large majority--104,913 to 47,238--on June 8, 1861. In the mountainous eastern part of the state, however, where few people owned slaves, voters opposed secession by a margin of two to one. President Lincoln's successor, Andrew Johnson, a Southern Democrat who broke with his party over the issue of secession, hailed from eastern Tennessee. In May 1862, President Abraham Lincoln appointed Johnson as military governor of federally-controlled Tennessee. Two years later, Johnson was selected as Lincoln's running mate.
A border state, Tennessee sent some of her sons into battle wearing the Confederate gray while others donned the Union blue. During the Civil War, important military engagements took place at Chattanooga and Nashville.
After the Civil War, delegates from across the state met in Nashville to shape a new constitution for Tennessee. To read more about this process see the Journal of the Proceedings of the Convention of Delegates Elected by the People of Tennessee, to Amend, Revise, or Form and Make a New Constitution, for the State which may be found by searching on the term Tennessee constitution in the collection Nineteenth Century in Print: Books. The new constitution was adopted on February 23, 1870.
To learn more about Tennessee before and after the war:
- Search on Tennessee in Civil War Photographs, 1861-1865 to locate more images of Civil War Tennessee. See, for example, Men Repairing a Single-Track Railroad after the Battle of Stone's River somewhere in the vicinity of Murfreesboro, Tennessee.
- See the Today in History features on Fisk University, W.C. Handy's "Memphis Blues," and Tennessee-born educator and activist Mary Church Terrell.
- View images of nature in Tennessee's Great Smokey Mountains by searching the collection American Environmental Photographs, 1891-1936 on the term Tennessee. See, for example Hemlock and Rhododendron at Norton Creek, or a Mill Dam and Mill at Roaring Fork near Gatlinburg.
