1863: Lincoln's Pivotal Year

Appendix B: Timeline, 1863

185 Appendix B: Timeline, 1863 January 1 President Lincoln signs Emancipation Proclamation. January 3 First drawing of Santa Claus (by Thomas Nast) is published in Harper’s Weekly. January 8 Construction (in California) of the first transcontinental railroad begins, to be completed in 1869. January 20 General Ambrose Everett Burnside leads his troops in what would become known as the disastrous “Mud March” to cross the Rappahannock River following defeat at Fredericksburg. January 25 Lincoln names General Joseph Hooker to replace General Burnside as commander of the Army of the Potomac. February 10 P. T. Barnum promotes the marriage of Tom Thumb and Lavinia Warren. February 16 Kansas State is established as the first land-grant college under the 1862 Morrill Act. February 24 Arizona is organized as a Territory of the United States. March 3 Congress approves removal of all Indians from Kansas. March 3 Lincoln signs first conscription (draft) act. March 14 Admiral David G. Farragut leads federal naval squadron past Port Hudson, Louisiana. April 2 “Bread riot” occurs in Richmond. April 5–6 Lincoln visits General Hooker at headquarters of the Army of the Potomac near Falmouth, Virginia. April 13 William Bullock is granted a patent for continuous-roll printing , using both sides of a sheet. May 1 Confederate Congress permits enslavement or execution of captured African American Union soldiers. May 1–4 Battle of Chancellorsville. Robert E. Lee defeats Union army but loses General Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson to friendly fire (Jackson dies May 10). May 5 Arrest in Ohio of antiwar “Copperhead” Democrat, former Congressman Clement Laird Vallandigham. “Valiant Val” is tried and convicted by military tribunal. May 19 General Ulysses S. Grant tries frontal assault on Vicksburg, Mississippi, without success. 186 Appendix B May 28 The famous 54th Massachusetts Regiment, one of the first African American volunteer units, leaves Boston for the front. June 27 Lincoln replaces General Hooker with General George Gordon Meade. July 1–3 Union forces under General Meade defeat Lee and his forces at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Meade fails to pursue the retreating Confederates. July 4 Grant and his troops force the Confederates to surrender Vicksburg , Mississippi. July 8 Port Hudson, Louisiana, surrenders to the Union. July 10 Clement C. Moore, author of A Visit from St. Nicholas, dies. July 13 New York City Draft Riots begin—worst civil disturbance in U.S. history save for Civil War itself. July 18 The 54th Massachusetts Regiment assaults Battery Wagner, near Charleston, South Carolina. The fortress is not taken, but the courage and sacrifice of the African American troops bring national recognition. White commander Robert Gould Shaw is killed in action. June 20 West Virginia is admitted to the Union as the thirty-fifth state. July 26 Sam Houston, first president of the Republic of Texas, dies. August 9 Lincoln urges General Grant to welcome black troops in order to “close the contest.” September    19–20 Confederates turn back Union forces at Chickamauga. October 3 President Lincoln proclaims a national Day of Thanksgiving. October 13 Republican John Brough soundly defeats Democrat Clement Vallandigham in closely watched race for governor of Ohio. Under terms of his conviction, Vallandigham had been banished to Confederacy but fled and waged the race from Ontario , Canada. October 16 Lincoln establishes new, consolidated military Department of Mississippi, putting Grant in command. October 29 Representatives of sixteen countries meet in Geneva, Switzerland , and form the Red Cross. November 19 President Lincoln and Edward Everett give speeches at dedication of Soldiers’ National Cemetery at Gettysburg. November 20 Lincoln suffers bout of smallpox and tells persistent favorseekers , “Now I have something I can give everyone.” 187 Timeline, 1863 November 23 Battle of Chattanooga waged. November 24 Battle of Lookout Mountain, Tennessee, occurs. December 7 Congress convenes in Washington (Confederate Congress opens on the same day in Richmond). December 8 Lincoln issues Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction. He transmits annual message to Congress, summing up the year 1863. He pays tribute to the army and navy, “to whom, more than to others, the world must stand indebted for the home of freedom disenthralled, regenerated, enlarged, and perpetuated.” Also in 1863 Edward Everett Hale publishes Man without a Country. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow writes “Tales of a Wayside Inn.” T. H. Huxley writes “Evidence as to Man’s Place in Nature.” J. S. Mill writes Utilitarianism. Whistler paints Little White Girl. Ebenezer Butterick develops the first paper dress pattern. The National Academy of...