“But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and provide new Guards for their future security.“

View our Articles

Jefferson Davis, Feb. 10, 1861

On this day in 1861, a telegram arrived at Brierfield, Jefferson Davis’ Mississippi plantation, informing him that on the previous day, breakaway delegates meeting in Montgomery, Ala., had chosen him…

Allegheny Arsenal Explosion of 1862

In the early afternoon on September 17, 1862, just about 200 miles from where the Battle of Antietam was taking place, another Civil War-era tragedy occurs: Three explosions rip through…

Battlefield Preservation

Save Tennessee Battlefields

Your help is needed to save two key tracts at Lookout Mountain and Franklin.
The first tract includes 301 acres that played an important role in the “Battle Above the Clouds” at Lookout Mountain. The second tract is a small but crucial parcel at the Franklin Battlefield, which adds a key piece of ground to the land the Trust already worked so hard to reclaim and restore. 

303
ACRES TARGETED

Visit the Trust
The Trent Affair

The Trent Affair

John Slidell In accordance with the authority conferred by this Congress, the Confederate President appointed John Slidell and James M. Mason diplomatic agents in October 1861, with the power to enter into conventions for treaties with England and France. They were commissioned to secure from these European powers recognition of…

Confederate Generals (A-D)

Confederate Generals (A-D)

Adams, Daniel Weisiger / Kentucky / Born 31 May 1821 Frankfort, Kentucky / Died New Orleans, Louisiana 13 June 18722nd Lieutenant Mississippi Militia / Lieutenant-Colonel PACS 1st Louisiana Infantry 13 March 1861 / Colonel PACS 30 October 1861 / Brigadier-General PACS 23 May 1862 / Paroled Meridian, Mississippi 9 May 1865 / WIA Shiloh 6…

Alexander W. Campbell

Alexander W. Campbell

Alexander William Campbell (June 4, 1828 – June 13, 1893), was a Confederate States Army Brigadier General during the American Civil War. He was a lawyer in Tennessee before and after the war, mayor of Jackson, Tennessee, 1856, and an unsuccessful candidate for the Democratic Party nomination for governor of Tennessee in 1880.…

Old Capital Prison

Old Capital Prison

In November 1861, Secretary of State William H. Seward told Lord Richard Lyons, British Ambassador to the United States, “My Lord, I can touch a bell on my right hand, and order the arrest of a citizen of Ohio; I can touch the bell again, and order the imprisonment of…

FEATURE 1
DOCUMENTS

READ what those who lived through America’s past said about their challenges and choices

VIEW DOCUMENTS
FEATURE 2
LIBRARY

EXPLORE biographies, battles, and events throughout America’s historical past

EXPLORE
FEATURE 3
RESOURCES

DISCOVER historical exhibits, sources for research, images of American history

FIND RESOURCES

Daniel S. Donelson

Daniel Smith Donelson (June 23, 1801 – April 17, 1863) was a Tennessee politician and soldier. The historic river port of Fort Donelson was named for him as a Brigadier…

General “JEB” James Ewell Brown Stuart, CSA

Born on February 6, 1833, James Ewell Brown (“Jeb”) Stuart was one of the more colorful cavaliers in the Army of Northern Virginia. Stuart enrolled at the the US Military Academy at…

Kennesaw Mountain “The Dead Angle”

Kennesaw Mountain “The Dead Angle”

Overview Mile by mile, William T. Sherman and Joseph E. Johnston slowly made their way toward Atlanta. Along the way, the armies clashed at New Hope Church, Pickett’s Mill, and Marietta. Johnston employed Fabian tactics as a means of slowing and stretching Sherman’s armies, withdrawing in the face of Sherman’s successive flanking maneuvers, while Sherman tried…

Battle of Darbytown Road

Battle of Darbytown Road

Grant in Charge On March 10, 1864, President Abraham Lincoln appointed Ulysses S. Grant as General-in-Chief of the Armies of the United States. Grant brought with him, from his successes in the Western Theater of the war, a reputation for the doggedness that Lincoln was seeking in his generals. Unlike…

Battle of Blackburn’s Ford

Battle of Blackburn’s Ford

The Battle of Blackburn’s Ford took place on July 18, 1861, in Prince William County and Fairfax County, Virginia, as part of the First Manassas Campaign of the American Civil War. A Union brigade was ordered to probe the Confederate defenses along Bull Run to locate the Confederate left. At Blackburn’s Ford, the brigade…

Battle of Big Bethel

Battle of Big Bethel

The Battle of Big Bethel, also known as the Battle of Bethel Church or Great Bethel was one of the earliest land battles of the American Civil War (Civil War) after the surrender of Fort Sumter. The battle between Union Army and Confederate States Army forces on June 10, 1861 took place in Hampton and York County, Virginia, (near the present-day unincorporated…

Database of Battles

From Native Indians, The American Revolution,
and American Civil War

The Battle of White Plains

General George Washington had, early in his chieftaincy, urged upon the Congress the necessity of the establishment of a permanent army, and with prophetic words had predicted the very evils…

Battle of White Marsh

The Battle of White Marsh (aka Battle of Edge Hill) was a battle fought in the area surrounding Whitemarsh Township, Pennsylvania. The battle, which took the form of a series…

The Battles of Lexington and Concord

They were fought on April 19, 1775, in Middlesex County, Province of Massachusetts Bay, within the towns of Lexington, Concord, Lincoln, Menotomy (present-day Arlington), and Cambridge, near Boston.

John Adams & The Stamp Act

John Adams & The Stamp Act

Thousands of angry colonists gathered beneath Boston’s Liberty Tree where they proceeded to march down to Andrew Oliver’s wharf. Oliver was the appointed Stamp Master, and it was believed he had the stamps in storage at his warehouse. Colonists completely looted the warehouse turning up nothing. Unsatisfied, they next ransacked…

The Revolution Begins

The Revolution Begins

Committees of Correspondence In 1772, Samuel Adams of Boston created the first Committee Of Correspondence, which was primarily an exchange of ideas in letters and pamphlets among members. Within a few years, this one committee led to dozens of similar discussion groups in towns throughout the colonies. Eventually, these isolated groups came together to…

American Society in Revolt

American Society in Revolt

Training the Continental Army As the colonies prepared themselves for war, new militias were formed throughout America, primarily to defend local communities from British aggression. Other units, however, rushed to join their comrades in Boston as soon as every man had a musket. Under the strict command of George Washington, Nathanael Greene,…

The Declaration of Independence

The Declaration of Independence

Virginia Proposes Independence At a meeting of the Second Continental Congress in the summer of 1776, Richard Henry Lee, a delegate from Virginia, proposed that the American colonies should declare their independence from Britain. Delegates debated this proposal heavily for a few weeks, and many returned to their home states to discuss…