The Messiah: (various pages throughout): A classical music rendition of the story of Jesus Christ, written by composer George Frederic Handel and first performed for Easter on April 13, 1742, in Dublin, Ireland. Its first production in the United States occurred in 1856, and The Messiah rapidly gained popularity across the country throughout the 1850s and 1860s.

Jesse James (pg. 47): Jesse and his older brother Frank were born in Missouri and raised by their mother, after their father left for California in 1850 and died there when Frank and Jesse were still young. Jesse James and his brother Frank both fought on the Confederate side during the Civil War and participated in several battles as well as guerilla raids. After the war they became outlaws, especially famed for their train and bank robberies. Despite their crimes, the James brothers were also well-liked and glorified throughout the country. Jesse was only nineteen years old when he carried out his first bank robbery in early 1866. He was killed in 1882. Frank abandoned outlawing and turned to quiet pursuits such as selling shoes and starting horse races.

Thaddeus Stevens (pg. 47): Stevens was a lawyer in Gettysburg in the early years of the 1800s, where he was well known for hearing the cases of minorities such as blacks, Native Americans, Mormons, and Jews, which other judges wouldn’t accept. In the 1820s he entered politics as a Whig and became a strong advocate for the abolition of slavery. When the Whig party began to crumble, Thaddeus Stevens joined the newly formed Republicans, and was soon viewed as the leader of the most radical sector of the party that fought for the immediate and complete abolition of slavery throughout the entire country. He served in Congress during the Civil War, and when the war ended, he championed the cause of the newly freed slaves and led the impeachment effort against President Andrew Johnson. More at www.civilwar.org/education/history/biographies/Thaddeus-Stevens.html

Red Cloud (pg. 47): Red Cloud was a Sioux Indian chief from Nebraska. Beginning in 1865 when more settlers began crossing the Sioux lands on the way to Montana and the military presence increased along the new wagon trails, such as the Bozeman, Red Cloud led the Sioux against the settlers in Red Cloud’s War from 1866-1868. The Treaty of Fort Laramie was signed by Red Cloud and the United States in 1868, and the Sioux settled on a reservation. Red Cloud went to Washington, D.C. many times to work for peace and understanding until he died in 1909.

 The Hayfield Fight (pg. 68): The Hayfield Fight was one incident during Red Cloud’s War. Led by Chiefs Dull Knife and Two Moon, Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Sioux Indians attacked civilians and soldiers as they mowed hay at Fort C.F. Smith on the Bozeman Trail in the morning of August 1, 1867. This fort as well as several others, including Fort Reno and Fort Phil Kearney, had been built following the discovery of gold in Montana territory, and violated treaties that the United States government had previously signed with the Indian tribes of the area. Indian resistance to these forts forced the U.S. army to withdraw from them over the following year and return the land to the Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Sioux. A detailed account of Hayfield Fight, as well as a period map and photos of the area can be found at www.nps.gov/bica/historyculture/hayfield-fight.htm

The Impeachment Trial of President Andrew Johnson (pg. 114): Much of Congress had disapproved of President Johnson’s handling of Reconstruction in the Southern states following the Civil War. As he was from the South himself, he favored quickly readmitting these states back into the Union without changes to their laws or their leading politicians. This would have allowed conditions to return to nearly exactly what they had been before the war.  Johnson also vetoed many acts that would have improved the situation of the newly freed slaves, ranging from material aid to civil rights, as well as assistance to loyal white Southerners. The Republicans in Congress strongly opposed this and the smoldering hostility was brought to a head when Johnson broke Federal Law in the Tenure of Office Act by firing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. The impeachment trial began in March of 1868, and concluded in May of the same year when Senator Edmund G. Ross of Kansas cast the final vote against impeachment, causing the vote in favor of impeachment to be just short of the required two-thirds majority of Congress, and Johnson was acquitted. Read the actual newspaper reports from the trial at http://www.andrewjohnson.com/

President Ulysses S. Grant (pg. 165): As the General mainly responsible for winning the Civil War for the Union, Grant was the obvious choice for nomination by the Republican party after Johnson’s term expired. In the 1868 election campaign for president, Grant ran against the Democratic Governor of New York, Horatio Seymour. Grant and the Republican party supported continuing the Reconstruction in the South and securing black land ownership and voting rights. Seymour and the Democrats believed Reconstruction to be unconstitutional and would have removed the Federal troops from the Southern states and returned them to prewar conditions and leadership. Grant and his vice president, Schuyler Colfax, were elected by 52.7% of the vote. See details of the election at http://presidentialcampaignselectionsreference.wordpress.com/overviews/19th-century/1868-overview/

 Washita River Massacre (pg. 168-9): On November 27, 1868, Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer led a surprise attack against the winter encampment of the Southern Cheyenne Indians near present day Cheyenne, Oklahoma. The Medicine Lodge Treaty of the year before had failed to establish peace between the Indians and the settlers, and when Major General Philip Sheridan, who believed in a very harsh approach to Native Americans, was appointed as commander of the military Department of Missouri, he authorized a surprise attack at dawn on the Cheyenne camp. When the ambush ended, Custer’s forces had lost 22 soldiers killed, 15 captured, and 1 missing.  Custer reported that 103 Cheyennes had been killed, including their chief, Black Kettle, but the Cheyenne estimates were only 11 men killed and an unrecorded number of women and children, 53 of whom were also captured by the U.S. soldiers.