The Appomattox Court House

On April 9, 1865, Robert E. Lee surrendered 28,000 troops to Ulysses S. Grant in Wilmer McLean's (a 47 year old farmer and merchant) home in Appomattox Court House located in Appomattox Country, Virginia. This is one of the most important events because it marks the end of the Civil War and the official win of the Union. General Robert E. Lee of the confederacy surrendered to the Union because Lee was planning to meet with additional confederate forces in North Carolina and resume fighting but Grant was able to cut off his final retreat.

Even after the surrender of Robert Lee, 175,000 Confederate soldiers were still I
in the field fighting. They were lead starving and hopeless with no commander to lead them. Only a couple of commanders were left; after news of Lee's surrender, General Joseph E. Johnston surrendered in North Carolina, General Kirby Smith surrendered at New Orleans. The final military action of the Confederacy was the Battle of Palmito Ranch.

JOURNEY THROUGH SLAVERY PART 4

               In 1830, Pierce Butler became the heir of an inheritance in Butler Island. Butler married a woman by the name of Fanny Kemble and she was an abolitionist. His family was rich due to slave labor. It would not be as a surprise because slavery became a billion dollar industry and it was one of the biggest forms of investments. Both the North and South depended on the usage of slaves to cultivate cotton and send it to textiles in the North.

               David Walker was never a slave, however, he became an abolitionist and published An Appeal to the Coloured Citizens of the World. Walker discusses black unity in order to rise up against masters and eliminate racial bondage. On the other hand William Lloyd Garrison published a newspaper called The Liberator. Garrison was one of the few white abolitionists and his paper became the voice of the abolitionist movement. Unlike Walker, Garrison talks about moral persuasion. He believed that through moral persuasion, slave owners would realize how wrong slavery is. Living in the North also caused tensions for free blacks. The African community was not allowed to become a church member or vote.

               Many southerners feared the elimination of slavery because it would eventually lead to a civil war and there would be multitudes of uneducated and uncivilized blacks living freely among whites. As part of the abolitionist movement, women also started to speak out in public and it definitely demonstrated a threat to the social order.

               By 1838, an increasing number of slaves continued to flee to the North and the Fugitive Slave Act continued to be enforced and one hundred lashes was the punishment. However, in the North, there was no physical bondage but there was segregated freedom. Sojourner Truth and Frederick Douglass became leaders of the abolitionist movement and in Douglass' newspaper, The North Star, he discusses the fight for the emancipation of both women and blacks.

Primary source: An excerpt from The Liberator/ letter to the public


http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part4/4h2928t.html

JOURNEY THROUGH SLAVERY PART 3

                    The Age of Enlightenment seemed like a series of encouraging ideas for white men to advance in society but the idea of liberty for slaves did not seem beyond reach. Even though early documents such as the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution do not defend the rights of slaves or free blacks, Thomas Jefferson, the creator of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness and owner of 130 slaves, believed that slaves would one day rise against their masters. Jefferson also believed that biologically, blacks were like children that needed to be taken care of.

                   Richard Allen was the first to found the African church and one of the few blacks to work to buy his freedom. He founded the church in Philadelphia for the oppressed in what is called the Evangelical revolution. Benjamin Rush was a white man and a doctor that was also a leader of the African church.The African church paved the way for abolitionist movements to make an impact in the North.

                    In 1793, Eli Whitney invented something that would change the course of America and affect slaves themselves. The cotton gin was advanced but it affected slaves.Since the invention of the cotton gin, cotton became the number one cash crop and it called for a higher demand for slaves.

In that same year, ten thousand blacks formed societies and churches in Philadelphia in order to help fugitive slaves. For instance, in 1817, the American Colonization Society focused on the resettlement of free blacks back in Africa

                     Some of the first slave rebellions were led by Nat Turner and Gabriel Prosser in an uprise towards whites. It brought awareness and fear among white men as well as hope for slaves. However, the taunting of blacks continued with the cartoon characters made by Edward Clay to ridicule blacks and in the 1830s a stage character by the name of Jim Crow was also a taunting image of blacks.



Primary Source: Letter from William Lloyd Garrison to the American Colonization Society
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/address-to-the-colonization-society/