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Nat Turner Slave Revolt
was a slave rebellion that took place in Southampton County, Virginia. Rebel slaves killed from 55 to 65 people, at least 51 being white -
William Lloyd Garrison Published The Liberator
and helped lead the successful abolitionist campaign against slavery in the United States. -
American Anti-Slavery Society Begins
was an abolitionist society founded by William Lloyd Garrison and Arthur Tappan. Frederick Douglass, an escaped slave, was a key leader of this society who often spoke at its meetings. -
Sarah Grimke’s Letters on the Equality of the Sexes and the Condition of Women published
First was the notion that women were subordinate to men by God's decree. -
Henry Highland Garnet’s “Address to the Slaves of the United States of America”
he shocked his listeners at the 1843 national convention of free people of color when he called upon slaves to murder their masters. -
Women’s Rights Convention at Seneca Falls
In 1848, Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and several other women decided to call a women's rights meeting in Seneca Falls, New York. -
Harriett Tubman Escapes from Slavery
she decided to escape slavery in Maryland for Philadelphia. She feared that her family would be further severed and was concerned for her own fate as a sickly slave of low economic value. -
Sojourner Truth Delivered her “Ain’t I a Woman” Speech
she encouraged other women leaders, notably Lucretia Mott, she continued to appear before suffrage gatherings for the rest of her life. -
Compromise of 1850
the Fugitive Slave Act was amended and the slave trade in Washington, D.C., was abolished. -
Fugitive Slave Act
part of the Compromise of 1850 between Southern slave-holding interests and Northern Free-Soilers. -
Harriet Beecher Stowe Published Uncle Tom’s Cabin
it achieved wide popularity, particularly among white readers in the North, by vividly dramatizing the experience of slavery. -
Bleeding Kansas
was a series of violent civil confrontations in the United States , which emerged from a political and ideological debate over the legality of slavery in the proposed state of Kansas. -
Kansas-Nebraska Act
It allowed people in the territories of Kansas and Nebraska to decide for themselves whether or not to allow slavery within their borders -
Republican Party Founded
anti-slavery Whigs had begun meeting in the upper mid western states to discuss the formation of a new party. -
Dred Scott Decision
ruled that a slave (Dred Scott) who had resided in a free state and territory (where slavery was prohibited) was not thereby entitled to his freedom and that African Americans were not and could never be citizens of the United States -
Lecompton Constitution
It contained clauses protecting slaveholding and a bill of rights excluding free blacks, and it added to the frictions leading up to the U.S. Civil War. -
Panic of 1857
a financial panic in the United States caused by the declining international economy and over-expansion of the domestic economy. -
Lincoln-Douglas Debates
was a series of seven debates between the Democratic senator Stephen A. Douglas and Republican challenger Abraham Lincoln during the 1858 Illinois senatorial campaign, largely concerning the issue of slavery extension into the territories. -
John Brown’s Raid on Harper’s Ferry
an assault by an armed band of abolitionists led by John Brown on the federal armoury located at Harper's Ferry, Virginia. It was a main precipitating incident to the American Civil War. -
Democratic Party Splits into Northern and Southern Halves
Northern Democrats nominated Stephen Douglas, while southern Democrats nominated John Breckinridge. This split the Democratic ticket in half, giving the Republicans, who nominated Abraham Lincoln, a huge advantage. -
South Carolina Secedes from the Union
South Carolina became the first slave state in the south to declare that it had seceded from the United States. -
Abraham Lincoln Elected President
became the 16th United States President -
Confederate States of America Founded
the government of 11 Southern states that seceded from the Union in 1860–61, carrying on all the affairs of a separate government and conducting a major war until defeated -
Firing on Fort Sumter
was the bombardment of Fort Sumter near Charleston, South Carolina by the Confederate States Army, and the return gunfire and subsequent surrender by the United States Army, that started the American Civil War. -
Battle of Antietam
one of the greatest Confederate threats to Washington, D.C. The battle took its name from Antietam Creek, which flows south from Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, to the Potomac River near Harper's Ferry, West Virginia. -
Battle of Gettysburg
is considered the most important engagement of the American Civil War. After a great victory over Union forces at Chancellorsville, General Robert E. Lee marched his Army of Northern Virginia into Pennsylvania -
Emancipation Proclamation
declared "that all persons held as slaves" within the rebellious states "are, and henceforward shall be free." -
Gettysburg Address
world-famous speech delivered by Pres. Abraham Lincoln at the dedication of the National Cemetery, the site of one of the decisive battles of the American Civil War -
Congress Passed the 13th Amendment
abolished slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime -
General U.S. Grant Assumed Command of Union Troops
a brief document officially promoting then-Major General Ulysses S. Grant to the rank of lieutenant general of the U.S. Army, tasking the future president with the job of leading all Union troops against the Confederate Army. -
Sherman’s March to the Sea
a military campaign of the American Civil War conducted through Georgia -
Abraham Lincoln Reelected
Lincoln himself believed he had little chance of being re-elected because of this, McClellan was thought to be a heavy favorite to win the election. -
Lincoln Assassination
Shot in the head by Confederate sympathizer John Wilkes Booth, Lincoln died the next morning. -
Lee Surrendered to Grant at Appomattox Court House
was one of the last battles of the American Civil War -
Andrew Johnson Became President
was the 17th president of the United States, serving from 1865 to 1869 -
Johnson Announced Plans for Presidential Reconstruction
implemented a plan of Reconstruction that gave the white South a free hand in regulating the transition from slavery to freedom and offered no role to blacks in the politics of the South. -
Arrival of Scalawags and Carpetbaggers in the South
refers to Northerners who moved to the South after the Civil War, during Reconstruction. Many carpetbaggers were said to have moved South for their own financial and political gains. Scalawags were white Southerners who cooperated politically with black freedmen and Northern newcomers. -
Ku Klux Klan formed
hate organizations that have employed terror in pursuit of their white supremacist agenda. One group was founded immediately after the Civil War -
Period of “Redemption” after the Civil War
during which the nation tried to resolve the status of the ex-Confederate states, the ex-Confederate leaders, and freedmen (ex-slaves) -
Freedman’s Bureau Established
established by Congress to provide practical aid to 4,000,000 newly freed African Americans in their transition from slavery to freedom -
Civil Rights Act Passed over Johnson’s Veto
overriding a veto by President Andrew Johnson. The law's chief thrust was to offer protection to slaves freed in the aftermath of the Civil War -
14th Amendment Ratified
grants citizenship to "all persons born or naturalized in the United States" which included former slaves who had just been freed after the Civil War. -
Andrew Johnson Impeached
a resolution to impeach the President for high crimes and misdemeanors. One week later, the House adopted eleven articles of impeachment against the President. -
U.S. Grant Elected President
first election of the Reconstruction Era, Republican nominee Ulysses S. Grant defeated Democrat Horatio Seymour. -
Creation of the Radical Republicans
rant was elected as a Republican in 1868 and after the election he generally sided with the Radicals on Reconstruction policies and signed the Civil Rights Act of 1871 into law -
15th Amendment Ratified
granted African American men the right to vote. -
Slaughterhouse Cases (Supreme Court)
decision in 1873 limiting the protection of the privileges claused of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. -
U.S. v. Cruikshank
an important United States Supreme Court decision in United States constitutional law, one of the earliest to deal with the application of the Bill of Rights to state governments following the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment. -
Compromise of 1877
an informal, unwritten deal, that settled the intensely disputed 1876 U.S. presidential election. It resulted in the United States federal government pulling the last troops out of the South, and formally ended the Reconstruction Era.
