The Civil War, Reconstruction, Post-Reconstruction, and Black Health, 1861–1900

Southern artillery batteries fired on Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor at 4:30 AM on April 12, 1861. The Civil War, called by some “The War Between the States,” had begun. Nearly four years later on April 9, 1865, the guns were silent. Confederate General Robert E.Lee surrendered to Union General Ulysses S.Grant in Wilmer McLean's parlor at Appomattox Court House in Virginia. It was the bloodiest war in the nation's history. ¹