Chronological History of the American Civil War

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funeral services in Washington a special eight car train dubbed “The Lincoln Special” left Washington, D.C., on April 21, 1865 at 12:30 pm and traveled 1,654 miles to carry his body to his final resting place in Springfield, Illinois arriving there on May 3rd. Also, on the train was a coffin containing the body of Lincoln’s son Willie, who had died in 1862 at the age of 11 of typhoid fever during Lincoln’s second year in office. Willie’s body had been disinterred from a plot in Washington, D.C. after Lincoln’s death so he could be buried alongside his father at the family plot in Springfield. Several stops were made along the way, in which Lincoln’s body lay in state. Millions of Americans viewed the train along the route as the train passed 444 communities in 7 states. On May 4, 1864, Lincoln is buried at Oak Ridge Cemetery at Springfield. Illinois. A red granite marker now stands over the area where Lincoln’s coffin lies, a substitute for the original white marble sarcophagus. His body rests below the floor in a steel and concrete-reinforced vault. This change was made in 1901 when the monument needed reconstruction, partly to deter grave robbers, because an attempt on the body had been made in 1876. By the way the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. is just that a memorial - no one is buried there. Worst U.S. Maritime Disaster in History Occurs Near Memphis A few facts you might not know about the Great American Civil War. It was the worst maritime disaster in U.S. history, costlier than even the April 14, 1912 sinking of the Titanic, when 1,517 people were lost. Overshadowed by bigger headlines in April 1865, the explosion of the Mississippi riverboat Sultana claimed the lives of more than 1,800 recently freed Union POWs. A short distance outside Memphis, Tennessee, on the Arkansas side of the Mississippi River, is an old building fronted by a historical marker representing all that remains of a once-thriving settlement known as Mound City. A quarter-mile beyond is a seasonal fishing camp nestled along a short cutoff that was previously part of the Mississippi. Lying a dozen or so feet beneath the soil of a nearby farm field that was formerly the river bed are a few charred pieces of wood and metal. Today the name Sultana carries the distinction — that of the greatest maritime disaster in U.S. waters. Like most government programs, it was a situation ripe for corruption. U.S. Government offered transportation payments to steamboat captains of $5 per enlisted man and $10 per officer for conveying

the former POWs. And with no real controls over safety and comfort issues, the river merchants knew they would be able to pack the former prisoners aboard without regard to peacetime load limits and reap windfall profits. The Sultana’s master and part-owner, Captain J. Cass Mason, already had one boat confiscated from him for hauling Confederate contraband and was in financial trouble. Along with Vicksburg’s chief quartermaster, Colonel Reuben B. Hatch, who was well-plugged into the Illinois political power grid

and seemingly immune from legal action. Even President Lincoln had cleared Hatch of some charges. Although the Sultana had a legal capacity of only 376, by the time she backed away from Vicksburg on the night of April 24, 1865, she was severely overcrowded with more than 2,100 paroled prisoners. Many of the men had been weakened by their incarceration in the Confederate prison camps and associated illnesses. The men were packed into every available space, and the overflow was so severe that in some places, the decks began to creak and sag and had to be supported with heavy wooden beams. On April 26, the top-heavy Sultana stopped at Helena, Arkansas, where photographer T.W. Bankes took an amazing shot (pictured) of the grossly overcrowded vessel. Fighting the spring flooded river at nearly 2:00 a.m. in the morning on April 27, 1865, when the Sultana was just seven miles north of Memphis, her boilers suddenly exploded. First one boiler exploded, followed a split second later by two more. Within twenty minutes of the explosion, the entire superstructure of the Sultana was in flames. The official cause of the Sultana disaster was determined to