History
During the American Civil War alot of the battles that were fought were in Tennessee. The side that won the most was the Union. In February of 1862 Ulysses S. Grant and the U.S. Navy gained power over the Cumberland and Tennessee Rivers. In June, Memphis became part of the Union. When Memphis became part of the Union a naval battle happened on the Mississippi River. The Union gained control over the western and middle sections of Tennessee. The Battle of Murfreesboro in January of 1863 decided whether they had control, and they did.
While Abraham Lincoln was President, Andrew Johnson, who was a War Democrat from Tennessee, was elected for Vice President in 1864. When Lincoln got assassinated in 1865 Johnson took his place as President. One of the first states to be seceded and have its elected members readmitted to the U.S. Congress would be Tennessee on July 24th, 1866. During the Reconstruction period, Tennessee was the only state that did not have a military governor. The Reconstruction period was from the years 1865-1877. It led into the years of the Civil War also.
There was still a huge struggle over the power in the Southern society after the Reconstruction Period ended. In the late 1870s and 1880s, White Democrats gained political power again in all of the Southern states such as Tennessee. The state legislature passed huge restrictive laws to take over African Americans in the next decade. African Americans made up almost 24% of Tennessee population in 1900.
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