Unit 1: Civil War and Reconstruction (Module 1, Lessons 5/6/7)
Vicksburg
Confederate stronghold on the Mississippi River which fell to the forces of Union General Grant in July 1863, thus splitting the Confederacy into two parts.
Clara Barton
Dedicated Union nurse who founded the American Red Cross after the war.
Stephen Douglas
Democratic incumbent running opponent against Abraham Lincoln in the 1858 race for US Senate.
Franklin Pierce
Democratic presidential candidate who gained victory in 1852 when the Whig vote in the South fell dramatically.
Harriet Tubman
One of the most famous conductors of the Underground Railroad who was born a slave in Maryland in 1820 or 1821 and helped 300 slaves flee to freedom.
Harriet Beecher Stowe
Published a novel called Uncle Tom's Cabin in 1852, which stressed that slavery was not just a political contest, but also a great moral struggle.
Abraham Lincoln
Republican candidate who ran against Stephen Douglas in 1858 race for US Senate.
Ku Klux Klan (KKK)
Secret organization that used terrorist tactics for white supremacy in the south after the civil war.
Stonewall
Nickname given to Confederate General Thomas J. Jackson after his brave conduct at the Battle of Bull Run.
Appomattox Court House
Virginia town where Lee surrendered to Grant on April 9, 1865.
scalawag
White southerner who joined the Republican Party after the civil war
Reconstruction
(1865-1877) period during which the U.S. began to rebuild after the Civil War.
Andrew Johnson
17th President of U.S.; from Tennessee; Lincoln's successor who tried to break the planters' power by excluding high ranking former Confederates and wealthy southern landowners from taking oath needed to restore their voting privileges; believed that "white man alone must manage the South."
John Wilkes Booth
26-year-old actor and southern sympathizer who assassinated Abraham Lincoln
carpetbagger
A northerner who moved to the south after the civil war
Dred Scott
A slave who appealed to the Supreme Court for his freedom on the grounds that that living in a free state (Illinois) and a free territory (Wisconsin) had made him a free man.
Income tax
A tax that takes a specified percentage of an individual's income.
Fourteenth Amendment
Adopted in 1868 and makes all persons born, naturalized, or former slave in the U.S. to be citizens and guarantees equal protection under the law.
Fifteenth Amendment
Adopted in 1870 and prohibits denial of voting rights to people for race or for being former slaves.
Thirteenth Amendment
Amendment adopted in 1865 that abolished slavery and involuntary servitude.
Robert E. Lee
Commanding general of the Confederate armies in the east; from Virginia and was determined to save the Confederate capital; kept Union armies at bay for three years using expert military defensive tactics.
Freedman's Bureau
Established by Congress to provide food, clothing, hospitals, legal protection, and education for former slaves and poor whites in the south in 1865.
Emancipation Proclamation
Executive order issued by Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863, freeing slaves in all regions behind Confederate lines.
Gettysburg Address
Famous speech by Abraham Lincoln in November 1863, at the dedication of a national cemetery on the site of the Battle of Gettysburg.
Hiram Revels
First African American senator
secession
Formal withdrawal of a state from the Union.
Jefferson Davis
Former senator of Mississippi who was unanimously elected as president by the Confederates.
William Tecumseh Sherman
Important Union general who served under Ulysses S. Grant in both the west and east; famous for his "March to the Sea" through Georgia in 1864
Bull Run
Location of first bloodshed on the battlefield during the Civil War; only 25 miles from Washington, DC
Antietam
Maryland creek where forces of Union General McClellan met Confederate General Lee's army, leading to a battle on September 17 that proved to be the bloodiest single-day battle in U.S. history.
Radical Republicans
Minority of Republicans in Congress who wanted to destroy the political power of former slaveholders and give full citizenship and voting rights to African Americans
Fort Sumter
Most important out of four southern forts which is located on an island in Charleston Harbor.
Gettysburg
Sleepy town in southern Pennsylvania where the most decisive battle of the war was fought in July 1863.
popular sovereignty
System in which the residents vote to decide an issue.
Underground Railroad
System of routes along which runaway slaves were helped to escape to Canada or to safe areas in the free states.
sharecropping
System which landowners give farm workers land, seed, and tools in return for a part of the crops they raise.
Confederacy
The Confederate States of America, a confederation formed in 1861 by the Southern states after their secession from the Union.
conscription
The drafting of citizens for military service.
Ulysses S. Grant
Union general and decisive military commander whose forces captured two western forts in just eleven days; Lincoln gave him command of the Union army in the east which led to Union victory