Part of the American Civil War | |
Date | April 9 – November 6, 1865 (6 months and 4 weeks) |
---|---|
Location | Southern United States |
Cause | Appomattox campaign |
The conclusion of the American Civil War commenced with the articles of surrender agreement of the Army of Northern Virginia on April 9, at Appomattox Court House, by General Robert E. Lee and concluded with the surrender of the CSS Shenandoah on November 6, 1865, bringing the hostilities of the American Civil War to a close. [1] Legally, the war did not end until a proclamation by President Andrew Johnson on August 20, 1866, when he declared "that the said insurrection is at an end and that peace, order, tranquillity, and civil authority now exist in and throughout the whole of the United States of America." [2]
Lee's defeat on April 9 began the effective end of the war, after which there was no substantial resistance, but the news of his surrender took time to spread and some fighting continued, though only small skirmishes. President Abraham Lincoln lived to see Lee's surrender after four bloody years of war, but he was assassinated just five days later. The Battle of Columbus, Georgia, was fought on April 16, the day after Lincoln died. For the most part though, news of Lee's defeat led to a wave of Confederate surrenders. Gen. Joseph E. Johnston surrendered his large Army of Tennessee and the Southeastern Department on April 26. The Confederate cabinet was dissolved on May 5, and Confederate President Jefferson Davis was captured by Union soldiers on May 10, one day after Lincoln's successor, Andrew Johnson, declared that the belligerent rights of the Confederacy were at an end, [3] with the rebellion effectively over.
The last battle of the war was fought at Palmito Ranch on May 12–13. The last large Confederate military department, the Trans-Mississippi Department, surrendered on May 26, completing the formalities on June 2. The last surrender on land did not come until June 23, when Cherokee Confederate General Stand Watie gave up his command. At sea, the last Confederate ship, CSS Shenandoah, did not surrender until November 6. It had continued sailing around the world raiding vessels until it finally received news of the end of the war. Shenandoah also fired the last shots of the war on June 22. By April 6, 1866, the rebellion was declared over in all states but Texas. Finally, on August 20, 1866, the war was declared legally over, though fighting had been over for more than a year by then.
The end of slavery in the United States of America is closely tied to the end of the Civil War. As the main cause of the war, slavery led to Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation, freeing slaves in the Confederacy as the Union advanced. The last slaves in the Confederacy were not freed until June 19, 1865, now celebrated as the national holiday Juneteenth. After the end of hostilities, the war-torn nation then entered the Reconstruction era in a partially successful attempt to rebuild the country and grant civil rights to freed slaves.
Although President Abraham Lincoln lived to see the effective end of the war, he did not live to see it through to its conclusion. Assassin John Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln on April 14, 1865, and he died the next morning. Lincoln's death was a shock to both North and South. [6] : 350 Unaware of Lee's surrender on April 9 and the assassination on April 14, General James H. Wilson's Raiders continued their march through Alabama into Georgia. On April 16, the Battle of Columbus, Georgia was fought. This battle – erroneously – has been argued to be the "last battle of the Civil War" and equally erroneously asserted to be "widely regarded" as such. [7] [8] [9] [ citation needed ] Columbus fell to Wilson's Raiders about midnight on April 16, and most of its manufacturing capacity was destroyed on the 17th. Confederate Colonel John Stith Pemberton, the inventor of Coca-Cola, was wounded in this battle, which resulted in his obsession with pain-killing formulas, ultimately ending in the recipe for his celebrated drink.
The next major stage in the peace-making process concluding the American Civil War was the surrender of General Joseph E. Johnston and his armies to Major General William T. Sherman on April 26, 1865, at Bennett Place, in Durham, North Carolina. [10] Johnston's Army of Tennessee was among nearly one hundred thousand Confederate soldiers who were surrendered from North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida. [10] The conditions of surrender were in a document called "Terms of a Military Convention" signed by Sherman, Johnston, and Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant at Raleigh, North Carolina. [11]
The first major stage in the peacemaking process was Lee's surrender at Appomattox on April 9, 1865. [12] This, coupled with Lincoln's assassination, induced Johnston to act, believing: "With such odds against us, without the means of procuring ammunition or repairing arms, without money or credit to provide food, it was impossible to continue the war except as robbers." [13] On April 17 Sherman and Johnston met at Bennett Place, and the following day an armistice was arranged, with terms discussed and agreed upon. Grant had authorized the surrender only of Johnston's forces, but Sherman exceeded his orders by providing very generous terms. These included that the rebel states be immediately recognized after their leaders signed loyalty oaths; that property and personal rights be returned to the Confederates; the reestablishment of the federal court system; and that a general amnesty be given. On April 24, authorities in Washington rejected Sherman's proposed terms; two days later, Johnston agreed to the same terms Lee had received previously on April 9. [14]
General Johnston surrendered the following commands under his direction on April 26, 1865: the Department of Tennessee and Georgia; the Army of Tennessee; the Department of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida; and the Department of North Carolina and Southern Virginia. [15] In doing so, Johnston surrendered to Sherman around 30,000 men. [14] On April 27 his adjutant announced the terms to the Army of Tennessee in General Orders #18, and on May 2 he issued his farewell address to the Army of Tennessee as General Orders #22. [16] The remaining parts of the Florida "Brigade of the West" surrendered with the rest of Johnston's forces on May 4, 1865, at Greensboro, North Carolina. [10]
On May 4, 1865, Union Maj. Gen. Henry Halleck proposed "to issue an order that all armed men in Virginia who do not surrender by a certain date shall be held as outlaws and robbers." [17] This was approved by Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant and Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton [18] and Halleck issued General Orders No. 6, Military Division of the James, on May 6, 1865, effective from May 20, 1865. The order stated that "all persons found in arms against the authority of the United States in the State of Virginia and North Carolina, will be treated as outlaws and robbers." [17]
Confederate President Jefferson Davis fled Richmond, Virginia, following its evacuation in the early part of April 1865. On May 5, 1865, in Washington, Georgia, Davis had held the last meeting of his Cabinet. At that time, the Confederate government was declared dissolved. [19] The meeting took place at the Heard house, the Georgia Branch Bank Building, with 14 officials present. [20] [ failed verification ] Despite the fact that there were still small pockets of resistance in the South, the president declared that the armed resistance was "virtually" ended and that nations or ships still harboring fugitives would be denied entry into U.S. ports. Persons found aboard such vessels would no longer be given immunity from prosecution of their crimes. [21] Premised on the surrender of all Confederate Armies east of the Mississippi River, on May 11, 1865, Gen. Grant issued General Orders No. 90 from the War Department stating "That from and after the first day of June, 1865, any and all persons found in arms against the United States, or who may commit acts of hostility against it east of the Mississippi River, will be regarded as guerrillas and punished with death." [22]
The Native American tribes of the Indian Territory realized that the Confederacy could no longer fulfill its commitments to them. Therefore, the Camp Napoleon Council was called to draft an agreement to present a united front as they negotiated a return of their loyalty to the United States. Native American tribes further west, many of them also at war with the U.S. Army, were also invited to take part, and several of them did. [23]
At the end of the meeting, on May 26, 1865, the council appointed commissioners (no more than five for each tribe) to attend a conference with the U.S. government in Washington, D.C., at which the results of the Camp Napoleon Council would be presented and discussed. However, the U.S. government refused to treat with such a large group representing so many tribes. Furthermore, the government regarded the Camp Napoleon meeting as unofficial and unauthorized. President Johnson later called for a meeting at Fort Smith (called the Fort Smith Council), which was held in September, 1865. [24]
Confederate leaders asked General Kirby Smith to send reinforcements from his Army of the Trans-Mississippi to east of the Mississippi River in the spring of 1864 following the Battle of Mansfield and the Battle of Pleasant Hill. This was not practical due to the Union naval control of the Mississippi River and the unwillingness of western troops to be transferred east of the river. Smith instead dispatched Major General Sterling Price and his cavalry on an invasion of Missouri that was ultimately not successful. Thereafter the war west of the Mississippi River was principally one of small raids.
By May 26, 1865, a representative of Smith's negotiated and signed surrender documents with a representative of Major General Edward Canby in Shreveport, Louisiana, then took custody of Smith's force of 43,000 soldiers when they surrendered, by then the only significant Confederate forces left west of the Mississippi River. With this ended all organized Southern military resistance to the Union forces. Smith signed the surrender papers on June 2 on board the U.S.S. Fort Jackson just outside Galveston Harbor. [25]
In view of the surrender of the Confederate Trans-Mississippi Department to Maj. Gen. Canby on May 26, 1865, Brig. Gen. Cyrus Bussey issued General Orders No. 24 from Headquarters Third Div., 7th Army Corps, Fort Smith, Ark., June 2, 1865, stating that "All such persons who remain in arms engaged in acts of hostility to the United States after a reasonable time to be informed of their surrender, will be regarded as guerrillas and outlaws, and when arrested will be shot." [26]
Ending slavery had become a key goal of the Union after Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863. The Emancipation Proclamation declared free all slaves in states in rebellion, but slaves actually gained their freedom as Union troops took Confederate territory. [27] While slaves in much of the eastern Confederacy had already been freed by Union incursion, many of the further reaches of the Confederacy had not been touched by war, including much of Texas. On June 19, 1865, Union General Gordon Granger gave General Order No. 3, declaring all slaves in Texas to be free. While practically the order took some time to spread and enforce, its date of enactment was momentous, marking the legal end of slavery in the Confederacy. [28] This is now celebrated as the national holiday Juneteenth. The full end of slavery in the United States did not come until December 6, with the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. [29] In Native American territories that had sided with the Confederacy, slavery did not end until 1866. [30]
On June 19, 1865, Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger issued General Orders No. 4, Headquarters District of Texas, Galveston, Tex., stating that "All lawless persons committing acts of violence, such as banditti, guerrillas, jayhawkers, horse-thieves, &c. are hereby declared outlaws and enemies of the human race, and will be dealt with accordingly." [31] President Andrew Johnson issued three proclamations in 1865 and 1866 that formally declared the end of the rebellion in different parts of the former Confederacy. [2] The first, issued on June 13, 1865, declared the rebellion fully suppressed only within the state of Tennessee, Johnson's home state where he had been military governor.
And I hereby also proclaim and declare that the insurrection, so far as it relates to, and within the State of Tennessee, and the inhabitants of the said State of Tennessee as reorganized and constituted under their recently adopted constitution and reorganization, and accepted by them, is suppressed, and therefore, also, that all the disabilities and disqualifications attaching to said State and the inhabitants thereof consequent upon any proclamations issued by virtue of the fifth section of the act entitled "An act further to provide for the collection of duties on imports, and for other purposes," approved the thirteenth day of July, one thousand eight hundred and sixty-one, are removed. [32]
The CSS Shenandoah was commissioned as a commerce raider by the Confederacy to interfere with Union shipping and hinder their efforts in the American Civil War. A Scottish-built merchant ship originally called the Sea King, it was secretly purchased by Confederate agents in September 1864. Captain James Waddell renamed the ship Shenandoah after she was converted to a warship off the coast of Spain on October 19, shortly after leaving England. William Conway Whittle, Waddell's right-hand man, was the ship's executive officer. [33]
The Shenandoah, sailing south then east across the Indian Ocean and into the South Pacific, was in Micronesia at the Island of Ponape (called Ascension Island by Whittle) at the time of the surrender of Lee's Army of Northern Virginia to the Union forces on April 9, 1865. [34] Waddell had already captured and disposed of thirteen Union merchantmen.
The Shenandoah destroyed one more prize in the Sea of Okhotsk, north of Japan, then continued to the Aleutians and into the Bering Sea and Arctic Ocean, crossing the Arctic Circle on June 19. [35] Continuing then south along the coast of Alaska the Shenandoah came upon a fleet of Union ships whaling on June 22. [35] She opened continuous fire, destroying a major portion of the Union whaling fleet. [35] Capt. Waddell took aim at a fleeing whaler, Sophia Thornton, and at his signal, the gunner jerked a wrist strap and fired the last two shots of the American Civil War. [36] Shenandoah had so far captured and burned eleven ships of the American whaling fleet while in Arctic waters. [35]
Waddell finally learned of Lee's surrender on June 27 when the captain of the prize Susan & Abigail produced a newspaper from San Francisco. The same paper contained Confederate President Jefferson Davis's proclamation that the "war would be carried on with re-newed vigor". [37] Shenandoah proceeded to capture a further ten whalers in the following seven hours. Waddell then steered Shenandoah south, intending to raid the port of San Francisco which he believed to be poorly defended. En route they encountered an English barque, Barracouta, on August 2 from which Waddell learned of the final collapse of the Confederacy including the surrenders of Johnston's, Kirby Smith's, and Magruder's armies and the capture of President Davis. The long log entry of the Shenandoah for August 2, 1865, begins "The darkest day of my life." Captain Waddell realized then in his grief that they had taken innocent unarmed Union whaling ships as prizes when the rest of the country had ended hostilities. [38]
Following the orders of the captain of the Barracouta, Waddell immediately converted the warship back to a merchant ship, storing her cannon below, discharging all arms, and repainting the hull. [38] [39] At this point, Waddell decided to sail back to England and surrender the Shenandoah in Liverpool. Surrendering in an American port carried the certainty of facing a court with a Union point of view and the very real risk of a trial for piracy, for which he and the crew could be hanged. Sailing south around Cape Horn and staying well off shore to avoid shipping that might report Shenandoah's position, they saw no land for another 9,000 miles until they arrived back in England, having logged a total of over 58,000 miles around the world in a year's travel—the only Confederate ship to circumnavigate the globe. [40]
Thus the final Confederate surrender of the war did not occur until November 6, 1865, when Waddell's ship reached Rock Ferry and was surrendered to Capt. R. N. Paynter, commander of HMS Donegal of the British Royal Navy. [38] [41] [42] The Shenandoah was officially surrendered by letter to the British Prime Minister, the Earl Russell. [43] [44] [45] [46] Ultimately, after an investigation by the British Admiralty court, Waddell and his crew were exonerated of doing anything that violated the laws of war and were unconditionally released. Shenandoah herself was sold to Sultan Majid bin Said of Zanzibar in 1866 and renamed El Majidi. [47] Several of the crew moved to Argentina to become farmers and eventually returned to the United States.[ citation needed ]
On April 6, 1866, Johnson issued a second proclamation that formally ended the rebellion in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia (as well as proclaiming it ended, rather than merely "suppressed," in Tennessee). Only Texas, where pockets of resistance remained, was excluded. [48]
Now, therefore, I, Andrew Johnson, President of the United States, do hereby proclaim and declare that the insurrection which heretofore existed in the States of Georgia, South Carolina, Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Alabama, Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Florida is at an end and is henceforth to be so regarded. [48]
The formal end of the war came on August 20, 1866, when Johnson signed a Proclamation – Declaring that Peace, Order, Tranquillity, and Civil Authority Now Exists in and Throughout the Whole of the United States of America. [49] [50] It noted that his April proclamation had declared "that there no longer existed any armed resistance of misguided citizens or others to the authority of the United States in any or in all the States before mentioned, excepting only the State of Texas." [50]
Whereas subsequently to the said 2d day of April, 1866, the insurrection in the State of Texas has been completely and everywhere suppressed and ended and the authority of the United States has been successfully and completely established in the said State of Texas and now remains therein unresisted and undisputed...
Whereas all the reasons and conclusions set forth in regard to the several States therein specially named now apply equally and in all respects to the State of Texas, as well as to the other States which had been involved in insurrection...
Now, therefore, I, Andrew Johnson, President of the United States, do hereby proclaim and declare that the insurrection which heretofore existed in the State of Texas is at an end and is to be henceforth so regarded in that State as in the other States before named in which the said insurrection was proclaimed to be at an end by the aforesaid proclamation of the 2d day of April, 1866.
And I do further proclaim that the said insurrection is at an end and that peace, order, tranquillity, and civil authority now exist in and throughout the whole of the United States of America. [50]
This final date, August 20, 1866, was adopted as the legal end of the Civil War by United States courts, departments, and agencies, as well as Congress. [2] An 1867 act of Congress extended soldiers' wartime rates of pay "for three years from and after the close of the rebellion, as announced by the President of the United States by proclamation, bearing date the twentieth day of August, eighteen hundred and sixty-six." [51] The Supreme Court also cited August 20, 1866 as the war's official end in Anderson v. United States. [52]
The American Civil War was a civil war in the United States between the Union and the Confederacy, which was formed in 1861 by states that had seceded from the Union. The central conflict leading to war was a dispute over whether slavery should be permitted to expand into the western territories, leading to more slave states, or be prohibited from doing so, which many believed would place slavery on a course of ultimate extinction.
The Army of Northern Virginia was the primary military force of the Confederate States of America in the Eastern Theater of the American Civil War. It was also the primary command structure of the Department of Northern Virginia. It was most often arrayed against the Union Army of the Potomac.
The Battle of Palmito Ranch, also known as the Battle of Palmito Hill, is considered by some criteria the final battle of the American Civil War. It was fought May 12 and 13, 1865, on the banks of the Rio Grande east of Brownsville, Texas, and a few miles from the seaport of Los Brazos de Santiago, at the southern tip of Texas. The battle took place more than a month after the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia under Robert E. Lee to Union forces at Appomattox Court House, which had since been communicated to both commanders at Palmito. In the intervening weeks the Confederacy had collapsed entirely, so it could also be classified as a postwar action.
Edward Porter Alexander was an American military engineer, railroad executive, planter, and author. He served first as an officer in the United States Army and later, during the American Civil War (1861–1865), in the Confederate Army, rising to the rank of brigadier general.
The Confederate States Army, also called the Confederate Army or the Southern Army, was the military land force of the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War (1861–1865), fighting against the United States forces to win the independence of the Southern states and uphold and expand the institution of slavery. On February 28, 1861, the Provisional Confederate Congress established a provisional volunteer army and gave control over military operations and authority for mustering state forces and volunteers to the newly chosen Confederate States president, Jefferson Davis (1808-1889),. Davis was a graduate of the United States Military Academy, on the Hudson River at West Point, New York, colonel of a volunteer regiment during the Mexican–American War (1846-1848). He had also been a United States senator from Mississippi and served as U.S. Secretary of War under 14th President Franklin Pierce. On March 1, 1861, on behalf of the new Confederate States government, Davis assumed control of the military situation at Charleston Harbor in Charleston, South Carolina, where South Carolina state militia had besieged the longtime Federal Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor, held by a small U.S. Army garrison under the command of Major Robert Anderson. (1805-1871). By March 1861, the Provisional Congress of the Confederate States meeting in the temporary capital of Montgomery, Alabama, expanded the provisional military forces and established a more permanent regular Confederate States Army.
CSS Shenandoah, formerly Sea King and later El Majidi, was an iron-framed, teak-planked, full-rigged sailing ship with auxiliary steam power chiefly known for her actions under Lieutenant Commander James Waddell as part of the Confederate States Navy during the American Civil War.
James Iredell Waddell was an officer in the United States Navy and later in the Confederate States Navy.
There is widespread disagreement among historians about the turning point of the American Civil War. A turning point in this context is an event that occurred during the conflict after which most modern scholars would agree that the eventual outcome was inevitable. The near simultaneous Battle of Gettysburg in the east and fall of Vicksburg in the west, in July 1863 is widely cited as the military climax of the American Civil War. Several other decisive battles and events throughout the war have been proposed as turning points. The events are presented here in chronological order with only the positive arguments for each given.
The Battle of Appomattox Court House, fought in Appomattox County, Virginia, on the morning of April 9, 1865, was one of the last, and ultimately one of the most consequential, battles of the American Civil War (1861–1865). It was the final engagement of Confederate General in Chief Robert E. Lee and his Army of Northern Virginia before they surrendered to the Union Army of the Potomac under the Commanding General of the United States Army, Ulysses S. Grant.
The most common name for the American Civil War in modern American usage is simply "The Civil War". Although rarely used during the war, the term "War Between the States" became widespread afterward in the Southern United States. During and immediately after the war, Northern historians often used the terms "War of the Rebellion" and "Great Rebellion", and the Confederate term was "War for Southern Independence", which regained some currency in the 20th century but has again fallen out of use. The name "Slaveholders' Rebellion" was used by Frederick Douglass and appears in newspaper articles. "Freedom War" is used to celebrate the war's effect of ending slavery.
The Battle of Namozine Church was an engagement in Amelia County, Virginia, between Union Army and Confederate States Army forces that occurred on April 3, 1865, during the Appomattox Campaign of the American Civil War. The battle was the first engagement between units of General Robert E. Lee's Confederate Army of Northern Virginia after that army's evacuation of Petersburg and Richmond, Virginia, on April 2, 1865, and units of the Union Army under the immediate command of Maj. Gen. Philip Sheridan, who was still acting independently as commander of the Army of the Shenandoah, and under the overall direction of Union General-in-Chief Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant. The forces immediately engaged in the battle were brigades of the cavalry division of Union Brig. Gen. and Brevet Maj. Gen. George Armstrong Custer, especially the brigade of Colonel and Brevet Brig. Gen. William Wells, and the Confederate rear guard cavalry brigades of Brig. Gen. William P. Roberts and Brig. Gen. Rufus Barringer and later in the engagement, Confederate infantry from the division of Maj. Gen. Bushrod Johnson.
Bennett Place is a former farm and homestead in Durham, North Carolina, which was the site of the last surrender of a major Confederate army in the American Civil War, when Joseph E. Johnston surrendered to William T. Sherman. The first meeting saw Sherman agreeing to certain political demands by the Confederates, which were promptly rejected by the Union cabinet in Washington. Another meeting had to be held to agree on military terms only, in line with Robert E. Lee’s recent surrender to Ulysses S. Grant. This effectively ended the war.
Thomas Taylor Munford was an American farmer, iron, steel and mining company executive and Confederate colonel and acting brigadier general during the American Civil War.
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The Pacific coast theater of the American Civil War consists of major military operations in the United States on the Pacific Ocean and in the states and Territories west of the Continental Divide. The theater was encompassed by the Department of the Pacific that included the states of California, Oregon, and Nevada, the territories of Washington, Utah, and later Idaho.
The Battle of Amelia Springs, Virginia was an engagement between the Union Army and Confederate Army of Northern Virginia that occurred on April 5, 1865 during the Appomattox Campaign of the American Civil War. It was followed by a second rear guard action near the same location on the night of April 5, 1865 and morning of April 6, 1865 during the Union Army pursuit of the Confederate forces which were fleeing westward after the fall of Petersburg and Richmond, Virginia at the Third Battle of Petersburg on April 2, 1865. The actions took place just prior to the Battle of Sailor's Creek on April 6, 1865. That battle would be the last major engagement between the Union Army under the overall direction of Union General-in-Chief, Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, and General Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia before that Confederate army's surrender at Appomattox Court House, Virginia on April 9, 1865.
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On the onset of the American Civil War in April 1861, Ulysses S. Grant was working as a clerk in his father's leather goods store in Galena, Illinois. When the war began, his military experience was needed, and congressman Elihu B. Washburne became his patron in political affairs and promotions in Illinois and nationwide.