This was a period of change throughout the U.S. The Civil War and Reconstruction took place. The North industrialized and the railroad expanded. The first transcontinental railroad was completed in 1869. The Homestead Act in 1862 eventually attracted large numbers of people to the Great Plains region, so that they could occupy free land and get a new start.

1860:
Abraham Lincoln is elected sixteenth President of the United States. On receiving the news of Lincoln's election, the South Carolina legislature calls a special state convention to meet at Columbia on December 20. On that date, by unanimous vote, South Carolina secedes from the Union. The first "repeating" rifle in the U.S. is produced by Oliver F. Winchester. The first relay on the Pony Express Mail Service leaves St. Joseph, Missouri, and arrives in Sacramento, California. Joseph Smith restored the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. Eighth census: U.S. population - 31,443,321.

1861:
Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas join South Carolina in seceding from the Union. These seven states form a new southern union, setting up a provisional government called the Confederate States of America. Jefferson Davis of Mississippi is elected President of the Confederacy for a six-year term. Confederate forces open fire on U.S. Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina; the fort surrenders on April 14. President Lincoln calls for a 75,000 man militia to suppress the "insurrection," this move provokes four remaining southern states, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina, to secede and join the Confederacy. The first transcontinental telegraph line is completed, bringing to an end the Pony Express.

1862:
The Homestead Act is passed, entitling any citizen or person who intends to acquire citizenship, who is twenty-one years or older and the head of a household, to acquire 160 acres of land in the public domain by settling on them for five years and paying a small fee. The law takes effect January 1, 1863. General Lee's invasion of the North is halted by General McClellan at the Battle of Antietam in Maryland. In the bloodiest single day of the Civil War, Union casualties are 2,108 killed and 9,549 wounded; Confederate casualties are 2,700 killed and 9,029 wounded.

1863:
President Lincoln issues the Emancipation Proclamation, which states, "All slaves in areas still in rebellion are freed." The proclamation also enables the recruitment of federal regiments of African-American volunteer soldiers. The best-known battle of the Civil War is fought at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, July 1-3. General Robert E. Lee sustains 20,400 casualties and retreats to Virginia. The Union army fails to capitalize on the victory and the Confederates escape. On July 4, Vicksburg, Mississippi surrenders to General U.S. Grant, thus opening the Mississippi River to U.S. forces.

1864:
General Ulysses S. Grant is named as the overall commander of all federal armies.
Union General William Tecumseh Sherman, with an army of 60,000, leaves Atlanta in flames and begins a march through Georgia on a 60-mile front, destroying everything that might be of use to the Confederacy.

1865:
General Robert E. Lee surrenders to General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, signaling the end of the Civil War. Abraham Lincoln is shot at Ford's Theater. The first President to be assassinated, Lincoln dies on April 15, at the age of fifty-six. He is buried at Springfield, Illinois. Andrew Johnson is inaugurated as the seventeenth President of the United States. Civil War causality totals are released: The Union - 359,000 dead, 100,000 wounded; The Confederacy -280,000 dead, 100,000 wounded. The war has cost the Union $5 billion and the Confederacy $3 billion. The Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is ratified, abolishing slavery in the United States.

1866:
The sharecropping system in the southern states results from a lack of success in attracting European immigrants and Chinese laborers to replace slave labor, and from lack of cash for wages to former slaves. The system keeps African-Americans in a virtual slave state, or "peonage". Four African-American regiments are established in the peacetime U.S. Army, and designated as the 24th and 25th Infantry and the 9th and 10th Cavalry. The units eventually acquire the nickname "Buffalo Soldiers" from the American Indians.

1867:
The U.S. purchases Alaska from Russia for $7,200,000.

1868:
General George A. Custer attacks Black Kettle's sleeping Cheyenne Village on the Washita River. One hundred and three Cheyenne people are killed, fifty-three women and children captured. The camp is destroyed and 900 ponies are shot. Susan B. Anthony founds the Suffragette newspaper, The Revolution. The motto of the newspaper is: The true Republic - men, their rights and nothing more: women, their rights and nothing less!"

1869:
Ulysses S. Grant is inaugurated as the eighteenth President of the United States. The Union Pacific Railroad, building west from Nebraska, joins the Central Pacific Railroad building east from California, at Promontory, Utah. The junction completes the first transcontinental railroad link. The Cincinnati Red Stockings, the first all-professional U.S. baseball team, is founded in Cincinnati, Ohio. The Suez Canal is opened in Egypt, facilitating world travel and trade.

1870:
The Fifteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, establishing the right to vote by all male citizens regardless of "Race, color, or previous condition of servitude," is ratified. Standard Oil Company of Ohio, with a capitalization of $1 million, is formed by John D. Rockefeller.

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