History Initiative Civil Rights – rights granted to all citizens.

History Initiative
Civil War and Reconstruction
Documents:
Emancipation Proclamation – an executive order issued by Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863, freeing
the slaves in all regions in rebellion against the Union.
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Civil Rights – rights granted to all citizens.
Freedmen’s School – a school set up to educate newly freed African Americans.
Sharecropping – a system in which landowners gave farm workers land, seed, and tools in return for a
part of the crops they raised.
Lynch – killing someone on the spot without a trial as punishment for a supposed crime, usually by
hanging.
13 Amendment – an amendment to the U.S. Constitution, adopted in 1865, banning slavery and
involuntary servitude in the United States.
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Ideas:
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King Cotton – cotton was called king because cotton was important to the world market, and the South
grew most of the cotton for Europe’s mills.
14 Amendment – an amendment to the U.S. Constitution, passed in 1868, which made all persons born
or naturalized in the United States – including former slaves – citizens of the country.
15 Amendment – passed in 1870, this amendment to the U.S. Constitution stated that citizens could
not be stopped from voting “on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”
Ananconda Plan – a strategy by which the Union proposed to defeat the Confederacy in the Civil War.
Terms:
Union State – a free state that remained with the Union during the Civil War.
Confederate State – a slave state that seceded (withdrew) from the Union during the Civil War and
joined the Confederate States of America.
Border State – a slave state that bordered states in which slavery was illegal and decided to stay with the
Union during the Civil War.
Blockade – when armed forces prevent the transportation of goods or people into or out of an area.
Hygiene – conditions and practices that promote health.
Rifle – a gun with a grooved barrel that causes a bullet to spin through the air.
Minié Ball – a bullet with a hollow base.
Ironclad – a warship covered with iron.
Cavalry – soldiers on horseback.
Copperhead – Abraham Lincoln’s main political opponents; they favored peace with the South.
Conscription – a law that required men to serve in the military or be drafted.
Bounty – a reward or cash payment given by a government.
Reconstruction – the process the U. S. government used to readmit the Confederate states to the Union
after the Civil War.
People:
Abraham Lincoln(1809-April 15,1865) - the 16th president of the U.S., serving from March 1861 until his
assassination in April 1865. Lincoln led the U.S. through its Civil War--its bloodiest war and its greatest
moral, constitutional and political crisis. In so doing he preserved the Union, abolished slavery,
strengthened the national government and modernized the economy.
Jefferson Davis (1808-1889) - the President of the Confederate States of America during the entire Civil
War. He took personal charge of the Confederate war plans but was unable to find a strategy to defeat
the larger, more powerful and better organized Union.
Robert E. Lee (1807–1870)– former U.S. military leader, he became the Commander of the Confederate
Army during the Civil War when his home state of Virginia seceded.
Ulysses S. Grant (1822–1885)– victorious Union general in the West who became the Commander of
the Union Army in March 1864.
Stonewall Jackson (1824 –1863) - a Confederate general during the Civil War, and one of the best-known
Confederate commanders after General Robert E. Lee. Confederate pickets accidentally shot him at the
Battle of Chancellorsville on May 2, 1863. The general survived with the loss of an arm to amputation,
but died of complications from pneumonia eight days later.
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Income Tax – a tax on earnings.
Greenback – paper currency issued by the federal government during the Civil War.
Freedmen’s Bureau – a federal agency set up to help former slaves after the Civil War.
Black Codes – a law passed by Southern states that limited the freedom of former slaves.
54 Massachusetts Regiment – one of the first African-American regiments organized to fight for the
Union in the Civil War.
Clara Barton (1821 – 1912) – was a pioneer nurse who founded the American Red Cross. During the end
of the American Civil War, Barton worked at a hospital she made helping the people at the Anderson
prison camp where 13,000 people died.
William Tecumseh Sherman (1820 – 1891) – He served as a General in the Union Army during the Civil
War, for which he received recognition for his outstanding command of military strategy as well as
criticism for the harshness of the "scorched earth" policies that he implemented in conducting total war
against the Confederate States.
John Wilkes Booth (1838 – April 26, 1865) – Confederate supporter who came up with a plan to
assassinate Abraham Lincoln, Vice-President Andrew Johnson, and Secretary of State William Seward on
April 14, 1865. Booth succeeded in killing Lincoln, but his accomplices did not kill Johnson or Seward.
Booth was found and killed by Union troops day later. His accomplices were either hanged or
imprisoned.
Radical Republicans – a congressman who, after the Civil War, favored using the government to create a
new order in the South and to give African Americans full citizenship and the right to vote.
Andrew Johnson (1808 –1875) – the 17th President of the United States, serving from 1865 to 1869.
Johnson became president as Abraham Lincoln's vice president at the time of Lincoln's assassination.
Ku Klux Klan – a group formed in 1866 that wanted to restore Democratic control of the South and to
keep former slaves powerless.
Events:
April 12, 1861 - Fort Sumter – a federal fort located in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina; the
Confederate attack on Fort Sumter marked the beginning of the Civil War.
May 1862 – Homestead Act – passed in 1862, this law offered 160 acres of land free to anyone who
agreed to live on and improve the land for five years.
July 1862 – Morrill Act – a law which gave federal land to states for the establishment of colleges, these
institutions would teach military tactics as well as engineering and agriculture.
September 17, 1862 - Battle of Antietam – a Civil War battle in 1862 in which 25,000 men were killed or
wounded.
July 1-3, 1863 - Battle of Gettysburg – an 1863 battle in the Civil War, in which the Union defeated the
Confederacy, ending hopes for a Confederacy victory in the North.
July 4, 1863 - Siege of Vicksburg – an 1863 Union victory in the Civil War that enabled the Union to
control the entire Mississippi River.
April 9, 1865 - Appomattox Court House – the Virginia town where Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses
S. Grant in 1865, ending the Civil War.
April 14, 1865 - Assassination of Lincoln – The murder of President Abraham Lincoln by John Wilkes
Booth. Booth shot Lincoln in the back of the head as Lincoln watched a play in Ford’s Theatre. Lincoln
died the next morning on April 15, 1865. He was the first U.S. president to be assassinated.
Compromise of 1877 – the agreement that resolved an 1876 election dispute: Rutherford B. Hayes
became president and then removed the last federal troops from the South.
1887 - Dawes Act – a law, enacted in 1887, that distributed reservation land to individual owners.