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Separate item on Presidential Reconstruction apart from the timeline is show below.
I posted this thread and the one below titled "Historians on the End of the American Civil War" at Talk:American Civil War. I post it here also because I think it could be useful for additions, corrections, clarifications and citations for this article, maybe even more than for the general American Civil War article. It also should have the advantage of being accessible to anyone who wishes to see or use the information and citations for a longer period of time. Threads on the other talk page are archived 60 days following the last comment.
This list includes release dates of all Confederate cabinet members who had been imprisoned after the war according to Faust, Patricia L., ed. Historical Times Illustrated History of the Civil War. New York: Harper & Row, 1986. ISBN 978-0-06-273116-6.
Full citations to the short references in each item are at the end of the list. Some of the more well known or notable events have more than one citation; some of them and others could be supported by additional citations, which would be superfluous in this thread and perhaps in any edit to an article.
I made a few additions to the original thread so I am reposting the revised version here on July 25 and July 29, 2022.
April 2, 1865. Last meeting of the Confederate cabinet in Richmond, Virginia (Attorney General George Davis missing). The Confederate government leaves Richmond as the Union Army captures the Confederate lines at Petersburg, VA. Government records were sent away or burned. Long, pp. 663-664.
April 9, 1865. Gen. Robert E. Lee signs documents surrendering the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia to General-in-chief Ulysses S. Grant with headquarters with the Union Army of the Potomac at Appomattox Court House, VA. Long, pp. 670-671. The terms included: "The officers give their individual paroles not to take up arms against the Government of the United States until properly exchanged and each company or regimental commander to sign a parole for the men of their commands....This done each officer and man to return to their homes, not to be disturbed by United States Authority so long as they observe their paroles and the laws in force where they may reside." Winik, p. 187.
April 11, 1865. President Abraham Lincoln issues a proclamation which insists that foreign countries end neutrality and, in diplomatic language, discontinue granting belligerent rights to the Confederacy. Here is the explanation by Stephen C. Neff in Justice in Blue and Gray Page 205: "In a companion proclamation to the one on port closure ["by exercise of sovereign right, as opposed to the belligerent method of blockade"] on the same day [April 11, 1865], Lincoln made it clear that the neutrality status of foreign countries was now expected to come to an end. Concretely, Lincoln stated that various restrictions on the treatment of Union ships in foreign ports, stemming from the application of foreign neutrality legislation, were expected to be discontinued – that the recognition of the Confederacy as a belligerent power by foreign states would not be tolerated. The United States, it was announced would now claim the full range of traditional peacetime privileges in foreign ports and would retaliate if they were not granted." Neff, page 205. The proclamation can be found at Abraham Lincoln, Proclamation 128—Claiming Equality of Rights with All Maritime Nations Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [1] It is apparently necessary to understand the diplomatic language used at the time for such matters to discern Neff's interpretation. Perhaps the proclamation might seem a little dense and technical without a familiarity with the meaning of the full rights of sovereign states and of neutrality and belligerent rights at the time, as understood at the time and explained by Professor Neff.
Neff immediately goes on to write at pages 205-206: "On May 10, 1865, President Johnson followed this up with a warning to foreign countries to stop offering hospitality of any kind to Confederate cruisers, coupling this with a threat of retaliation (in the form of refusing access to American ports to government vessels of noncooperating countries.)" Another sentence with regard to the May 10 proclamation is shown at the May 10, 1865 entry below.
April 12, 1865. Formal surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia ceremony takes place at Appomattox Court House. Long, p. 674.
April 12, 1865. Union forces under Maj. Gen. E. R. S. Canby occupy Mobile, Alabama, the last major city of the Confederacy to fall to the Union Army. Long, p. 673.
April 14, 1865. Union Army Brig. Gen. Robert Anderson raises the U.S. flag over the ruined Fort Sumter at Charleston, SC, which he had surrendered exactly four years previously. Long, p. 676.
April 14, 1865. U.S. President Abraham Lincoln is fatally shot at Ford's Theater in Washington, DC about 10:00 p.m. Long, pp. 675-676.
April 15, 1865. President Lincoln dies. Vice President Andrew Johnson takes the oath of office as President of the United States. Long, p. 677.
April 21, 1865. Col. John S. Mosby disbands his Confederate partisan rangers at Millwood, Clarke County, Virginia, previously part of Fauquier County, Virginia. Long, p. 680. Mosby said "We are soldiers, not highwaymen." Shelby Foote wrote "So much then for baleful predictions as to the postsurrender activities of Virginia's leading partisan...." Foote, III, p. 1000.
April 26, 1865. Confederate Gen. Joseph E. Johnston refuses to obey President of the Confederate President Jefferson Davis's order to disband his infantry and set a future rendezvous for the men to continue the fight as partisans. Johnston further refuses to join Davis with as many cavalrymen as he could. Thomas, p. 304.
April 26, 1865. Gen. Joseph E. Johnston surrenders the Confederate Army of Tennessee at Bennett Place, Durham, North Carolina on the terms accepted by the Army of Northern Virginia after more comprehensive and generous terms negotiated by Gen. Johnston and Union Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman on April 18 were rejected in Washington, with Sherman receiving word on on April 24. Long, pp. 681-682, Foote, III, pp. 988-996.
April 26, 1865. Lincoln's assassin John Wilkes Booth is mortally wounded by Union Army soldier Boston Corbett, is captured and dies. Assassination conspirator Davy Herold surrenders at the same time and place. Long, p. 682.
April 26, 1865. Last meeting of the full Confederate cabinet with Confederate President Jefferson Davis at Charlotte, North Carolina. Attorney General George Davis left the group which still intended to get west of the Mississippi River. Long, p. 683; Foote, III, p. 1002; Walmsley, pp. 336-349.
April 27, 1865. Sultana disaster. Long, p. 683, Foote, III, p. 1027.
April 27, 1865. Confederate States Secretary of the Treasury George A. Trenholm was ill and resigned. Confederate States Postmaster General John H. Reagan assumed his duties. Long, p. 683.
April 29, 1865. President Johnson ends trade restrictions in former Confederate territory east of the Mississippi River controlled by Union forces. Long, p. 684. Andrew Johnson, Executive Order Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [2]
April-July, 1865. Confederate prisoners of war are gradually released, most in June and July, after taking the Oath of Allegiance to the United States. The last Confederate prisoners of war were released in November from Fort Lafayette, in New York Harbor. Wagner, p. 600.
May 4, 1865. Lt. Gen. Richard Taylor surrenders Confederate forces in Alabama, Mississippi and eastern Louisiana based on the Appomattox Court House terms. Long, p. 685. McPherson, p. 485.
May 4, 1865. Confederate Colonel George C. Gibbs paroles the remaining Union prisoners of war at Andersonville Prison, GA. Rodriguez, pp.50-51.
May 4/5, 1865. Last meetings of some of the Confederate cabinet members and certain generals are held with Jefferson Davis who effectively dissolves the Confederate government. Walmsley, pp. 336-349.
May 6, 1865. With the consent of Secretory of War Edwin Stanton and Lt. General Ulysses S. Grant, Major General Henry Halleck issues an order that "From and after the 20th instant all persons found in arms against the authority of the United States in the State of Virginia and North Carolina, will be treated as robbers and outlaws." [3]
May 8, 1865. Paroles are given to Lt. Gen. Richard Taylor's Confederate forces at Citronelle, Alabama. Long, p. 686; Foote, III, p. 1000. Richard Taylor is paroled at Meridian, MS, May 11, 1865. Eicher, John H., p. 523.
May 9, 1865. Confederate Lt. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest bids farewell to his troops. He urges them to surrender and obey Federal authority. Henry, p. 438, Foote, III, pp. 1001-1002. He was paroled at Gainesville, AL on May 10, 1865. Eicher, John H., p. 240.
May 9, 1865. President Johnson declares terms to reestablish the authority of the United States and execute the laws within Virginia, orders actions by named executive department officers; recognizes Francis H. Pierpont as Governor of Virginia. Long, p. 686. Andrew Johnson, Executive Order—To Reestablish the Authority of the United States and Execute the Laws Within the Geographical Limits Known as the State of Virginia Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [4]
May 10, 1865. Confederate President Jefferson Davis is captured by two Union Army cavalry regiments, 4th Michigan and 1st Wisconsin, at Irwinville, Georgia. Long, p. 687; Foote, III, pp. 1009-1011; Thomas, p. 305; McPherson, p. 485.
May 10, 1865. Small Confederate forces in Florida, Georgia and northern Arkansas surrender. Long, p. 687.
May 10, 1865. U.S. President Andrew Johnson issues a proclamation with the premises that "armed resistance to the authority of this Government in the said insurrectionary States may be regarded as virtually at an end" and "persons by whom that resistance, as well as the operations of insurgent cruisers, was directed are fugitives or captives." He orders US forces to "arrest the said [insurgent] cruisers and to bring them into a port of the United States, in order that they may be prevented from committing further depredations on commerce and that the persons on board of them may no longer enjoy impunity for their crimes." Long, p. 687. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 132—Ordering the Arrest of Insurgent Cruisers Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [5] Official Records, Series 3, Volume 5, p. 18. The British government officially withdraws belligerent rights from the Confederacy on June 2, 1865. Long, p. 692.
Stephen C. Neff in Justice Blue and Gray states at page 206: "This proclamation of May 10 - the very day of the capture of Jefferson Davis - also included an explicit statement that armed resistance was now 'virtually at an end' and persons in revolt were now reduced to the humble status of 'mere fugitives or captives.'" Note that the actual language is not "persons in revolt" but "persons by whom that resistance, as well as the operations of insurgent cruisers, was directed..." Neff wrote nothing about this applying to a larger group of soldiers or others or that it criminalized any acts by a larger group. Though he notes the "virtual" end of "armed resistance", he does not indicate this is the end date for the war. In fact, just before this on page 205 he states, among other things: "In practice, the war was brought to an end on a piecemeal basis, by way of a welter of specific measures by the Union government." Neff, p. 206.
May 10, 1865. Confederate Maj. Gen. Samuel Jones surrenders his forces at Tallahassee, FL. Long, p. 687.
May 10, 1865. Confederate guerrilla leader William Clarke Quantrill is fatally wounded in an action with an irregular Union force ( the Shelby County Home Guard) near Taylorsville, Kentucky. Quantrill dies June 6 in Louisville. Long p. 687.
May 11, 1865. Confederate Brig. Gen. M. Jeff Thompson surrenders his brigade at Chalk Bluff, AR. Long, p. 687.
May 11, 1865. "General Orders No. 90 } War Department, Adjt. General's Office, Washington, May 11, 1865. Punishment of Guerrillas. "All the forces of the enemy east of the Mississippi River having been duly surrendered by their proper commanding officers to the Armies of the United States, under agreements of parole and disbandment, and there being no authorized troops of the enemy east of the Mississippi River, it is -- "Ordered', That from and after the first day of June, 1865, any and all persons found in arms against the United States, or who may commit acts of hostility against it east of the Mississippi River, will be regarded as guerrillas and punished with death. The strict enforcement of this order is especially enjoined upon the commanding officers of all U.S. forces with the territorial limits to which it applies. "By command of Lieutenant-General Grant: "E. D. TOWNSEND, "Assistant Adjutant General" The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. Series 1, Volume 46, Part 3, Page 1134. [6]. Accessed June 8, 2022, University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, [7]. Accessed June 8, 2022, University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, [8]..
May 12-13, 1865. Union Army Col. Theodore H. Barrett is defeated at the 2-day Battle of Palmito Ranch, Texas, the last land battle of any significant size in the war. Long, p. 688. Wagner, 328, 330. Eicher, David J., p. 843. Hunt, Jeffrey Wm. The Last Battle of the Civil War: Palmetto Ranch. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 2002. ISBN 978-0-292-73461-6. Dyer calls the second day as the Battle of White Hill. Dyer, p. 891 spells the word "Palmetto," as does Hunt, and adds "Battle of White's Ranch" as occuring on May 13 by the same Union force engaged at Palmetto Ranch, May 12-13.
May 13, 1865. Confederate governors of Arkansas, Louisiana and Missouri and a representative from Texas urge Gen. E. Kirby Smith to surrender. Brig. Gen. Joseph O. Shelby threatens to arrest him if he does. Long, p. 688.
May 14-27, 1865. Dyer lists seven skirmishes in Missouri between May 14 and May 27, 1865. He lists no casualties. Only one Union Army unit that was not a Missouri militia unit, a detachment of the 13th U.S. Cavalry, engaged in any of these skirmishes, the one near Waynesville on May 23. The skirmish at Switzler's Mill in Chariton County on May 27 is the last one listed by Dyer, p. 815, and the last one listed by Long at p. 690 other than his statement that there were operations in Texas against guerrillas for most of 1865. p. 691.
May 17, 1865. Maj. Gen. Philip H. Sheridan is given command of US forces west of the Mississippi River and south of the Arkansas River. Long, p. 688. Lt. Gen. Grant orders Sheridan to take 50,000 men to pacify Texas and parts of Louisiana still controlled by Confederate general Edmund Kirby Smith and to offer surrender on the same terms granted to Lee and Johnston. Grant's further desired actions against the French puppet ruler of Mexico, Maximilian, for aiding the rebellion were told to Sheridan verbally. Direct actions against Maximilian were restrained by Secretary of State William Seward who favored a more cautious approach. Chernow, pp. 554-557; Foote, III, pp. 1018-1019..
May 17, 1865. The last Confederate prison for Union prisoners of war at Camp Ford, Texas, is evacuated. Wagner, p. 600.
May 19, 1865. Confederate commerce raider CSS Stonewall surrenders at Havana, Cuba. Long, p. 689.
May 19, 1865. An order to Captain Henry Shook at McMinnville, Tennessee by Maj. Gen. Lovell Rousseau at Tullahoma, Tennessee (signed by Jno. O Cravens, Assistant Adjutant General) directed Shook to accept the surrender of "a number of bushwackers...[and] All other bands may be receivedin the same way." One exception was made: "Champ Ferguson and his band have been declared outlaws by Major-General Rousseau. The major-general commanding therefore directs that you do not accept the surrender of Ferguson or any number of his band and that you treat them as outlaws." The War of the Rebellion: Official Records, Series 1, Volume 49, Part 2, page 843 [9].
May 19, 1865. Brig. Gen. Henry Hobson, Lexington, KY, orders Major Bridgewater at Stanford, KY to capture and kill a gang of guerrillas operating near Somerset, KY. The War of the Rebellion: Official Records, Series 1, Volume 49, Part 2, page 843 [10].
May 20, 1865. Former Confederate Secretary of the Navy Stephen R. Mallory was arrested and charged with "treason and with organizing and setting on foot piratical expeditions." He was paroled with conditions on March 10, 1866. Denney, p. 570.
May 22, 1865. President Johnson ends restrictions at Southern ports except Galveston, La Salle, Brazos Santiago (Point Isabel) and Brownsville, TX on and after July 1, 1865. Long, p. 689. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 133—Raising the Blockade of Certain Ports Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [11]
May 22, 1865. Jefferson Davis is imprisoned at Fort Monroe, VA. Foote, III, p. 1013.
May 23, 1865. Grand Review of the Army of the Potomac in Washington, DC. Long, p. 689.
May 23, 1865. The pro-Union government of Virginia was established in Richmond, Long, p. 689.
May 24, 1865. Grand Review of Sherman's Army, the Military Division of the Mississippi. ( Army of the Tennessee and Army of Georgia) in Washington, DC. Long, p. 689.
May 26, 1865. Confederate Lt. Gen. Simon B. Buckner on behalf of Gen. Edmund Kirby Smith enters terms of surrender for the Confederate Army of the Trans-Mississippi similar to those signed at Appomattox Court House by Gen. Robert E. Lee. Union Maj. Gen. Peter J. Osterhaus acted for Maj. Gen. E. R. S. Canby. The Army of the Trans-Mississippi was the last army of the Confederacy of significant size to remain in the field. Long, p. 690. Catton, Bruce in The Centennial History of the Civil War. Vol. 3, Never Call Retreat. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1965 wrote at p. 445. "...and on May 26 he [E. Kirby Smith] surrendered and the war was over." In the case of United States v. Anderson, 76 U.S. 56 (1869) "The U.S. attorneys argued that the Rebellion had been suppressed following the surrender of the Trans-Mississippi Department, as established in the surrender document negotiated on May 26, 1865." Trudeau, p. 396. The Supreme Court decided that the "legal end of the American Civil War had been decided by Congress to be August 20, 1866 - the date of Andrew Johnson's final proclamation on the conclusion of the Rebellion." Trudeau, 397.
May 27, 1865. President Johnson orders "in all cases of sentences by military tribunals of imprisonment during the war the sentence be remitted and that the prisoners be discharged." Long, p. 690; Denney, p. 572, Foote, III, p. 1031. Andrew Johnson, Executive Order Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [12]
May 29, 1865. President Johnson issues a proclamation granting a general amnesty and pardon to "all persons who have, directly or indirectly, participated in the existing rebellion, except as hereinafter excepted,..." There are 14 limited categories of exceptions. The proclamation continues "Provided, That special application may be made to the President for pardon by any person belonging to the excepted classes, and such clemency will be liberally extended as may be consistent with the facts of the case and the peace and dignity of the United States." Long, pp. 691-692; Denney, p. 572. Eicher, David J., p. 844. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 134—Granting Amnesty to Participants in the Rebellion, with Certain Exceptions Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [13]
"Altogether he [Johnson] granted 13,500 special pardons out of about 15,000 applications." McPherson, p. 505.
May 29, 1865. President Johnson proclaims terms for reorganizing a constitutional government in North Carolina; William W. Holden appointed governor. Long, 691. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 135—Reorganizing a Constitutional Government in North Carolina Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [14]
May 29, 1865-end of 1865. "There were operations in Texas and on the Rio Grande by the Federal Army for most of the rest of 1865 against guerrillas and former Confederates escaping to Mexico." Long, p. 691.
May 29, 1865: The New York Times page 1 headline declares: "END OF THE REBELLION.; THE LAST REBEL ARMY DISBANDS. Kirby Smith Surrenders the Land and Naval Forces Under His Command. The Confederate Flag Disappears from the Continent. THE ERA OF PEACE BEGINS. Military Prisoners During the War to be Discharged. Deserters to be Released from Confinement. [OFFICIAL.] FROM SECRETARY STANTON TO GEN. DIX. [15] The New York Times; May 29, 1865. Page 1. WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, May 27, 1865...."
May 31, 1865. Confederate Lt. Gen. John B. Hood was paroled one day after he was captured. Foote, III, p. 1021.
June 1, 1865. On or just before this date: "General Order No. 90 of the War Department stated unequivocally that 'from and after the first date of June, 1865, any and all persons found in arms against the United States, or who may commits acts of hostility against it east of the Mississippi River, will be regarded as guerrillas and punished with death.'" Trudeau, p. 353.
June 2, 1865. Gen. E. Kirby Smith approves and signs the terms of surrender in the agreement of May 26 for the Army of the Trans-Mississippi aboard the steamer USS Fort Jackson (1862) in Galveston harbor. Foote, III, p. 1021; Long, p. 692.
June 2, 1865. Order for the Trans-Mississippi with similar terms for treating soldiers engaging in continued hostility in the Trans-Mississippi after reasonable time for notice of the surrender of the Trans-Mississippi by Gen. Kirby Smith as in Lt. Gen. Grant's General Orders No. 90 of May 11, 1865 prescribing continued hostility east of the Mississippi after June 1, 1865 to be guerrilla, or outlaw, actions: "General Orders No. 24 } Headquarters Third Div., 7th Army Corps. Fort Smith, Ark. June 2, 1865 "I…............. "II. The Trans-Mississippi (rebel) Department having surrendered to General Canby on the 26th of May, reqires that all soldiers in arms against the United States immediately report to the nearest military post, when they will be paroled on delivering their arms to the U. S. authorities. All such persons who remain in arms engaged in acts of hostility to the United States after a reasonable time to be informed of their surrender, will be regarded as guerrillas and outlaws, and when arrested will be shot. "By Order of Brig. Gen. Cyrus Bussey: "L. A. Duncan, Acting Assistant Adjutant-General" The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. Series 1, Volume 48, Part 2, Page 530. [16] Hathi Trust Digital Library, accessed June 12, 2022.
June 2, 1865. The British government officially withdraws belligerent rights from the Confederacy. Long, p. 692. There are a few exceptions and conditions, including holding any U.S. warship in the ports, harbors or waters of the U.K. or possessions to allow a Confederate ship already there to leave; allowing Confederate ships to divest their armaments and change flags but without U.K. protection and 24 hours rule. Army and Navy Journal, June 24, 1865 Page 695 Volume II Number 44 [17]
June 2, 1865. President Johnson orders "all military restrictions upon trade in any of the States or Territories of the United States, except in articles contraband of war--[as defined in the order] shall cease from and after the present date." Andrew Johnson, Executive Order—General Orders: 107 Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [18]
June 3, 1865. Confederate naval forces on the Red River surrender. Long, p. 692, Foote, III, p. 1027.
June 6, 1865. President Johnson issues orders of discharge of prisoners of war for all enlisted men, petty officers and officers of the rebel army not above the grade of captain and of the rebel navy not above the grade of lieutenant unless graduates of a US military academy, upon taking an oath of allegiance. Orders for discharge of higher officers who are prisoners are to be issued when the discharge under this order is completed. All "who desire will be permitted to take the oath of amnesty after their release." Andrew Johnson, Executive Order—General Orders: 109 Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [19]
June 12, 1865. Brevet Brig. Gen. William Gamble is ordered by Brig. General. John P. Slough to "send a squadron of the Eighth Regiment Illinois Cavalry to scout the country in the vicinity of Aldie [Virginia] to break up bands of marauders and guerrillas, and to ascertain the names of, and arrest, if possible, the persons concerned in the recent murders of Union people." The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. Series 1, Volume 46, Part 3, Page 1275. [20]. Accessed June 8, 2022, University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, [21].
June 13, 1865. President Johnson declares trade open in all territory east of the Mississippi River except for contraband of war. Long, p. 693. The order specified an effective date "on and after the 1st day of July next, subject to the laws of the United States, and in pursuance of such regulations as might be prescribed by the Secretary of the Treasury." Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 137—Removing Trade Restrictions on Confederate States Lying East of the Mississippi River Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [22]
June 13, 1865. President Johnson declares that Tennessee reorganized its government, suppressed the rebellion and he restored the State and lifted almost all disqualifications from its inhabitants. This is included in proclamation 137 noted in the previous item for June 13, 1865, [23]. More in Presidential Reconstruction entry at end of this timeline.
June 16, 1865. Lt. Gen. Grant vigorously objects to President Johnson that indictments brought against Gen. Robert E. Lee and other Confederate officers in Norfolk, VA violated the terms of the surrender and paroles of the men of the Army of Northern Virginia and other Confederate armies. He threatens to resign as General in Chief if the indictments are not dismissed. Chernow, pp. 552-553. General Grant replies to Gen. Robert E. Lee that he believes that the men who surrendered at Appomattox Court House can not be tried for treason as long as they observes the terms of their parole and he asked that Judge Underwood at Nofolk be ordred to quash all indictments found against paroled prisoners of war, and to desist from further prosecution of them. The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. Series 1, Volume 46, Part 3, Page 1276. [24]
June 19, 1865. Two days after taking command of the District of Texas at Galveston, Union Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger announces to the people of Texas that in line with a proclamation by the "Executive of the United States, all slaves are free." Conner, p. 177.
June 19, 1965. U.S. Secretary of State William H. Seward sends a message to the British ambassador objecting to reservations and statements in the June 2 British statement. He also wrote "It is hardly necessary to say that the United States do not admit what they have heretofore constantly controverted, that the original concession of belligerent privileges to the Rebels by Great Britain was either necessary or just, or sanctioned by the law of nations." *Army and Navy Journal, July 22, 1865 Page 763 Volume II Number 48 [25]
June 20, 1865. At President Johnson's order, U.S. Attorney General James Speed orders the U.S. Attorney at Norfolk, VA to drop the prosecutions of Gen. Lee and other officers. Chernow, p. 553. While the prosecution of Gen. Lee was not pursued, the indictment was not formally dropped until 1869 according to Noah Andre Trudeau. Trudeau, 358.
June 23, 1865. President Johnson ends the blockade of Southern ports. Long, p. 693. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 141—Raising the Blockade of All Ports in the United States Including Galveston, Texas Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [26]
June 23, 1865. Brig. Gen. Stand Watie surrenders his Native American (Indian) division near Fort Towson in Indian Territory, the last surrender of any sizable force of Confederate troops by a Confederate general officer. Long, p. 693.
June 24, 1865. President Johnson removes commercial restrictions from States and territories west of the Mississippi River. Long, p. 695. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 142—Removing Restrictions on Trade West of the Mississippi River Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [27]
June 28, 1865. The military operations of the Confederate commerce raider CSS Shenandoah end with the taking of 11 whaling ships in the Bering Sea. Long, p. 694. Wagner, p. 537. The Shenandoah is not surrendered to the British until November 6, 1865 in Liverpool, England. Long, p. 695.
June 28, 1865. At the order of Lt. Gen. Grant, the Army of the Potomac is demobilized; officers and soldiers not yet mustered out are reorganized into a provisional corps under Maj. Gen. Horatio Wright. The process was put into effect by GENERAL ORDERS, HDQRS. ARMY OF THE POTOMAC, No. 35. June 28, 1865. "By virtue of Special Orders, No. 339, current series, from the Adjutant-General's Office, this army, as an organization, ceases to exist....etc." By command of Major-General Meade: GEO. D. RUGGLES, Assistant Adjutant-General. Official Records of War of the Rebellion: Serial 097 Pages 1301-3. Chapter LVIII. [28]. ehistory, The Ohio State University, accessed June 8, 2022. Official Records, Series 1, Volume 46, Part 3, pp. 1301-1303. [29], accessed June 8, 2022, University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, [30].
August 29, 1865. President Johnson declares that contraband of war could be traded with States "recently declared in insurrection", Long, 695. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 145—Removing Trade Restrictions on Contraband of War Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [31]
September 14/21, 1865. Various Native American (Indian) tribes renounce Confederate agreements and sign treaties of peace and friendship with the United States. Long, p. 695.
October 11, 1865. Alexander H. Stephens, John H. Reagan, George A. Trenholm, Charles Clark and John Archibald Campbell were paroled by President Johnson. Long, p. 695. Andrew Johnson, Executive Order Paroling Alexander H. Stephens and Others Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [32]
October 12, 1865. President Johnson declares the end of martial law in Kentucky. Long, p. 695. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 146—Declaring an End to Martial Law in the State of Kentucky Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [33]
October 30, 1865. U.S. Secretary of State William Seward informs U.S. Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles of Britain's Earl Russell's message of October 18 relieving U.S. vessels of all the objectionable restraints in Russell's June 2, 1865 message. Army and Navy Journal, November 4, 1865, p. 172 [34]
November 6, 1865. Confederate Navy Lt. James Iredell Waddell surrenders the CSS Shenandoah to the British government in Liverpool, England. Long, p. 695.
December 1865. Former Confederate Secretary of War James A. Seddon is released from prison. Current, Macmillan Compendium, p. 942.
January 1, 1866. Former Confederate Attorney General George A. Davis is released from prison. He had not been arrested until November 1865 and spent only a few weeks in prison. Davis, pp. 381-385
January 1866. Former Confederate Secretary of State and Senator Robert M.T. Hunter is paroled. Current, Macmillan Compendium, p. 550.
March 10, 1866. Former Confederate Secretary of the Navy Stephen R. Mallory is paroled. Current, Macmillan Compendium, p. 668.
April 2, 1866. President Johnson declares the insurrection over (except in Texas). Long, p. 696. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 153—Declaring the Insurrection in Certain Southern States to be at an End Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [35]
August 20, 1866. President Johnson issues a proclamation announcing the end of the American Civil War in all States including Texas. Long, pp. 696-697. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 157—Declaring that Peace, Order, Tranquillity, and Civil Authority Now Exists in and Throughout the Whole of the United States of America Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [36]
May 13, 1867. Jefferson Davis is released on bail. Davis, p. 386; Foote, III, pp. 1038-1039.
September 7, 1867. President Johnson extends the amnesty of 1865 in a proclamation in which he declares that he did: "hereby proclaim and declare that the full pardon described in the said proclamation of the 29th day of May, A. D. 1865, shall henceforth be opened and extended to all persons who, directly or indirectly, participated in the late rebellion, with the restoration of all privileges, immunities, and rights of property, except as to property with regard to slaves, and except in cases of legal proceedings under the laws of the United States; but upon this condition, nevertheless, that every such person who shall seek to avail himself of this proclamation shall take and subscribe the following oath and shall cause the same to be registered for permanent preservation in the same manner and with the same effect as with the oath prescribed in the said proclamation of the 29th day of May, 1865..."
There were fewer limited exceptions than in the May 29, 1865 proclamation. The categories in the September 7, 1867 proclamation were high ranking Confederate executive officers and generals above the grade of brigadier or naval officers above rank or title of captain, Confederate agents in foreign countries, Confederate governors of States, persons who mistreated lawful prisoners of war, persons who were in confinement or custody of in the civil, military or naval service of the United States when they seek to obtain the benefits of the proclamation, or are out on bail, and any person who engaged in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln or any plot or conspiracy connected with it. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 167—Offering and Extending Full Pardon to All Persons Participating in the Late Rebellion Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [37]
"Probably only some three hundred persons fell into these excluded groups. Moreover, this proclamation, like its predecessor, was supplemented by the continued granting of individual pardons. Eventually, nearly all of the civilian leaders of the Confederacy received pardons with two notable exceptions: Jefferson Davis and Secretary of War John Breckenridge (who was living abroad at the time), both of whom obstinately refused to request individual pardons." Neff, p. 225.
July 4, 1868. President Andrew Johnson issued a proclamation in which he stated that he did "hereby proclaim and declare, unconditionally and without reservation, to all and to every person who, directly or indirectly, participated in the late insurrection or rebellion, excepting such person or persons as may be under presentment or indictment in any court of the United States having competent jurisdiction upon a charge of treason or other felony, a full pardon and amnesty for the offense of treason against the United States or of adhering to their enemies during the late civil war, with restoration of all rights of property, except as to slaves, and except also as to any property of which any person may have been legally divested under the laws of the United States." Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 170—Granting Pardon to All Persons Participating in the Late Rebellion Except Those Under Indictment for Treason or Other Felony Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [38]
There was "no requirement of a loyalty oath of any kind and only one excluded category – persons presently facing treason or other felony charges such as Jefferson Davis." Neff, p. 225.
December 5, 1868. The Chief Justice of the United States Salmon P. Chase, sitting as circuit justice, could not agree with trial judge John C. Underwood on whether the 14th Amendment precluded the prosecution of Jefferson Davis and the case should be dismissed on the basis that the amendment already inflicted punishment on Davis by depriving him of the right to hold office. They sent a " certificate of division" to the U.S. Supreme Court for decision and adjourned the trial to await action by the Court. Hagen, p. 224; Nichols, p. 284. William C. Davis states that Chase quashed the indictment. As the other cited sources show, Chase merely, and improperly, told Jefferson Davis's attorneys that he accepted their arguments as a basis to do so, virtually assuring them of a favorable hearing in the U.S. Supreme Court.
December 25, 1868. President Johnson issued a universal amnesty proclamation in which he declares that he did: "hereby proclaim and declare unconditionally and without reservation, to all and to every person who, directly or indirectly, participated in the late insurrection or rebellion a full pardon and amnesty for the offense of treason against the United States or of adhering to their enemies during the late civil war, with restoration of all rights, privileges, and immunities under the Constitution and the laws which have been made in pursuance thereof." Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 179—Granting Full Pardon and Amnesty for the Offense of Treason Against the United States During the Late Civil War Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [39]
"This finally put a stop (as noted above) to the Davis treason trial. Practically the only persons outside the circle of mercy were the convicted Lincoln murderers – and even three of them were given individual pardons, in Johnson's final days in office in March 1869, for services performed for their fellow inmates and jailors during an outbreak of disease in their prison." Neff, p. 225.
February 11, 1869. The U.S. Government enters a nolle prosequi in the case of United States v. Jefferson Davis. (" Nolle prosequi ... is legal Latin meaning 'to be unwilling to pursue'. In Commonwealth and US common law, it is used for prosecutors' declarations that they are voluntarily ending a criminal case before trial or before a verdict is rendered.") Hagen, p. 225; Nichols, p. 284. Icenhauer-Ramirez, p. 318.
United States v. Anderson, 76 U.S. 56 (1869) The syllabus of the decision accurately summarizes on page 56 the court's holding as follows: "As respects rights intended to be secured by the above-mentioned Abandoned or Captured Property Act, "the suppression of the rebellion" is to be regarded as having taken place on the 20th of August, 1866, on which day the President by proclamation declared it suppressed in Texas "and throughout the whole of the United States of America," that same date being apparently adopted by Congress in a statute continuing a certain rate of pay to soldiers in the army "for three years after the close of the rebellion, as announced by the President of the United States by proclamation bearing date August 20, 1866." [40]
Per Noah Andre Trudeau, pages 396-397 about the Anderson case: "The U.S. attorneys argued that the Rebellion had been suppressed following the surrender of the Trans-Mississippi Department, as established in the surrender document negotiated on May 26, 1865. Anderson's lawyer, in turn, argued that the end of the war was a legislative matter, not a military one, and that Congress had previously recognized President Johnson's August 20 proclamation as the first official declaration that the Civil War had ended everywhere. The Supreme Court ruled that Nelson Anderson was entitled to recompense from the United States government for his cotton. The court's key determination was that the legal end of the American Civil War had been decided by Congress to be August 20, 1866 - the date of Andrew Johnson's final proclamation on the conclusion of the Rebellion. For legal purposes at least, the end of the Civil War was a matter of record." Trudeau, pp. 396-397.
Presidential Reconstruction:
In addition to the proclamations with terms for reorganizing the government of Virginia (May 9 above) and North Carolina, (May 29 above), on June 13, 1865. President Johnson declares that Tennessee had reorganized its government, suppressed the rebellion and he restored the State and lifted disqualifications from its inhabitants as part of Proclamation 137. "And I hereby also proclaim and declare that the insurrection, so far as it relates to and within the State of Tennessee and the inhabitants of the said State of Tennessee as reorganized and constituted under their recently adopted constitution and reorganization and accepted by them, is suppressed, and therefore, also, that all the disabilities and disqualifications attaching to said State and the inhabitants thereof consequent upon any proclamation issued by virtue of the fifth section of the act entitled "An act further to provide for the collection of duties on imports and for other purposes," approved the 13th day of July, 1861, are removed." However this did not include "any of the penalties and forfeitures for treason heretofore incurred under the laws of the United States or any of the provisions, restrictions, or disabilities set forth in my proclamation bearing date the 29th day of May, 1865, or as impairing existing regulations for the suspension of the habeas corpus and the exercise of military law in cases where it shall be necessary for the general public safety and welfare during the existing insurrection ." Long p. 693. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 137—Removing Trade Restrictions on Confederate States Lying East of the Mississippi River Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [41]
In addition, between June 13, 1865 and July 13, 1865, President Johnson proclaimed terms for reorganizing constitutional governments in other Confederate states and appointed provisional governors in the following proclamations: June 13, 1865: Mississippi, Long, p. 693 [42]; June 17, 1865: Georgia, Long p. 693 [43]; June 17, 1865: Texas, Long p. 693 [44]; June 21, 1865: Alabama, Long, p. 693 [45]; June 30, 1865: South Carolina, p. 694; [46]; July 13, 1865: Florida, Long 694; [47].
In a special message to the U.S. Senate on December 18, 1865, President Johnson advised: "As the result of the measures instituted by the Executive with the view of inducing a resumption of the functions of the States comprehended in the inquiry of the Senate, the people of North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Tennessee have reorganized their respective State governments, and "are yielding obedience to the laws and Government of the United States....The proposed amendment to the Constitution, providing for the abolition of slavery forever within the limits of the country, has been ratified by each one of those States, with the exception of Mississippi..... In Florida and Texas the people are making commendable progress in restoring their State governments...." [48].
References
Footnote: Stephen A. Neff is a professor of law and the University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh School of Law in Scotland. A page of the university web site notes: "Stephen Neff's primary research interest is the history of public international law. He is the author of a book on the historical development of international economic law. His current focus is the history of the law of neutrality...." [64] Retrieved June 7, 2022. Donner60 ( talk) 09:40, 25 July 2022 (UTC)
Works of historians searched for this post often end with an event or several events at the end of the war without specifying one of them as "the" end date. I have noted a few of these in summary for noted historians. I do not have access to every possible source for these viewpoints, of course. So I cannot claim this post is all-inclusive or that I did not miss something. I found few references to the May 9 (actually May 10) order at all, much less any that declared it an end date or criminalized future actions; General Grant's May 11, 1865 order, not generally noted in the histories, does appear to do so, thus I include it at the end with others. I do think is representative of how historians treat the end of the war.
If any editors have any further relevant quotations, I invite them to add them to this list.
Original texts of June 14, 2022, July 5, 2022 and July 25, 2022 are now replaced with this revised and expanded text.
I thought my original compilation would be complete but I found some additional sources, including from the Civil War period, which I think add some value to how the end date of the war has been seen over the years.
I am putting the key comment about the majority view of historians on the end of the American Civil War from the relatively recent article Finding the Ending of the American Civil War first. I will put additional comments from that article in the chronological order of the references below. I have reorganized the list from the oldest item to the most current, rather than by author's last name. Readers will recognize many historians of note regardless of where they are listed.
I originally prepared this to support a change in the infobox and first line of the article. Whether this results or not is still in question but is heading toward a resolution on July 25, 2022. Regardless of the outcome, this material may be of interest and of use in further research or for inclusion in this or another article, such as Conclusion of the American Civil War.
Finding the Ending of America's Civil War by William A. Blair (Professor at Penn State University) The American Historical Review Published by: Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Historical Association Vol. 120, No. 5 (December 2015) [65] "More that four decades ago, historian Avery Craven made the bold statement "The American Civil War did not end at Appomattox", adding "Until the Negro's place in American life was fixed, the war was not over." But he remained a minority voice, as the sheer weight of scholarship has leaned toward portraying the surrenders of the Confederate armies as the end of the war. "Footnote 25: ...For the argument against war continuing beyond the surrenders, see, for instance, Gary W. Gallagher, The Confederate War: How Popular Will, Nationalism, and Military Strategy Could Not Stave Off Defeat (Cambridge, Mass. 1997), 206, "n.1....The literature as a whole remains tilted toward the war ending with the surrenders...."
1865: Predicated on the surrender of the armies
“All the forces of the enemy east of the Mississippi River having been duly surrendered by their proper commanding officers to the Armies of the United States, under agreements of parole and disbandment, and there being no authorized troops of the enemy east of the Mississippi River, it is - “Ordered', That from and after the first day of June, 1865, any and all persons found in arms against the United States, or who may commit acts of hostility against it east of the Mississippi River, will be regarded as guerrillas and punished with death. The strict enforcement of this order is especially enjoined upon the commanding officers of all U.S. forces with the territorial limits to which it applies. “By command of Lieutenant-General Grant: “E. D. TOWNSEND, “Assistant Adjutant General”
1865: May 26: Kirby Smith's Surrender
"May 29 [1865]....Peace. Peace herself, at last, for [Kirby] Smith and [John] Magruder have surrendered, if General [Edward] Canby's dispatch to the War Department be truthful. So here I hope and believe ends, by God's great and undeserved mercy, this chapter [page 314] of this journal I opened with the heading War on the night of April 13, 1861. We have lived a century of common life since then. Only within the last two months have I dared to hope that this fearful struggle would be settled so soon."
1865: May 26, 1865, Kirby Smith's Surrender: The New York Times:
"END OF THE REBELLION.; THE LAST REBEL ARMY DISBANDS. Kirby Smith Surrenders the Land and Naval Forces Under His Command. The Confederate Flag Disappears from the Continent. THE ERA OF PEACE BEGINS. Military Prisoners During the War to be Discharged. Deserters to be Released from Confinement. [OFFICIAL.] FROM SECRETARY STANTON TO GEN. DIX. [67] The New York Times; May 29, 1865. Page 1. "WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, May 27, 1865.... "Maj.-Gen. Dix: "A dispatch from Gen. CANBY, dated at New-Orleans, yesterday, the 26th inst., states that arrangements for the surrender of the Confederate forces in the Trans-Mississippi Department have been concluded. They include the men and material of the army and navy. EDWIN M. STANTON, "Secretary of War."
1865: Trans-Mississippi surrender order
General Orders No. 24 } Headquarters Third Div., 7th Army Corps. Fort Smith, Ark. June 2, 1865 …............. The Trans-Mississippi (rebel) Department having surrendered to General Canby on the 26th of May, requires that all soldiers in arms against the United States immediately report to the nearest military post, when they will be paroled on delivering their arms to the U. S. authorities. All such persons who remain in arms engaged in acts of hostility to the United States after a reasonable time to be informed of their surrender, will be regarded as guerrillas and outlaws, and when arrested will be shot. By Order of Brig. Gen. Cyrus Bussey: L. A. Duncan, Acting Assistant Adjutant-General
1865: May 26, 1865
Page 1426: “On the 19th of April, an officer of the rebel General Dick Taylor's staff, arrived at General Canby's headquarters, with a flag of truce, to make a surrender of his army. For some cause, the negotiations were protracted until the 4th of May, when the surrender took place at Citronelle, Ala. The terms accorded were in substance those granted to General Lee, by General Grant. The number of troops surrendered by this capitulation, somewhat exceeded twenty thousand. This surrender was followed by that of Forrest, Jeff. Thompson, Morgan and all the other commanders of rebel bands east of the Mississippi. The rebel General E. Kirby Smith, commanding in the Trans-Mississippi region, had nominally a large army, and at first was defiant, proclaiming his intention of maintaining his position of hostility. General Sheridan was ordered thither with a large cavalry force; but the rebel [page 1427] General, on finding that all the rebel armies east of the Mississippi, had surrendered, that Davis was a prisoner, and that his own troops were deserting and abandoning the conflict by thousands, reconsidered his decision, and made propositions for surrender, which was finally consummated on the 26th of May, at New Orleans, General Buckner representing Smith on the occasion, while that worthy made his escape into Mexico, with a large sum of money, the fruit of his cotton speculations. The army thus surrendered, had been greatly reduced in numbers by the abandonment of the service of which we have already spoken, and the number paroled was not large.
“With this surrender, the war, so far as the territory of the United States was concerned, ceased. The greater part of the Union army was disbanded, only about one hundred thousand men being retained in the service, and army corps being reduced to divisions, divisions to brigades, and brigades to regiments. The blockade was raised, the revocation of the rights they had accorded to belligerents demanded from foreign powers, and the remaining rebel war vessels on the high seas declared pirates. Military and provisional governors were appointed in the States which had been in revolt.”
1865: Total of Events
U.S. Army and Navy Journal, Volume 3, New York, August 26, 1865. [69] Page 8.
“Practically the war is over – for the purposes of business, of campaigning, of ordinary life. Constructively, and for the purposes of settling certain relations which it disturbed, the war is not over. Some such distinction is necessary for comprehending, supporting and legalizing the present action of the Government; and it is founded in reason." [Trials by military commission; government of insurgent states by military authority.]
"At the very outset, the greatest difficulty is encountered in determining the precise close of an unsuccessful insurrection, whether it be a petty affair of a SHAY, or a DORR, or a CALHOUN, in a single State, or the gigantic scheme of a DAVIS in a dozen States. We believe no day can be named, nor any month even, in which the present Rebellion ended. Was it when LEE surrendered, or JOHNSTON, or TAYLOR, or KIRBY SMITH? Was it upon the capture of DAVIS, its representative head. At what subsequent date then? There is no treaty of peace to fix the epoch, and there never could have been, because it would have given the insurrection a sovereign belligerent treaty-making power which we always deny."
1865/1868: Total of events of Jefferson Davis's capture and surrenders of Confederate armies, but clearly taking it to the last surrender of the armies.
Page 640: “With these events the war was fully terminated. The Confederate armies had surrendered, and the heads of the rebel government were prisoners or fugitives. The military and civil organizations of the great revolt had alike perished. As an immediate consequence, the leading armies of the United States were disbanded or greatly reduced to a force simpty adequate for the maintenance of order in the late insurgent districts; the naval equipments were in like manner curtailed; restrictions were removed from foreign and internal trade; the new state of affairs were recognized by foreign governments, and before the 4th of July, 1865, with the important exception of the regulations affecting the restoration or reconstruction of civil government in the late rebel States, and the position of parties engaged in the rebellion, the administration of the national affairs had mainly returned to its accustomed channels.”
1867: May 26, 1865 (On land, Kirby Smith's surrender)
Page 757: “Though the war on land ceased, and the Confederate flag utterly disappeared from this continent with the collapse and dispersion of Kirby Smith's command; it was yet displayed at sea by two of the British-built, British-armed and (mainly) British manned cruisers engaged in the spoliation of our commerce;....”
1870: May 26, 1865
Draper, John William. History of the American Civil War. [70] Volume 3. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1870. OCLC 830251756. Retrieved July 28, 2022.
Page 618: "The surrender of Johnson to Sherman was followed, on the 14th of May, by that of General Taylor, with all the remaining Confederate armies east of the Mississippi, to General Canby. [typo? May 4th usually cited] On the 26th of the same month General Kirby Smith surrendered his entire command wst of the Mississippi to General Canby. With this, all military opposition to the government ended."
1881: Kirby Smith's Surrender; Surrender of the Armies: Jefferson Davis
Page 630, Near the end of Chapter LIV: “With General E. K. Smith's surrender the Confederate flag no longer floated on the land; only one gallant sailor still unfurled it on the Pacific. Captain Waddell, commanding the Confederate cruiser Shenandoah swept the ocean from Australia nearly to Behring's Straits....” Chapter LVI first sentence, Page 663: “When the Confederate soldiers laid down their arms and went home, all hostilities against the power of the Government of the United States ceased.”
1885: May 26, 1865: Adam Badeau
Page 639: "In fact the history of the war after the 9th of April is nothing but an enumeration of surrenders. On the 14th of April, Johnston made his first overtures to Sherman; on the 21st, Cobb yielded Macon; on the 4th of May, Richard Taylor surrendered all the rebel forces east of the Mississippi. On the 11th of May, Jefferson Davis, disguised as a woman and in flight, was captured at Irwinsville, Georgia; and on the 26th of the same month, Kirby Smith surrendered his entire command west of the Mississippi River. On that day the last organized rebel force disappeared from the territory of the United States."
1886: May 26, 1865: Ulysses S. Grant
Page 522: "General E. Kirby Smith surrendered the trans-Mississippi department on the 26th of May, leaving no other Confederate army at liberty to continue the war."
1886: May 26, 1865
unpaginated e-book; end of Chapter XXX
"Meanwhile on the 5th of April, Grant, who had kept Sherman, as well as Sheridan, advised of his main movements, had also ordered the former to press Johnston's Army as he was pressing Lee, so as, between them, they might "push on, and finish the job." In accordance with this order, Sherman's Forces advanced toward Smithfield, and, Johnston having rapidly retreated before them, entered Raleigh, North Carolina, on the 13th. The 14th of April, brought the news of the surrender of Lee to Grant, and the same day a correspondence was opened between Sherman and Johnston, looking to the surrender of the latter's Army—terms for which were actually agreed upon, subject, however, to approval of Sherman's superiors. Those terms, however, being considered unsatisfactory, were promptly disapproved, and similar terms to those allowed to Lee's Army, were substituted, and agreed to, the actual surrender taking place April 26th, near Durham, North Carolina. On the 21st, Macon, Georgia, with 12,000 Rebel Militia, and sixty guns, was surrendered to Wilson's Cavalry-command, by General Howell Cobb. On the 4th of May, General Richard Taylor surrendered all the armed Rebel troops, East of the Mississippi river; and on the 26th of May, General Kirby Smith surrendered all of them, West of that river." "On that day, organized, armed Rebellion against the United States ceased, and became a thing of the past. It had been conquered, stamped out, and extinguished, while its civic head, Jefferson Davis, captured May 11th, at Irwinsville, Georgia, while attempting to escape, was, with other leading Rebels, a prisoner in a Union fort.”
1890: Kirby Smith Surrender (May 26, 1865)
Page 490: “Far away, in Texas Gen. E. Kirby Smith enacted the last scene – surrendering the last armed soldier of the Confederacy.”
1902: Anxiety while Davis at large, and unsurrendered army west of Mississippi River.
“Pages 282-3: “While the trial was going on in Washington, Jefferson Davis was captured, on May 10th, near Irwinsville, Ga., by a detachment of General Wilson's cavalry. Mr. Davis and his family, with Alexander H. Stephens, lately Vice-President of the Confederacy, John H. Reagan, Postmaster General, Clement C. Clay, and other State prisoners, were sent to Fortress Monroe. The propeller Clyde, with the party on board, reached Hampton Roads on May 19th. The next day, May 20th, Mr. Stanton sent for me to come to his office. He told me where Davis was, and said that he had ordered General Nelson A. Miles to go to Hampton Roads to take charge of the prisoners, transferring them from the Clyde to the fortress. Mr. Stanton was much concerned lest Davis should commit suicide; he said that he himself would do so in like circumstances. "I want you to go to Fortress Monroe," he said, "and caution General Miles against leaving Davis any possible method of suicide; tell him to put him in fetters, if necessary. Davis must be brought to trial; he must not be allowed to kill himself." Mr. Stanton also told me that he wanted a representative of the War Department down there to see what the military was doing, and to give suggestions and make criticisms and send him full reports.
“The status of Jefferson Davis at the time explains Mr. Stanton's anxiety. It should be remembered that Davis had not surrendered when the capital of the Confederacy, Richmond, was captured; neither had he surrendered with either of the two principal armies under Lee and Johnston. At that time the whole Confederate army west of the Mississippi was still at large. To allow Davis to join this force was only to give the Confederacy an opportunity to reassemble the forces still unsurrendered and make another stand for life.”
1905: May 26, 1865
Page 619: “For a time Smith's attitude seemed so threatening, that Sheridan was sent from Washington to bring him to reason. After one more skirmish, near Brazos, quite needless, Smith, too, on the 26th of May, surrendered his whole armed force to Canby, receiving the same generous terms accorded to other Confederate armies. And thus was slavery's grand levy of war against the United States brought to a conclusive end.”
1908: May 26, 1865
Full entry on last Table of Contents page (unnumbered on download): "Alphabetical Index of Campaigns, Battles, Engagements, Actions, Combats, Sieges, Skirmishes, Reconnaissances, Scouts and Other Military Events Connected with the "War of the Rebellion" During the Period of Actual Hostilities, From April 12, 1861, to May 26, 1865................595"
1911: Surrender of the armies; end of May 1865
Page 387: “The Civil War had ended in the months of April and May, 1865. April 9 the army of Virginia, under the command of Lee, had surrendered to General Grant: officers and soldiers had to promise not to take up arms against the United States so long as they were not regularly exchanged, and were then given their freedom. In April and May the other Confederate armies submitted under the same conditions. By the end of May hostilities were no longer in progress anywhere, and the soldiers of the Federal armies were disbanded and sent home. June 6 the Southern prisoners shut up in Northern posts were freed. Victory was a fact; there was neither vengeance nor cruel repression, but as soon as possible all citizens were restored to the enjoyment of their rights.
1919: May 26, 1865
Pages 201-202: “The surrender at Appomattox on April 9, 1865, compelled another migration of the dwindling executive company. General Johnston had not yet surrendered. A conference which he had with the President and the Cabinet at Greensboro ended in giving him permission to negotiate with Sherman. Even then Davis was still bent on keeping up the fight; yet, though he believed that Sherman would reject Johnston's overtures, he was overtaken at Charlotte on his way South by the crushing news of Johnston's surrender. There the executive history of the Confederacy came to an end in a final Cabinet meeting. Davis, still blindly resolute to continue the struggle, was deeply distressed by the determination of his advisers to abandon it. In imminent danger of capture, the President's party made its way to Abbeville, where it broke up, and each member sought safety as best he could. Davis with a few faithful men rode to Irwinsville, Georgia, where, in the early morning of the 10th of May, he was surprised and captured. But the history of the Confederacy was not quite [page 202] at an end. The last gunshots were still to be fired far away in Texas on the 13th of May. The surrender of the forces of the Trans-Mississippi on May 26, 1865, brought the war to a definite conclusion.”
1919: May 26, 1865
Page 42: "AMERICAN CIVIL WAR 1861–1865" Page 43: "On May 26th the war came to an end, after a desperate struggle of nearly four years."
1937: War or no war does not depend on wishes or interests of third States
Page 200: “To make the existence of war or no war depend on the wishes or interests of third States is to create a rule neither satisfying to the requirements of consistent legal principle, nor in general, I venture to think, to the need of the statesman dealing with practical problems as they arise – it is a doctrine likely to create more complications than it will assuage.”
Page 206: “What recognition does is not to operate as a grant of rights of war, but create at most a species of estoppel. The neutral State estops itself from denying that a true war exists....I have laboured the point that recognition of belligerency is the acknowledgement of an existing fact, not the conferring of a status, still less a privilege (even those who adopt the status view point out that it is given for the benefit of the recognising State's own subjects, not for that of the insurgents)."
1963: May 26, 1865
“The Commission is deeply indebted to the Editorial Advisory Board members, each of whom rendered valuable assistance toward the final draft of the narrative. James I. Robertson, Jr., Executive Director U. S. Civil War Centennial Commission” Page 31 “Lee’s surrender left Johnston with no place to go. On April 26, near Durham, N. C., the Army of Tennessee laid down its arms before Sherman’s forces. With the surrender of isolated forces in the Trans-Mississippi West on May 4, 11, and 26, the most costly war in American history came to an end.”
1965: May 26, 1865
1967: US Attorneys argued in 1869 that war ended May 26, 1865; US Supreme Court held that for legal purposes it ended with Andrew Johnson's proclamation of August 20, 1865
Page 332: United States v. Anderson was argued before the Supreme Court of the United States at its December, 1869 term. Hoar and Hale, for the government made the same points previously stressed in the Court of Claims. The attorneys argued that the claim, filed June 5, 1868, was too late; that when the courts were reopened and when armed aggression against government had ceased, there was no longer civil war. They contended that the rebellion was suppressed as a matter [page 333] of fact after Kirby Smith surrendered on May 26, 1865, and that Anderson's right to file a claim expired two years from that date. Presidential proclamations were regarded by the government attorneys as executive recognition of the fact that peace was restored; these proclamations did not in themselves create peace. They continued their argument to the effect that if an executive act was, indeed, necessary to establish the fact of suppression, then that of April 2, 1866, recognized an end to the rebellion in South Carolina and was applicable to Nelson Anderson. Because the cause of action arose in that state, the statute would run from the time the rebellion was suppressed there. They discussed other acts and proclamations relating to the war's end, arguing that they had no applicability to the Captured and Abandoned Property Act.”
Page 336: “The important issue was concerned with the date of expiration of two years after the suppression of the rebellion. The Supreme Court held that the suppression in one locality was not tantamount to suppression of the rebellion and that an interpretation which allowed one rule for one area and a different standard for another section could not be permitted.....”
“Though various other proclamations and acts of Congress had a bearing on the subject, [Justice] Davis stated that it was only necessary to notice the presidential proclamation of August 20, 1866, and the act of Congress of March 2, 1867. The August 20, 1866, proclamation related to Texas, and it in the President stated:
“This was the first official declaration that the rebellion had been suppressed everywhere; this proclamation was accepted by Congress when, on March 2, 1867, the provision was made that the act of June 20, 1864, fixing the pay of non-commisioned officers and privates through the term of the rebellion, was to remain in force for three years after the close of the rebellion as announced by the President in his proclamation. Congress thereby, said the court adopted August 20, 1866, as the day of close for this purpose. The Supreme Court reasons that Congress would certainly not intend a harsher rule for claimants, and that the point of time should be construed liberally in favor of those who adhered to the Union. The court accepted the August 20, [Page 337] 1866, date as being applicable so far as rights secured by the Captured and Abandoned Property Act was concerned.”
1971: End of May 1865, by implication in introduction to next months' entry.
1974: Many ending dates (thus Spring 1865 or total of events) Cites May 10, 1865 and said some take this to be end of the war, but notes only an uncited US Supreme Court case which does not line up with United States v. Anderson (1869)
(Foote does not cite the case. I could not find it. In United States v. Anderson, 76 U.S. 56 (1869), the Court wrote that the August 20, 1866 date marked the date of the “suppression of the rebellion” throughout the country by Johnson's proclamation and that Congress had accepted the date for “the close of the rebellion." So I don't think the statement about an uncited case can be verified. In any event, the later statement by Foote below expresses the many endings or piecemeal view of the end of the war.)
Foote noted at page 1019 that the statement was premature by three days because the Battle of Palmito Ranch was the last sizeable clash of arms in the whole war. At page 1040, Foote expressed the several endings of the war view as follow: “Appomattox was one of several endings; Durham Station, Citronelle, Galveston [presumably the June 2 signing of the May 26 surrender terms by E. Kirby Smith although not definitely distinguished from the lifting of the blockade at Galveston on June 23] were others; as were Johnson's mid-May proclamation and the ratification of the 13th Amendment, which seven months later freed the slaves not freed in the course of the four-year struggle...”
1982: Many events as recited.
1994: Most specific reference is to August 20, 1866, as noted by US Supreme Court as legal end of war.
Trudeau Pages 396-397: In the case of United States v. Anderson, 76 U.S. 56 (1869) “The U.S. attorneys argued that the Rebellion had been suppressed following the surrender of the Trans-Mississippi Department, as established in the surrender document negotiated on May 26, 1865. Anderson's lawyer, in turn, argued that the end of the war was a legislative matter, not a military one, and that Congress had previously recognized President Johnson's August 20 proclamation as the first official declaration that the Civil War had ended everywhere.
Trudeau Page 397: “The Supreme Court ruled that Nelson Anderson was entitled to recompense from the United States government for his cotton. The court's key determination was that the legal end of the American Civil War had been decided by Congress to be August 20, 1866 – the date of Andrew Johnson's final proclamation on the conclusion of the Rebellion. For legal purposes at least, the end of the Civil War was a matter of record.”
1995: Spring 1865
Page 208: “When the Civil War finally ended in the spring of 1865, the conflict had been a tragedy without parallel for the state of Tennessee.”
1997: Spring 1865
2001: Several events. Notes substance of proclamation but states that in fact armed resistance wasn't quite at an end. Goes on to state several events.
2003: May 26, 1865
Page 308: "By 26 May, General Edward Kirby Smith had surrendered the Rebel forces in the trans-Mississippi west. The war was over.
2009: May 10 order cited in events by date; implies this is the end of armed resistance, except for Palmito Ranch, but does not specifically say it is the end of the war.
In Wagner, the entry for May 29 on the same page 51 reads: “By proclamation, President Johnson grants amnesty and pardon to all persons who directly or indirectly participated in the 'existing rebellion' – with some exceptions – upon the taking of an oath declaring their allegiance to the U.S. Constitution and laws.” It further states that this is an indication Johnson will pursue a moderate Reconstruction policy.
2009: Surrender of Confederate armies starting with Appomattox surrender.
Page 251: "In early April the Army of the Potomac finally broke through rebel lines in front of Petersburg, seized Richmond, and ran Lee's army to earth at Appomattox Court House on 9 April, beginning a chain of events that led in a little more than month to the surrender of all the Confederacy's armies and an end to the war."
2010: Victories Bringing Armed Struggle to End (total of events or piecemeal); Concluding with Stand Watie surrender, June 23 Notes legal end with proclamation of August 20, 1866.
Neff Page 203: “By the spring of 1865, the combined effects of the Union naval blockade and the victories of the federal land forces finally brought the armed struggle to a conclusion....Because various aspects of the war were terminated at different times, it became difficult to say, with the precision so obsessively demanded by lawyers, exactly when the state of war actually terminated.”
Neff Page 204: Section Heading “Ending a War” In certain respects, the end of the Confederate war effort came about in an orderly fashion, with the formal surrender of the various Southern armed forces to their union foes....concluding with the submission of a force of Cherokee Indians allied to the Confederacy on June 25.” (June 23, Long. p. 695, Trudeau, p. 360)
Neff Page 207: “This array of different termination measures and policies inevitably made it difficult to say with any confidence when the war itself actually ended in legal terms....In April 2, 1866, President Johnson proclaimed “the insurrection” to be ended in all of the Confederate states except Texas. Finally, on August 20, 1866, he pronounced it to be over in that state as well.”
2015: Surrender of the Armies Also discusses other theories such as when the last State of the old Confederacy's representatives was seated in Congress.
Page 1759: “The large-scale fighting between the Confederacy and the Union during the U.S. Civil War closed with the surrenders of four Confederate armies – at Appomattox, [page 1760] Virginia; at Durham Station, North Carolina; at Galveston, Texas; and at Citronelle, Alabama. The terms were lenient: If soldiers laid down their arms and obeyed the laws of the United States, they remained safe from prosecution. Where this left the civilian population, especially the leaders of the rebellion, was unknown – as was the status of civic participation by white and black people in the South. But no one was hanged for treason against the United States.” “The leniency toward former enemies had begun without the United States taking the counsel of Europe. It was a leniency created to end the fighting, to encourage reunion, and to deny further resistance by creating martyrs or by encouraging Confederates to seek foreign partners to continue the fight, such as through an alliance with the French in Mexico.”
Page 1761: “If the war did not end with the Surrenders, then when did it end? Only recently has the question gained fresh currency. More that four decades ago, historian Avery Craven made the bold statement “The American Civil Ward did not end at Appomattox, adding “Until the Negro's place in American life was fixed, the war was not over.” But he remained a minority voice, as the sheer weight of scholarship has leaned toward portraying the surrenders of the Confederate armies as the end of the war. Although violence continued in the South – much of it aimed at either controlling elections or preserving the racial orders – historians have disagreed over whether to interpret this as a continuation of warfare. On the one hand, those who see the end of the war with surrenders in 1865 argue that the rebels did not secede again, and also that the violence involved only a tiny fraction of the South's white males. At the same time, according to the argument, the violence featured minimal interstate cooperation, belying the notion of a concerted, organized leadership. On the other hand, the violence did fulfilll the goal of conducting what one historian has called a counterrevolution that overturned Republican state governments in favor of a regime friendlier to the interests of the former Confederates. More recently, Gregory P. Downs has revived the provocative idea that we should consider the end of wartime as coming around 1870, with the admission of the last southern states under Radical Reconstruction.”25 FN25...For the argument against war continuing beyond the surrenders, see, for instance, Gary W. Gallagher, The Confederate War: How Popular Will, Nationalism, and Military Strategy Could Not Stave Off Defeat (Cambridge, Mass. 1997), 206, n.1....The literature as a whole remains tilted toward the war ending with the surrenders....”
Page 1762: “Attorney General James Speed argued for maintaining martial law – a status that continued for all of 1865 and part of 1866, until Andrew Johnson proclaimed the final restoration of peace and civil authority in the South on August 20, 1866.”
Page 1764: “After the seating of a Georgia senator in Congress in 1871 completed the process for all the former states in rebellion, not even a diehard Radical could legitimately stretch the definition of wartime anymore....Whether the war ended in the spring of 1865, or with Johnson's declaration of August 1866, or not until 1871, all of these endpoints featured no negotiated settlement and no intervention by a third party....Ultimately, what happened in the United States was homegrown.”
No end dates given:
Guelzo, Allen C. Fateful Lightning: A New History of the Civil War & Reconstruction. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012. ISBN 978-0-19-984328-2. I found no statement of an end date for the war. I saw that the book ends with a lengthy analysis of consequences of the war without noting specific dates after Guelzo had written about the April surrenders.
Murray, Williamson and Wayne Wei-Siang Hsieh, A Savage War: A Military History of the Civil War. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2016. ISBN 978-0-691169408 has an extended analysis at the “end of the war” but does not carry on the narrative of events beyond the surrender of Johnston's army.
Starr, Steven. The Union Cavalry in the Civil War 3 volumes, does not specify an end date for the war and does not carry the narratives beyond the Grand Reviews. Donner60 ( talk) 04:21, 5 July 2022 (UTC)
Revised July 29, 2022.
No mention of belligerent rights/status or the May 10, 1865 proclamation.
No mention of belligerent rights/status or the May 10, 1865 proclamation. Carefully perused; no index.
No mention of belligerent rights/status or the May 10, 1865 proclamation.
No mention of belligerent rights/status or the May 10, 1865 proclamation.
No mention of belligerent rights/status or the May 10, 1865 proclamation.
No mention of belligerent rights/status or the May 10, 1865 proclamation.
No mention of belligerent rights/status or the May 10, 1865 proclamation.
No mention of belligerent rights/status or the May 10, 1865 proclamation.
See also The Alabama Claims Arbitration [111] by Tom Bingham The International and Comparative Law Quarterly, Vol. 54, No. 1 (Jan., 2005), pp. 1-25 Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the British Institute of International and Comparative Law Donner60 ( talk) 09:20, 4 July 2022 (UTC)
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Separate item on Presidential Reconstruction apart from the timeline is show below.
I posted this thread and the one below titled "Historians on the End of the American Civil War" at Talk:American Civil War. I post it here also because I think it could be useful for additions, corrections, clarifications and citations for this article, maybe even more than for the general American Civil War article. It also should have the advantage of being accessible to anyone who wishes to see or use the information and citations for a longer period of time. Threads on the other talk page are archived 60 days following the last comment.
This list includes release dates of all Confederate cabinet members who had been imprisoned after the war according to Faust, Patricia L., ed. Historical Times Illustrated History of the Civil War. New York: Harper & Row, 1986. ISBN 978-0-06-273116-6.
Full citations to the short references in each item are at the end of the list. Some of the more well known or notable events have more than one citation; some of them and others could be supported by additional citations, which would be superfluous in this thread and perhaps in any edit to an article.
I made a few additions to the original thread so I am reposting the revised version here on July 25 and July 29, 2022.
April 2, 1865. Last meeting of the Confederate cabinet in Richmond, Virginia (Attorney General George Davis missing). The Confederate government leaves Richmond as the Union Army captures the Confederate lines at Petersburg, VA. Government records were sent away or burned. Long, pp. 663-664.
April 9, 1865. Gen. Robert E. Lee signs documents surrendering the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia to General-in-chief Ulysses S. Grant with headquarters with the Union Army of the Potomac at Appomattox Court House, VA. Long, pp. 670-671. The terms included: "The officers give their individual paroles not to take up arms against the Government of the United States until properly exchanged and each company or regimental commander to sign a parole for the men of their commands....This done each officer and man to return to their homes, not to be disturbed by United States Authority so long as they observe their paroles and the laws in force where they may reside." Winik, p. 187.
April 11, 1865. President Abraham Lincoln issues a proclamation which insists that foreign countries end neutrality and, in diplomatic language, discontinue granting belligerent rights to the Confederacy. Here is the explanation by Stephen C. Neff in Justice in Blue and Gray Page 205: "In a companion proclamation to the one on port closure ["by exercise of sovereign right, as opposed to the belligerent method of blockade"] on the same day [April 11, 1865], Lincoln made it clear that the neutrality status of foreign countries was now expected to come to an end. Concretely, Lincoln stated that various restrictions on the treatment of Union ships in foreign ports, stemming from the application of foreign neutrality legislation, were expected to be discontinued – that the recognition of the Confederacy as a belligerent power by foreign states would not be tolerated. The United States, it was announced would now claim the full range of traditional peacetime privileges in foreign ports and would retaliate if they were not granted." Neff, page 205. The proclamation can be found at Abraham Lincoln, Proclamation 128—Claiming Equality of Rights with All Maritime Nations Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [1] It is apparently necessary to understand the diplomatic language used at the time for such matters to discern Neff's interpretation. Perhaps the proclamation might seem a little dense and technical without a familiarity with the meaning of the full rights of sovereign states and of neutrality and belligerent rights at the time, as understood at the time and explained by Professor Neff.
Neff immediately goes on to write at pages 205-206: "On May 10, 1865, President Johnson followed this up with a warning to foreign countries to stop offering hospitality of any kind to Confederate cruisers, coupling this with a threat of retaliation (in the form of refusing access to American ports to government vessels of noncooperating countries.)" Another sentence with regard to the May 10 proclamation is shown at the May 10, 1865 entry below.
April 12, 1865. Formal surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia ceremony takes place at Appomattox Court House. Long, p. 674.
April 12, 1865. Union forces under Maj. Gen. E. R. S. Canby occupy Mobile, Alabama, the last major city of the Confederacy to fall to the Union Army. Long, p. 673.
April 14, 1865. Union Army Brig. Gen. Robert Anderson raises the U.S. flag over the ruined Fort Sumter at Charleston, SC, which he had surrendered exactly four years previously. Long, p. 676.
April 14, 1865. U.S. President Abraham Lincoln is fatally shot at Ford's Theater in Washington, DC about 10:00 p.m. Long, pp. 675-676.
April 15, 1865. President Lincoln dies. Vice President Andrew Johnson takes the oath of office as President of the United States. Long, p. 677.
April 21, 1865. Col. John S. Mosby disbands his Confederate partisan rangers at Millwood, Clarke County, Virginia, previously part of Fauquier County, Virginia. Long, p. 680. Mosby said "We are soldiers, not highwaymen." Shelby Foote wrote "So much then for baleful predictions as to the postsurrender activities of Virginia's leading partisan...." Foote, III, p. 1000.
April 26, 1865. Confederate Gen. Joseph E. Johnston refuses to obey President of the Confederate President Jefferson Davis's order to disband his infantry and set a future rendezvous for the men to continue the fight as partisans. Johnston further refuses to join Davis with as many cavalrymen as he could. Thomas, p. 304.
April 26, 1865. Gen. Joseph E. Johnston surrenders the Confederate Army of Tennessee at Bennett Place, Durham, North Carolina on the terms accepted by the Army of Northern Virginia after more comprehensive and generous terms negotiated by Gen. Johnston and Union Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman on April 18 were rejected in Washington, with Sherman receiving word on on April 24. Long, pp. 681-682, Foote, III, pp. 988-996.
April 26, 1865. Lincoln's assassin John Wilkes Booth is mortally wounded by Union Army soldier Boston Corbett, is captured and dies. Assassination conspirator Davy Herold surrenders at the same time and place. Long, p. 682.
April 26, 1865. Last meeting of the full Confederate cabinet with Confederate President Jefferson Davis at Charlotte, North Carolina. Attorney General George Davis left the group which still intended to get west of the Mississippi River. Long, p. 683; Foote, III, p. 1002; Walmsley, pp. 336-349.
April 27, 1865. Sultana disaster. Long, p. 683, Foote, III, p. 1027.
April 27, 1865. Confederate States Secretary of the Treasury George A. Trenholm was ill and resigned. Confederate States Postmaster General John H. Reagan assumed his duties. Long, p. 683.
April 29, 1865. President Johnson ends trade restrictions in former Confederate territory east of the Mississippi River controlled by Union forces. Long, p. 684. Andrew Johnson, Executive Order Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [2]
April-July, 1865. Confederate prisoners of war are gradually released, most in June and July, after taking the Oath of Allegiance to the United States. The last Confederate prisoners of war were released in November from Fort Lafayette, in New York Harbor. Wagner, p. 600.
May 4, 1865. Lt. Gen. Richard Taylor surrenders Confederate forces in Alabama, Mississippi and eastern Louisiana based on the Appomattox Court House terms. Long, p. 685. McPherson, p. 485.
May 4, 1865. Confederate Colonel George C. Gibbs paroles the remaining Union prisoners of war at Andersonville Prison, GA. Rodriguez, pp.50-51.
May 4/5, 1865. Last meetings of some of the Confederate cabinet members and certain generals are held with Jefferson Davis who effectively dissolves the Confederate government. Walmsley, pp. 336-349.
May 6, 1865. With the consent of Secretory of War Edwin Stanton and Lt. General Ulysses S. Grant, Major General Henry Halleck issues an order that "From and after the 20th instant all persons found in arms against the authority of the United States in the State of Virginia and North Carolina, will be treated as robbers and outlaws." [3]
May 8, 1865. Paroles are given to Lt. Gen. Richard Taylor's Confederate forces at Citronelle, Alabama. Long, p. 686; Foote, III, p. 1000. Richard Taylor is paroled at Meridian, MS, May 11, 1865. Eicher, John H., p. 523.
May 9, 1865. Confederate Lt. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest bids farewell to his troops. He urges them to surrender and obey Federal authority. Henry, p. 438, Foote, III, pp. 1001-1002. He was paroled at Gainesville, AL on May 10, 1865. Eicher, John H., p. 240.
May 9, 1865. President Johnson declares terms to reestablish the authority of the United States and execute the laws within Virginia, orders actions by named executive department officers; recognizes Francis H. Pierpont as Governor of Virginia. Long, p. 686. Andrew Johnson, Executive Order—To Reestablish the Authority of the United States and Execute the Laws Within the Geographical Limits Known as the State of Virginia Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [4]
May 10, 1865. Confederate President Jefferson Davis is captured by two Union Army cavalry regiments, 4th Michigan and 1st Wisconsin, at Irwinville, Georgia. Long, p. 687; Foote, III, pp. 1009-1011; Thomas, p. 305; McPherson, p. 485.
May 10, 1865. Small Confederate forces in Florida, Georgia and northern Arkansas surrender. Long, p. 687.
May 10, 1865. U.S. President Andrew Johnson issues a proclamation with the premises that "armed resistance to the authority of this Government in the said insurrectionary States may be regarded as virtually at an end" and "persons by whom that resistance, as well as the operations of insurgent cruisers, was directed are fugitives or captives." He orders US forces to "arrest the said [insurgent] cruisers and to bring them into a port of the United States, in order that they may be prevented from committing further depredations on commerce and that the persons on board of them may no longer enjoy impunity for their crimes." Long, p. 687. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 132—Ordering the Arrest of Insurgent Cruisers Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [5] Official Records, Series 3, Volume 5, p. 18. The British government officially withdraws belligerent rights from the Confederacy on June 2, 1865. Long, p. 692.
Stephen C. Neff in Justice Blue and Gray states at page 206: "This proclamation of May 10 - the very day of the capture of Jefferson Davis - also included an explicit statement that armed resistance was now 'virtually at an end' and persons in revolt were now reduced to the humble status of 'mere fugitives or captives.'" Note that the actual language is not "persons in revolt" but "persons by whom that resistance, as well as the operations of insurgent cruisers, was directed..." Neff wrote nothing about this applying to a larger group of soldiers or others or that it criminalized any acts by a larger group. Though he notes the "virtual" end of "armed resistance", he does not indicate this is the end date for the war. In fact, just before this on page 205 he states, among other things: "In practice, the war was brought to an end on a piecemeal basis, by way of a welter of specific measures by the Union government." Neff, p. 206.
May 10, 1865. Confederate Maj. Gen. Samuel Jones surrenders his forces at Tallahassee, FL. Long, p. 687.
May 10, 1865. Confederate guerrilla leader William Clarke Quantrill is fatally wounded in an action with an irregular Union force ( the Shelby County Home Guard) near Taylorsville, Kentucky. Quantrill dies June 6 in Louisville. Long p. 687.
May 11, 1865. Confederate Brig. Gen. M. Jeff Thompson surrenders his brigade at Chalk Bluff, AR. Long, p. 687.
May 11, 1865. "General Orders No. 90 } War Department, Adjt. General's Office, Washington, May 11, 1865. Punishment of Guerrillas. "All the forces of the enemy east of the Mississippi River having been duly surrendered by their proper commanding officers to the Armies of the United States, under agreements of parole and disbandment, and there being no authorized troops of the enemy east of the Mississippi River, it is -- "Ordered', That from and after the first day of June, 1865, any and all persons found in arms against the United States, or who may commit acts of hostility against it east of the Mississippi River, will be regarded as guerrillas and punished with death. The strict enforcement of this order is especially enjoined upon the commanding officers of all U.S. forces with the territorial limits to which it applies. "By command of Lieutenant-General Grant: "E. D. TOWNSEND, "Assistant Adjutant General" The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. Series 1, Volume 46, Part 3, Page 1134. [6]. Accessed June 8, 2022, University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, [7]. Accessed June 8, 2022, University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, [8]..
May 12-13, 1865. Union Army Col. Theodore H. Barrett is defeated at the 2-day Battle of Palmito Ranch, Texas, the last land battle of any significant size in the war. Long, p. 688. Wagner, 328, 330. Eicher, David J., p. 843. Hunt, Jeffrey Wm. The Last Battle of the Civil War: Palmetto Ranch. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 2002. ISBN 978-0-292-73461-6. Dyer calls the second day as the Battle of White Hill. Dyer, p. 891 spells the word "Palmetto," as does Hunt, and adds "Battle of White's Ranch" as occuring on May 13 by the same Union force engaged at Palmetto Ranch, May 12-13.
May 13, 1865. Confederate governors of Arkansas, Louisiana and Missouri and a representative from Texas urge Gen. E. Kirby Smith to surrender. Brig. Gen. Joseph O. Shelby threatens to arrest him if he does. Long, p. 688.
May 14-27, 1865. Dyer lists seven skirmishes in Missouri between May 14 and May 27, 1865. He lists no casualties. Only one Union Army unit that was not a Missouri militia unit, a detachment of the 13th U.S. Cavalry, engaged in any of these skirmishes, the one near Waynesville on May 23. The skirmish at Switzler's Mill in Chariton County on May 27 is the last one listed by Dyer, p. 815, and the last one listed by Long at p. 690 other than his statement that there were operations in Texas against guerrillas for most of 1865. p. 691.
May 17, 1865. Maj. Gen. Philip H. Sheridan is given command of US forces west of the Mississippi River and south of the Arkansas River. Long, p. 688. Lt. Gen. Grant orders Sheridan to take 50,000 men to pacify Texas and parts of Louisiana still controlled by Confederate general Edmund Kirby Smith and to offer surrender on the same terms granted to Lee and Johnston. Grant's further desired actions against the French puppet ruler of Mexico, Maximilian, for aiding the rebellion were told to Sheridan verbally. Direct actions against Maximilian were restrained by Secretary of State William Seward who favored a more cautious approach. Chernow, pp. 554-557; Foote, III, pp. 1018-1019..
May 17, 1865. The last Confederate prison for Union prisoners of war at Camp Ford, Texas, is evacuated. Wagner, p. 600.
May 19, 1865. Confederate commerce raider CSS Stonewall surrenders at Havana, Cuba. Long, p. 689.
May 19, 1865. An order to Captain Henry Shook at McMinnville, Tennessee by Maj. Gen. Lovell Rousseau at Tullahoma, Tennessee (signed by Jno. O Cravens, Assistant Adjutant General) directed Shook to accept the surrender of "a number of bushwackers...[and] All other bands may be receivedin the same way." One exception was made: "Champ Ferguson and his band have been declared outlaws by Major-General Rousseau. The major-general commanding therefore directs that you do not accept the surrender of Ferguson or any number of his band and that you treat them as outlaws." The War of the Rebellion: Official Records, Series 1, Volume 49, Part 2, page 843 [9].
May 19, 1865. Brig. Gen. Henry Hobson, Lexington, KY, orders Major Bridgewater at Stanford, KY to capture and kill a gang of guerrillas operating near Somerset, KY. The War of the Rebellion: Official Records, Series 1, Volume 49, Part 2, page 843 [10].
May 20, 1865. Former Confederate Secretary of the Navy Stephen R. Mallory was arrested and charged with "treason and with organizing and setting on foot piratical expeditions." He was paroled with conditions on March 10, 1866. Denney, p. 570.
May 22, 1865. President Johnson ends restrictions at Southern ports except Galveston, La Salle, Brazos Santiago (Point Isabel) and Brownsville, TX on and after July 1, 1865. Long, p. 689. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 133—Raising the Blockade of Certain Ports Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [11]
May 22, 1865. Jefferson Davis is imprisoned at Fort Monroe, VA. Foote, III, p. 1013.
May 23, 1865. Grand Review of the Army of the Potomac in Washington, DC. Long, p. 689.
May 23, 1865. The pro-Union government of Virginia was established in Richmond, Long, p. 689.
May 24, 1865. Grand Review of Sherman's Army, the Military Division of the Mississippi. ( Army of the Tennessee and Army of Georgia) in Washington, DC. Long, p. 689.
May 26, 1865. Confederate Lt. Gen. Simon B. Buckner on behalf of Gen. Edmund Kirby Smith enters terms of surrender for the Confederate Army of the Trans-Mississippi similar to those signed at Appomattox Court House by Gen. Robert E. Lee. Union Maj. Gen. Peter J. Osterhaus acted for Maj. Gen. E. R. S. Canby. The Army of the Trans-Mississippi was the last army of the Confederacy of significant size to remain in the field. Long, p. 690. Catton, Bruce in The Centennial History of the Civil War. Vol. 3, Never Call Retreat. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1965 wrote at p. 445. "...and on May 26 he [E. Kirby Smith] surrendered and the war was over." In the case of United States v. Anderson, 76 U.S. 56 (1869) "The U.S. attorneys argued that the Rebellion had been suppressed following the surrender of the Trans-Mississippi Department, as established in the surrender document negotiated on May 26, 1865." Trudeau, p. 396. The Supreme Court decided that the "legal end of the American Civil War had been decided by Congress to be August 20, 1866 - the date of Andrew Johnson's final proclamation on the conclusion of the Rebellion." Trudeau, 397.
May 27, 1865. President Johnson orders "in all cases of sentences by military tribunals of imprisonment during the war the sentence be remitted and that the prisoners be discharged." Long, p. 690; Denney, p. 572, Foote, III, p. 1031. Andrew Johnson, Executive Order Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [12]
May 29, 1865. President Johnson issues a proclamation granting a general amnesty and pardon to "all persons who have, directly or indirectly, participated in the existing rebellion, except as hereinafter excepted,..." There are 14 limited categories of exceptions. The proclamation continues "Provided, That special application may be made to the President for pardon by any person belonging to the excepted classes, and such clemency will be liberally extended as may be consistent with the facts of the case and the peace and dignity of the United States." Long, pp. 691-692; Denney, p. 572. Eicher, David J., p. 844. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 134—Granting Amnesty to Participants in the Rebellion, with Certain Exceptions Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [13]
"Altogether he [Johnson] granted 13,500 special pardons out of about 15,000 applications." McPherson, p. 505.
May 29, 1865. President Johnson proclaims terms for reorganizing a constitutional government in North Carolina; William W. Holden appointed governor. Long, 691. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 135—Reorganizing a Constitutional Government in North Carolina Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [14]
May 29, 1865-end of 1865. "There were operations in Texas and on the Rio Grande by the Federal Army for most of the rest of 1865 against guerrillas and former Confederates escaping to Mexico." Long, p. 691.
May 29, 1865: The New York Times page 1 headline declares: "END OF THE REBELLION.; THE LAST REBEL ARMY DISBANDS. Kirby Smith Surrenders the Land and Naval Forces Under His Command. The Confederate Flag Disappears from the Continent. THE ERA OF PEACE BEGINS. Military Prisoners During the War to be Discharged. Deserters to be Released from Confinement. [OFFICIAL.] FROM SECRETARY STANTON TO GEN. DIX. [15] The New York Times; May 29, 1865. Page 1. WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, May 27, 1865...."
May 31, 1865. Confederate Lt. Gen. John B. Hood was paroled one day after he was captured. Foote, III, p. 1021.
June 1, 1865. On or just before this date: "General Order No. 90 of the War Department stated unequivocally that 'from and after the first date of June, 1865, any and all persons found in arms against the United States, or who may commits acts of hostility against it east of the Mississippi River, will be regarded as guerrillas and punished with death.'" Trudeau, p. 353.
June 2, 1865. Gen. E. Kirby Smith approves and signs the terms of surrender in the agreement of May 26 for the Army of the Trans-Mississippi aboard the steamer USS Fort Jackson (1862) in Galveston harbor. Foote, III, p. 1021; Long, p. 692.
June 2, 1865. Order for the Trans-Mississippi with similar terms for treating soldiers engaging in continued hostility in the Trans-Mississippi after reasonable time for notice of the surrender of the Trans-Mississippi by Gen. Kirby Smith as in Lt. Gen. Grant's General Orders No. 90 of May 11, 1865 prescribing continued hostility east of the Mississippi after June 1, 1865 to be guerrilla, or outlaw, actions: "General Orders No. 24 } Headquarters Third Div., 7th Army Corps. Fort Smith, Ark. June 2, 1865 "I…............. "II. The Trans-Mississippi (rebel) Department having surrendered to General Canby on the 26th of May, reqires that all soldiers in arms against the United States immediately report to the nearest military post, when they will be paroled on delivering their arms to the U. S. authorities. All such persons who remain in arms engaged in acts of hostility to the United States after a reasonable time to be informed of their surrender, will be regarded as guerrillas and outlaws, and when arrested will be shot. "By Order of Brig. Gen. Cyrus Bussey: "L. A. Duncan, Acting Assistant Adjutant-General" The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. Series 1, Volume 48, Part 2, Page 530. [16] Hathi Trust Digital Library, accessed June 12, 2022.
June 2, 1865. The British government officially withdraws belligerent rights from the Confederacy. Long, p. 692. There are a few exceptions and conditions, including holding any U.S. warship in the ports, harbors or waters of the U.K. or possessions to allow a Confederate ship already there to leave; allowing Confederate ships to divest their armaments and change flags but without U.K. protection and 24 hours rule. Army and Navy Journal, June 24, 1865 Page 695 Volume II Number 44 [17]
June 2, 1865. President Johnson orders "all military restrictions upon trade in any of the States or Territories of the United States, except in articles contraband of war--[as defined in the order] shall cease from and after the present date." Andrew Johnson, Executive Order—General Orders: 107 Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [18]
June 3, 1865. Confederate naval forces on the Red River surrender. Long, p. 692, Foote, III, p. 1027.
June 6, 1865. President Johnson issues orders of discharge of prisoners of war for all enlisted men, petty officers and officers of the rebel army not above the grade of captain and of the rebel navy not above the grade of lieutenant unless graduates of a US military academy, upon taking an oath of allegiance. Orders for discharge of higher officers who are prisoners are to be issued when the discharge under this order is completed. All "who desire will be permitted to take the oath of amnesty after their release." Andrew Johnson, Executive Order—General Orders: 109 Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [19]
June 12, 1865. Brevet Brig. Gen. William Gamble is ordered by Brig. General. John P. Slough to "send a squadron of the Eighth Regiment Illinois Cavalry to scout the country in the vicinity of Aldie [Virginia] to break up bands of marauders and guerrillas, and to ascertain the names of, and arrest, if possible, the persons concerned in the recent murders of Union people." The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. Series 1, Volume 46, Part 3, Page 1275. [20]. Accessed June 8, 2022, University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, [21].
June 13, 1865. President Johnson declares trade open in all territory east of the Mississippi River except for contraband of war. Long, p. 693. The order specified an effective date "on and after the 1st day of July next, subject to the laws of the United States, and in pursuance of such regulations as might be prescribed by the Secretary of the Treasury." Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 137—Removing Trade Restrictions on Confederate States Lying East of the Mississippi River Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [22]
June 13, 1865. President Johnson declares that Tennessee reorganized its government, suppressed the rebellion and he restored the State and lifted almost all disqualifications from its inhabitants. This is included in proclamation 137 noted in the previous item for June 13, 1865, [23]. More in Presidential Reconstruction entry at end of this timeline.
June 16, 1865. Lt. Gen. Grant vigorously objects to President Johnson that indictments brought against Gen. Robert E. Lee and other Confederate officers in Norfolk, VA violated the terms of the surrender and paroles of the men of the Army of Northern Virginia and other Confederate armies. He threatens to resign as General in Chief if the indictments are not dismissed. Chernow, pp. 552-553. General Grant replies to Gen. Robert E. Lee that he believes that the men who surrendered at Appomattox Court House can not be tried for treason as long as they observes the terms of their parole and he asked that Judge Underwood at Nofolk be ordred to quash all indictments found against paroled prisoners of war, and to desist from further prosecution of them. The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. Series 1, Volume 46, Part 3, Page 1276. [24]
June 19, 1865. Two days after taking command of the District of Texas at Galveston, Union Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger announces to the people of Texas that in line with a proclamation by the "Executive of the United States, all slaves are free." Conner, p. 177.
June 19, 1965. U.S. Secretary of State William H. Seward sends a message to the British ambassador objecting to reservations and statements in the June 2 British statement. He also wrote "It is hardly necessary to say that the United States do not admit what they have heretofore constantly controverted, that the original concession of belligerent privileges to the Rebels by Great Britain was either necessary or just, or sanctioned by the law of nations." *Army and Navy Journal, July 22, 1865 Page 763 Volume II Number 48 [25]
June 20, 1865. At President Johnson's order, U.S. Attorney General James Speed orders the U.S. Attorney at Norfolk, VA to drop the prosecutions of Gen. Lee and other officers. Chernow, p. 553. While the prosecution of Gen. Lee was not pursued, the indictment was not formally dropped until 1869 according to Noah Andre Trudeau. Trudeau, 358.
June 23, 1865. President Johnson ends the blockade of Southern ports. Long, p. 693. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 141—Raising the Blockade of All Ports in the United States Including Galveston, Texas Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [26]
June 23, 1865. Brig. Gen. Stand Watie surrenders his Native American (Indian) division near Fort Towson in Indian Territory, the last surrender of any sizable force of Confederate troops by a Confederate general officer. Long, p. 693.
June 24, 1865. President Johnson removes commercial restrictions from States and territories west of the Mississippi River. Long, p. 695. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 142—Removing Restrictions on Trade West of the Mississippi River Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [27]
June 28, 1865. The military operations of the Confederate commerce raider CSS Shenandoah end with the taking of 11 whaling ships in the Bering Sea. Long, p. 694. Wagner, p. 537. The Shenandoah is not surrendered to the British until November 6, 1865 in Liverpool, England. Long, p. 695.
June 28, 1865. At the order of Lt. Gen. Grant, the Army of the Potomac is demobilized; officers and soldiers not yet mustered out are reorganized into a provisional corps under Maj. Gen. Horatio Wright. The process was put into effect by GENERAL ORDERS, HDQRS. ARMY OF THE POTOMAC, No. 35. June 28, 1865. "By virtue of Special Orders, No. 339, current series, from the Adjutant-General's Office, this army, as an organization, ceases to exist....etc." By command of Major-General Meade: GEO. D. RUGGLES, Assistant Adjutant-General. Official Records of War of the Rebellion: Serial 097 Pages 1301-3. Chapter LVIII. [28]. ehistory, The Ohio State University, accessed June 8, 2022. Official Records, Series 1, Volume 46, Part 3, pp. 1301-1303. [29], accessed June 8, 2022, University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, [30].
August 29, 1865. President Johnson declares that contraband of war could be traded with States "recently declared in insurrection", Long, 695. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 145—Removing Trade Restrictions on Contraband of War Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [31]
September 14/21, 1865. Various Native American (Indian) tribes renounce Confederate agreements and sign treaties of peace and friendship with the United States. Long, p. 695.
October 11, 1865. Alexander H. Stephens, John H. Reagan, George A. Trenholm, Charles Clark and John Archibald Campbell were paroled by President Johnson. Long, p. 695. Andrew Johnson, Executive Order Paroling Alexander H. Stephens and Others Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [32]
October 12, 1865. President Johnson declares the end of martial law in Kentucky. Long, p. 695. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 146—Declaring an End to Martial Law in the State of Kentucky Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [33]
October 30, 1865. U.S. Secretary of State William Seward informs U.S. Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles of Britain's Earl Russell's message of October 18 relieving U.S. vessels of all the objectionable restraints in Russell's June 2, 1865 message. Army and Navy Journal, November 4, 1865, p. 172 [34]
November 6, 1865. Confederate Navy Lt. James Iredell Waddell surrenders the CSS Shenandoah to the British government in Liverpool, England. Long, p. 695.
December 1865. Former Confederate Secretary of War James A. Seddon is released from prison. Current, Macmillan Compendium, p. 942.
January 1, 1866. Former Confederate Attorney General George A. Davis is released from prison. He had not been arrested until November 1865 and spent only a few weeks in prison. Davis, pp. 381-385
January 1866. Former Confederate Secretary of State and Senator Robert M.T. Hunter is paroled. Current, Macmillan Compendium, p. 550.
March 10, 1866. Former Confederate Secretary of the Navy Stephen R. Mallory is paroled. Current, Macmillan Compendium, p. 668.
April 2, 1866. President Johnson declares the insurrection over (except in Texas). Long, p. 696. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 153—Declaring the Insurrection in Certain Southern States to be at an End Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [35]
August 20, 1866. President Johnson issues a proclamation announcing the end of the American Civil War in all States including Texas. Long, pp. 696-697. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 157—Declaring that Peace, Order, Tranquillity, and Civil Authority Now Exists in and Throughout the Whole of the United States of America Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [36]
May 13, 1867. Jefferson Davis is released on bail. Davis, p. 386; Foote, III, pp. 1038-1039.
September 7, 1867. President Johnson extends the amnesty of 1865 in a proclamation in which he declares that he did: "hereby proclaim and declare that the full pardon described in the said proclamation of the 29th day of May, A. D. 1865, shall henceforth be opened and extended to all persons who, directly or indirectly, participated in the late rebellion, with the restoration of all privileges, immunities, and rights of property, except as to property with regard to slaves, and except in cases of legal proceedings under the laws of the United States; but upon this condition, nevertheless, that every such person who shall seek to avail himself of this proclamation shall take and subscribe the following oath and shall cause the same to be registered for permanent preservation in the same manner and with the same effect as with the oath prescribed in the said proclamation of the 29th day of May, 1865..."
There were fewer limited exceptions than in the May 29, 1865 proclamation. The categories in the September 7, 1867 proclamation were high ranking Confederate executive officers and generals above the grade of brigadier or naval officers above rank or title of captain, Confederate agents in foreign countries, Confederate governors of States, persons who mistreated lawful prisoners of war, persons who were in confinement or custody of in the civil, military or naval service of the United States when they seek to obtain the benefits of the proclamation, or are out on bail, and any person who engaged in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln or any plot or conspiracy connected with it. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 167—Offering and Extending Full Pardon to All Persons Participating in the Late Rebellion Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [37]
"Probably only some three hundred persons fell into these excluded groups. Moreover, this proclamation, like its predecessor, was supplemented by the continued granting of individual pardons. Eventually, nearly all of the civilian leaders of the Confederacy received pardons with two notable exceptions: Jefferson Davis and Secretary of War John Breckenridge (who was living abroad at the time), both of whom obstinately refused to request individual pardons." Neff, p. 225.
July 4, 1868. President Andrew Johnson issued a proclamation in which he stated that he did "hereby proclaim and declare, unconditionally and without reservation, to all and to every person who, directly or indirectly, participated in the late insurrection or rebellion, excepting such person or persons as may be under presentment or indictment in any court of the United States having competent jurisdiction upon a charge of treason or other felony, a full pardon and amnesty for the offense of treason against the United States or of adhering to their enemies during the late civil war, with restoration of all rights of property, except as to slaves, and except also as to any property of which any person may have been legally divested under the laws of the United States." Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 170—Granting Pardon to All Persons Participating in the Late Rebellion Except Those Under Indictment for Treason or Other Felony Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [38]
There was "no requirement of a loyalty oath of any kind and only one excluded category – persons presently facing treason or other felony charges such as Jefferson Davis." Neff, p. 225.
December 5, 1868. The Chief Justice of the United States Salmon P. Chase, sitting as circuit justice, could not agree with trial judge John C. Underwood on whether the 14th Amendment precluded the prosecution of Jefferson Davis and the case should be dismissed on the basis that the amendment already inflicted punishment on Davis by depriving him of the right to hold office. They sent a " certificate of division" to the U.S. Supreme Court for decision and adjourned the trial to await action by the Court. Hagen, p. 224; Nichols, p. 284. William C. Davis states that Chase quashed the indictment. As the other cited sources show, Chase merely, and improperly, told Jefferson Davis's attorneys that he accepted their arguments as a basis to do so, virtually assuring them of a favorable hearing in the U.S. Supreme Court.
December 25, 1868. President Johnson issued a universal amnesty proclamation in which he declares that he did: "hereby proclaim and declare unconditionally and without reservation, to all and to every person who, directly or indirectly, participated in the late insurrection or rebellion a full pardon and amnesty for the offense of treason against the United States or of adhering to their enemies during the late civil war, with restoration of all rights, privileges, and immunities under the Constitution and the laws which have been made in pursuance thereof." Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 179—Granting Full Pardon and Amnesty for the Offense of Treason Against the United States During the Late Civil War Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [39]
"This finally put a stop (as noted above) to the Davis treason trial. Practically the only persons outside the circle of mercy were the convicted Lincoln murderers – and even three of them were given individual pardons, in Johnson's final days in office in March 1869, for services performed for their fellow inmates and jailors during an outbreak of disease in their prison." Neff, p. 225.
February 11, 1869. The U.S. Government enters a nolle prosequi in the case of United States v. Jefferson Davis. (" Nolle prosequi ... is legal Latin meaning 'to be unwilling to pursue'. In Commonwealth and US common law, it is used for prosecutors' declarations that they are voluntarily ending a criminal case before trial or before a verdict is rendered.") Hagen, p. 225; Nichols, p. 284. Icenhauer-Ramirez, p. 318.
United States v. Anderson, 76 U.S. 56 (1869) The syllabus of the decision accurately summarizes on page 56 the court's holding as follows: "As respects rights intended to be secured by the above-mentioned Abandoned or Captured Property Act, "the suppression of the rebellion" is to be regarded as having taken place on the 20th of August, 1866, on which day the President by proclamation declared it suppressed in Texas "and throughout the whole of the United States of America," that same date being apparently adopted by Congress in a statute continuing a certain rate of pay to soldiers in the army "for three years after the close of the rebellion, as announced by the President of the United States by proclamation bearing date August 20, 1866." [40]
Per Noah Andre Trudeau, pages 396-397 about the Anderson case: "The U.S. attorneys argued that the Rebellion had been suppressed following the surrender of the Trans-Mississippi Department, as established in the surrender document negotiated on May 26, 1865. Anderson's lawyer, in turn, argued that the end of the war was a legislative matter, not a military one, and that Congress had previously recognized President Johnson's August 20 proclamation as the first official declaration that the Civil War had ended everywhere. The Supreme Court ruled that Nelson Anderson was entitled to recompense from the United States government for his cotton. The court's key determination was that the legal end of the American Civil War had been decided by Congress to be August 20, 1866 - the date of Andrew Johnson's final proclamation on the conclusion of the Rebellion. For legal purposes at least, the end of the Civil War was a matter of record." Trudeau, pp. 396-397.
Presidential Reconstruction:
In addition to the proclamations with terms for reorganizing the government of Virginia (May 9 above) and North Carolina, (May 29 above), on June 13, 1865. President Johnson declares that Tennessee had reorganized its government, suppressed the rebellion and he restored the State and lifted disqualifications from its inhabitants as part of Proclamation 137. "And I hereby also proclaim and declare that the insurrection, so far as it relates to and within the State of Tennessee and the inhabitants of the said State of Tennessee as reorganized and constituted under their recently adopted constitution and reorganization and accepted by them, is suppressed, and therefore, also, that all the disabilities and disqualifications attaching to said State and the inhabitants thereof consequent upon any proclamation issued by virtue of the fifth section of the act entitled "An act further to provide for the collection of duties on imports and for other purposes," approved the 13th day of July, 1861, are removed." However this did not include "any of the penalties and forfeitures for treason heretofore incurred under the laws of the United States or any of the provisions, restrictions, or disabilities set forth in my proclamation bearing date the 29th day of May, 1865, or as impairing existing regulations for the suspension of the habeas corpus and the exercise of military law in cases where it shall be necessary for the general public safety and welfare during the existing insurrection ." Long p. 693. Andrew Johnson, Proclamation 137—Removing Trade Restrictions on Confederate States Lying East of the Mississippi River Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. [41]
In addition, between June 13, 1865 and July 13, 1865, President Johnson proclaimed terms for reorganizing constitutional governments in other Confederate states and appointed provisional governors in the following proclamations: June 13, 1865: Mississippi, Long, p. 693 [42]; June 17, 1865: Georgia, Long p. 693 [43]; June 17, 1865: Texas, Long p. 693 [44]; June 21, 1865: Alabama, Long, p. 693 [45]; June 30, 1865: South Carolina, p. 694; [46]; July 13, 1865: Florida, Long 694; [47].
In a special message to the U.S. Senate on December 18, 1865, President Johnson advised: "As the result of the measures instituted by the Executive with the view of inducing a resumption of the functions of the States comprehended in the inquiry of the Senate, the people of North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Tennessee have reorganized their respective State governments, and "are yielding obedience to the laws and Government of the United States....The proposed amendment to the Constitution, providing for the abolition of slavery forever within the limits of the country, has been ratified by each one of those States, with the exception of Mississippi..... In Florida and Texas the people are making commendable progress in restoring their State governments...." [48].
References
Footnote: Stephen A. Neff is a professor of law and the University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh School of Law in Scotland. A page of the university web site notes: "Stephen Neff's primary research interest is the history of public international law. He is the author of a book on the historical development of international economic law. His current focus is the history of the law of neutrality...." [64] Retrieved June 7, 2022. Donner60 ( talk) 09:40, 25 July 2022 (UTC)
Works of historians searched for this post often end with an event or several events at the end of the war without specifying one of them as "the" end date. I have noted a few of these in summary for noted historians. I do not have access to every possible source for these viewpoints, of course. So I cannot claim this post is all-inclusive or that I did not miss something. I found few references to the May 9 (actually May 10) order at all, much less any that declared it an end date or criminalized future actions; General Grant's May 11, 1865 order, not generally noted in the histories, does appear to do so, thus I include it at the end with others. I do think is representative of how historians treat the end of the war.
If any editors have any further relevant quotations, I invite them to add them to this list.
Original texts of June 14, 2022, July 5, 2022 and July 25, 2022 are now replaced with this revised and expanded text.
I thought my original compilation would be complete but I found some additional sources, including from the Civil War period, which I think add some value to how the end date of the war has been seen over the years.
I am putting the key comment about the majority view of historians on the end of the American Civil War from the relatively recent article Finding the Ending of the American Civil War first. I will put additional comments from that article in the chronological order of the references below. I have reorganized the list from the oldest item to the most current, rather than by author's last name. Readers will recognize many historians of note regardless of where they are listed.
I originally prepared this to support a change in the infobox and first line of the article. Whether this results or not is still in question but is heading toward a resolution on July 25, 2022. Regardless of the outcome, this material may be of interest and of use in further research or for inclusion in this or another article, such as Conclusion of the American Civil War.
Finding the Ending of America's Civil War by William A. Blair (Professor at Penn State University) The American Historical Review Published by: Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Historical Association Vol. 120, No. 5 (December 2015) [65] "More that four decades ago, historian Avery Craven made the bold statement "The American Civil War did not end at Appomattox", adding "Until the Negro's place in American life was fixed, the war was not over." But he remained a minority voice, as the sheer weight of scholarship has leaned toward portraying the surrenders of the Confederate armies as the end of the war. "Footnote 25: ...For the argument against war continuing beyond the surrenders, see, for instance, Gary W. Gallagher, The Confederate War: How Popular Will, Nationalism, and Military Strategy Could Not Stave Off Defeat (Cambridge, Mass. 1997), 206, "n.1....The literature as a whole remains tilted toward the war ending with the surrenders...."
1865: Predicated on the surrender of the armies
“All the forces of the enemy east of the Mississippi River having been duly surrendered by their proper commanding officers to the Armies of the United States, under agreements of parole and disbandment, and there being no authorized troops of the enemy east of the Mississippi River, it is - “Ordered', That from and after the first day of June, 1865, any and all persons found in arms against the United States, or who may commit acts of hostility against it east of the Mississippi River, will be regarded as guerrillas and punished with death. The strict enforcement of this order is especially enjoined upon the commanding officers of all U.S. forces with the territorial limits to which it applies. “By command of Lieutenant-General Grant: “E. D. TOWNSEND, “Assistant Adjutant General”
1865: May 26: Kirby Smith's Surrender
"May 29 [1865]....Peace. Peace herself, at last, for [Kirby] Smith and [John] Magruder have surrendered, if General [Edward] Canby's dispatch to the War Department be truthful. So here I hope and believe ends, by God's great and undeserved mercy, this chapter [page 314] of this journal I opened with the heading War on the night of April 13, 1861. We have lived a century of common life since then. Only within the last two months have I dared to hope that this fearful struggle would be settled so soon."
1865: May 26, 1865, Kirby Smith's Surrender: The New York Times:
"END OF THE REBELLION.; THE LAST REBEL ARMY DISBANDS. Kirby Smith Surrenders the Land and Naval Forces Under His Command. The Confederate Flag Disappears from the Continent. THE ERA OF PEACE BEGINS. Military Prisoners During the War to be Discharged. Deserters to be Released from Confinement. [OFFICIAL.] FROM SECRETARY STANTON TO GEN. DIX. [67] The New York Times; May 29, 1865. Page 1. "WAR DEPARTMENT, WASHINGTON, May 27, 1865.... "Maj.-Gen. Dix: "A dispatch from Gen. CANBY, dated at New-Orleans, yesterday, the 26th inst., states that arrangements for the surrender of the Confederate forces in the Trans-Mississippi Department have been concluded. They include the men and material of the army and navy. EDWIN M. STANTON, "Secretary of War."
1865: Trans-Mississippi surrender order
General Orders No. 24 } Headquarters Third Div., 7th Army Corps. Fort Smith, Ark. June 2, 1865 …............. The Trans-Mississippi (rebel) Department having surrendered to General Canby on the 26th of May, requires that all soldiers in arms against the United States immediately report to the nearest military post, when they will be paroled on delivering their arms to the U. S. authorities. All such persons who remain in arms engaged in acts of hostility to the United States after a reasonable time to be informed of their surrender, will be regarded as guerrillas and outlaws, and when arrested will be shot. By Order of Brig. Gen. Cyrus Bussey: L. A. Duncan, Acting Assistant Adjutant-General
1865: May 26, 1865
Page 1426: “On the 19th of April, an officer of the rebel General Dick Taylor's staff, arrived at General Canby's headquarters, with a flag of truce, to make a surrender of his army. For some cause, the negotiations were protracted until the 4th of May, when the surrender took place at Citronelle, Ala. The terms accorded were in substance those granted to General Lee, by General Grant. The number of troops surrendered by this capitulation, somewhat exceeded twenty thousand. This surrender was followed by that of Forrest, Jeff. Thompson, Morgan and all the other commanders of rebel bands east of the Mississippi. The rebel General E. Kirby Smith, commanding in the Trans-Mississippi region, had nominally a large army, and at first was defiant, proclaiming his intention of maintaining his position of hostility. General Sheridan was ordered thither with a large cavalry force; but the rebel [page 1427] General, on finding that all the rebel armies east of the Mississippi, had surrendered, that Davis was a prisoner, and that his own troops were deserting and abandoning the conflict by thousands, reconsidered his decision, and made propositions for surrender, which was finally consummated on the 26th of May, at New Orleans, General Buckner representing Smith on the occasion, while that worthy made his escape into Mexico, with a large sum of money, the fruit of his cotton speculations. The army thus surrendered, had been greatly reduced in numbers by the abandonment of the service of which we have already spoken, and the number paroled was not large.
“With this surrender, the war, so far as the territory of the United States was concerned, ceased. The greater part of the Union army was disbanded, only about one hundred thousand men being retained in the service, and army corps being reduced to divisions, divisions to brigades, and brigades to regiments. The blockade was raised, the revocation of the rights they had accorded to belligerents demanded from foreign powers, and the remaining rebel war vessels on the high seas declared pirates. Military and provisional governors were appointed in the States which had been in revolt.”
1865: Total of Events
U.S. Army and Navy Journal, Volume 3, New York, August 26, 1865. [69] Page 8.
“Practically the war is over – for the purposes of business, of campaigning, of ordinary life. Constructively, and for the purposes of settling certain relations which it disturbed, the war is not over. Some such distinction is necessary for comprehending, supporting and legalizing the present action of the Government; and it is founded in reason." [Trials by military commission; government of insurgent states by military authority.]
"At the very outset, the greatest difficulty is encountered in determining the precise close of an unsuccessful insurrection, whether it be a petty affair of a SHAY, or a DORR, or a CALHOUN, in a single State, or the gigantic scheme of a DAVIS in a dozen States. We believe no day can be named, nor any month even, in which the present Rebellion ended. Was it when LEE surrendered, or JOHNSTON, or TAYLOR, or KIRBY SMITH? Was it upon the capture of DAVIS, its representative head. At what subsequent date then? There is no treaty of peace to fix the epoch, and there never could have been, because it would have given the insurrection a sovereign belligerent treaty-making power which we always deny."
1865/1868: Total of events of Jefferson Davis's capture and surrenders of Confederate armies, but clearly taking it to the last surrender of the armies.
Page 640: “With these events the war was fully terminated. The Confederate armies had surrendered, and the heads of the rebel government were prisoners or fugitives. The military and civil organizations of the great revolt had alike perished. As an immediate consequence, the leading armies of the United States were disbanded or greatly reduced to a force simpty adequate for the maintenance of order in the late insurgent districts; the naval equipments were in like manner curtailed; restrictions were removed from foreign and internal trade; the new state of affairs were recognized by foreign governments, and before the 4th of July, 1865, with the important exception of the regulations affecting the restoration or reconstruction of civil government in the late rebel States, and the position of parties engaged in the rebellion, the administration of the national affairs had mainly returned to its accustomed channels.”
1867: May 26, 1865 (On land, Kirby Smith's surrender)
Page 757: “Though the war on land ceased, and the Confederate flag utterly disappeared from this continent with the collapse and dispersion of Kirby Smith's command; it was yet displayed at sea by two of the British-built, British-armed and (mainly) British manned cruisers engaged in the spoliation of our commerce;....”
1870: May 26, 1865
Draper, John William. History of the American Civil War. [70] Volume 3. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1870. OCLC 830251756. Retrieved July 28, 2022.
Page 618: "The surrender of Johnson to Sherman was followed, on the 14th of May, by that of General Taylor, with all the remaining Confederate armies east of the Mississippi, to General Canby. [typo? May 4th usually cited] On the 26th of the same month General Kirby Smith surrendered his entire command wst of the Mississippi to General Canby. With this, all military opposition to the government ended."
1881: Kirby Smith's Surrender; Surrender of the Armies: Jefferson Davis
Page 630, Near the end of Chapter LIV: “With General E. K. Smith's surrender the Confederate flag no longer floated on the land; only one gallant sailor still unfurled it on the Pacific. Captain Waddell, commanding the Confederate cruiser Shenandoah swept the ocean from Australia nearly to Behring's Straits....” Chapter LVI first sentence, Page 663: “When the Confederate soldiers laid down their arms and went home, all hostilities against the power of the Government of the United States ceased.”
1885: May 26, 1865: Adam Badeau
Page 639: "In fact the history of the war after the 9th of April is nothing but an enumeration of surrenders. On the 14th of April, Johnston made his first overtures to Sherman; on the 21st, Cobb yielded Macon; on the 4th of May, Richard Taylor surrendered all the rebel forces east of the Mississippi. On the 11th of May, Jefferson Davis, disguised as a woman and in flight, was captured at Irwinsville, Georgia; and on the 26th of the same month, Kirby Smith surrendered his entire command west of the Mississippi River. On that day the last organized rebel force disappeared from the territory of the United States."
1886: May 26, 1865: Ulysses S. Grant
Page 522: "General E. Kirby Smith surrendered the trans-Mississippi department on the 26th of May, leaving no other Confederate army at liberty to continue the war."
1886: May 26, 1865
unpaginated e-book; end of Chapter XXX
"Meanwhile on the 5th of April, Grant, who had kept Sherman, as well as Sheridan, advised of his main movements, had also ordered the former to press Johnston's Army as he was pressing Lee, so as, between them, they might "push on, and finish the job." In accordance with this order, Sherman's Forces advanced toward Smithfield, and, Johnston having rapidly retreated before them, entered Raleigh, North Carolina, on the 13th. The 14th of April, brought the news of the surrender of Lee to Grant, and the same day a correspondence was opened between Sherman and Johnston, looking to the surrender of the latter's Army—terms for which were actually agreed upon, subject, however, to approval of Sherman's superiors. Those terms, however, being considered unsatisfactory, were promptly disapproved, and similar terms to those allowed to Lee's Army, were substituted, and agreed to, the actual surrender taking place April 26th, near Durham, North Carolina. On the 21st, Macon, Georgia, with 12,000 Rebel Militia, and sixty guns, was surrendered to Wilson's Cavalry-command, by General Howell Cobb. On the 4th of May, General Richard Taylor surrendered all the armed Rebel troops, East of the Mississippi river; and on the 26th of May, General Kirby Smith surrendered all of them, West of that river." "On that day, organized, armed Rebellion against the United States ceased, and became a thing of the past. It had been conquered, stamped out, and extinguished, while its civic head, Jefferson Davis, captured May 11th, at Irwinsville, Georgia, while attempting to escape, was, with other leading Rebels, a prisoner in a Union fort.”
1890: Kirby Smith Surrender (May 26, 1865)
Page 490: “Far away, in Texas Gen. E. Kirby Smith enacted the last scene – surrendering the last armed soldier of the Confederacy.”
1902: Anxiety while Davis at large, and unsurrendered army west of Mississippi River.
“Pages 282-3: “While the trial was going on in Washington, Jefferson Davis was captured, on May 10th, near Irwinsville, Ga., by a detachment of General Wilson's cavalry. Mr. Davis and his family, with Alexander H. Stephens, lately Vice-President of the Confederacy, John H. Reagan, Postmaster General, Clement C. Clay, and other State prisoners, were sent to Fortress Monroe. The propeller Clyde, with the party on board, reached Hampton Roads on May 19th. The next day, May 20th, Mr. Stanton sent for me to come to his office. He told me where Davis was, and said that he had ordered General Nelson A. Miles to go to Hampton Roads to take charge of the prisoners, transferring them from the Clyde to the fortress. Mr. Stanton was much concerned lest Davis should commit suicide; he said that he himself would do so in like circumstances. "I want you to go to Fortress Monroe," he said, "and caution General Miles against leaving Davis any possible method of suicide; tell him to put him in fetters, if necessary. Davis must be brought to trial; he must not be allowed to kill himself." Mr. Stanton also told me that he wanted a representative of the War Department down there to see what the military was doing, and to give suggestions and make criticisms and send him full reports.
“The status of Jefferson Davis at the time explains Mr. Stanton's anxiety. It should be remembered that Davis had not surrendered when the capital of the Confederacy, Richmond, was captured; neither had he surrendered with either of the two principal armies under Lee and Johnston. At that time the whole Confederate army west of the Mississippi was still at large. To allow Davis to join this force was only to give the Confederacy an opportunity to reassemble the forces still unsurrendered and make another stand for life.”
1905: May 26, 1865
Page 619: “For a time Smith's attitude seemed so threatening, that Sheridan was sent from Washington to bring him to reason. After one more skirmish, near Brazos, quite needless, Smith, too, on the 26th of May, surrendered his whole armed force to Canby, receiving the same generous terms accorded to other Confederate armies. And thus was slavery's grand levy of war against the United States brought to a conclusive end.”
1908: May 26, 1865
Full entry on last Table of Contents page (unnumbered on download): "Alphabetical Index of Campaigns, Battles, Engagements, Actions, Combats, Sieges, Skirmishes, Reconnaissances, Scouts and Other Military Events Connected with the "War of the Rebellion" During the Period of Actual Hostilities, From April 12, 1861, to May 26, 1865................595"
1911: Surrender of the armies; end of May 1865
Page 387: “The Civil War had ended in the months of April and May, 1865. April 9 the army of Virginia, under the command of Lee, had surrendered to General Grant: officers and soldiers had to promise not to take up arms against the United States so long as they were not regularly exchanged, and were then given their freedom. In April and May the other Confederate armies submitted under the same conditions. By the end of May hostilities were no longer in progress anywhere, and the soldiers of the Federal armies were disbanded and sent home. June 6 the Southern prisoners shut up in Northern posts were freed. Victory was a fact; there was neither vengeance nor cruel repression, but as soon as possible all citizens were restored to the enjoyment of their rights.
1919: May 26, 1865
Pages 201-202: “The surrender at Appomattox on April 9, 1865, compelled another migration of the dwindling executive company. General Johnston had not yet surrendered. A conference which he had with the President and the Cabinet at Greensboro ended in giving him permission to negotiate with Sherman. Even then Davis was still bent on keeping up the fight; yet, though he believed that Sherman would reject Johnston's overtures, he was overtaken at Charlotte on his way South by the crushing news of Johnston's surrender. There the executive history of the Confederacy came to an end in a final Cabinet meeting. Davis, still blindly resolute to continue the struggle, was deeply distressed by the determination of his advisers to abandon it. In imminent danger of capture, the President's party made its way to Abbeville, where it broke up, and each member sought safety as best he could. Davis with a few faithful men rode to Irwinsville, Georgia, where, in the early morning of the 10th of May, he was surprised and captured. But the history of the Confederacy was not quite [page 202] at an end. The last gunshots were still to be fired far away in Texas on the 13th of May. The surrender of the forces of the Trans-Mississippi on May 26, 1865, brought the war to a definite conclusion.”
1919: May 26, 1865
Page 42: "AMERICAN CIVIL WAR 1861–1865" Page 43: "On May 26th the war came to an end, after a desperate struggle of nearly four years."
1937: War or no war does not depend on wishes or interests of third States
Page 200: “To make the existence of war or no war depend on the wishes or interests of third States is to create a rule neither satisfying to the requirements of consistent legal principle, nor in general, I venture to think, to the need of the statesman dealing with practical problems as they arise – it is a doctrine likely to create more complications than it will assuage.”
Page 206: “What recognition does is not to operate as a grant of rights of war, but create at most a species of estoppel. The neutral State estops itself from denying that a true war exists....I have laboured the point that recognition of belligerency is the acknowledgement of an existing fact, not the conferring of a status, still less a privilege (even those who adopt the status view point out that it is given for the benefit of the recognising State's own subjects, not for that of the insurgents)."
1963: May 26, 1865
“The Commission is deeply indebted to the Editorial Advisory Board members, each of whom rendered valuable assistance toward the final draft of the narrative. James I. Robertson, Jr., Executive Director U. S. Civil War Centennial Commission” Page 31 “Lee’s surrender left Johnston with no place to go. On April 26, near Durham, N. C., the Army of Tennessee laid down its arms before Sherman’s forces. With the surrender of isolated forces in the Trans-Mississippi West on May 4, 11, and 26, the most costly war in American history came to an end.”
1965: May 26, 1865
1967: US Attorneys argued in 1869 that war ended May 26, 1865; US Supreme Court held that for legal purposes it ended with Andrew Johnson's proclamation of August 20, 1865
Page 332: United States v. Anderson was argued before the Supreme Court of the United States at its December, 1869 term. Hoar and Hale, for the government made the same points previously stressed in the Court of Claims. The attorneys argued that the claim, filed June 5, 1868, was too late; that when the courts were reopened and when armed aggression against government had ceased, there was no longer civil war. They contended that the rebellion was suppressed as a matter [page 333] of fact after Kirby Smith surrendered on May 26, 1865, and that Anderson's right to file a claim expired two years from that date. Presidential proclamations were regarded by the government attorneys as executive recognition of the fact that peace was restored; these proclamations did not in themselves create peace. They continued their argument to the effect that if an executive act was, indeed, necessary to establish the fact of suppression, then that of April 2, 1866, recognized an end to the rebellion in South Carolina and was applicable to Nelson Anderson. Because the cause of action arose in that state, the statute would run from the time the rebellion was suppressed there. They discussed other acts and proclamations relating to the war's end, arguing that they had no applicability to the Captured and Abandoned Property Act.”
Page 336: “The important issue was concerned with the date of expiration of two years after the suppression of the rebellion. The Supreme Court held that the suppression in one locality was not tantamount to suppression of the rebellion and that an interpretation which allowed one rule for one area and a different standard for another section could not be permitted.....”
“Though various other proclamations and acts of Congress had a bearing on the subject, [Justice] Davis stated that it was only necessary to notice the presidential proclamation of August 20, 1866, and the act of Congress of March 2, 1867. The August 20, 1866, proclamation related to Texas, and it in the President stated:
“This was the first official declaration that the rebellion had been suppressed everywhere; this proclamation was accepted by Congress when, on March 2, 1867, the provision was made that the act of June 20, 1864, fixing the pay of non-commisioned officers and privates through the term of the rebellion, was to remain in force for three years after the close of the rebellion as announced by the President in his proclamation. Congress thereby, said the court adopted August 20, 1866, as the day of close for this purpose. The Supreme Court reasons that Congress would certainly not intend a harsher rule for claimants, and that the point of time should be construed liberally in favor of those who adhered to the Union. The court accepted the August 20, [Page 337] 1866, date as being applicable so far as rights secured by the Captured and Abandoned Property Act was concerned.”
1971: End of May 1865, by implication in introduction to next months' entry.
1974: Many ending dates (thus Spring 1865 or total of events) Cites May 10, 1865 and said some take this to be end of the war, but notes only an uncited US Supreme Court case which does not line up with United States v. Anderson (1869)
(Foote does not cite the case. I could not find it. In United States v. Anderson, 76 U.S. 56 (1869), the Court wrote that the August 20, 1866 date marked the date of the “suppression of the rebellion” throughout the country by Johnson's proclamation and that Congress had accepted the date for “the close of the rebellion." So I don't think the statement about an uncited case can be verified. In any event, the later statement by Foote below expresses the many endings or piecemeal view of the end of the war.)
Foote noted at page 1019 that the statement was premature by three days because the Battle of Palmito Ranch was the last sizeable clash of arms in the whole war. At page 1040, Foote expressed the several endings of the war view as follow: “Appomattox was one of several endings; Durham Station, Citronelle, Galveston [presumably the June 2 signing of the May 26 surrender terms by E. Kirby Smith although not definitely distinguished from the lifting of the blockade at Galveston on June 23] were others; as were Johnson's mid-May proclamation and the ratification of the 13th Amendment, which seven months later freed the slaves not freed in the course of the four-year struggle...”
1982: Many events as recited.
1994: Most specific reference is to August 20, 1866, as noted by US Supreme Court as legal end of war.
Trudeau Pages 396-397: In the case of United States v. Anderson, 76 U.S. 56 (1869) “The U.S. attorneys argued that the Rebellion had been suppressed following the surrender of the Trans-Mississippi Department, as established in the surrender document negotiated on May 26, 1865. Anderson's lawyer, in turn, argued that the end of the war was a legislative matter, not a military one, and that Congress had previously recognized President Johnson's August 20 proclamation as the first official declaration that the Civil War had ended everywhere.
Trudeau Page 397: “The Supreme Court ruled that Nelson Anderson was entitled to recompense from the United States government for his cotton. The court's key determination was that the legal end of the American Civil War had been decided by Congress to be August 20, 1866 – the date of Andrew Johnson's final proclamation on the conclusion of the Rebellion. For legal purposes at least, the end of the Civil War was a matter of record.”
1995: Spring 1865
Page 208: “When the Civil War finally ended in the spring of 1865, the conflict had been a tragedy without parallel for the state of Tennessee.”
1997: Spring 1865
2001: Several events. Notes substance of proclamation but states that in fact armed resistance wasn't quite at an end. Goes on to state several events.
2003: May 26, 1865
Page 308: "By 26 May, General Edward Kirby Smith had surrendered the Rebel forces in the trans-Mississippi west. The war was over.
2009: May 10 order cited in events by date; implies this is the end of armed resistance, except for Palmito Ranch, but does not specifically say it is the end of the war.
In Wagner, the entry for May 29 on the same page 51 reads: “By proclamation, President Johnson grants amnesty and pardon to all persons who directly or indirectly participated in the 'existing rebellion' – with some exceptions – upon the taking of an oath declaring their allegiance to the U.S. Constitution and laws.” It further states that this is an indication Johnson will pursue a moderate Reconstruction policy.
2009: Surrender of Confederate armies starting with Appomattox surrender.
Page 251: "In early April the Army of the Potomac finally broke through rebel lines in front of Petersburg, seized Richmond, and ran Lee's army to earth at Appomattox Court House on 9 April, beginning a chain of events that led in a little more than month to the surrender of all the Confederacy's armies and an end to the war."
2010: Victories Bringing Armed Struggle to End (total of events or piecemeal); Concluding with Stand Watie surrender, June 23 Notes legal end with proclamation of August 20, 1866.
Neff Page 203: “By the spring of 1865, the combined effects of the Union naval blockade and the victories of the federal land forces finally brought the armed struggle to a conclusion....Because various aspects of the war were terminated at different times, it became difficult to say, with the precision so obsessively demanded by lawyers, exactly when the state of war actually terminated.”
Neff Page 204: Section Heading “Ending a War” In certain respects, the end of the Confederate war effort came about in an orderly fashion, with the formal surrender of the various Southern armed forces to their union foes....concluding with the submission of a force of Cherokee Indians allied to the Confederacy on June 25.” (June 23, Long. p. 695, Trudeau, p. 360)
Neff Page 207: “This array of different termination measures and policies inevitably made it difficult to say with any confidence when the war itself actually ended in legal terms....In April 2, 1866, President Johnson proclaimed “the insurrection” to be ended in all of the Confederate states except Texas. Finally, on August 20, 1866, he pronounced it to be over in that state as well.”
2015: Surrender of the Armies Also discusses other theories such as when the last State of the old Confederacy's representatives was seated in Congress.
Page 1759: “The large-scale fighting between the Confederacy and the Union during the U.S. Civil War closed with the surrenders of four Confederate armies – at Appomattox, [page 1760] Virginia; at Durham Station, North Carolina; at Galveston, Texas; and at Citronelle, Alabama. The terms were lenient: If soldiers laid down their arms and obeyed the laws of the United States, they remained safe from prosecution. Where this left the civilian population, especially the leaders of the rebellion, was unknown – as was the status of civic participation by white and black people in the South. But no one was hanged for treason against the United States.” “The leniency toward former enemies had begun without the United States taking the counsel of Europe. It was a leniency created to end the fighting, to encourage reunion, and to deny further resistance by creating martyrs or by encouraging Confederates to seek foreign partners to continue the fight, such as through an alliance with the French in Mexico.”
Page 1761: “If the war did not end with the Surrenders, then when did it end? Only recently has the question gained fresh currency. More that four decades ago, historian Avery Craven made the bold statement “The American Civil Ward did not end at Appomattox, adding “Until the Negro's place in American life was fixed, the war was not over.” But he remained a minority voice, as the sheer weight of scholarship has leaned toward portraying the surrenders of the Confederate armies as the end of the war. Although violence continued in the South – much of it aimed at either controlling elections or preserving the racial orders – historians have disagreed over whether to interpret this as a continuation of warfare. On the one hand, those who see the end of the war with surrenders in 1865 argue that the rebels did not secede again, and also that the violence involved only a tiny fraction of the South's white males. At the same time, according to the argument, the violence featured minimal interstate cooperation, belying the notion of a concerted, organized leadership. On the other hand, the violence did fulfilll the goal of conducting what one historian has called a counterrevolution that overturned Republican state governments in favor of a regime friendlier to the interests of the former Confederates. More recently, Gregory P. Downs has revived the provocative idea that we should consider the end of wartime as coming around 1870, with the admission of the last southern states under Radical Reconstruction.”25 FN25...For the argument against war continuing beyond the surrenders, see, for instance, Gary W. Gallagher, The Confederate War: How Popular Will, Nationalism, and Military Strategy Could Not Stave Off Defeat (Cambridge, Mass. 1997), 206, n.1....The literature as a whole remains tilted toward the war ending with the surrenders....”
Page 1762: “Attorney General James Speed argued for maintaining martial law – a status that continued for all of 1865 and part of 1866, until Andrew Johnson proclaimed the final restoration of peace and civil authority in the South on August 20, 1866.”
Page 1764: “After the seating of a Georgia senator in Congress in 1871 completed the process for all the former states in rebellion, not even a diehard Radical could legitimately stretch the definition of wartime anymore....Whether the war ended in the spring of 1865, or with Johnson's declaration of August 1866, or not until 1871, all of these endpoints featured no negotiated settlement and no intervention by a third party....Ultimately, what happened in the United States was homegrown.”
No end dates given:
Guelzo, Allen C. Fateful Lightning: A New History of the Civil War & Reconstruction. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012. ISBN 978-0-19-984328-2. I found no statement of an end date for the war. I saw that the book ends with a lengthy analysis of consequences of the war without noting specific dates after Guelzo had written about the April surrenders.
Murray, Williamson and Wayne Wei-Siang Hsieh, A Savage War: A Military History of the Civil War. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2016. ISBN 978-0-691169408 has an extended analysis at the “end of the war” but does not carry on the narrative of events beyond the surrender of Johnston's army.
Starr, Steven. The Union Cavalry in the Civil War 3 volumes, does not specify an end date for the war and does not carry the narratives beyond the Grand Reviews. Donner60 ( talk) 04:21, 5 July 2022 (UTC)
Revised July 29, 2022.
No mention of belligerent rights/status or the May 10, 1865 proclamation.
No mention of belligerent rights/status or the May 10, 1865 proclamation. Carefully perused; no index.
No mention of belligerent rights/status or the May 10, 1865 proclamation.
No mention of belligerent rights/status or the May 10, 1865 proclamation.
No mention of belligerent rights/status or the May 10, 1865 proclamation.
No mention of belligerent rights/status or the May 10, 1865 proclamation.
No mention of belligerent rights/status or the May 10, 1865 proclamation.
No mention of belligerent rights/status or the May 10, 1865 proclamation.
See also The Alabama Claims Arbitration [111] by Tom Bingham The International and Comparative Law Quarterly, Vol. 54, No. 1 (Jan., 2005), pp. 1-25 Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the British Institute of International and Comparative Law Donner60 ( talk) 09:20, 4 July 2022 (UTC)
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