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Written Expressly for Rapid Reference: Grant
The undergrowth bushwood took fire, and most of the wounded were burned to death. Grant lost twenty thousand men, and Lee ten thousand. It was supposed that Grant would retire beyond the Rapidan; but he thought differently, and pushed on to Spottsylvania Court House.
1864-Battle of Spottsylvania, May 8-12. After five days of maneuvering and fighting, Grant engaged Lee, and held his ground in face of many obstacles. It was during this battle that Grant sent his famous dispatch. "I propose to fight it out on this line if it takes all summer."
1864-Battle of Cold Harbor. This battle had no appreciable effect on either side, but it is unique for quick butchery. Twenty minutes after the first shot was fired, ten thousand Union troops were killed or wounded. "The army wearied of the useless slaughter," says Barnes, "refused to continue the attack."
1864-September 2, General Sherman captured the city of Atlanta, Ga., and burned it; and then cutting the telegraph wires so that he could not be stopped from the War Department, Washington, started on his " March to the Sea." This sundering of the Confederacy made the end of the war a question of time only. Sherman's army had a sixty mile front on the march, and destroyed everything on its way, bringing home the horrors of war to the Confederates. On Christinas Day, having been unheard from for nearly five weeks, he reached Savannah, and sent his famous dispatch to President Lincoln, offering "twenty-five thousand bales of cotton, and one hundred and fifty cannon, as a Christmas present to the nation."
1864-Nevada, the thirty-sixth State, was admitted to the Union, October 31. The name is of Spanish origin, - Sierra Nevada-signifying "snow-covered mountains." It is the poorest agricultural, and the richest mineral State in the Union.
1864-Battle of Nashville, December 15 and 16. The effect of this battle was to let Sherman go where he pleased, without danger of meeting a foe.
1865-Gen. Lee surrendered to Gen. Grant at Appomattox Court House, April 9. This event ended the war.
1865-On the night of April 14, President Lincoln was assassinated, in Ford's Theater, Washington, by John Wilkes Booth, a half-crazy actor, who thought he was avenging the South, while killing her most powerful friend. President of the United States, in accordance with the Constitution, April 15.
1865-Andrew Johnson, the Vice-President, was inaugurated seventeenth
1865-The Thirteenth Amendment, declaring the abolition of slavery, was
Nebraska, the thirty-seventh State, was received into the Union, March 1.
1867-Maximilian, the so-called Emperor of Mexico, shot, June 19. During our civil war, Napoleon III. tried to found an empire in Mexico, and used as an instrument, Maximilian, brother of the Emperor of Austria. This was in direct violation of the Monroe Doctrine; and as soon as the Civil War was over, Napoleon III. was told to withdraw his troops from Mexico. He did so, leaving the unfortunate monarch in the hands of Juarez, who condemned him to death. adopted as a part of the Constitution of the United States, December 18.
1867-Alaska was purchased from Russia for the sum of $7,200,000 gold.
1868-Impeachment of President Johnson, February 24. The attempt to impeach the President was made in consequence of his having tried to remove the Secretary of War, which was held to be in violation of the Tenure-of-Office-Bill, which had already been passed over the President's veto. The President escaped impeachment by one vote.
1868-The Fourteenth Amendment passed whereby civil rights are guaranteed to all, irrespective of creed, color, or previous condition of servitude, July 28.
1868-A treaty between China and the United States, whereby the United States gained valuable commercial privileges from that exclusive nation.
1869-Ulysses Simpson Grant, inaugurated eighteenth President of the United States, March 4.
1869-The trans-continental railroad from New York to San Francisco completed.
1870-The Fifteenth Amendment, whereby the right of suffrage is guaranteed to all without regard to race, color, or previous condition of servitude, March 30.
1870-The treaty of Washington ratified-Great Britain was compelled to pay $15,500,000 in gold for damages caused to American commerce by Confederate cruisers, fitted out in English ports, during the Civil War. States.
1870-Congress rejected the application of San Domingo, to join the United
1871-October 8, a great fire broke out in Chicago, by which three thousand acres of the city were devastated, $200,000,000 of property destroyed, and a hundred thousand people left homeless.
1872-November 9, a fire broke out in Boston that laid waste sixty acres of the business portion of the city, and destroyed $
70,000,000 worth of property.
1873-Troubles with the Modoc Indians. Captain Jack and several of the leaders were captured and hanged for the murder of settlers.
1875-Colorado, the thirty-eighth State was admitted to the Union, March 3.
1876-Centennial Exhibition of the art and industries of all nations, opened at Philadelphia, May 10. The exhibition lasted six months.
1877-The encroachment of gold prospectors precipitated difficulties with the Sioux Indians. Gen. Custer was dispatched against them; and on June 25, he, his two brothers, his nephew, and every man of his command were slain on the Little Big Horn River. The Indians were soon afterward defeated and scattered.
1877-Rutherford B. Hayes, was inaugurated nineteenth President of the United States, March 4.
1881-James A. Garfield, the twentieth President of the United States, inaugurated March 4.
1881-President Garfield shot July 2, by Charles J. Guiteau, a half-crazy office-seeker. The President died at Long Branch, N. J., the nineteenth of September following 1881-Gen. Chester A. Arthur, Vice-President, inaugurated twenty-first President of the United States, in accordance with the Constitution, September 20.
1882-Charles J. Guiteau hanged in the Washington Jail, for the murder of President Garfield, June 30.
1884-The Republican National Convention was held at Chicago, June 3. James G. Blaine and Gen. John A. Logan, were nominated.
1884-The Democratic National Conventional was held at Chicago, July 8. Grover Cleveland and Thomas A. Hendricks were nominated.
1884--On July 5. A Bureau of Navigation was created in the Treasury Department, to have direction of interests connected with American shipping.
1884-International Conference at Washington, October 1. An international conference was held at Washington for the purpose of agreeing on a common prime meridian. Twenty-five nations were represented. On October 13, it was decided to adopt the meridian of Greenwich.
1884-December 6, the Washington Monument was finished. It is the highest monument in the world-five hundred feet.
1885-Gen. Grant died at Mount McGregor, near Saratoga, N. Y., July 23, and was buried in Riverside Park, New York City, with public honors.
1888-March 12, a treaty with China was signed at Washington, whereby Chinese laborers were excluded from the United States for a term of twenty years. The Chinese Government rejected the treaty, whereupon the Chinese Exclusion Bill was passed by Congress, and signed by the President September 7.
1888-June 5, the Democratic National Convention met at St. Louis, Mo., and nominated Grover Cleveland and Allen G. Thurman.
1888-June 19, the Republican National Convention met in Chicago, and nominated Benjamin Harrison, and Levi P. Morton.
1888-A difficulty arose with Hayti on account of the seizure and detention of American vessels, but the Haytian Government surrendered the detained ships, and amicable relations were restored.
1888-Gen. Philip Henry Sheridan died at Nonquitt, Mass., August 5.
1889-Benjamin Harrison was inaugurated twenty-third President of the United States, March 4.
1889-November 3, North and South Dakota were admitted to the Union as two States.
1889-November 8, Montana was admitted to the Union by a proclamation of the President.
1889-November 11, Washington was admitted into the Union.
1890-A tripartite treaty between the United States, England and Germany regarding Samoa, ratified by the Senate, February 4. 1890-The bill to celebrate the four hundredth anniversary of the discovery of America by Columbus, by a World's Exposition in Chicago, passed Congress, April 25.
1890-The Pan-American Congress was held in Washington, and ten American Republics signed the international arbitration treaty.
1890-Eleventh decenninal census of the United States. The official count stated that the population (Indians excluded) was 62,622,250.
1890-July 3, Idaho was received into the Union.
1890-Wyoming was admitted to the Union, July 10.
1891-William Windom, Secretary of the Treasury died, January 29.
1891-Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman, died February 14.
1891-The first of our reciprocity treaties in conformity with the clause of the Tariff Act of October 1, 1890, was concluded with Brazil, February 5. Several other treaties of commercial reciprocity have since been concluded by the United States with other nations.
1891-October 15, 1890, David C. Hennessey, chief of Police of New Orleans, was assassinated by the members of the Mafia, an Italian secret society. secret society.