Browse Items (26 total)

When researching North Carolinian reactions to major judicial and political oppression in the Reconstruction era (1865-1877), many primary sources indicate that North Carolina was liberal in relation to other southern states. Yet, in an era of such…

“By the Constitution of this State I was empowered to be commander-in-chief to call out the militia, to execute the law, suppress riots and insurrections, and to repel invasion.” (Holden 1911, 120) This was Holden’s statement in…

The story of the Ku Klux Klan during Reconstruction is well known. Most southern states felt repercussions from Klan influence and violence. Lisa Cardyn explores Klan violence on a level that is often overlooked: the sexual nature of Klan violence.…

Not many people know that Caswell County, North Carolina, had a fairly large population in the nineteenth century. Tax and census records, however, show that the county was large enough to be split into districts to account for all residents. Thomas…

Many people believe that Republicans wanted to abolish slavery because they viewed it as an immoral and evil institution. Some abolitionists used their religious beliefs to shape political debates over the issue of slavery. In an article, the…

In North Carolina’s 1864 gubernatorial elections between Governor Zebulon B. Vance and William W. Holden, Vance promoted strong intimidation tactics in order to scare Holden’s supporters into voting for Vance on election day. It is also…

Historian David Williams relays that “roughly 200,000 blacks, most of them refugees from slavery, served in the Union armed forces." (Williams 2014, 5) Though many people may not know this fact, runaway slaves' participation in the Union army…

In early April of 1865, the Union brigade led by Colonel Palmer of General George Stoneman’s raiders, invaded the town of Elkin, North Carolina, to requisition food supplies. The remainder of the Union force was trapped on the South side of the…

Many women played a prominent strategic role in the Civil War, and some lost their lives for their cause. Rose O’Neal Greenhow served as a spy and ambassador for the Confederacy. Greenhow was arrested in 1862 for espionage and exiled from…

During the Civil War, the absence of men and scarcity of supplies created tremendous hardship for women and children at home, particularly in the South. Union naval blockades cut off most ports, making food, clothing, and other goods scarce and…