The Battle of Palmito Ranch was fought in Texas #OTD in 1865. The Confederate victory is widely considered the last battle of the Civil War. The battle occurred over one month after Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox and two days after Jefferson Davis was captured. Image
Both sides knew the war was virtually over, but a small contingent of Confederate forces refused to surrender near Brownsville, Texas. Many of the men serving under the Union Army there were members of the United States Colored Troops.
A fragile cease fire had been agreed to between the two sides on May 11. However, Confederate Lt. Gen. Edmund Smith of the Trans-Mississippi Department refused to accept the inevitable end of the war.
He ordered a small contingent of Confederate forces to block the Union capture of Brownsville. Although outnumbered, they managed to defeat Union forces at Palmetto Ranch.
However, the governors of Arkansas, Louisiana, Missouri, and Texas had negotiated a surrender while the battle took place, paving the way for official surrender. Union Private John J. Williams was the last man killed in the battle. Image

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More from @TheCivilWarDoc1

May 13
#OTD in 1862 Newton Knight reenlisted in the Confederate Army after being on furlough. He originally enlisted in July of 1861. He deserted in October of 1862 and headed home after he received word the Confederate Army had taken his family's horses for the war effort. Image
There is much debate and mystery surrounding Knight, his actions during and after the war, and what motivated him. However, Knight's life provides insight into conflicting ideas of race, class, and politics in Mississippi and the South writ large during the Civil War.
Knight was a yeoman farmer in Jones County, Mississippi when the war broke out. According to historian @vikki_bynum, only 12% of the county's population was Black and most whites were subsistence farmers like Knight.
Read 13 tweets
May 11
#OTD in 1916 a grand jury indicted Jesse Washington for the murder of Lucy Fryer near Waco, Texas. Fryer was brutally murdered in her home on May 8. The following thread recounts Washington's trial and lynching and contains disturbing details that might be triggering for some.
Washington was quickly arrested and charged with Fryer's death. He was 17 years old, illiterate, and mentally disabled. Furthermore, he was questioned without a lawyer or his parents present, despite the fact he was a minor. Washington initially claimed he was innocent.
Washington had been working for Fryer's family for only five months when she was murdered. He was found by authorities sitting on his family's front porch. His shirt was bloody, which he claimed was because of a nose bleed. Locals quickly labeled him as the perpetrator.
Read 24 tweets
May 9
John Brown was born #OTD in 1800 in Torrington, Conn. Brown was a militant abolitionist and rose to national prominence during Bleeding Kansas in the 1850s. He led a raid at Harper's Ferry, Virginia in 1859 in hopes of inciting a slave revolt that would destroy slavery itself.
As a boy his family moved to Ohio. His father started a successful tannery business. One of Brown's father's employees was U.S. Grant's father, Jessie Grant. John Brown was raised in an abolitionist family who offered aid to fugitive enslaved people on the Underground Railroad.
Brown later founded his own tannery business in Pennsylvania and also aided fugitive enslaved people in their quest for freedom. His abolitionist views became militant I during the early 1850s when he lived in Springfield, Massachusetts.
Read 15 tweets
May 4
#OTD in 1864 the House passed the Wade-Davis Reconstruction bill. The House version of the bill was written by Rep. Henry Davis of Maryland. By this time Congress attempted to preemptively take control of post-war policy, creating a rift with President Lincoln.
Lincoln issued the "Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction" on December 8, 1863. It required only 10 percent of a seceding state's population to take an oath of loyalty before a new state government could be formed. These states would also be required to abolish slavery.
Radical Republicans in Congress felt Lincoln's plan was too lenient and began crafting legislation of their own to address the issue. They asserted that Confederate states were not states, but conquered territory. Lincoln maintained that those states never legally seceded.
Read 8 tweets
May 3
Last night at the Met Gala, Sarah Jessica Parker wore a dress designed in homage to Elizabeth Hobbs Keckley. Keckley was the first Black female fashion designer to work in the White House. She was First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln's dressmaker. Here is a thread about her life. Image
Keckley was born an enslaved woman in Dinwiddie County, Virginia in February of 1818. As a child she worked with her mother as a house servant for Colonel Armistead Burwell and took care of his infant child. Burwell was also Keckley's biological father. Image
Keckley was routinely subject to severe physical punishment under the orders of Burwell's wife. Keckley remembered the first time she was whipped and wrote, "The blows were not administered with a light hand, I assure you, and doubtless the severity of the lashing has made..." Image
Read 17 tweets
May 2
#OTD in 1865 President Andrew Johnson put out a reward of $100,000 dollars (Approximately $2 million in today's money) for the capture of Confederate President Jefferson Davis. Davis and a small group of close advisors had fled Richmond in early April. Image
They initially fled to Danville, Virginia but had to quickly leave because the Union Army was hot on their tail. They arrived in the town of Washington, Georgia in Wilkes County of May 3rd. He held his last meeting the next day. Image
Davis reunited with his family on May 7th and they arrived in Abbeville on May 8th. During this time, it was believed by the United States Government that Davis played a role in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Image
Read 9 tweets

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