Browse Items (17 total)

Illustrated periodicals like Harper's Weekly were popular with Americans in the middle of the 19th century. After southern states formed the Confederate States of America, residents there could not easily receive newspapers and magazines printed in…

As women participated in the movement to abolish slavery during the first half of the 19th century, some of them also began to advocate for women's rights. In July 1848, a group of women and men held a convention in Seneca Falls, New York. They…

Hiring out enslaved men, women, and children was a common business arrangement among Virginians during slavery. This practice, which occurred in rural and urban areas, enabled owners of slaves to profit from their labor when they could not employ all…

In March 1865, before the Civil War had ended, Congress created the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands (generally known as the Freedmen’s Bureau) to supervise matters related to freed people as well as to distribute land "abandoned" by…

Black men in Virginia voted for the first time in October 1867, when they participated in the election on whether to hold a convention to rewrite the state's constitution as required by Congress after the Civil War. They also voted for delegates to…

On April 9, 1865, Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia to General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House. The surrender effectively ended the American Civil War in Virginia, although fighting continued in…

After the Civil War ended and slavery was abolished in 1865, Radical Republicans in Congress became frustrated with the opposition that many white southerners exhibited to extending full rights of citizenship to African Americans. Congress proposed…

Using the data from the 1860 census, this map was created in 1861. It shows the distribution of enslaved Virginians in each of the state's counties, with the darker shades showing the counties with the highest percentage of enslaved men, women, and…

The power of the president to pardon those who commit offenses against the United States is enumerated in the Article Two of the U. S. Constitution. A presidential pardon is an executive order granting clemency for a conviction of a crime, with the…

Prior to the Civil War, Virginia did not have a comprehensive public school system. Some localities provided some "free schools" or "charity schools" for the children of indigent white families. African Americans, free and enslaved, were excluded…