The Civil War and Reconstruction Era, 1845-1877

The Civil War and Reconstruction Era, 1845-1877 is David Blight's Spring 2008 course HIST 119, published on Open Yale Courses as 27 lectures of about 50 minutes. It moves from antebellum Southern and Northern societies and their opposing ideologies, through fugitive slaves and the Underground Railroad, the Mexican War, the Kansas-Nebraska Act, Dred Scott, John Brown and the election of 1860, into the war itself: strategy, Confederate ascendancy, the turning points of 1863, Lincoln and emancipation, the home fronts and why the Union won. The final third covers wartime and Radical Reconstruction, the impeachment crisis, Black Reconstruction in the South, the retreat from Reconstruction and the disputed election of 1876, ending with how the war has been remembered.

The syllabus lists the books read on campus and the papers and exams campus students wrote, which are not graded online. Each lecture is available as streaming or downloadable video, audio and a searchable transcript. Open Yale Courses is free, needs no registration and awards no certificate or credit.