A Popular History of the United States of America, From the Aboriginal Times to the Present Day

Embracing An Account Of The Aborigines; The Norsemen In The New World; The Discoveries By The Spaniards, English, And French; The Planting Of Settlements; The Growth Of The Colonies; The Struggle For Liberty In The Revolution; The Development Of The Nation; The Civil War; The Centennial Of Independence; And The Recent Annals Of The Republic. The Whole Brought Down To The Year 1889.

John Clark Ridpath

• Publisher: Left of Brain Books
• Year: 2021
• eBook ISBN: 9781396318030
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Military & Maritime History
• Index: History

Discover American history through these exciting short stories of key moments.The celebrated historian, John Clark Ridpath, chronicles everything that happened in the North American continent, from the Native American people and their eccentric habits, to the voyages of the Norsemen and their account of the strange country, and finally the coincidental, yet grand, landing of Christopher Columbus in America. Ridpath details the periods of colonization, revolution, union, and civil war, then finishes with the 19th century state of affairs in the country, when the book was written. He includes an objective account of some of the most notable presidents, like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Abraham Lincoln. This timeless book displays history through a series of thrilling narratives, so it's entertaining as much as it's informative. Ridpath's style is clear and engaging, and he includes 203 "charts, maps, drawings, and diagrams" to put text into context and bring history to life. "I offer to you a new history of your country...to every American citizen some knowledge of the history of his country is indispensable." "The book is intended for the average American; for the man of business who has neither time nor disposition to plod through ten or twenty volumes of elaborate historical dissertation."

PART I.

Aboriginal America.

CHAPTER I.

The Red Men—Origin, Distribution, Character.

The primitive inhabitants of the New World were the Red men called Indians. The name Indian was conferred upon them from their real or fancied resemblance to the people of India. But without any such similarity the name would have been the same; for Columbus and his followers, believing that they had only rediscovered the Indies, would of course call the inhabitants Indians. The supposed similarity between the two races, if limited to mere personal appearance, had some foundation in fact; but in manners, customs, institutions, and character, no two peoples could be more dissimilar than the American aborigines and the sleepy inhabitants of China and Japan.

The origin of the North American Indians is involved in complete obscurity. That they are one of the older races of mankind can not be doubted. But at what date or by what route they came to the Western continent is an unsolved problem. Many theories have been proposed to account for the Red man’s presence in the New World, but most of them have been vague and unsatisfactory. The notion that the Indians are the descendants of the Israelites is absurd. That half civilized tribes, wandering from beyond the Euphrates, should reach North America, surpasses human credulity. That Europeans or Africans, at some remote period, crossed the Atlantic by voyaging from island to island, seems altogether improbable. That the Kamtchatkans, coming by way of Behring’s Strait, reached the frozen North-west and became the progenitors of the Red men, has no evidence other than conjecture to support it. Until further research shall throw additional light on the history and migrations of the primitive races of mankind, the origin of the Indians will remain shrouded in mystery. It is not unlikely that a more thorough knowledge of the North American languages may furnish a clue to the early history of the tribes that spoke them.

The Indians belong to the Ganowanian, or Bow-and-Arrow family of men. Some races cultivate the soil; others have herds and flocks others build cities and ships. To the Red man of the Western continent the chase was every thing. Without the chase he pined and languished and died. To smite with swift arrow the deer and the bear was the chief delight and profit of the primitive Americans. Such a race could live only in a country of woods and wild animals. The illimitable hunting-grounds—forest, and hill, and river—were the Indian’s earthly paradise, and the type of his home hereafter.

The American aborigines belonged to several distinct families or nations. Above the sixtieth parallel of latitude the whole continent from Labrador to Alaska was inhabited by The Esquimaux. The name means the eaters of raw meat. They lived in snow huts, or in hovels, partly or wholly underground. Sometimes their houses were more artistically constructed out of the bones of whales and walruses. Their manner of life was that of fishermen and hunters. They clad themselves in winter with the skins of seals, and in summer with those of reindeers. Inured to cold and exposure, they made long journeys in sledges drawn by dogs, or risked their lives in open boats fighting with whales and polar bears among the terrors of the icebergs. By eating abundantly of oils and fat meats they kept the fires of life a-burning, even amid the rigors and desolations of the Arctic winter.

Lying south of the Esquimaux, embracing the greater part of Canada and nearly all that portion of the United States east of the Mississippi and north of the thirty-seventh parallel of latitude, spread the great family of The Algonquins. It appears that their original seat was on the Ottawa River. At the beginning of the seventeenth century the Algonquins numbered fully a quarter of a million. The tribes of this great family were nomadic in their habits, roaming from one hunting-ground and river to another, according to the exigencies of fishing and the chase. Agriculture was but little esteemed. They were divided into many subordinate tribes, each having its local name, dialect, and traditions. When the first European settlements were planted the Algonquin race was already declining in numbers and influence. Wasting diseases destroyed whole tribes. Of all the Indian nations the Algonquins suffered most from contact with the White man. Before his aggressive spirit, his fiery rum, and his destructive weapons, the warriors were unable to stand. The race has withered to a shadow; only a few thousands remain to rehearse the story of their ancestors.

Within the wide territory occupied by the Algonquins lived the powerful nation of The Huron-Iroquois. Their domain extended over the country reaching from Georgian Bay and Lake Huron to Lakes Erie and Ontario, south of those lakes to the valley of the Upper Ohio, and eastward to the River Sorel. Within this extensive district was a confederacy of vigorous tribes, having a common ancestry, and generally—though not always—acting together in war. At the time of their greatest power and influence the Huron-Iroquois embraced no less than nine allied nations. These were the Hurons proper, living north of Lake Erie; the Eries and Andastes, south of the same water; the Tuscaroras, of Carolina, who ultimately joined their kinsmen in the North; the Senecas, Cayugas, Onondagas, Oneidas, and Mohawks, constituting the famous Five Nations of New York. The warriors of this great confederation presented the Indian character in its most favorable aspect. They were brave, patriotic, and eloquent; not wholly averse to useful industry; living in respectable villages; tilling the soil with considerable success; faithful as friends but terrible as enemies.

South of the country of the Algonquins were The Cherokees and The Mobilian Nations; the former occupying Tennessee, and the latter covering the domain between the Lower Mississippi and the Atlantic. The Cherokees were highly civilized for a primitive people, and contact with the whites seemed to improve rather than degrade them. The principal tribes of the Mobilians were the Yamassees and Creeks of Georgia, the Seminoles of Florida, and the Choctaws and Chickasaws of Mississippi. These displayed the usual characteristics of the Red men, with this additional circumstance, that below the thirty-second parallel of latitude evidences of temple-building, not practiced among the Northern tribes, began to appear.

West of the Father of Waters was the great and widely-spread race of The Dakotas, whose territory extended from the Arkansas River to the country of the Esquimaux and westward to the Rocky Mountains. Their languages and institutions, differing much among the various tribes, are not so well understood as those of some other nations. South of the land of the Dakotas, in a district nearly corresponding with the present State of Texas, lived the wild Comanches, whose very name is a synonym for savage ferocity. Beyond the Rocky Mountains were the Indian nations of the Plains; the great family of The Shoshonees, The Selish, The Klamaths, and The Californians. On the Pacific slope farther southward dwelt in former times the famous races of Aztecs and Toltecs. These were the most civilized of the primitive Indian nations, but at the same time among the most feeble; the best builders in wood and stone, but the least warlike of any of the aborigines. Such is a brief sketch of the distribution of the copper-colored race in the New World. The territorial position of the various nations and tribes will be easily understood from an examination of the accompanying map.

The Indians were strongly marked with national peculiarities. The most striking characteristic of the race was a certain sense of personal independence—willfulness of action—freedom from restraint. To the Red man’s imagination the idea of a civil authority which should subordinate his passions, curb his will, and thwart his purposes, was intolerable. Among this people no common enterprise was possible unless made so by the concurrence of free wills. If the chieftain entered the war-path, his kinsmen and the braves of other tribes followed him only because they chose his leadership. His authority and right of command extended no further than to be foremost in danger, most cunning in savage strategy, bravest in battle. So of all the relations of Indian life. The Medicine Man was a self-constituted physician and prophet. No man gave him his authority; no man took it away. His right was his own; and his influence depended upon himself and the voluntary respect of the nation. In the solemn debates of the Council House, where the red orators pronounced their wild harangues to groups of motionless listeners, only questions of expediency were decided. The painted sachems never thought of imposing on the unwilling minority the decision which had been reached in council.

Next among the propensities of the Red men was the passion for war. Their wars, however, were always undertaken for the redress of grievances, real or imaginary, and not for conquest. But with the Indian, a redress of grievances meant a personal vindictive, and bloody vengeance on the offender. The Indian’s principles of war were easily understood, but irreconcilable with justice and humanity. The forgiveness of an injury was reckoned a weakness and a shame. Revenge was considered among the nobler virtues. The open, honorable battle of the field was an event unknown in Indian warfare. Fighting was limited to the surprise, the ambuscade, the massacre; and military strategy consisted of cunning and treachery. Quarter was rarely asked, and never granted; those who were spared from the fight were only reserved for a barbarous captivity, ransom, or the stake. In the torture of his victims all the diabolical ferocity of the savage warrior’s nature burst forth without restraint.

 

Map I.

Aboriginal America,

Showing the Distribution and Territorial Limits of the Indian Nations, in the New World.

 

In times of peace the Indian character shone to a better advantage. But the Red man was, at his best estate, an unsocial, solitary, and gloomy spirit. He was a man of the woods. He communed only with himself and the genius of solitude. He sat apart. The forest was better than his wigwam, and his wigwam better than the village. The Indian woman was a degraded creature, a drudge, a beast of burden; and the social principle was correspondingly low. The organization of the Indian family was so peculiar as to require a special consideration. Among civilized nations the family is so constructed that the lines of kinship diverge constantly from the line of descent, so that collateral kinsmen with each generation stand at a still greater remove from each other. The above diagram will serve to show how in a European family the lines of consanguinity diverge until the kinship becomes so feeble as to be no longer recognized. It will be observed that this fact of constant divergence is traceable to the establishment of a male line of descent.

 

Diagram of European Kinship.

 

In the Indian family all this is reversed. The descent is established in the female line; and as a consequence the ties of kinship converge upon each other until they all meet in the granddaughter. That is, in the aboriginal nations of North America, every grandson and granddaughter was the grandson and granddaughter of the whole tribe. This arose from the fact that all the uncles of a given person were reckoned as his fathers also; all the mother’s sisters were mothers; all the cousins were sisters and brothers; all the nieces were daughters; all the nephews, sons, etc. This peculiarity of the Indian family organization is illustrated in the annexed diagram.

 

Diagram of Indian Kinship.

 

Civil government among the Indian nations was in its primitive stages of development. Each tribe had its own sachem, or chieftain, to whom in matters of peace and war a tolerable degree of obedience was rendered. At times confederations were formed, based either on ties of kinship or the exigencies of war. But these confederations were seldom enduring, and were likely at any time to be broken up by the barbarous passion and insubordination of the tribes who composed them. Sometimes a sachem would arise with such marked abilities, warlike prowess, and strength of will, as to gain an influence, if not a positive leadership over many nations. But with the death of the chieftain, or sooner, each tribe, resuming its independence, would return to its own ways. No general Indian Congress was known; but national and tribal councils were frequently called to debate questions of policy and right.

In matters of religion the Indians were a superstitious race, but seldom idolaters. They believed in a great spirit, everywhere present, ruling the elements, showing favor to the obedient, and punishing the sinful. Him they worshiped; to him they sacrificed. But not in temples, for the Indians built none. They also believed in many subordinate spirits—some good, some bad. Both classes frequented the earth. The bad spirits brought evil dreams to the Indian; diseases also, bad passions, cruel winters, and starvation. The good spirits brought sunshine, peace, plentiful harvests, all the creatures of the chase. The Medicine Man, or Prophet, obtained a knowledge of these things by fasting and prayer, and then made revelations of the will and purpose of the spirit world. The religious ceremonies of the Indians were performed with great earnestness and solemn formality.

In the matter of the arts the Indian was a barbarian. His house was a wigwam or hovel. Some poles set up in a circle, converging at the top, covered with skins and the branches of trees, lined and sometimes floored with mats, a fire in the center, a low opening opposite the point from which the wind blew—such was the aboriginal abode of North America. Indian utensils were few, rude, and primitive. Poorly-fashioned earthen pots, bags and pouches for carrying provisions, and stone hammers for pounding parched corn, were the stock and store. A copper kettle was a priceless treasure. The warrior’s chief implement was his hatchet of stone or copper. This he always carried with him, and it was rarely free from the stain of blood. His weapon of offence and defence was the bow and arrow, by no means an insignificant or feeble instrument. The arrow pointed with stone or iron was frequently driven entirely through the ponderous buffalo. The range of the winged missile was two hundred yards or more, and the aim was one of fatal accuracy when the White man was the target. The Indian’s clothing was a blanket, thrown over his shoulders, bound around him perhaps with a thong of leather. The material for his moccasins¹ and leggins was stripped from the red buck, elk, or buffalo. He was fond of hanging about his person an infinity of non-sensical trappings; fangs of rattlesnakes, claws of hawks, feathers of eagles, bones of animals, scalps of enemies. He painted his face and body, specially when the passion of war was on him, with all manner of glaring and fantastic colors. So the Prophet of his nation taught him; so he would be terrible to his enemies; so he would exemplify the peculiarities of his nation and be unlike the Pale face. All the higher arts were wanting. Indian writing consisted only of quaint and half-intelligible hieroglyphics rudely scratched on the face of rocks or cut in the bark of trees. The artistic sense of the savage could rise no higher than a coarse necessity compelled the flight.

The language spoken by a people is always a matter of special interest and importance. The dialects of the North American races bear many and evident marks of resemblance among themselves; but little or no analogy to the languages of other nations. If there is any similarity at all, it is found between the Indian tongues and those spoken by the nomadic races of Asia. The vocabulary of the Red men was a very limited one. The principal objects of nature had special names, and actions were likewise specifically expressed. Abstract ideas but rarely found expression in any of the Indian languages; such ideas could only be expressed by a long and labored circumlocution. Words had a narrow but very intense meaning. There was, for instance, no general word signifying to hunt or to fish; but one word signified “to-kill-a-deer-with-an-arrow;” another, “to-take-fish-by-striking-the-ice.” In most of the dialects there was no word for brother; but “elder-brother” and “younger-brother” could be expressed. Among many of the tribes the meanings of words and phrases were so restricted that the warrior would use one set of terms and the squaw another to express the same ideas. The languages were monosyllabic; but many of the monosyllables might be combined to form compounds resembling the polysyllables of European tongues. These compounds, expressing abstract and difficult ideas, were sometimes inordinately long,² the whole forming an explanation or description of the thing rather than a single word. Scholars have applied the term agglutinative to those languages in which such labored and tedious forms of expression occur. Of this sort are the tongues spoken by the nomadic races of Asia.

 

Specimen of Indian Writing.

 

Translation: Eight soldiers (9), with muskets (10), commanded by a captain (1), and accompanied by a secretary (2), a geologist (3), three attendants (4, 5, 6), and two Indian guides, encamped here. They had three camp fires (13, 14, 15), and ate a turtle and a prairie hen (11, 12), for supper.

 

In personal appearance the Indians were strongly marked. In stature they were nearly all below the average of Europeans. The Esquimaux are rarely five feet high, but are generally thick-set and heavy. The Algonquins are taller and lighter in build; a straight and agile race, lean and swift of foot. Eyes jet-black and sunken; hair black and straight; beard black and scant; skin copper-colored, a reddish-black, cinnamon-hued, brown; high cheek bones; forehead and skull variable in shape and proportion; hands and feet small; body lithe but not strong; expression sinister, or rarely dignified and noble:—these are the well-known features and person of the Indian.

 

A North American Indian.³

 

Though generally sedate in manners and serious in behavior, the Red men at times gave themselves up to merry-making and hilarity. The dance was universal—not the social dance of civilized nations, but the dance of ceremony, of religion, and of war. Sometimes the warriors danced alone, but frequently the women joined in the wild exercise, circling around and around, chanting the weird, monotonous songs of the tribes. Many other amusements were common, such as running, leaping, wrestling, shooting at a mark, racing in canoes along swift rivers or placid lakes, playing at ball, or engaging in intricate and exciting games, performed with small stones resembling checkers or dice. To this latter sport was not unfrequently added the intoxication of gambling, in which the warriors, under the influence of their fierce passion, would often hazard and lose their entire possessions. In soberer moments, the Red men, never inclined to conversation, would sit in silence, communing each with his own thoughts or lost in a dream under the fascination of his pipe. The use of tobacco was universal and excessive; and after the introduction of intoxicating liquors by the Europeans the Indians fell into terrible drunkenness, only limited in its extent by the amount of spirits which they could procure. It is doubtful whether any other race has been so awfully degraded by drink.

Such is a brief sketch of the Red man—who was rather than is. The only hope of the perpetuity of his race seems now to center in the Choctaws, Cherokees, Creeks and Chickasaws of the Indian Territory. These nations, numbering in the aggregate about forty-eight thousand souls, have attained a considerable degree of civilization; and with just and liberal dealing on the part of the Government the outlook for the future is not discouraging. Most of the other Indian tribes seem to be rapidly approaching extinction. Right or wrong, such is the logic of events. Whether the Red man has been justly deprived of the ownership of the New World will remain a subject of debate; that he has been deprived, can be none. The Saxon has come. His conquering foot has trodden the vast domain from shore to shore. The weaker race has withered from his presence and sword. By the majestic rivers and in the depths of the solitary woods the feeble sons of the Bow and Arrow will be seen no more. Only their names remain on hill and stream and mountain. The Red man sinks and fails. His eyes are to the West. To the prairies and forests, the hunting-grounds of his ancestors, he says farewell. He is gone! The cypress and the hemlock sing his requiem.

 

PART II.

Voyage and Discovery.
A. D. 986-1607.

CHAPTER II.

The Icelanders and Norwegians in America.

The western continent was first seen by white men in A. D. 986. A Norse navigator by the name of Herjulfson, sailing from Iceland to Greenland, was caught in a storm and driven westward to Newfoundland or Labrador. Two or three times the shores were seen, but no landing was made or attempted. The coast was low, abounding in forests, and so different from the well-known cliffs of Greenland as to make it certain that another shore hitherto unknown was in sight. On reaching Greenland, Herjulfson and his companions told wonderful stories of the new lands seen in the west.

Fourteen years later, the actual discovery of America was made by Lief Erickson. This noted Icelandic captain, resolving to know the truth about the country which Herjulfson had seen, sailed west ward from Greenland, and in the spring of the year 1001 reached Labrador. Impelled by a spirit of adventure, he landed with his companions, and made explorations for a considerable distance along the coast. The country was milder and more attractive than his own, and he was in no haste to return. Southward he went as far as Massachusetts, where the daring company of Norsemen remained for more than a year. Rhode Island was also visited; and it is alleged that the hardy adventurers found their way into New York harbor.

What has once been done, whether by accident or design, may easily be done again. In the years that followed Lief Erickson’s discovery, other companies of Norsemen came to the shores of America. Thorwald, Lief’s brother, made a voyage to Maine and Massachusetts in 1002, and is said to have died at Fall River in the latter state. Then another brother, Thorstein by name, arrived with a band of followers in 1005; and in the year 1007, Thorfinn Karlsefne, the most distinguished mariner of his day, came with a crew of a hundred and fifty men, and made explorations along the coast of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and perhaps as far south as the capes of Virginia. Other companies of Icelanders and Norwegians visited the countries farther north, and planted colonies in Newfoundland and Nova Scotia. Little however, was known or imagined by these rude sailors of the extent of the country which they had discovered. They supposed that it was only a portion of Western Greenland, which, bending to the north around an arm of the ocean, had reappeared in the west. The settlements which were made, were feeble and soon broken up. Commerce was an impossibility in a country where there were only a few wretched savages with no disposition to buy and nothing at all to sell. The spirit of adventure was soon appeased, and the restless Northmen returned to their own country. To this undefined line of coast, now vaguely known to them, the Norse sailors gave the name of Vinland; and the old Icelandic chroniclers insist that it was a pleasant and beautiful country. As compared with their own mountainous and frozen island of the North, the coasts of New England may well have seemed delightful.

Norse Explorations.

The men who thus first visited the shores of the New World were a race of hardy adventurers, as lawless and restless as any that ever sailed the deep. Their mariners and soldiers penetrated every clime. The better parts of France and England fell under their dominion. All the monarchs of the latter country after William the Conqueror—himself the grandson of a sea-king—are descendants of the Norsemen. They were rovers of the sea; freebooters and pirates; warriors audacious and headstrong, wearing hoods surmounted with eagles’ wings and walruses’ tusks, mailed armor, and for robes the skins of polar bears. Woe to the people on whose defenceless coasts the sea-kings landed with sword and torch! Their wayward life and ferocious disposition are well portrayed in one of their own old ballads:

He scorns to rest ’neath the smoky rafter,

He plows with his boat the roaring deep;

The billows boil and the storm howls after—

But the tempest is only a thing of laughter,—

The sea-king loves it better than sleep!

During the twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth centuries occasional voyages continued to be made; and it is said that as late as A. D. 1347 a Norwegian ship visited Labrador and the north-eastern parts of the United States. The Norse remains which have been found at Newport, at Garnet Point, and several other places seem to point clearly t...

Table of contents

• Preface.
• Introduction
• PART I. Aboriginal America.
• CHAPTER I. The Red Men—Origin, Distribution, Character.
• PART II. Voyage and Discovery. A. D. 986-1607.
• CHAPTER III. Spanish Discoveries in America.
• CHAPTER IV. Spanish Discoveries in America.—Continued.
• CHAPTER V. The French in America.
• CHAPTER VI. English Discoveries and Settlements.
• CHAPTER VII. English Discoveries and Settlements.–Continued.
• CHAPTER VIII. Voyages and Settlements of the Dutch.
• PART III. Colonial History. A. D. 1607-1775.
• CHAPTER X. Virginia.–The Second Charter.
• CHAPTER XI. Virginia.–The Third Charter.
• CHAPTER XII. Virginia.—The Royal Government.
• CHAPTER XIII. Massachusetts.—Settlement.
• CHAPTER XIV. Massachusetts.—The Union.
• CHAPTER XV. Massachusetts—King Philip’s War.
• CHAPTER XVI. Massachusetts.–War and Witchraft.
• CHAPTER XVII. Massachusetts.—Wars of Anne and George.
• CHAPTER XVIII. New York.—Settlement.
• CHAPTER XIX. New York.—Administration of Stuyvesant.
• CHAPTER XX. New York Under the English.
• Colonial History.—Continued.
• CHAPTER XXII. Rhode Island.
• CHAPTER XXIII. New Hampshire.
• Colonial History.—Continued.
• Chapter XXV. Pennsylvania.
• Colonial History.—Continued.
• CHAPTER XXVII. North Carolina.
• CHAPTER XXVIII. South Carolina.
• CHAPTER XXIX. Georgia.
• Colonial History.—Continued.
• CHAPTER XXXI. Campaigns of Washington and Braddock.
• CHAPTER XXXII. Ruin of Acadia.
• CHAPTER XXXIII. Expeditions of Shirley and Johnson.
• CHAPTER XXXIV. Two Years of Disaster.
• CHAPTER XXXV. Two Years of Successes.
• CHAPTER XXXVI. Condition of the Colonies.
• PART IV. Revolution and Confederation. A. D. 1775-1789.
• CHAPTER XXXVIII. The Beginning.
• CHAPTER XXXIX. The Work of ’76.
• CHAPTER XL. Operations of ’77.
• CHAPTER XLI. France to the Rescue.
• CHAPTER XLII. Movements of ’79.
• CHAPTER XLIII. Reverses and Treason.
• CHAPTER XLIV. The End.
• CHAPTER XLV. Confederation and Union.
• PART V. National Period. A. D. 1789-1882.
• CHAPTER XLVI. Washington’s Administration, 1789-1797.
• CHAPTER XLVII. Adams’s Administration, 1797-1801.
• CHAPTER XLVIII. Jefferson’s Administration, 1801-1809.
• CHAPTER XLIX. Madison’s Administration, and War of 1812.
• CHAPTER L. War of 1812.—Continued.
• CHAPTER LI. The Campaigns of ’14.
• CHAPTER LII. Monroe’s Administration.
• CHAPTER LIII. Adams’s Administration, 1825-1829.
• CHAPTER LIV. Jackson’s Administration, 1829-1837.
• CHAPTER LV. Van Buren’s Administration, 1837-1841.
• CHAPTER LVI. Administrations of Harrison and Tyler, 1841-1845.
• CHAPTER LVII. Polk’s Administration, and the Mexican War, 1845-1849.
• CHAPTER LVIII. Administrations of Taylor and Fillmore, 1849-1853.
• CHAPTER LIX. Pierce’s Administration, 1853-1857.
• CHAPTER LX. Buchanan’s Administration, 1857-1861.
• CHAPTER LXI. Lincoln’s Administration, and the Civil War, 1861-1865.
• CHAPTER LXII. Causes.
• CHAPTER LXIII. First Year of the War.
• CHAPTER LXIV. Campaigns of ’62.
• CHAPTER LXV. The Work of ’63.
• CHAPTER LXVI. The Closing Conflicts.
• CHAPTER LXVII. Johnson's Administration, 1865-1869.
• CHAPTER LXVIII. Grant’s Administration, 1869-1877.
• CHAPTER LXIX. Hayes’s Administration, 1877-1881.
• CHAPTER LXX. Administrations of Garfield and Arthur.
• CHAPTER LXXI. Cleveland’s Administration, 1885–
• CHAPTER LXXII. Harrison’s Administration, 1889—
• CHAPTER LXXIII. Conclusion.
• APPENDIX A.
• Sir John Mandeville’s Argument on the Figure of the Earth.
• APPENDIX B.
• APPENDIX C.
• APPENDIX D.
• APPENDIX E.
• Amendments to the Constitution.
• APPENDIX F.
• APPENDIX G.
• PRONUNCIATION OF PROPER NAMES.