Chronological History of the American Civil War

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payment of weapons. The North made matters worse for the South, by printing counterfeit Confederate notes, which made confusion endemic. (Printing money and trying to spend your way out of recession hasn’t changed much in the last 150 plus years. Until the Civil War, inflation was almost non existent.) At Loudoun Heights, Virginia, Major John S. Mosby (CSA), also known as “The Gray Ghost,” slips into the Federal camp and surprises a superior force of Federals at 4:30 a.m. However, in the dark and none could really distinguish who was friend or foe, the Union rallied to the attack that almost cost them their commander, Major Henry A. Cole (U.S.). Mosby leaves with only 6 prisoners and 60 horses while losing 6 men. Monday, January 11, 1864: While most people today, believe that President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863 stopped slavery, it didn’t. It was used to stop England from helping the Confederacy. Lincoln’s proclamation declared “that all persons held as slaves” in areas within the rebellious states now under control of the North, “are, and henceforward shall be free.” Although the Emancipation Proclamation did not end slavery in the nation, it captured the hearts and imagination of enough Americans, that it fundamentally transformed the character of the war. Now, the U.S.’s acceptance of black men into the Union Army and Navy could enable the liberated to become liberators. But, it wasn’t until today, that the U.S. Senator from Missouri, John Henderson proposed within the U.S. Senate that slavery should be abolished throughout the USA. He would take the lead in drafting the 13th Amendment of the Constitution, which would not become law until after the war’s end. Message to Col. Fielding Hurst: “You will proceed with your entire command, camp and garrison equipage, by the most direct route, to Purdy (Tennessee) where you will establish your camp and proceed to the destruction of all armed enemies to the United States Government…This order is not intended to confine you to any particular locality, but you will move your command in any part of West Tennessee.” by order of Brig. General Grierson. Tuesday, January 12, 1864 : Federal troops would take part in two days of hostilities just south of the Rio Grande, at Matamoros, Mexico. Their mission was to escort American consul, L. Pierce, Jr out of town for his own protection, when it seemed that he and his residence had become the target of hostilities. Although no official record, George Washington Carver is believed to have been born today into slavery in Diamond, Missouri. Carver went on to become one of the most prominent scientists and inventors of his time, as well as a teacher at the Tuskegee Institute. He devised over 100 products using one crop the “peanut” including cosmetics, dyes, paints, plastics, gasoline, and nitroglycerin. Wednesday, January 13, 1864 : President Abraham Lincoln orders Major Generals Quincy A. Gillmore (U.S.) in Florida, and Nathaniel P. Banks (U.S.), in New Orleans, Louisana, to proceed at once in constructing free governments in the state of Florida and Louisiana. Skirmishes still going on near Collierville, and at Sevierville in Tennessee.

At age 37, now known as the “father of American music” songwriter, Stephen Collins Foster (pictured) was primarily known for his parlour and minstrel music, dies poverty-stricken in Lower East Side of Manhattan, New York. Foster had written over 200 songs. Many of his songs had Southern themes, yet Foster never lived in the South and visited it only once. Among his best known are “Oh! Susanna,” “Camptown Races,” “Old Folks at Home,” (known also as Swanee