Dates by Year
Major Events
- Jan 4 New York Stock Exchange opens its first permanent headquarters at 10-12 Broad Street, near Wall Street, in New York City
- Jan 31 Congress passes, by a vote of 121-24, the 13th Amendment to the US Constitution, abolishing slavery in the United States except as punishment for a crime[1][2]
- Feb 4Robert E. Lee is named general-in-chief of Confederate forces
- Feb 6 GeneralRobert E. Lee is appointed General-in-Chief of the Confederate Armies during the US Civil War
- Feb 17 Union forces led byWilliam T. Sherman capture the state capital of Columbia, South Carolina. Thecity is ablaze by nightfall, fanned by high winds devastating much of the city. It is not known which side started the fires.
- Apr 9 Confederate GeneralRobert E. Lee and 26,765 troops surrender at Appomattox Court House to U.S. Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant, ending the Civil War in Northern Virginia
- Apr 14 US PresidentAbraham Lincoln isshot in the head byJohn Wilkes Booth at Ford's Theatre in Washington; he dies a day later
- Apr 27 Steamboat "SS Sultana" explodes in the Mississippi River, killing up to 1,800 of the 2,427 passengers in the greatest maritime disaster in United States history; most are paroled Union POWs on their way home.
- May 9 PresidentAndrew Johnson issues a proclamation declaring that armed resistance in the South is virtually at an end, the commonly accepted end date of the American Civil War
- Jun 19 Union GeneralGordon Granger declares slaves free in Texas, now the date the end of slavery is celebrated across the US asJuneteenth
- Jun 22 The CSS Shenandoah fires the last shot of the American Civil War in the Bering Strait to indicate surrender
- Jul 2 One-time Methodist Reform Church ministerWilliam Booth and his wifeCatherine Booth found the East London Christian Mission, now known as TheSalvation Army
- Jul 5 US Secret Service begins operating under the Treasury Department
- Nov 26 "Alice in Wonderland" byLewis Carroll is published in America
- Dec 6 13th Amendment of the United States Constitution is ratified, abolishing slavery except as a punishment for crime where the party has been duly convicted[1]
1865 in Music
- Jun 10Richard Wagner's opera "Tristan und Isolde" (Tristan and Isolde) premieres in Munich, Germany
- Dec 17Franz Schubert's Symphony No. 8, "Unfinished Symphony", premieres in Vienna with Johann von Herbeck conducting
Did You Know?
CSS Shenandoah is the last Confederate combat unit to surrender in the American Civil War after circumnavigating the globe on a cruise that sinks or captures 38 vessels
More People Born in 1865
More 1865 Deaths
Articles About 1865
John Wilkes Booth at Lincoln's Inauguration
A photo of Abraham Lincoln's second inauguration in 1865, highlighting the location of his eventual assassin John Wilkes Booth as Lincoln makes his speechMarch 4
America’s Civil War Comes Home To Roost
On this day a surrender agreement ending the American Civil War was signed in the house of a man who had been driven out of his first home by the hostilities.April 9
Abraham Lincoln's Deathbed
The bed on which Abraham Lincoln died hours after being shot by John Wilkes Booth, taken shortly after Lincoln's body was removedApril 15
Execution of Lincoln's Assassins
Mary Surratt, Lewis Powell, David Herold, and George Atzerodt are hanged for their part in the assassination of Abraham LincolnJuly 7
Women And Politics: The Passions of Palmerston
Queen Victoria had an intense dislike for her Prime Minister Lord Palmerston. But other women took a quite different view of the man dubbed ‘Lord Cupid’.October 18
Famous Weddings in 1865
- Jan 16 Confederate Brigadier-General John Pegram marries Hetty Cary (US Civil War)
- Sep 27 PhysicistJohannes van der Waals (27) weds Anna Magdalena Smit (18)
Andrew Johnson
