. The federal government denied states this right. However, proponents such as John C. Calhoun —who resigned as vice president to represent South Carolina in the Senate—fought vehemently for nullification. When nullification would not work and many of the Southern states felt that they were no longer respected, they moved toward thoughts of secession.

Pro-slavery States and Free States

As America began to expand—first with the lands gained from the Louisiana Purchase and later with the Mexican War —the question arose of whether new states would be pro-slavery states or free states. An attempt was made to ensure that equal numbers of free states and pro-slavery states were admitted to the Union, but over time this proved difficult.

The Missouri Compromise passed in 1820. This established a rule that prohibited enslavement in states from the former Louisiana Purchase north of the latitude 36 degrees 30 minutes, with the exception of Missouri.

During the Mexican War, the debate began about what would happen with the new territories the U.S. expected to gain upon victory. David Wilmot proposed the Wilmot Proviso in 1846, which would ban enslavement in the new lands. This was shot down amid much debate.

The Compromise of 1850 was created by Henry Clay and others to deal with the balance between pro-slavery states and free states. It was designed to protect both Northern and Southern interests. When California was admitted as a free state, one of the provisions was the Fugitive Slave Act . This held individuals responsible for harboring freedom-seeking enslaved people, even if they were located in free states.

The  Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 was another issue that further increased tensions. It created two new territories that would allow the states to use popular sovereignty to determine whether they would be free states or pro-slavery states. The real issue occurred in Kansas where pro-slavery Missourians, called "Border Ruffians," began to pour into the state in an attempt to force it toward slavery.

Problems came to a head with a violent clash at Lawrence, Kansas. This caused it to become known as " Bleeding Kansas ." The fight even erupted on the floor of the Senate when anti-slavery proponent Sen. Charles Sumner of Massachusetts was beaten on the head by South Carolina Sen. Preston Brooks.

The Abolitionist Movement

Increasingly, Northerners became more polarized against enslavement. Sympathies began to grow for abolitionists and against enslavement and enslavers. Many in the North came to view enslavement as not just socially unjust, but morally wrong.

The abolitionists came with a variety of viewpoints. People such as William Lloyd Garrison and Frederick Douglass wanted immediate freedom for all enslaved people. A group that included Theodore Weld and Arthur Tappan advocated for emancipating enslaved people slowly. Still others, including Abraham Lincoln, simply hoped to keep slavery from expanding.

A number of events helped fuel the cause for abolition in the 1850s.  Harriet Beecher Stowe  wrote " Uncle Tom's Cabin ," a popular novel that opened many eyes to the reality of enslavement. The Dred Scott Case  brought the issues of enslaved peoples' rights, freedom, and citizenship to the Supreme Court.

Additionally, some abolitionists took a less peaceful route to fighting against slavery. John Brown and his family fought on the anti-slavery side of "Bleeding Kansas." They were responsible for the Pottawatomie Massacre, in which they killed five settlers who were pro-slavery. Yet, Brown's best-known fight would be his last when the group attacked Harper's Ferry in 1859, a crime for which he would hang.

The Election of Abraham Lincoln

The politics of the day were as stormy as the anti-slavery campaigns. All of the issues of the young nation were dividing the political parties and reshaping the established two-party system of Whigs and Democrats.

The Democratic party was divided between factions in the North and South. At the same time, the conflicts surrounding Kansas and the Compromise of 1850 transformed the Whig party into the Republican party (established in 1854). In the North, this new party was seen as both anti-slavery and for the advancement of the American economy. This included the support of industry and encouraging homesteading while advancing educational opportunities. In the South, Republicans were seen as little more than divisive.

The presidential election of 1860 would be the deciding point for the Union. Abraham Lincoln represented the new Republican Party and Stephen Douglas , the Northern Democrat, was seen as his biggest rival. The Southern Democrats put John C. Breckenridge on the ballot. John C. Bell represented the Constitutional Union Party, a group of conservative Whigs hoping to avoid secession.

The country's divisions were clear on Election Day. Lincoln won the North, Breckenridge the South, and Bell the border states. Douglas won only Missouri and a portion of New Jersey. It was enough for Lincoln to win the popular vote, as well as 180 electoral votes .

Even though things were already near a boiling point after Lincoln was elected, South Carolina issued its "Declaration of the Causes of Secession " on December 24, 1860. They believed that Lincoln was anti-slavery and in favor of Northern interests.

President James Buchanan's administration did little to quell the tension or stop what would become known as " Secession Winter ." Between Election Day and Lincoln's inauguration in March, seven states seceded from the Union: South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas.

In the process, the South took control of federal installations, including forts in the region, which would give them a foundation for war. One of the most shocking events occurred when one-quarter of the nation's army surrendered in Texas under the command of General David E. Twigg. Not a single shot was fired in that exchange, but the stage was set for the bloodiest war in American history.

Edited by Robert Longley

DeBow, J.D.B. "Part II: Population." Statistical View of the United States, Compendium of the Seventh Census . Washington: Beverley Tucker, 1854. 

De Bow, J.D.B. " Statistical view of the United States in 1850 ." Washington: A.O.P. Nicholson. 

Kennedy, Joseph C.G. Population of the United States 1860: Compiled from the Original Returns of the 8th Census . Washington DC: Government Printing Office, 1864.

• Order of Secession During the American Civil War
• American Civil War: Causes of Conflict
• Slavery in 19th Century America
• The American Civil War and Secession
• The Hoax That a Tariff Provoked the Civil War
• Did Uncle Tom's Cabin Help to Start the Civil War?
• The Road to the Civil War
• American History Timeline 1851–1860
• The Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854
• Lecompton Constitution
• The Missouri Compromise
• The Corwin Amendment, Enslavement, and Abraham Lincoln
• Top 9 Events That Led to the Civil War
• U.S. Legislative Compromises Over Enslavement, 1820–1854
• Bleeding Kansas
• The Crittenden Compromise to Prevent the Civil War

6 Primary Sources from the American Civil War

Sign up today to receive a packet of reprinted primary sources that matches this lesson plan.

Each of these documents examines an important moment or principle the events and experiences of the American Civil War. Starting with secession, highlighting turning point battles, examining one of the most famous speeches in U.S. History, featuring a soldier’s last letter, and including a paper that symbolized the end of the war for many soldiers, this packet provides an opportunity to look at Civil War history up-close.

Below, you’ll find everything you’ll need to customize a lesson or pick and choose what’s most helpful to your student’s interests and learning needs. 

Common Core Standards and National Council for Social Studies Standards related to the documents and resources of this lesson plan are included at the end of the page.

On December 20, 1860, the state of South Carolina passed an ordinance of secession, declaring itself separate from the rest of the United States. Following decades of growing tension over slavery between regions, the nation was tearing apart. Four months later on April 12, 1861, the first shots of the American Civil War were fired at Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina, and with hindsight the secession ordinances of the southern states, sparked the most costly conflict in U.S. History.

As you examine the document and historical context resources, these questions may be helpful: 

• What type of response do you think the publisher wanted with this headline?
• Does the newspaper give a reason for secession? Does it give a lot of background?
• What would your reaction be if someone handled you this newspaper page in 1861? 

Transcription

• View PDF here

Primary Source Background

• Charleston Mercury

Historical Context Articles

• Trigger Events of the Civil War: Decades of Division
• The Gathering Storm: The Secession Crisis
• Voices of Secession
• What Caused the Civil War?
• Fort Sumter Animated Map
• Charleston & Fort Sumter Virtual Tour

Additional Primary Sources

• Secession Acts of the Thirteen Confederate States

By the late spring of 1863, the city of Vicksburg in Mississippi was the last Confederate stronghold on the Mississippi River. Union General Ulysses S. Grant prepared a siege to capture the city and the Confederate defenders led by General John C. Pemberton. As the siege dragged on for weeks, civilians were caught in the fighting and tried to seek safety by living in underground burrows or caves. On July 4, 1863, Vicksburg surrendered to Grant, marking on the turning point victories for the Union cause during the Civil War.

• Who does the newspaper seem to be encouraging? 
• What are some of the hardships reported in the newspaper?
• If you got to write the final paragraph to this newspaper, what would you say? (see Primary Source Background)
• The Daily Citizen

Historical Context

• "No Ingress or Egress": Refugees of the Siege of Vicksburg
• 10 Facts: The Vicksburg Campaign
• Vicksburg Campaign In4 Minutes
• Vicksburg Animated Map
• Vicksburg Virtual Tour
• Grant Remembers the Surrender and Victory at Vicksburg

During the summer of 1863, Confederate General Robert E. Lee took his approximately 72,000 soldiers north into Maryland and Pennsylvania. Meanwhile, the Union army got a new commander, General George G. Meade , and hurried to pursue the Confederates and block their access to Washington D.C. On July 1-3, 1863, the two armies clashed at the crossroads town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. 

The Battle of Gettysburg was a Union victory and marked the turning point of the Civil War. With more than 50,000 estimated casualties, the three-day engagement was the bloodiest single battle of the conflict.

• Imagine you are reading the headlines in 1863, how do you think you feel about the quickly reported news?
• Does the paper get the essential details correct? What can you identify as rumor or simply wrong information? (Historic Context and Videos will help with this)
• Aside from reading a newspaper, what are some other ways that people might have learned about the Battle of Gettysburg or what happened to their soldiers?
• The New York Tribune
• 10 Facts: Gettysburg
• How Well Do You Know The Battle of Gettysburg?
• The Battle of Gettysburg In4 Minutes
• Gettysburg Virtual Tour
• Gettysburg Animated Map
• General Order, No. 66
• Letter from Gen. Robert E. Lee to Confederate President, Jefferson Davis
• E. P. Alexander at Gettysburg

On November 19, 1863, during the dedication of Gettysburg National Cemetery, President Abraham Lincoln delivered one of the most famous speeches in U.S. History. Known as the Gettysburg Address, it briefly summarized the president's hopes for the future and his meaning for the soldiers' sacrifices during the Battle of Gettysburg four months earlier.

• What did Lincoln credit the Founding Fathers with creating?
• What difficulties did Lincoln say the nation was facing?
• What vision did Lincoln offer for the future of the United States? Do you think that vision has been fulfilled?
• Lincoln's Gettysburg Address
• Versions of the Gettysburg Address
• Abraham Lincoln
• 7 Gettysburg Myths and Misconceptions
• Gettysburg National Cemetery
• The Gettysburg Address In4 Minutes
• The Gettysburg Address: The Two-Minute Speech That Saved America
• Gettysburg Address Document Based Questions

Many Civil War soldiers wrote letters about their experiences and thoughts about the war. Some of the saddest letters are the last ones that these soldiers wrote. In November 1863, a Confederate soldier named Sam Davis had been captured and charged for espionage. He wrote a farewell letter to his family before his execution, reflecting on his love for his parents and siblings. (See "Additional Primary Sources" for another soldier's letter not related to a spy execution.)

• What is seems to be most important to Davis as he writes this last letter?
• Did Davis admit he was guilty of spying or claim to be innocent?
• Do you think Davis might have written a different letter before going into battle?
• Sam Davis's Short Life as a Soldier and Spy
• Sam Davis - Biography
• Spy Executions during the American Civil War
• Civil War Irregular Operations
• Soldier Life during the Civil War  In4 Minutes
• Experiences of the Civil War's Common Soldier
• Civil War Soldier Gear In4 Minutes

Sullivan Ballou Letter

• Civil War Music: Just Before The Battle, Mother

On April 9, 1865, the General Robert E. Lee surrendered the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia to Union General Ulysses S. Grant at the village of Appomattox Court House. Included in the terms of surrender was parole for Confederate soldiers, allowing them to return home and not be harassed or captured on their journey. 

• If you received one of these parole slips in 1865 at the end of the Civil War, would you return home or go build a new life somewhere else?
• Do you think the Parole Pass symbolized a type of freedom for Confederate veterans or a reminder of the war that they had to carry with them for their safety from arrest?
• Do you agree with the surrender terms that Grant and Lee negotiated at Appomattox? (See resources in Historic Context and Videos for more details)
• View printable file of Appomattox Paroles here
• Appomattox Parole Passes
• Appomattox Court House
• 10 Facts: Appomattox Court House
• To The Bitter End: Final Months of the War
• Appomattox: The Surrender
• Appomattox Court House Virtual Tour
• 1865 Animated Map
• Civil War Music: When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again
• Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant’s Terms of Agreement Entered into with Gen. Robert E. Lee at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, April 9, 1865, and Supplementary Terms April 10, 1865
• Gen. Robert E. Lee's Farewell Address
• The Last Salute of the Army of Northern Virginia

Common Core:

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.6-8.1 Cite specific textual evidence to support analysis of primary and secondary sources.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.6-8.2 Determine the central ideas or information of a primary or secondary source; provide an accurate summary of the source distinct from prior knowledge or opinions.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.6-8.4 Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, including vocabulary specific to domains related to history/social studies.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.6-8.9 Analyze the relationship between a primary and secondary source on the same topic.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.WHST.6-8.7 Conduct short research projects to answer a question (including a self-generated question), drawing on several sources and generating additional related, focused questions that allow for multiple avenues of exploration.

NCSS Standards for Social Studies:

1—Culture 2—Time, Continuity, and Change 3—People, Places, and Environment 5—Individuals, Groups, and Institutions 10—Civic, Ideals, and Practices

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The 1850's were a turbulent time in American history. The North and South were seeing total different views on the issue of slavery. The North saw slavery as immoral and that it was unconstitutional. The south on the other hand saw slavery as their right. The South viewed African Americans as lower human beings which justified slavery. "The 1850's was a time of attempted compromise when compromise was no longer possible." This quote best describes this time period, because Americans were trying to compromise their views to prevent a large conflict, but there were many events which made a compromise impossible. The Fugitive Slave Act was part of the Compromise of 1850. This act required that authorities in the North had to assist …show more content…

The final ruling on the case was that Scott was denied his freedom. The court based their decision on the fact that the constitution did not give any rights and that black people were not citizens of the U.S. Without a doubt there was outrage among the black communities in the North, and everywhere else. Blacks in the North started meeting in conventions and gathering discussing how unjust the ruling was and how outraged they were over the decision. The court's ruling came as a "victory" for southerners, because it showed slaves that the road to freedom would not come as easy as a court case. John Brown was a frontiers man. He became somewhat of a celebrity in New England around 1857. He found his life's calling which was fundraising for the frontier exploits, or battles he conducted. When peace had come across Kansas in late 1857, Brown had developed a plan to capture the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia. After collecting funds from his New England friends, Brown and his army moved to a farmhouse where they began to train. It was the night of October 16, 1859 when Brown and twenty-two men took over the arsenal. They waited for slaves to rally to his banner. Quickly the Virginia Militia and a detachment of the United States Marines put an end to John Browns Raid killing most of his men and wounding Brown himself. This raid scared southerners to death, because they feared a slave

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• 3 Works Cited

Many causes led to the Civil War. This all happened around the mid 1800s. It was a conflict between the Northern and Southern states. Both sides had their own view on slavery, and their separate views caused contentions between the two. Both had different views on whether to expand or stop slavery growth to the West, or have slavery at all.

• 7 Works Cited

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• 1 Works Cited

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There were many events that led to the civil war. Slavery was a big issue in the 1800s which led to small civil wars within our own country. The battle of Fort Sumter was the last battle leading to the civil war. Also the election angered many states created the Union and confederacy sides also causing the civil war.

What Is The Significance Of The Compromise Of 1850

After working tirelessly to set forth his Compromise, Henry Clay’s Compromise finally became a law in 1850. Initially, the Compromise of 1850 slit up guidelines about slavery for the North and South. In the North, CA was a free state, the slave trade was prohibited in Wash. DC, and unrelated to slavery, TX lost their boundary conflict with NM. In the South, slaveholding was permitted in Wash. DC, and the creation of the Fugitive slave act. The fugitive slave act gave federal support to slave catchers. Although the N and S both benefitted from the compromise, the North technically gained more out of it. The Compromise of 1850 was significant because it gave the South the Fugitive slave law, and gave the North a new free state, CA—everybody wins!

What Events Led To The Civil War Essay

There were many different views on slavery in the North and South. This led to tension between pro-slavery and anti-slavery citizens. Lincoln’s election, the Dred Scott Decision, and Bleeding Kansas, are three of the numerous events that led to the Civil War.

John Brown as the Villian or Hero Essay

In 1850, the Fugitive Slave Law was passed. This law plainly stated that citizens were required to help slave catchers if inquired upon to do so. This law would make it immensely difficult for slaves to successfully escape slavery. Slaves would have to be even more careful not to run into the wrong person.

The American civil war: causes and conflicts Essay

The American Civil War, which began in 1861 to 1865, has gone down in history as the one of the most significant events to have ever occurred in the United States of America, thus far. At that time, questions had arose wondering how the United States ever got so close to hitting rock bottom, especially being that it was a conflict within the country itself. Hostility steadily grew through the years dividing the nation further and further, and finally leading to the twelfth day in April 1861 in Fort Sumter, North Carolina. The American Civil War was an irrepressible battle and aside from the obvious physical effects of the war, the disagreement over states rights, the act of slavery, and the raising of tariffs played crucial roles in the

Essay on The American Civil War

In the Civil War the North had many advantages over the South. The South was outnumbered, out supplied, and pushed into a corner using military tactics. Many things changed because of the Civil War. The military tactics used by the North changed how war was fought from then on. Many changes were made politically; some were only temporary, while others were permanent. After the war was over, the country was reunited and the image of the soul and duty of our country redefined.

Essay On How Did The Civil War Start

The only way to learn the past is to go into the past. The Civil War was the biggest war inside the U.S itself. To think about it makes me shutter. The south had to secede alright.The Civil War only started because of the South seceded from the United States. Then they turn around and decide to fight for the things they believed in but the rest of the union did not agree. The ways of the world decides to fight but there is more than just one reason why the Civil War started.The South seceded from the United States because of wanting to keep slavery the north and south are to different and they wanted to control their own rights.

Causes and Effects of the American Civil War Essay

     One of the final cause of the Civil was involved a slave named Dred Scott. Dred Scott was an enslaved person owned by John Emerson. Emerson took Dred Scott from Missouri to Illinois, a free state. They then moved back to Missouri, which was a slave state under the Missouri Compromise. In 1857 Dred Scott sued the state of Missouri on the claim that by living in a free state, he was free and had earned his freedom. Scott won that case, but the ruling was later overturn by the Missouri Supreme Court. The Missouri Supreme Court ruled that the compromises including the Missouri Compromise were unconstitutional and that African Americans were not United State citizens and could not be a citizen. Slaves were considered property and had no rights.

Related Topics

• Slavery in the United States
• American Civil War
• Confederate States of America

Women during the Civil War

Written by: Catherine Clinton, University of Texas, San Antonio

By the end of this section, you will:.

• Explain the effects of government policy during Reconstruction on society from 1865 to 1877

Suggested Sequencing

Use this Narrative alongside the Mary Chesnut’s War Narrative to allow students to analyze and compare women’s experiences during the Civil War.

Whether black or white, Northern or Southern, rich or poor, women confronted daunting obstacles during the Civil War era. The impulse to overthrow societal constraints and the struggle for equal opportunity were critical concerns for many women in the 1860s.

The abolitionist movement flourished alongside female activism, and during the decades leading up to the Civil War, women increasingly advocated for women’s rights, particularly suffrage. The vote was then a right granted at the state level; New Jersey had briefly allowed some women to vote (who satisfied the same property-ownership qualifications as men), but generally, momentum for suffrage had been lost after the American Revolution. It revived during the 1850s, when many reformers, such as Susan B. Anthony, began their suffrage work after becoming engaged in the temperance, abolitionist, and moral reform movements of the 1830s and 1840s. In 1848, Elizabeth Cady Stanton initiated a national women’s rights movement in Seneca Falls, New York, after witnessing male resistance to women’s participation in abolitionism at the World Antislavery Convention in London in 1840. Yet women’s rights campaigns were intertwined with abolitionism. Antislavery activist Angelina Grimke argued that slaves might be emancipated while women were denied equal status, but women could never truly be free until slavery was abolished, suggesting a domino effect.

Pictured are two of the leading suffragists of the nineteenth century, Elizabeth Cady Stanton (left) and Susan B. Anthony (right).

When war was declared in spring 1861, women were prepared to launch into action to contribute to the war effort. In the South, they stitched sashes and prepared cockades for their soldiers marching off to defend the newly established Confederacy. In the North, medical pioneers and sisters Elizabeth and Emily Blackwell called a meeting of women in Manhattan to coordinate efforts for soldiers’ aid. On April 29, 1861, between 2,000 and 3,000 responded to the call. They trained nurses for work in the field and established a network of soldiers’ aid societies. The Women’s Central Relief Association’s board of 12 overseers included six women, which was unconventionally egalitarian for the era.

Nurses not only cared for soldiers in wards but some undertook tours of duty on the battlefield. Mary Anne Bickerdyke, or “Mother” Bickerdyke, as she was affectionately known to the troops, attended to the Union wounded on 19 different battle sites. She spent most of her time at the Union’s military hospital in Cairo, Illinois. Even more innovative, female nurses and matrons staffed the war department’s mobile “floating hospitals,” set up near battle sites to rescue the wounded. Mary Edwards Walker was an abolitionist and surgeon who fought for an army appointment and eventually served. She was given the Medal of Honor by President Andrew Johnson and remains the only female recipient of the award to this day. Clara Barton was perhaps the best-known nurse of the Civil War generation and later founded the American Red Cross in 1881.

Before the war, Dorothea Dix travelled the world to investigate treatment of the mentally ill, and she campaigned from Maine to Louisiana to try to build humane facilities to care for those diagnosed with insanity. Dix helped establish the Harrisburg State Hospital in Pennsylvania, one of America’s first asylums, in 1851. During the war, she worked independently of the federal army, organizing wartime care of soldiers in the state of Massachusetts. Through her personal appeals, thousands of dollars were donated to supply Massachusetts soldiers with food and medicine. Dix was eventually appointed Superintendent of Army Nurses and provided “care, succor [assistance] and relief” to hundreds of Union soldiers.

More than 3,000 women served as military nurses, the majority in the North. Louisa May Alcott’s Hospital Sketches depicted a nurse’s life, describing times when “legless, armless occupants entering my ward admonished me that I was there to work, not to wonder or weep.” Confederate women organized private facilities; Sally Tompkins founded a hospital in Richmond and was given the rank of captain by Confederate President Jefferson Davis. Phoebe Pember, a former Charleston socialite working in a Confederate hospital, wrote of rats that “ate all the poultices applied during the night to the sick, and dragged away the pads stuffed with bran from under the arms and legs of the wounded.”

A new generation of women leaders began to emerge. With the help of the U.S. Christian Commission, Annie Wittenmyer developed a “dietary kitchen system” in which patients were each given a diet tailored to their medical condition. This system is still in use in hospitals today. Because three of every five soldiers who died in uniform succumbed to disease unrelated to combat or wounds, superior care was important to keeping the ranks full. None other than Ulysses S. Grant said of Wittenmyer that “no soldier on the firing line gave more heroic service than she did.”

An intrepid cadre of women embarked on even more dangerous but heroic journeys. A small group served as spies, including the infamous Washington, DC, society widow Rose Greenhow, who drowned while trying to evade the blockade off the coast of North Carolina, smuggling gold and documents back into the Confederacy from her mission in Europe. Young women often worked as saboteurs and scouts during military operations in occupied territories.

Rose Greenhow, pictured here with her daughter in a Washington, DC, prison in 1862, was part of a small group of female Confederate spies.

Scores of women disguised themselves as male soldiers to serve in combat. Two such women were Irish immigrants Jennie Hodges and Rosetta Wakeman. Both fought in the 1864 Red River Campaign in Louisiana. Hodges was born female but lived as a male most of her adult life, enlisting as Albert Cashier. Wakeman enlisted in the 153rd New York volunteers as Private Edwin Wakeman. Wakeman wrote home to her family about her experience on the battlefield: “I was not in the first day’s fight but the next day I had to face the enemy bullets with my regiment. I was under fire about four hours and laid on the field of battle all night. There was three wounded in my Co. and one killed.”

In 1863, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony organized the Women’s Loyal National League, the first national women’s political organization, which advocated an amendment to the Constitution abolishing slavery that was more expansive than Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation (the League shifted its focus to women’s suffrage after the war). The abolition of slavery became a top priority for northern women activists, who poured their talent and energy into political organizing. Most wanted to secure freedom for blacks before women’s suffrage, but black women were even more outspoken. At their first national convention, African American activist Frances Ellen Watkins Harper said, “You white women speak here of rights. I speak of wrongs.” Harper and other free black women in the North advocated on behalf of enslaved southern women, noting that more than half the black population of four million was still in bondage. Black women joined white women in the fight to end slavery and pushed for autonomy for all women, not just white women. Many explicitly raised awareness about the connection between discrimination on the basis of race and of sex.

Harriet Tubman continued her dangerous career behind enemy lines. She had served as a conductor on the Underground Railroad, helping runaway slaves escape to freedom, and then began to work with the Union army as a nurse, scout, and spy in occupied South Carolina. Self-liberated ex-slave Susie King Taylor moved into Union-occupied territory along the South Carolina and Georgia coasts, where she served as a nurse and also as a teacher for illiterate black Union soldiers serving near her Sea Island encampment.

Harriet Tubman, photographed here soon after the end of the Civil War, helped the Union army during the Civil War and was a conductor on the Underground Railroad.

Women of color had a special stake in the struggle, rightly perceiving the Civil War as a battle for black liberation. With the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment in 1865, women within the Loyal League, which pledged to win equal rights within the scope of the U.S. Constitution, could claim victory. With the Fourteenth Amendment, however, the situation became critical: this amendment specified “due process” and “equal protection,” essential foundations upon which rights might be constructed. But Section Two of the amendment specified rights were to be accorded to “the male inhabitants of such state, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States.” The question of who should be granted these rights produced a split within the movement, and Susan B. Anthony, for one, challenged the notion that only men could vote.

In the wake of Southern surrender and the enormous task of binding the nation’s wounds and rebuilding the country, women put their shoulders to the wheel. Yet those who had taken over men’s positions during wartime in the U.S. Treasury Department, for example, and in the munitions factories in Confederate Richmond were encouraged to retire and, in some cases, were even expelled. Women suffered the consequences of war because they lost their fathers, sons, and husbands and thus their primary means of financial support. The provision for female pensioners and protective labor legislation helped to shape late nineteenth-century reform and federal reform. The legacy of the Civil War put an indelible stamp on the women’s rights movements, as women continued the long struggle for women’s suffrage. They were successful in winning the right to vote in several westerns states while working for a constitutional amendment.

Review Questions

1. During the Civil War, women who took part in a variety of reform movements before the war made which of the following their primary goal?

• Women’s suffrage
• The right of women to serve as doctors
• The abolition of slavery
• The right of former slaves to serve in the Union Army

2. Women such as “Mother” Bickerdyke served in the war mainly as

• volunteers on the home front, writing letters of encouragement to wounded soldiers
• workers in factories, replacing men as they were drafted into the army
• nurses on the frontlines
• women disguised as men fighting on the frontlines

3. Primarily known for her work in reforming the treatment of the mentally ill, Dorothea Dix served during the Civil War as

• founder of the U.S. Christian Commission
• superintendent of Army Nurses
• founder of the Woman’s Loyal National League
• a spy for the Union Army

4. When Union General Ulysses S. Grant stated that “no soldier on the firing line gave more heroic service than she did,” he was speaking of

• Sarah Grimké
• Louisa May Alcott
• Clara Barton
• Annie Wittenmyer

5. During the Civil War, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony campaigned for an amendment to the Constitution that would

• abolish slavery
• grant women the right to vote
• grant equal rights to all persons regardless of their sex
• grant freed slaves the right to vote

6. During the war, Harriet Tubman and Rose Greenhow both worked as

7. Most southern women who had the time to volunteer for the Confederate cause served as

• nurses and seamstresses
• scouts and saboteurs
• blockade runners

Free Response Questions

• Describe the reasons for formation of the Women’s Loyal National League.
• Explain the role African American women played in the Civil War.

AP Practice Questions

“TO THE WOMEN OF THE REPUBLIC: We ask you to sign and circulate this petition for the ENTIRE ABOLITION OF SLAVERY. We have now ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND signatures, but we want a MILLION before Congress adjourns. Remember the President’s Proclamation reaches only the Slaves of Rebels. The jails of LOYAL Kentucky are to-day crammed’ with Georgia, Mississippi and Alabama slaves, advertised to be sold for their jail fees According to LAW,’ precisely as before the war!!! While slavery exists ANYWHERE there can be freedom NOWHERE. THERE MUST BE A LAW ABOLISHING SLAVERY. We have undertaken to canvass the Nation for freedom. Women, you cannot vote or fight for your country. Your only way to be a power in the Government is through the exercise of this one, sacred, Constitutional RIGHT OF PETITION;’ and we ask you to use it now to the utmost. Go to the rich, the poor, the high, the low, the soldier, the civilian, the white, the black gather up the names of all who hate slavery all who love LIBERTY, and would have it the LAW of the land and lay them at the feet of Congress, your silent but potent vote for human freedom guarded by the law. . . . E. CADY STANTON President. SUSAN B. ANTHONY, Secretary W.L.N. League”

Women’s Loyal National League, “To the Women of the Republic,” January 25, 1864

1. The phrase, “remember the President’s Proclamation reaches only the Slaves of Rebels,” refers to

• the Proclamation of Rights and Grievances
• the Olive Branch Petition
• the Emancipation Proclamation
• Field Order No. 15

2. The ideas expressed in the excerpt were a continuation of which philosophy?

• The ideals in the U.S. Constitution
• The “perfectionist” ideals of the Second Great Awakening
• The philosophy expressed by the Stamp Act Congress
• The philosophy of compromise expressed by Henry Clay

Primary Sources

Brumgardt, John, ed. Civil War Nurse: The Diary and Letters of Hannah Ropes . Knoxville, TN: The University of Tennessee Press, 1980.

Cady Stanton, Elizabeth, and Susan B. Anthony. “To the Women of the Republic.” January 25, 1864. https://www.thirteen.org/wnet/slavery/experience/gender/docs2.html

“Declaration of Sentiments, Seneca Falls, 1848.” https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/mod/senecafalls.asp

“Fifteenth Amendment. Black Suffrage.” http://www.ushistory.org/documents/amendments.htm#amend15

“Fourteenth Amendment. Civil Rights.” http://www.ushistory.org/documents/amendments.htm#amend14

“Thirteenth Amendment. Abolition of Slavery.” http://www.ushistory.org/documents/amendments.htm#amend13

Suggested Resources

Campbell, Edward, and Kym Rice. A Woman’s War: Southern Women, Civil War, and the Confederate Legacy . Charlottesville, VA: University Press of Virginia, 1997.

Chesnut, Mary Boykin. Mary Chesnut’s Diary , edited by Catherine Clinton. New York: Penguin, 2011.

Clinton, Catherine. The Other Civil War . New York: Hill and Wang, 1999.

Giesberg, Judith. Civil War Sisterhood . Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2006.

King Taylor, Susie. Reminiscences of My Life in Camp , edited by Catherine Clinton. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2006.

Massey, Mary Elizabeth. Women in the Civil War . Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 1994.

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What the 'Dawn of the Civil War' can tell us about today's acrimonious politics

Dave Davies

In The Demon of Unrest, author Erik Larson chronicles the five months between the election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860 and the start of the Civil War, drawing parallels to today's political climate.

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