| A | B |
|---|
| Fugitive Slave Law | This ws the part of the Compromise of 1850 which the abolitionists in the North really hated, because it ade the "Underground Railroad" illegal. It was this part of the Compromise which prompted Harriet Beecher Stowe to write her popular anti-slavery novel, Uncle Tom''s Cabin |
| States' rights | According to this theory of the federal union, a state has the authority to nullify acts of the federal government and even to leave the Union if it wishes to do so |
| Nativism | This was the political movement, mostly in the North, designed to ensure that Americans born in this country receive better treatment than immigrants |
| Popular Soverignty | This was the compromise policy that would allow the settlers who eventually move into a nterritory out West to decide for themselves if they wish to enter the Union as a slave or free state |
| Free soilers | This was the name used to describe the New Englanders who moved to Kansas and Nebraska in the late 1850s in order to prevent those territories |
| Arsenal | This is the word used to describe a place where military weapons are manufactured and stored, and it was such a place in Harpers Ferry, VA that radical abolitionist tried to seize in 1859 |
| First Battle of Bull Run | The first major battle of the Civil War, Confederates won, July 1861 |
| Casualties | military term for those killed in battle |
| War of Attrition | one side inflicts continuous losses on the enemy in order to wear down its strength |
| Shells | devices that exploded in the air or when they hit something |
| Canister | a special type of shell filled with bullets |
| Battle of Shiloh | Civil War battle in 1862 in Tennessee |
| Battle of Antietam | Civil War battle in 1862 in Maryland |
| Merrimack | Southern vessel; iron plates bolted to an old wooden steamship |
| Monitor | Union vessel; iron plates bolted to an old wooden steamship |
| Transcendentalism | Philosophical movement of the mid-1800s that emphasized spiritual discovery and insight rather than reason |
| Temperance Movement | an organized campaign to eliminate alcohol consumption |
| Abstinence | to not drink alcohol |
| Segregated | seperated according to race |
| Utopian Communities | small societies dedicated to perfection in social and political conditions |
| Abolitionist Movement | the movement to end slavery |
| Emancipation | This is the word which means "to set free," and this was what the abolitionists wanted Lincoln to do as soon as he became President |
| Underground Railroad | a network of escape routes that provided protection and transportation for slaves fleeing north to freedom |
| Gag Rule | rule passed by the House in 1836 prohibiting antislavery petitions from being read or acted upon |
| Seneca Falls Convention | the first women's rights covention in U.S. history |
| Lower South | Because these were the states in which cotton was dominant crop, and slavery was used the most, these states were grouped under this descriptive name, and they were the first to quit the Union in 1860 |
| Insurrection | Once the Confederates in Charleston fired the first shots against U.S. governemnt propert in April 1861, Pres. Lincoln declared that the Confederate States were doing this, and that now therefore he has the duty and authority to use force against the Confederates |
| Fort Sumter | It was at this army post in Charleston, SC that Lincoln decided to take a stand against the Confederates and by announcing that he intended to re-supply it. Lincoln forced the Confederates to attack it, thus causing them to commit a clear act of rebellion against the governemtn of the U.S. |
| Alcoholism | The existence of this problem on a large scale in the U.S. in the 1820s and 1830s caused family problems, and encouraged women to get involved in a social reform movement to correct it |
| Suffrage | This is a word which means the right to vote, and it was something American women struggled for over a long period of time in the 19th and early 20th centuries |
| Slave Breaker | This is the term to describe an employee of a plantation owner whose job it would be to punish any slave who had an "attitude," or who refused to be submissive and passive |
| "The Pledge" | Women who were protesting their unequal status and treatment at the hands of men often used this economic pressure tactic to force legl concessions to be made to women's rights groups |
| Blockade | This is a tactic, used by the Union navy, of preventing and enemy from trading with foreign countries by preventing any ship from entering or leaving the enemy's seaports |
| Siege | This is a tactic, used by the Union forces at Vicksburg, in which an enemy position is surrounded and deprived of food and supplies in order to make it surrender |
| Appomattox | This was the site at which Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant on April 9, 1865, thus bringing the Civil War to an end in a victory for the Union |
| Pickett's Charge | On the 3rd day of the battle of Gettysburg, this was the name given to the failed Confederate assault on the center of the Union line |
| 20th Maine | This was the Union regiment which successfully held onto the hill known as "Little Round Top" at Gettysburg on the 2nd day of that battle, and thus saved the entire Union line |
| Ford's Theater | This was the site at which President Lincoln was assassinated on April 14, 1865, just five days after the fighting in the Civil War had ended |
| Martial Law | This is the name given to emergency rule by military authorites, during which some of the rights normally protected by the Bill of Rights |
| Guerrillas | This is a name, taken from the Spanish for "little war," which describes small groups of soldiers who use hit-and-run tactics in a last ditch attempt to avoid a total surrender |
| March to the Sea | This is the name given to the expedition of the Union army led by Sherman across Georgia, during which everything in its path, was burned or destroyed in Nov - Dec 1864 |
| 54th Massachusetts | This was the all black volunteer regiment commanded by Col. Robert Gould Shaw which earned a reputation for bravery in an attack on Fort Wagner in South Carolina 1863 |
| Gunboat | Powered by steam and bull to navigate shallow bodies of water, these Union weapons were basically small floating forst fitted with cannons |
