Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Tenure of Office Act, in U.S. history, measure passed on Mar. 2, 1867, by Congress over the veto of President Andrew Johnson; it forbade the President to remove any federal officeholder appointed by a...

(Encyclopedia) White, Richard Grant, 1821–85, American journalist, writer, and Shakespearean scholar, b. New York City. He had a varied career and was at different times music critic and coeditor (1851–59) of th...

(Encyclopedia) Vicksburg campaign, in the American Civil War, the fighting (Nov., 1862–July, 1863) for control of the Mississippi River. The Union wanted such control in order to split the Confederacy and to resto...

(Encyclopedia) Fuller, John Frederick Charles, 1878–1966, British soldier. In World War I, he recognized the importance of mechanized warfare and, as general staff officer of the tank corps, planned the stunning t...

(Encyclopedia) Stanton, Edwin McMasters, 1814–69, American statesman, b. Steubenville, Ohio. He was admitted to the Ohio bar in 1836 and began to practice law in Cadiz. As his reputation grew, he moved first to St...

(Encyclopedia) Halleck, Henry Wager, 1815–72, Union general in the American Civil War, b. Oneida co., N.Y., grad. West Point, 1839. He entered the Corps of Engineers and became an expert on fortifications; his Ele...

(Encyclopedia) Shiloh, battle of, Apr. 6–7, 1862, one of the great battles of the American Civil War. The battle took its name from Shiloh Church, a meetinghouse c.3 mi (5 km) SSW of Pittsburg Landing, which was a...

(Encyclopedia) Meade, George Gordon, 1815–72, Union general in the American Civil War, b. Cádiz, Spain. Graduated from West Point in 1835, he resigned from the army the next year and became a civil engineer. In 1...

(Encyclopedia) Fort Donelson dŏnˈəlsən [key], Confederate fortification in the Civil War, on the Cumberland River at Dover, Tenn., commanding the river approach to Nashville, Tenn. After capturing Fort Henry, on...

(Encyclopedia) Wilson, Henry, 1812–75, American politician, Vice President of the United States (1873–75), b. Farmington, N.H. At 21 he legally changed his name from Jeremiah Jones Colbath, and as Henry Wilson h...