1861–1865
Civil War
The Union and Confederacy fought over slavery, secession, and the future of the United States.
Defining Moments
Key Historical Events
1863
Emancipation Proclamation
Civil War
Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation declared enslaved people in areas still rebelling against the United States free and made emancipation a central Union war aim.
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1863
Battle of Gettysburg
Civil War
The three-day Battle of Gettysburg stopped Robert E. Lee’s second invasion of the North and produced more than 50,000 Union and Confederate casualties.
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1864
Assassination of Abraham Lincoln
Civil War
John Wilkes Booth shot President Abraham Lincoln at Ford’s Theatre on April 14, 1865; Lincoln died the next morning as the Civil War was ending.
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Explore Destinations From This Era
Allatoona Pass Battlefield
Cartersville, GA
A preserved Civil War battlefield and railroad pass with original earthworks, trenches, monuments, and connections to both the Great Locomotive Chase and the 1864 Battle of Allatoona.
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Appomattox Court House National Historical Park
Appomattox, VA
A preserved Virginia village where Robert E. Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia to Ulysses S. Grant in April 1865.
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Atwood Museum
Chatham, MA
A preserved 1752 sea captain’s home and expanded museum campus interpreting centuries of Chatham and Cape Cod history.
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Boston Fire Museum
Boston, MA
A free museum inside an 1891 firehouse preserves antique apparatus, alarms, artifacts, and stories from Boston’s pioneering professional fire department.
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Brooklyn Navy Yard
Brooklyn, NY
A landmark New York shipyard where generations of workers built celebrated American warships and where historic industry continues within a modern manufacturing campus.
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Camp Milton Historic Preserve
Jacksonville, FL
A Jacksonville preserve where surviving Confederate earthworks and interpretive features reveal the scale of Florida's largest Civil War encampment.
View DetailsAbout This Era
The Union and Confederacy fought over slavery, secession, and the future of the United States.
Last updated August 2, 2026
Road Trips in this Era
Arkansas Statehood & the Making of Little Rock
Connect the pivotal 1862 battles at Pea Ridge and Prairie Grove with Fort Smith’s Civil War and frontier history.
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Civil War Northeast Florida
Explore coastal defenses, Jacksonville earthworks, and Florida’s largest Civil War battle on a two-day journey across Northeast Florida.
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Defending the Delaware: Forts from Civil War to World War II
Follow a century of Delaware coastal defense from a Civil War island fortress to a modernized river fort and the World War II batteries at Cape Henlopen.
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From Chattanooga to Atlanta: Georgia's 1864 Campaign Corridor
Follow the rail corridor and battlefield landscapes that frame the Union advance from the Chattanooga region toward Atlanta and the struggle to hold its supply line.
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Sherman's March to the Sea: Milledgeville to Savannah
Trace Sherman's 1864 March to the Sea from Georgia's wartime capital through a documented headquarters stop to the capture of Fort McAllister and occupation of Savannah.
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The Camden Expedition: Arkansas’s Red River Campaign
Follow the 1864 Camden Expedition from Arkansas’s Confederate capital through the battlefield sequence that ended the Union advance.
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