Portal:American Civil War

The American Civil War Portal

This sutler's tent sold provisions to soldiers

The American Civil War (1861–1865) was a sectional rebellion against the United States of America by the Confederate States, formed of eleven southern states' governments which moved to secede from the Union after the 1860 election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States. The Union's victory was eventually achieved by leveraging advantages in population, manufacturing and logistics and through a strategic naval blockade denying the Confederacy access to the world's markets.

In many ways, the conflict's central issues – the enslavement of African Americans, the role of constitutional federal government, and the rights of states – are still not completely resolved. Not surprisingly, the Confederate army's surrender at Appomattox on April 9,1865 did little to change many Americans' attitudes toward the potential powers of central government. The passage of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments to the Constitution in the years immediately following the war did not change the racial prejudice prevalent among Americans of the day; and the process of Reconstruction did not heal the deeply personal wounds inflicted by four brutal years of war and more than 970,000 casualties – 3 percent of the population, including approximately 560,000 deaths. As a result, controversies affected by the war's unresolved social, political, economic and racial tensions continue to shape contemporary American thought. The causes of the war, the reasons for the outcome, and even the name of the war itself are subjects of much discussion even today. (Full article)

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USS New Ironsides under steam and sail

USS New Ironsides was a wooden-hulled broadside ironclad built for the United States Navy during the American Civil War. The ship spent most of her career blockading the Confederate ports of Charleston, South Carolina, and Wilmington, North Carolina, in 1863–1865. New Ironsides bombarded the fortifications defending Charleston in 1863 during the First and Second Battles of Charleston Harbor. At the end of 1864 and the beginning of 1865 she bombarded the defenses of Wilmington in the First and Second Battles of Fort Fisher.

Although she was struck many times by Confederate shells, gunfire never significantly damaged the ship or injured the crew. Her only casualty in combat occurred when she was struck by a spar torpedo carried by the CSS David. Eight crewmen were awarded the Medal of Honor for their actions during the Second Battle of Fort Fisher in 1865. The ship was destroyed by fire in 1865 after she was placed in reserve. (Full article...)

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Grand Parade of the States

The New England state of Connecticut played an important role in the American Civil War, providing arms, equipment, technology, funds, supplies, and soldiers for the Union Army and the Union Navy. Several Connecticut politicians played significant roles in the Federal government and helped shape its policies during the war and the Reconstruction. (Full article...)

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Oliver Christian Bosbyshell (January 3, 1839 – August 1, 1921) was Superintendent of the United States Mint at Philadelphia from 1889 to 1894. He claimed to have been the first Union soldier wounded by enemy action in the Civil War, stating that he received a bruise on the forehead from an object thrown by a Confederate sympathizer while his unit was marching through Baltimore in April 1861.

Bosbyshell was born in Mississippi of an old Philadelphia family, residing temporarily in the South, and raised in Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania. He enlisted in the Union cause on the outbreak of war. He served in the Union army during the American Civil War with the 25th Pennsylvania Volunteer Regiment for three months and then the 48th Pennsylvania Infantry for three years. He saw action in several key battles of the Eastern theater and was promoted to the rank of major. He led African American troops during the Battle of the Crater that suffered over 400 casualties. (Full article...)

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

Did you know...

... that American Civil War chaplain Thomas Mooney was pulled from service after baptizing a cannon?
... that the statue of Austin Blair, according to the newspaper City Pulse, is one of only two monuments in the United States to mention slavery as a cause of the American Civil War?
... that at the Battle of La Haye-du-Puits in July 1944, a Confederate flag dating to the American Civil War was raised over the town?
... that Edward L. Molineux seized goods worth $210 million in 2025 from the Confederacy during the American Civil War?
... that Benjamin Jackson was likely paid at least $300 to fight in the American Civil War as Lewis Saunders?
... that Edward W. Gantt was a Confederate soldier who defected to the Union during the American Civil War?