Civil War Vocabulary

Question 1

Abolitionist

Answer 1

A person who wanted to end slavery in the United States

Question 2

The Liberator

Answer 2

An anti-slavery newspaper written by William Lloyd Garrison. It drew attention to abolition, both positive and negative, causing a war of words between supporters of slavery and those opposed

Question 3

Underground Railroad

Answer 3

A system of secret routes used by escaping slaves to reach freedom in the North or in Canada

Question 4

Civil Disobedience

Answer 4

A nonviolent, public refusal to obey allegedly unjust laws

Question 5

Missouri Compromise

Answer 5

“Compromise of 1820” over the issue of slavery in Missouri. It was decided Missouri entered as a slave state and Maine entered as a free state and all states North of the 36th parallel were free states and all South were slave states

Question 6

Popular Sovereignty

Answer 6

A belief that ultimate power resides in the people

Question 7

Compromise of 1850

Answer 7

(1) California admitted as free state, (2) territorial status and popular sovereignty of Utah and New Mexico, (3) resolution of Texas-New Mexico boundaries, (4) federal assumption of Texas debt, (5) slave trade abolished in DC, and (6) new fugitive slave law; advocated by Henry Clay and Stephen A. Douglas

Question 8

Fugitive Slave Act

Answer 8

A law that made it a crime to help runaway slaves; allowed for the arrest of escaped slaves in areas where slavery was illegal and required their return to slaveholders

Question 9

Kansas-Nebraska Act

Answer 9

1854 - Created Nebraska and Kansas as states and gave the people in those territories the right to choose to be a free or slave state through popular sovereignty

Question 10

Dred Scott v Sandford

Answer 10

1857 Supreme Court decision that stated that slaved were not citizens; that living in a free state or territory, even for many years, did not free slaves; and declared the Missouri Compromise unconstitutional

Question 11

Treason

Answer 11

The crime of betraying one’s country

Question 12

Martyr

Answer 12

A person who dies for a cause

Question 13

Border State

Answer 13

State on the border between the North and South: Delaware, Maryland. Kentucky, and Missouri

Question 14

Emancipation Proclamation

Answer 14

Proclamation issued by Lincoln, freeing all slaves in areas still at war with the Union

Question 15

54th Massachusetts Regiment

Answer 15

All-black unit led by Union Colonel Robert Gould Shaw during the Civil War

Question 16

Copperhead

Answer 16

A Northerner who opposed using force to keep the Southern states in the Union

Question 17

Battle of Bull Run

Answer 17

July 21, 1861. Va. (outside of D.C.) people watched the battle. Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson: Confederate general, held his ground and stood in battle like a “stone wall”. Union retreated. Confederate victory. Showed that both sides needed training and war would be long and bloody.

Question 18

Battle of Antietam

Answer 18

Civil War battle in which the North succeeded in halting Lee’s Confederate forces in Maryland. Was the bloodiest battle of the war resulting in 25,000 casualties

Question 19

Battle of Fredericksburg

Answer 19

The Union, led by Major General Ambrose Burnside, was defeated and lost 12,000 men. General Robert E. Lee, Commander of the Army of Northern Virginia, was the Confederate general who led in the defeat

Question 20

Battle of Gettysburg

Answer 20

Turning point of the War that made it clear the North would win. 50,000 people died, and the South lost its chance to invade the North

Question 21

Pickett’s Charge

Answer 21

A failed confederate attack during the Civil War led by general George Pickett at the Battle of Gettysburg

Question 22

Gettysburg Address

Answer 22

A 3-minute address by Abraham Lincoln during the American Civil War (November 19, 1963) at the dedication of a national cemetery on the site of the Battle of Gettysburg

Question 23

Appomattox Courthouse

Answer 23

The Virginia town where Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant in 1865, ending the Civil War