Politicians

William McKinley was an enlisted man in the American Civil War who rose to become President of the United States in 1896, the fifth (and last) Civil War Veteran to hold the office.

US Senator from Ohio, Governor of Ohio, Treasury Secretary under President Lincoln, and sixth Chief Justice of the United States, Salmon P. Chase was one of the most prominent members of the new Republican Party, warned of the "Slave Power conspiracy" and created the slogan "Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men."

When Louisiana seceded from the Union, Benjamin resigned his Senate seat and was appointed Attorney General of the Confederacy by his close personal friend, Jefferson Davis. In September 1861 he was appointed Secretary of War, though ultimately had strong disagreements with President Davis over the conduct the war, and quarreled with generals P.G.T. Beauregard and "Stonewall" Jackson.

Governor Francis Pickens of South Carolina witnessed the secession of his state from the Union and directed South Carolina's militia to create a ring of fire around Fort Sumter before the creation of the Confederacy. His term ended in 1862. After the defeat of the Confederacy, Pickens proposed the motion at the constitutional convention for South Carolina to be readmitted into the Union.

Robert B. Rhett, newspaper publisher of the Charleston Mercury, advocated for secession in his paper before the American Civil War. A signer of South Carolina's Ordinance of Secession, he helped draft the Confederate States Constitution. A prominent figure in the secession movement, Rhett played a minor role in the Confederates States government, serving just one term in Congress.

Edwin M. Stanton was a prominent lawyer and US Attorney General before serving as Lincoln's controversial but effective Secretary of War.

Fernando Wood was a shipping magnate, nine-term Democratic Congressman and three-term Mayor of New York City in the middle part of the 19th century. He is best known for proposing that New York City secede from the Union and declare itself an open city in order to protect its lucrative cotton trade with the Confederacy.

Andrew G. Magrath, a jurist and governor of South Carolina in the last year of the Civil War, protected the interests of southern slaveholders as a federal judge and then famously resigned his judgeship on November 7, 1860 after Abraham Lincoln's election.

Christopher Memminger was a South Carolina politician and financial expert who helped draft his state's official justification for secession and the Confederate Constitution.

Andrew Johnson was a Tennessee politician and Vice President of the United States who ascended to the presidency in April 1865 upon the death of Abraham Lincoln. His benign approach to the reintegration of Southerners into the Union following the Civil War contributed to his impeachment in 1868, which failed in the Senate by a single vote.