Abraham Lincoln was an American lawyer and statesman who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. Lincoln led the nation through the American Civil War, the country's greatest moral, cultural, constitutional, and political crisis. He succeeded in preserving the Union, abolishing slavery, bolstering the federal government, and modernizing the U.S. economy.
The American Civil War was a civil war in the United States fought between northern and Pacific states and southern states that voted to secede and form the Confederate States of America. The central cause of the war was the status of slavery, especially the expansion of slavery into newly acquired land after the Mexican-American War. On the eve of the Civil War in 1860, four million of the 32 million Americans were black slaves, mostly in the South.
The Emancipation Proclamation, or Proclamation 95, was a presidential proclamation and executive order issued by United States President Abraham Lincoln on September 22, 1862, during the Civil War. The Proclamation read:
The 1864 United States presidential election, the 20th quadrennial presidential election, was held on Tuesday, November 8, 1864. In the midst of the American Civil War, incumbent President Abraham Lincoln of the National Union Party easily defeated the Democratic nominee, former General George B. McClellan, by a wide margin of 212–21 in the electoral college, with 55% of the popular vote. For the election, the Republican Party and some Democrats created the National Union Party, especially to attract War Democrats.
George Brinton McClellan was an American soldier, Civil War Union general, civil engineer, railroad executive, and politician who served as the 24th Governor of New Jersey. A graduate of West Point, McClellan served with distinction during the Mexican–American War (1846–1848), and later left the Army to work on railroads until the outbreak of the American Civil War (1861–1865). Early in the conflict, McClellan was appointed to the rank of major general and played an important role in raising a well-trained and organized army, which would become the Army of the Potomac in the Eastern Theater; he served a brief period as Commanding General of the United States Army of the Union Army.
Salmon Portland Chase was a U.S. politician and jurist who served as the sixth Chief Justice of the United States. He also served as the 23rd Governor of Ohio, represented Ohio in the United States Senate, and served as the 25th United States Secretary of the Treasury. Chase was therefore one of a few U.S. politicians who served in all three branches of the federal government.
Clement Laird Vallandigham was an American politician and leader of the Copperhead faction of anti-war Democrats during the American Civil War. He served two terms for Ohio's 3rd congressional district in the United States House of Representatives. In 1863, he was convicted at an Army court martial of opposing the war, and exiled to the Confederacy. He ran for governor of Ohio in 1863 from exile in Canada, but was defeated. Vallandigham died in 1871 in Lebanon, Ohio, after accidentally shooting himself in the abdomen with a pistol, while representing a defendant in a murder case for killing a man in a barroom brawl in Hamilton.
Edwin McMasters Stanton was an American lawyer and politician who served as Secretary of War under the Lincoln Administration during most of the American Civil War. Stanton's management helped organize the massive military resources of the North and guide the Union to victory. However, he was criticized by many Union generals, who perceived him as overcautious and micromanaging. He also organized the manhunt for Abraham Lincoln's assassin, John Wilkes Booth.
John Adams Dix was an American politician and military officer who was Secretary of the Treasury, Governor of New York and Union major general during the Civil War. He was notable for arresting the pro-Southern Maryland General Assembly, preventing that divided border state from seceding, and for arranging a system for prisoner exchange via the Dix–Hill Cartel, concluded in partnership with Confederate Major General Daniel Harvey Hill.
Lincoln: A Novel is a 1984 historical novel, part of the Narratives of Empire series by Gore Vidal. The novel describes the presidency of Abraham Lincoln and extends from the start of the American Civil War until his assassination. Rather than focus on the Civil War itself, the novel is centred on Lincoln's political and personal struggles. Though Lincoln is the focus, the book is never narrated from his point of view ; Vidal instead writes from the perspective of key historical figures. He draws from contemporary diaries, memoirs, letters, newspaper accounts, the biographical writings of John Hay and John Nicolay, and the work of modern historians.
The Battle of Fort Pillow, also known as the Fort Pillow massacre, was fought on April 12, 1864, at Fort Pillow on the Mississippi River in Henning, Tennessee, during the American Civil War. The battle ended with a massacre of Union soldiers attempting to surrender, by soldiers under the command of Confederate Major General Nathan Bedford Forrest. Military historian David J. Eicher concluded: "Fort Pillow marked one of the bleakest, saddest events of American military history."
Katherine Jane ("Kate") Chase Sprague was a Washington society hostess during the American Civil War. During the war, she married Rhode Island Governor William Sprague.
During the American Civil War, the State of Ohio played a key role in providing troops, military officers, and supplies to the Union army. Due to its central location in the Northern United States and burgeoning population, Ohio was both politically and logistically important to the war effort. Despite the state's boasting a number of very powerful Republican politicians, it was divided politically. Portions of Southern Ohio followed the Peace Democrats and openly opposed President Abraham Lincoln's policies. Ohio played an important part in the Underground Railroad prior to the war, and remained a haven for escaped and runaway slaves during the war years.
Grant Comes East: A Novel of the Civil War (2004) is an alternate history novel written by Newt Gingrich, former Speaker of the United States House of Representatives; William R. Forstchen, and Albert S. Hanser, and the second of a trilogy. It is the sequel to Gettysburg: A Novel of the Civil War. The third book of the historical trilogy is called Never Call Retreat: Lee and Grant: The Final Victory and was published in 2005. The novel is illustrated with historic photographs of the Civil War. It was featured on the New York Times bestseller list.
During the American Civil War, the Ohio River port city of Cincinnati, Ohio, played a key role as a major source of supplies and troops for the Union Army. It also served as the headquarters for much of the war for the Department of the Ohio, which was charged with the defense of the region, as well as directing the army's offensives into Kentucky and Tennessee.
The presidency of Abraham Lincoln began on March 4, 1861, when Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated as the 16th president of the United States, and ended upon his assassination and death on April 15, 1865, 42 days into his second term. Lincoln was the first member of the recently established Republican Party elected to the presidency. He was succeeded by Vice President Andrew Johnson. Lincoln presided over the Union victory in the American Civil War, which dominated his presidency.
Tennessee Johnson is a 1942 American film about Andrew Johnson, the 17th president of the United States, released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was directed by William Dieterle and written by Milton Gunzburg, Alvin Meyers, John Balderston, and Wells Root.
Anna Ella Carroll was an American politician, pamphleteer and lobbyist. She was born in to a very wealthy and prominent family in her state and city: her great-grandfather was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence and the last surviving signers and a delegate to the Second Continental Congress and later in the new Congress of the United States, her father was the Governor of Maryland from 1830–1831, and her mother was the daughter of a Baltimore physician. She was also the eldest of eight children. She played a significant role as an adviser to the Lincoln presidential cabinet during the American Civil War (1861-1865). She also wrote many pamphlets criticizing slavery. She died on February 19, 1894, at the age of 79.
Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln is a 2005 book by Pulitzer Prize-winning American historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, published by Simon & Schuster. The book is a biographical portrait of U.S. President Abraham Lincoln and some of the men who served with him in his cabinet from 1861 to 1865. Three of his Cabinet members had previously run against Lincoln in the 1860 election: Attorney General Edward Bates, Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase and Secretary of State William H. Seward. The book focuses on Lincoln's mostly successful attempts to reconcile conflicting personalities and political factions on the path to abolition and victory in the American Civil War.
First Reading of the Emancipation Proclamation of President Lincoln is an 1864 oil-on-canvas painting by Francis Bicknell Carpenter. In the painting, Carpenter depicts Abraham Lincoln, the 16th President of the United States, and his Cabinet members reading over the Emancipation Proclamation, which proclaimed the freedom of slaves in the ten states rebelling against the Union in the American Civil War. Lincoln presented the Emancipation Proclamation to his Cabinet on July 22, 1862, and issued the Proclamation on September 22, 1862, which took effect on January 1, 1863.
