- Abraham Lincoln
Reviews Lincoln's early years as a farmer and his significant impact on U.S. agriculture, including the establishment of the USDA and the beginnings of the National Agricultural Library. Also includes various full text documents and agricultural Acts from the 1860s. - Robert E. Lee
Robert Edward Lee (January 19, 1807 - October 12, 1870) was a career U.S. Army officer and the most celebrated general of the Confederate forces during the American Civil War. Lee was the son of Maj. Gen. Henry Lee III "Light Horse Harry" (1756-1818), Governor of Virginia, and his second wife, Anne Hill Carter (1773-1829). He was a descendant of Thomas More and of King Robert II of Scotland through the Earls of Crawford. - Ulysses S. Grant
Ulysses S. Grant (born Hiram Ulysses Grant, April 27, 1822 - July 23, 1885) was an American general and the eighteenth President of the United States (1869-1877). He achieved international fame as the leading Union general in the American Civil War, capturing Vicksburg in 1863 and Richmond in 1865. He accepted the surrender of his Confederate opponent Robert E. Lee at Appomattox Court House. - Jefferson Davis
Jefferson Finis Davis was an American politician who served as President of the Confederate States of America for its entire history from 1861 to 1865 during the American Civil War. Davis believed that corruption had destroyed the old Union and that the Confederacy had to be pure to survive. During his presidency, Davis was never able to find a strategy that would defeat the larger, more industrially developed Union. - John Brown
John Brown (May 9, 1800 - December 2, 1859) was the first white American abolitionist to advocate and practice insurrection as a means to the abolition of slavery. President Abraham Lincoln said he was a "misguided fanatic" and Brown has been called "the most controversial of all 19th-century Americans." His attempt in 1859 to start a liberation movement among enslaved blacks in Harpers Ferry, Virginia, electrified the nation, … - John Adams
John Adams (July 1, 1825-November 30, 1864), was an officer in the United States Army. With the onset of the American Civil War, he resigned his commission and joined the Confederate States Army, rising to the rank of brigadier general before being killed in action. Adams was born in Nashville, Tennessee, to Irish immigrant parents. He graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1846, ranking 25th in his class. - John Paul
John Paul (June 30, 1839 - November 1, 1901) was a U.S. Representative from Virginia, father of John Paul [1883-1964]. Born in Rockingham County, Virginia, Paul attended the common schools and Roanoke College, Salem, Virginia. During the Civil War entered the Confederate States Army and became a captain in the First Virginia Cavalry. He studied law in the University of Virginia at Charlottesville and was graduated in 1867. - James Longstreet
James Longstreet (January 8, 1821 - January 2, 1904) was one of the foremost Confederate generals of the American Civil War, the principal subordinate to General Robert E. Lee, who called him his "Old War Horse." He served under Lee as a corps commander for many of the famous battles fought by the Army of Northern Virginia in the Eastern Theater, but also with Gen. Braxton Bragg in the Army of Tennessee in the Western Theater. - Ken Burns
Kenneth Lauren Burns (b. July 29, 1953) is an American director and producer of documentary films known for his style of making use of original prints and photographs. Among his most notable productions are the 1990 film, "The Civil War", the 1994 film, "Baseball", and the 2001 film, "JAZZ". - Winfield Scott
Winfield Scott (June 13, 1786 - May 29, 1866) was a United States Army general, diplomat, and presidential candidate. Known as "Old Fuss and Feathers" and the "Grand Old Man of the Army", he served on active duty as a general longer than any other man in American history and most historians rate him the ablest American commander of his time. Over the course of his fifty-year career, he commanded forces in the War of 1812, the Mexican-American War, the Black Hawk War, … - William Tecumseh Sherman
William Tecumseh Sherman (February 8, 1820 - February 14 1891) was an American soldier, businessman, educator, and author. He served as a general in the United States Army during the American Civil War (1861-65), receiving both recognition for his outstanding command of military strategy, and criticism for the harshness of the "scorched earth" policies he implemented in conducting total war against the enemy, … - George B. McClellan
George Brinton McClellan (December 3 1826 - October 29 1885) was a major general during the American Civil War. He organized the famous Army of the Potomac and served briefly (November 1861 to March 1862) as the general-in-chief of the Union Army. Early in the war, McClellan played an important role in raising a well-trained and organized army for the Union. However, although McClellan was meticulous in his planning and preparations, … - Dred Scott
Dred Scott was a slave who sued unsuccessfully for his freedom in the famous "Dred Scott v. Sandford" case of 1856. His case was based on the fact that he and his wife Harriet were slaves, but had lived in states and territories where slavery was illegal, including Illinois and parts of the Louisiana Purchase. The court ruled 7 to 2 against Scott, finding that he held no property and therefore was not entitled to file suit in a federal court. - Harriet Tubman Harriet Tubman
Harriet Tubman (1820 - 1913) escaped slavery in Maryland in 1849 and traveled north. She then helped hundreds of other slaves flee to the north to freedom via the Underground Railroad. Mrs. Tubman helped John Brown recruit soldiers for his raid on Harpers Ferry (1859). She spied for the Union (in South Carolina ) during the US Civil War. After the war, she lived in Auburn, New York , and founded the Harriet Tubman Home for Aged Negroes. - John Wilkes Booth
John Wilkes Booth (May 10, 1838 - April 26, 1865) was an American actor from Maryland, who fatally shot President of the United States Abraham Lincoln at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. on April 14, 1865. Lincoln died the next day from a single gunshot wound to the head - the first American president to be assassinated. Booth was a successful professional stage actor of his day and a member of the prominent Booth family of actors. - Nathan Bedford Forrest
Nathaniel Bedford Forrest (July 13, 1821-October 29, 1877) was a Confederate Army general during the American Civil War. Perhaps the most highly regarded cavalry and partisan (guerrilla) leader in the war, Forrest is regarded by many military historians as that conflict's most innovative and successful general. His tactics of mobile warfare are still studied by modern soldiers. Forrest is also one of the war's most controversial figures. - Henry Ford
Henry Chapman Ford (1828-1894) was an American illustrator born in Livonia, New York. He studied art in Paris and Florence late in the 1850s. During the Civil War he was a soldier assigned to prepare illustrations of interest to the military. After the War he moved to Chicago, Illinois where, in 1871, his studio was destoyed in the "Great Fire." In 1875 he settled in Santa Barbara, California where he would live out his days. - James Buchanan
James Buchanan (April 23, 1791 - June 1, 1868) was the fifteenth President of the United States (1857-1861). He was the only President from Pennsylvania and the only President to never marry. As president he was a "doughface" who battled Stephen A. Douglas for control of the Democratic Party. Scholars consistently rank him as one of the two or three worst American presidents; although he claimed secession was illegal, he claimed going to war to stop it was also illegal. - John Bell
John Bell (also known as "The Great Apostate") (February 15, 1797 - September 10, 1869) was a U.S. politician, attorney, and plantation owner. A wealthy slaveholder from Tennessee, Bell served in the United States Congress in both the House of Representatives and Senate. He began his career as a Democrat, he eventually fell out with Andrew Jackson and became a Whig. - John Henry
John Henry (November 1, 1800 - April 28, 1882) was a U.S. Representative from Illinois. Born near Stanford, Kentucky, Henry attended the public schools. He served as a private in Captain Arnett's company of Illinois volunteers in the Black Hawk War. He served as member of the State house of representatives 1832-1840. He was prominently identified with the construction of the first railway in Illinois in 1838. He served as member of the State senate 1840-1847. - William McKinley
William McKinley, Jr. (January 29, 1843 - September 14, 1901) was the twenty-fifth President of the United States, and the last veteran of the Civil War to be elected. By the 1880s, this Ohio native was a nationally known Republican leader; his signature issue was high tariffs on imports as a formula for prosperity, as typified by his McKinley Tariff of 1890. As the Republican candidate in the 1896 presidential election, he upheld the gold standard, … - James M. McPherson
James M. McPherson is an American Civil War historian, and is the George Henry Davis '86 Professor Emeritus of United States History at Princeton University. He received the Pulitzer Prize for "Battle Cry of Freedom", his most famous book. He was the president of the American Historical Association in 2003, and is a member of the editorial board of "Encyclopædia Britannica". Born in Valley City, North Dakota, he graduated from St. Peter High School, … - Drew Gilpin Faust
Historian Drew Gilpin Faust '68 will shatter one of America's oldest glass ceilings when she becomes the first woman to lead Harvard University in the school's 371-year history. Her appointment as president was unanimously approved by Harvard's Board of Overseers on Sunday, Feb. 11, after a highly publicized, yearlong search. - Patrick Henry
Patrick Henry (February 12, 1843 - May 18, 1930) was a U.S. Representative from Mississippi, uncle of Patrick Henry [1861-1933]. Born near Cynthia, Mississippi, Henry attended the common schools, Mississippi College, Clinton, Mississippi, Madison College, Sharon, Mississippi, and the Nashville (Tennessee) Military College. He moved to Brandon, Mississippi, in 1858. Enlisted in the Confederate service as a first lieutenant in Company B, Sixth Mississippi Infantry Regiment, … - Braxton Bragg
Braxton Bragg (March 22, 1817 - September 27, 1876) was a career U.S. Army officer and a general in the Confederate States Army, a principal commander in the Western Theater of the American Civil War. - Clara Barton
Clarissa Harlowe Barton (December 25, 1821 - April 12, 1912), better known as Clara Barton, was a pioneer American teacher, nurse, and humanitarian. She has been described as having had an "indomitable spirit" and is best remembered for organizing the American Red Cross. - Grover Cleveland
Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18 1837 - June 24 1908) was the twenty-second and twenty-fourth President of the United States, and the only President to serve two non-consecutive terms (1885-1889 and 1893-1897). He was the only Democrat elected to the Presidency in the era of Republican political domination between 1860 and 1912, after the American Civil War. His admirers praise him for his bedrock honesty, independence, integrity, … - A. P. Hill
Ambrose Powell Hill (November 9, 1825 - April 2, 1865), was a Confederate general in the American Civil War. He gained early fame as the commander of "Hill's Light Division," becoming one of Stonewall Jackson's ablest subordinates. He later commanded a corps under Robert E. Lee in the Army of Northern Virginia before his death in battle just prior to the end of the war. - Shelby Foote
Shelby Dade Foote, Jr. was an American novelist and a noted historian of the American Civil War. With geographic and cultural roots in the Mississippi Delta alluvium, Foote's life and writing paralleled the radical shift from the agrarian planter system of the Old South to the Civil Rights era of the New South. Foote was relatively unknown to the general public for most of his career until his appearance in Ken Burns' PBS documentary "The Civil War" in 1990, … - Joseph E. Johnston
Joseph Eggleston Johnston (February 3, 1807 - March 21, 1891) was a career U.S. Army officer and one of the most senior generals in the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War. His effectiveness was undercut by tensions with President Jefferson Davis, but he also suffered from a lack of aggressiveness and victory eluded him in every campaign he personally commanded. - Joseph Hooker
Joseph Hooker (November 13, 1814 - October 31, 1879), known as "Fighting Joe", was a career U.S. Army officer and a major general in the Union Army during the American Civil War. Although he served throughout the war, usually with distinction, he is best remembered for his stunning defeat by Confederate General Robert E. Lee at the Battle of Chancellorsville in 1863. - Emily Dickinson
Emily Dickinson was an American poet. Though virtually unknown in her lifetime, Dickinson has come to be regarded, along with Walt Whitman, as one of the two quintessential American poets of the 19th century. Dickinson lived an introverted and hermetic life. Although she wrote, at the last count, 1,789 poems, only a handful of them were published during her lifetime. All of these were published anonymously and some may have been published without her knowledge. - Ambrose Burnside
Ambrose Everett Burnside (May 23, 1824 - September 13, 1881) was an American railroad executive, inventor, industrialist, and politician from Rhode Island, serving as governor and a U.S. Senator. As a Union Army general in the American Civil War, he conducted successful campaigns in North Carolina and East Tennessee, but was defeated in the disastrous Battle of Fredericksburg and Battle of the Crater. His distinctive style of facial hair is now known as sideburns, … - George Armstrong Custer
George Armstrong Custer (December 5, 1839 - June 25, 1876) was a United States Army cavalry commander in the American Civil War and the Indian Wars. Promoted at an early age to a temporary war-time rank of brigadier general, and later made a permanent Lt. Colonel, he was a flamboyant and aggressive commander during numerous Civil War battles, known for his personal bravery in leading charges against opposing cavalry. - Sam Houston
Samuel Houston (March 2, 1793-July 26, 1863) was a 19th century American statesman, politician, and soldier. Born in Virginia, Houston was a key figure in the history of Texas, including periods as President of the Republic of Texas, Senator for Texas after it joined the United States, and finally as governor. Although a slaveowner and opponent of abolitionism, he refused, due to his unionist convictions, … - Bruce Catton
Bruce Catton (October 9, 1899 - August 28, 1978) was a journalist and a notable historian of the American Civil War. He won a Pulitzer Prize for history in 1954 for "A Stillness at Appomattox", his study of the final campaign of the war in Virginia. Catton was known as a narrative historian who specialized in popular histories that emphasized the colorful characters and vignettes of history, in addition to the simple dates, facts, and analyses. - John Bell Hood
John Bell Hood (June 1 or June 29, 1831 - August 30, 1879) was a Confederate general during the American Civil War. Hood had a reputation for bravery and aggressiveness that sometimes bordered on recklessness. Arguably one of the best brigade and division commanders in the Confederate States Army, Hood became increasingly ineffective as he was promoted to lead larger, independent commands, … - Louisa May Alcott
Louisa May Alcott was an American novelist. She is best known for the novel "Little Women", published in 1868. This novel is loosely based on her childhood experiences with her three sisters. - Gideon Welles
Gideon Welles (July 1, 1802 - February 11, 1878) was the United States Secretary of the Navy from 1861 to 1869. His buildup of the Navy to successfully execute blockades of Southern ports was a key component of Northern victory of the Civil War. Welles was also instrumental in the Navy's creation of the Medal of Honor. Born in Glastonbury, Connecticut, Welles earned a degree at Norwich University. He became a lawyer through the then-common practice of reading the law, … - John Pope
John Pope (March 18, 1822 - September 23, 1892) was a career U.S. Army officer and Union general in the American Civil War. He had a brief, but successful, career in the Western Theater, but is best known for his defeat at the Second Battle of Bull Run in the East. After the Civil War, he resumed a successful military career in the Indian Wars.
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