People History 1 Unit test 4 ch13-16

Abraham Lincoln

The 16th president and the first Republican to hold that office, his election prompted secession in the South and he led the nation through its Civil War in order to restore the Union, eliminating slavery in the process.

Stephen F. Austin

The key figure in American colonization of Texas, he spent more than a year in Mexican prisons before leading the Siege of Bexar in late 1835. He lost a bid to become president of the Republic of Texas in 1836, months before dying of pneumonia at age 43.

Edwin Stanton

The temperamental and somewhat erratic secretary of war was the focal point of controversy when President Andrew Johnson tried to purge his cabinet of its only Radical Republican by sacking him.

Rutherford B. Hayes

This Ohio governor became the 19th president in the confusing and hotly contested election of 1876. Despite having fewer popular votes than his opponent, he was given the presidency in return for the removal of the last federal troops in the South, thus ending Reconstruction.

John Charles Fremot

This adventurer and soldier led five expeditions to the West, briefly took control of California during the Mexican War, was court-martialed for mutiny, and became the first Republican candidate for president, losing to James Buchanan in 1856.

John Tyler

A pro-slavery Virginian, he became the 10th president when William Henry Harrison died just one month into his term. He broke ranks with his Whig Party and doomed hopes of being elected in 1844 over his intense pursuit of the annexation of Texas.

John Brown

A radical abolitionist, he and his followers murdered five pro-slavery settlers in Kansas in 1856 and, three years later, staged a futile raid on the armory at Harper's Ferry, Va., for the purpose of igniting a guerrilla war. He was then hanged, ensuring his status as a martyr to abolitionism

Clara Barton

A self-taught nurse, she served the Union Army by overseeing the collection and distribution of medical supplies. After the war, she led an effort to locate and identify thousands of missing soldiers and was the primary founder of the American Red Cross.

Stephen A. Douglas

A senator from Illinois, he helped assure passage of the Compromise of 1850 and the Kansas-Nebraska Act, but is most noted for a series of debates on slavery with Abraham Lincoln during his successful re-election campaign of 1858.

Zachary Taylor

A victorious general in the Mexican-American War, he rode that popularity to election as a Whig president in 1849. His presidency was dominated by debate about slavery in the Mexican cession, but he died before there was any resolution.

Nicholas P. Trist

An American negotiator sent with the U.S. Army to Mexico City, he was ordered home by President Polk, but ignored the order and stayed on to negotiate the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. He was fired upon his return to Washington.

John L. O'Sullivan

An influential editor and proponent of the expansionist Young America movement, he coined the term "Manifest Destiny" in an 1845 article in Democratic Review.

Horace Greeley

Famous newspaper editor who ran for president as a Liberal Republican against Grant in 1872. Despite having the support of the Democrats, he lost in a landslide following a savage campaign during which both Greeley and his wife died.

George McClellan

He succeeded Winfield Scott as general-in-chief of the Union Army, but was removed in 1862 by President Lincoln, who became frustrated with his failure to take the offensive. He ran against Lincoln as a Democrat in 1864 on a platform of ending the war.

William T. Sherman

Noted for his bold military strategy, this Union general led his troops on a "scorched earth" march from Atlanta to the sea in 1864 before heading north to more military victories in the Carolinas.

Clement Vallandigham

A Democratic congressman from Ohio, he was an outspoken leader of the anti-war Copperheads, which resulted in his arrest and deportation to the South in 1863. He then went to Canada, where he ran for governor of Ohio but was defeated

Sam Houston

A Jacksonian Democrat and former Tennessee governor, he commanded the Texan Army in the decisive battle at San Jacinto. This catapulted him to two terms as president of the Texas Republic, 13 years in the U.S. Senate and a term as Texas' governor, from which he was removed for opposing secession

Andrew Johnson Ch 16

A Jacksonian from Tennessee, he remained in the Senate after secession and was rewarded with the vice presidency in 1864. He became president after Lincoln's death, but his differences with Congress over Reconstruction led to his unsuccessful impeachment

Antonio López de Santa Anna

A Mexican general and political leader whose claim to dictatorial powers contributed to the Texas Revolution, he was captured at the Battle of San Jacinto in 1836 and signed treaties agreeing to Texas' independence.

Dred Scott

A Missouri slave, he sued on the grounds that a move into the Wisconsin Territory should have freed him. The 1857 Supreme Court ruling that bears his name found 1) that no African American could sue because they were not citizens, and 2) the Missouri Compromise was unconstitutional

Franklin Pierce

A New England Democrat, he became the 14th president in 1853 and his shaky tenure was dominated by furor surrounding the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which he supported and which cost him the nomination for re-election

James Buchanan

A Pennsylvania Democrat, as the 15th president he proved incapable of steering the country through difficulties that included an economic panic, a growing sectional crisis and, during the final four months of his tenure, the secession of seven Southern states.

George Meade

A Union general, his forces maintained the high ground against Confederate assaults at the decisive Battle of Gettysburg in July 1863.

Ulysses S. Grant

A failed businessman and borderline alcoholic, he became a Civil War hero and the 18th president. He led Union forces to success in the West, was promoted to general in chief in 1864 and forced Lee to sign surrender papers at Appomattox Court House the following year

Thaddeus Stevens

A fervent abolitionist and longtime congressman from Pennsylvania, he was a leader of the Radical Republicans during Reconstruction and co-sponsor of the impeachment of Andrew Johnson.

Charles Sumner Ch14

A fervent abolitionist and longtime senator from Massachusetts, he is remembered for being brutally caned on the floor of the Senate in 1856 and for leading the Radical Republicans during Reconstruction

Robert E. Lee ch15

A highly respected career officer with the U.S. Army, he was offered command of the Union Army at the outbreak of the Civil War, but declined to go against his native Virginia. He then accepted a similar position with the Confederate Army, which he held until his surrender at Appomattox

Harriet Beecher Stowe

A member of a prominent family of religious leaders, this author's 1852 novel of slave life, Uncle Tom's Cabin, sold more than 300,000 copies within a year and swayed public opinion in the North to a more abolitionist position.

John Wilkes Booth

A noted actor and Confederate supporter, he shot and killed President Lincoln at Ford's Theater in Washington, D.C., on April 14, 1865, then was surrounded and killed at a farm in northern Virginia 12 days later.

James K. Polk

Andrew Jackson's protege, this Tennessee Democrat was elected the 11th president in 1844 on an expansionist platform that pledged to annex Texas, which provoked the Mexican-American War, and to press U.S. claims in the Oregon Territory.

William Henry Seward

As a two term anti-slavery senator from New York, he emerged as a leading candidate for the Republican nomination for president in 1860, but was defeated by Abraham Lincoln, in turn becoming Lincoln's secretary of state.

Mary Surratt

As owner of the Washington, D.C., boardinghouse where the assassination of President Lincoln was plotted, she was tried, convicted and became the first woman hanged by the federal government on July 7, 1865

John Crittenden

As senator from Kentucky, in 1861 he proposed a compromise that would have extended the Missouri Compromise line between free and slave west to the Pacific. It died amid opposition from newly elected President Lincoln.

Millard Fillmore

He became the 13th president upon the death of Zachary Taylor and signed into law the Compromise of 1850, but failed to garner the Whig nomination in 1852

P.G.T Beauregard

He became the Confederacy's first prominent general by ordering the first shots to be fired at Fort Sumter, leading the Rebel victory at First Bull Run and later commanding armies at Shiloh and the defense of Petersburg in 1864.

Winfield Scott

He led the U.S. Army into Mexico City during our war with that nation, was an unsuccessful Whig candidate for president in 1852 and served as Union general-in-chief during the Civil War, devising the Anaconda Plan for defeating the Confederacy.

Jefferson Davis

He served two terms as senator from Mississippi and was secretary of war prior to his election as president of the Confederacy, a title he held until the end of the Civil War.

Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson

One of the Confederacy's best commanders, he led his army to considerable success on the battlefield until he was fatally wounded by friendly fire at Chancellorsville, Va., in 1863

John Breckenridge

Pro-slavery presidential candidate from Kentucky who was nominated by the Southern faction of the Democratic Party in 1860