Fort Sumter
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Fort Sumter is an incomplete sea fort at the mouth of Charleston Harbor, South Carolina, where the battle that sparked the American Civil War took place. Built on an artificial island in 1829 in respo
View from north in 2009
Fort Sumter was photographed in 1861 when it was still intact.
Letter from William H. Seward advising President Lincoln on the obstacles in resupplying Fort Sumter, March 1861
Major Anderson and His Officers prior to Bombardment of Ft Sumpter 1861
James Buchanan
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James Buchanan Jr. was the 15th president of the United States, serving from 1857 to 1861. A northern Democrat, he sought to resolve the sectional crisis through a pro-slavery interpretation of the U.
Fort Sumter
…militia. The fort was not yet complete and less than half of the cannon that should have been available were in place, due to military cuts by President James Buchanan. In a letter delivered January 31, 1861, South Carolina Governor Pickens demanded of President Buchanan that he surrender Fort Sumter because "I regard…
Daguerreotype of Buchanan, c. 1850–1868
Buchanan's birthplace
1834 portrait of Buchanan at age 42–43 by Jacob Eichholtz
Bust of James Buchanan by Henry Dexter at the National Portrait Gallery