View a gallery of images of Confederate and Union Army regiments, troops, and infantry from Pennsylvania to Georgia, Virginia to Massachusetts. From 1861-1865, more than three million men fought in the American Civil War, and over 600,000 lost their lives in battle.

This 3 min video examines some of the technological advancements and how they were used by both sides, until the Union was able to gain the upper hand.

Learn how journalists reported on slavery and military conflict during the Civil War. We'll look at six primary sources from the Civil War and explore the techniques journalists on both sides used to spread the news and their opinions: What role did cartoons and photography play in swaying public sentiment? Who got to report on the news and how did their perspective affect their reporting?

This is a collection of short videos and biographies on Union and Confederate leaders during the Civil War.

In this lesson, students will use one of the major tools of a historian: personal letters. These primary source materials provide firsthand evidence of events and information on the perspective, cognition, values, and attitudes of the person writing the letter. Students will read several letters from individuals who lived during the Civil War and analyze their content. Furthermore, students will formulate a character description of someone who lived during the Civil War and, in pairs of letter-writing correspondents, write one another letters concerning a major event during the war.

Examine how the horrors of the Civil War battlefield forced medicine in America to evolve from a crude practice to a profession grounded in science, in these videos from Mercy Street and The Good Stuff: Time Capsule. Utilizing video and discussion questions, students learn about how medical innovations like the triage system, limb amputations, and general hospitals saved thousands of lives, changed Americans’ expectations regarding healthcare and laid the groundwork for later scientific discoveries of the 19th century. For more resources from Mercy Street, check out the collection page.

This activity shows students how both in the North and in the South, music was used extensively during the Civil War to rally troops and the public. Different versions of familiar songs, in which both sides borrowed each other’s tunes or lyrics, are presented. It was not uncommon for each side to serenade the other, or for battle to stop while an impromptu concert was held. Singing an “altered rendition” of one side’s favorite song was often done to poke fun at the enemy. Students will examine lyrics of “Battle Cry of Freedom” and “Dixie” with versions from both sides, and make conclusions about the lyrics. Student questions provided here can be used for general class discussion or individual assessment. Answers to the questions are included.

This inquiry kit features Library of Congress sources, including songs and photographs, focusing on the music of the American Civil War.

Women played a significant role in the Civil War. They served in a variety of capacities, as trained professional nurses giving direct medical care, as hospital administrators or as attendants offering comfort. Although the exact number is not known, between 5,000 and 10,000 women offered their services. For more resources from Mercy Street, check out the collection page.

In this lesson students analyze a single photograph from the Library of Congress collection Civil War Glass Negatives and Related Prints. Using the skills developed, students then find and analyze other images. Conclusions reached will allow students develop links between the Civil War and American industrialization.

This lesson plan has students look at the photos produced during the civil war and make inferences based on what they can see.

This video gives an overview of prisons during the American Civil War and how prisoners were treated. This resource is great for helping students understand the ordinary experience instead of only focusing on the generals and presidents of the time.

Winter, 1865: the final stages of General Sherman’s bloody march through the south. On February 17th, the capital city of Columbia, South Carolina lies squarely in the General’s crosshairs. In a last-ditch effort to protect the vital railroad hub and the thousands of terrified refugees packing city streets, Confederate soldiers destroy the remaining bridge over the Broad River. The reprieve is temporary. In less than 12 hours Sherman’s men will cross the river and bring destruction to the birthplace of the Secessionist south. Nearly a century and a half after these dramatic events, David Brinkman of Columbia, South Carolina, believes a long-standing marker commemorating this history has missed the mark. History Detectives host Elyse Luray goes to Columbia to examine the evidence and see if this discovery will redraw the maps of the Civil War.

The steamship Sultana exploded without warning one night in 1865, killing 1,800 people. Was the disaster a result of Civil War sabotage? For additional background and information use the History Detectives Evaluating Abraham Lincoln lesson plan.

This course surveys the social science literature on civil war. Students will study the origins of civil war, discuss variables that affect the duration of civil war, and examine the termination of conflict. This course is highly interdisciplinary and covers a wide variety of cases.

Students will be engaged in learning about American history prior and during the Civil War. They will be exploring historical documents and learning about the stories of people involved. They will then create a digitial story of what they learned to share with the class. Image attribution: Adam Jones from Kelowna, BC, Canada, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

How do we remember the Civil War? Whose stories are told in the art and memorials from and about the time period? In this resource students will examine works of art from and relating to the Civil War era. Students will also learn about the 54th Regiment of Massachusetts, an all-Black regiment, and compose a written response to a cause they are passionate about.

The American Civil War was fought from 1861-1865, and followed by the period of Reconstruction, generally accepted by scholars to have ended in 1877. The following collections include documents essential to gaining and understanding of how the war began, progressed, and ended, and how Reconstruction was conceived and attempted. This toolkit provides guiding questions and links to essential documents, resources, and lesson plans related to the Civil War and reconstruction.

The purpose of this lesson to assist student understanding of why the American Constitution places ultimate authority of the military in the hands of civilians rather than military leaders. Students should appreciate the historical uniqueness of the American military as an extension of constitutional principles in which the people always have the last word.