On April 27, 1861, Abraham Lincoln became the first US president to suspend the writ of habeas corpus – the right to be released from unlawful detention. He took this controversial move in the hopes it would prevent Maryland from joining the Confederacy.
April 14, 1866 was the earliest known usage of the first US mourning stamp, which honored Abraham Lincoln. It was issued a year after his assassination, during a critical time in US history, when the country was attempting to heal from the bloody Civil War.
On April 12, 1861, North and South clashed for the first time at Fort Sumter, South Carolina. It was the opening battle of the Civil War, the bloodiest conflict in American history.
On April 6, 1866, in Springfield, Illinois, Dr. Benjamin F. Stephenson founded the Grand Army of the Republic (GAR) to bring together Civil War veterans. The GAR provided veterans with support and camaraderie and was influential in the creation of Memorial Day and more…
On March 29, 1867, Independence, Missouri, was founded. Known as the “Queen City of the Trails,” it became the starting point for several trails that carried thousands of settlers to the West.
Soldier, geologist, and explorer John Wesley Powell was born on March 24, 1834, in Mount Morris, New York. A Civil War veteran, Powell explored and produced some of the first accurate maps of the West and later was director of the US Geological Survey.
On March 9, 1862, the USS Monitor and CSS Virginia (formerly USS Merrimack) fought in the first battle between two ironclad warships. The battle changed naval warfare around the world, as major navies halted construction of wooden ships to build iron monitors.
Carl Christian Schurz was born on March 2, 1829, in Liblar, Prussia, Germany (present-day Erftstadt). Schurz commanded forces during the Civil War, reformed the Civil Service and was a vocal proponent of forest preservation.
Winslow Homer was born on February 24, 1836, in Boston, Massachusetts. Largely self-taught, he was one of the most prominent painters of the 1800s.