Strong central government, wanted the nation to stay together

State's rights important (secession)

Attempted Compromises: The Missouri Compromise (1820), kept a voting balance of a slave state (Missouri) and a free state (Maine).  Compromise of 1850, California was a free state, Southwest territories would decide about slavery.  Kansas-Nebraska Act, popular sovereignty decided the issue of slavery in the state.

Republican Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated President on March 4, 1861.

Southern states feared there would be no new slave states.

Southern leaders thought their power in the House would decline as free states joined

Southern states wanted the right to declare any national law illegal.

Northern states wanted the national government's power to be supreme over the states.

The North and the South had different attitudes toward slavery, free labor (paid) versus slave labor (unpaid)

Confederate troops bombarded a Union stronghold, Fort Sumter, Charleston,
South Carolina, April 12, 1861.

Ways of life were different for both sides: plantations versus factories.

On state's rights the North argued no state had a right to secede from the Union,
the South argued a state could leave the Union if it voted to do so.

Major Civil War Battles

On April 12, 1861 at 4:30 A.M. the first shot hurtled over Fort Sumter, at the entrance to the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina.  This was the beginning of the Civil War.  Union troops, were forced to leave the fort the following day.  The U.S. flag was not raised again at Fort Sumter until February 18, 1865.  The fort was not of military importance, but a symbol to both sides. 

The First Battle at Bull Run (1861) was the first major battle.  It was suppose to be the shortest and the end to the brand new war. Volunteer soldiers lined-up in colorful, clean uniforms waiting for the event to begin. People with picnic baskets sat on the hillsides as the troops battled. After ten hours of fighting, 900 soldiers lay dying as the Union troops retreated to Washington. 

Known as the bloodiest battle of the Civil War, the Battle of Shiloh caused more than 23,500 men to be killed or missing.  From this important battle, General Grant knew that the South would not be pushovers. 

The Battle of Antietam (1862) saw General Lee lead the Confederate troops into the North.  The battle was not a decisive victory for either side.  This battle led to the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation by President Abraham Lincoln. 

At home, families and friends were on opposite sides of the war.  Southern troops were young and poorly equipped.  Much of the war took place in the South.  Large cities like Atlanta and Richmond were destroyed and devastated with disease.  Battle was often man-to-man.  Women were left to run businesses and farms throughout the country.  The collapse of the South made Confederate money worthless.

Clara Barton
Clara Barton known as the "Angel of the Battlefields" was a famous Civil War nurse to wounded Union troops.  She was the founder of the American Red Cross in1881. After the war, she opened the Missing Soldier Office.  The government gave her $15,000 in federal money and her own staff.  As soon as the word spread, Clara got many letters looking for lost men and boys.  She made contacts with the families herself.  Soon after, she went to Andersonville, Georgia where almost 80,000 soldiers were prisoners of the war.  When she closed the office in 1868, she was able to find information on more than 22,000 soldiers.

African Americans fought in both armies.  The Confederacy used slaves as naval crew members and soldiers and the Union enlisted them early in the war.  African soldiers did not have equal pay and were discriminated against while serving in segregated units.  Robert Smalls, a sailor and later an honored Union naval captain went on to become a Congressman after the war ended..

Letters from soldiers

Letter from Sullivan Ballou to his wife, Sarah

Writing Activities for Fifth Graders
 

Without slaves after the war southern landholders reduced the size of their plantations.  Landowners had to sell large portions of land. The concept of sharecropping began in the South.  A tenant or sharecropper agreed to give the landowner, as rent, a portion of the crop raised from his labor. Sharecropping kept newly freed slaves in debt to landowners.  

As the northern cities were building industries with the help of immigrants, the southern cities were trying to rebuild their lives.

Reconstruction policies were put into place after the war.  Southern military leaders could not hold office.  Southerners resented "Carpetbaggers" from the north.  African-Americans were allowed to hold public offices and had equal rights under the Civil Rights Act of 1866.