Strange-but-true stories on the Civil War
Today's blog post comes from David J. Gerleman, assistant editor of The Papers of Abraham Lincoln. Abraham Lincoln’s two-year stint as a Illinois Whig congressman is one of the lesser-known periods of his eventful life. Had he remained in obscurity, it might have remained the crowning achievement of a fizzled frontier political career. Having been … Continue reading The Check is in the Mail: The Hunt for Abraham Lincoln’s Congressional Pay Records
Today’s blog post comes from National Archives social media intern Anna Fitzpatrick. The news of the Emancipation Proclamation was greeted with joy, even though it did not free all the slaves. Because of the limitations of the proclamation, and because it depended on a Union military victory, President Lincoln recognized that the Emancipation Proclamation would … Continue reading Emancipation Proclamation: The 13th Amendment
Today’s blog post comes from National Archives social media intern Anna Fitzpatrick. On the first day of the new year in 1863, the Emancipation Proclamation went into effect, declaring freedom for slaves in parts of the Confederacy that had not yet come under Union control. Historian John Hope Franklin described the day: [It] was a … Continue reading Emancipation Proclamation: January 1, 1863
Today’s blog post comes from National Archives social media intern Anna Fitzpatrick. On January 1, 1863, the Emancipation Proclamation brought freedom to the slaves in the Confederacy. By the war's end, the U.S. Colored Troops Bureau had recruited hundreds of thousands of black soldiers, who fought for both their own and others' freedom. The Emancipation … Continue reading Emancipation Proclamation: A Letter Home
The issues of freedom for the slaves and military service were intertwined from the beginning of the Civil War. News from Fort Sumter had set off a rush by free black men to enlist in military units. They were turned away, however, because a Federal law dating from 1792 barred them from bearing arms for … Continue reading Emancipation Proclamation: Creation of the United States Colored Troops
Today’s blog post comes from National Archives social media intern Anna Fitzpatrick. Only 100 days after promising in the Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation that slaves in the Confederacy would soon be freed, Lincoln fulfilled that promise by signing the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863. This proclamation changed the character of the war, adding moral force … Continue reading Emancipation Proclamation: “It is my Desire to be Free”
Today’s blog post comes from National Archives social media intern Anna Fitzpatrick. Throughout the Civil War, when President Lincoln needed to concentrate—when he faced a task that required his focused and undivided attention—he would leave the White House, cross the street to the War Department, and take over the desk of Thomas T. Eckert, chief … Continue reading The Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation
Today’s blog post comes from National Archives social media intern Anna Fitzpatrick. Before President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, the Federal Government took steps to begin the process of freeing the slaves. In July 1862—acting on Lincoln's warning that freeing slaves in parts of the South occupied by Union troops might … Continue reading Emancipation Proclamation: A Certificate of Freedom
Today’s blog post comes from National Archives social media intern Anna Fitzpatrick. Nine months before President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, he signed a bill on April 16, 1862, that ended slavery in the District of Columbia. The act finally concluded many years of disagreements over ending ''the national shame'' of slavery in the nation's … Continue reading Emancipation Proclamation: Freedom in Washington, DC
Today's post comes from Nikita Buley, an intern in the National Archives Office of Strategy and Communications. Why were neck beards ever socially acceptable? In my humble opinion, they are the facial equivalent of mullets or bowl cuts. Unlike bad haircuts, however, they may have had some useful characteristics. Maybe they kept cold wind from … Continue reading Facial Hair Friday: William and William (A Tale of Two Neck Beards)
