{"id":227824,"date":"2024-06-13T17:21:31","date_gmt":"2024-06-13T17:21:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newhampshiredigitalnews.com\/index.php\/2024\/06\/13\/the-first-commemoration-of-abolition-pieces-of-history\/"},"modified":"2024-06-13T17:21:31","modified_gmt":"2024-06-13T17:21:31","slug":"the-first-commemoration-of-abolition-pieces-of-history","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newhampshiredigitalnews.com\/index.php\/2024\/06\/13\/the-first-commemoration-of-abolition-pieces-of-history\/","title":{"rendered":"The First Commemoration of Abolition \u2013 Pieces of History"},"content":{"rendered":"


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June 19th, or \u201cJuneteenth<\/a>,\u201d is the oldest known celebration commemorating the end of slavery in the United States. Today\u2019s post, looking at the history of the federal holiday, comes from Saba Samy, an intern at the National Archives in Washington, DC.<\/em><\/p>\n

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President Lincoln on the Battlefield, Maryland, Antietam, 1862. (National Archives Identifier 533297<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n

On September 17, 1862, the United States Civil War reached a gruesome peak with the Battle of Antietam near Sharpsburg, Maryland. This battle is the bloodiest single day in U.S. military history. However, the day symbolized a Union victory as it momentarily stopped Confederate General Robert E. Lee\u2019s invasion of the north.\u00a0<\/p>\n

This victory provided President Abraham Lincoln with the opportunity to issue a Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation on September 22, 1862. President Lincoln\u2019s proclamation said that on the first day of January, \u201call persons held as slaves within any State, or designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, first page, September 22, 1862. (National Archives Identifier 350916735<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, last page, September 22, 1862. (National Archives Identifier 350916735<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n

One hundred days later, on January 1, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln issued the final Emancipation Proclamation<\/a>. Despite the Proclamation\u2019s expansive and revolutionary wording, in reality the effect was limited. The freedom that it promised was dependent on a Union victory, and it only applied in the Confederate states. This left more than half a million men, women, and children enslaved in parts of the South already under Northern control and in border states loyal to the Union.<\/p>\n

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Facsimile of the Emancipation Proclamation. (National Archives Identifier 6923829<\/a>)
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Nevertheless, the wartime measure promised freedom that fundamentally transformed the character of the war. It strengthened the Union both militarily and politically and is a milestone along the road to slavery\u2019s abolition.<\/p>\n

Even though the Union won the war when the South surrendered at the Appomattox Court House in Virginia on April 9, 1865, in reality the end of the conflict was disorganized. Across the South and West, Confederate forces still remained active as it took time for word about General Lee\u2019s surrender to reach them. One of the last locations to finally receive the news was in Galveston, Texas, where General Edmund Kirby surrendered on June 2, 1865.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While the Civil War was coming to an end, the Thirteenth Amendment abolishing slavery was in the process of ratification. On January 31, 1865, two-thirds of Congress had approved the joint resolution, with President Lincoln symbolically approving on February 1. However, it took until the end of the year for three-fourths of the states to finally ratified it.<\/p>\n

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Joint Resolution Proposing the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, 1\/31\/1865. (National Archives Identifier 1408764<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n

During this interim, on June 19, 1865, U.S. Major General Gordon Granger issued General Order 3, which informed the people of Texas that all enslaved persons in the state were now free. This day has come to be known as \u2018Juneteenth,\u2019 a combination of \u2018June\u2019 and \u201819th,\u2019 and is the oldest known celebration commemorating the end of slavery in the U.S.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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General Order 3, June 19, 1865. (National Archives Identifier 182778372<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n

It was from General Order 3, the Juneteenth holiday was born<\/a>. Since then, commemoration for the historical date has spread from Texas to states across the nation. Juneteenth became an officially observed federal holiday after President Joe Biden signed a bill into law on June 17, 2021.<\/p>\n

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President Joe Biden, joined by Vice President Kamala Harris, lawmakers and guests, signs the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act on June 17, 2021, in the East Room of the White House. (Official White House Photo by Chandler West<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n

Although the full privileges of freedom were not immediately available to everyone, the Emancipation Proclamation and General Order No. 3 serve as key moments in the history of abolition in the U.S. These documents demonstrate the progress in the continuous path toward a more perfect union and the efforts to fulfill the promises of our founding documents.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The National Archives in Washington, DC, will display the Emancipation Proclamation and \u2018Juneteenth\u2019 General Order No. 3 from Tuesday, June 18, through Thursday, June 20, 2024<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Visit the <\/em>National Archives website<\/em><\/a> to learn more about our resources and events related to Juneteenth and African American history.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n


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June 19th, or \u201cJuneteenth,\u201d is the oldest known celebration commemorating the end of slavery in the United States. Today\u2019s post, looking at the history of<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":227825,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[182],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-227824","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-history"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newhampshiredigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/227824","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newhampshiredigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newhampshiredigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newhampshiredigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newhampshiredigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=227824"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newhampshiredigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/227824\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newhampshiredigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/227825"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newhampshiredigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=227824"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newhampshiredigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=227824"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newhampshiredigitalnews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=227824"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}