Alexander Hamilton American Civil War Trivia American History 1 American History 2 American History 3 American History 4 American History 5 California Gold Rush Civil War Battles Daniel Boone Davey Crockett Declaration of Independence Lewis & Clark Expedition Mayflower Old Ironsides Revolutionary War Spanish-American War Bill of Rights Trivia
Civil War Trivia Questions With Answers
Trivia quiz with answers about the American Civil War
Civil War Trivia Questions With Answers
What was the American Civil War?
A: It was a war fought in the United States (U.S.) from 1861 to 1865.
Largely as a result of the long-standing controversy over the enslavement of black people, when did the war break out?
A: In April 1861, when secessionist forces attacked Fort Sumter in
South Carolina.
This occurred shortly after United States President
Abraham Lincoln was what?
A: Inaugurated.
The loyalists of the Union in the North proclaimed what?
A: Support for the Constitution.
They faced secessionists of the Confederate States in the South, who advocated for states' rights to do what?
A: Uphold slavery.
Among the 34 U.S. states in February 1861, how many Southern slave states individually declared their secession from the
country to form the Confederate States of
America?
A: Seven.
The Confederacy grew to include how many states?
A: Eleven, all of them slaveholding.
A: United States government, nor by any foreign country.
The states that remained loyal to the U.S. were known as what?
A: The Union.
The Union and Confederacy quickly raised volunteer and conscription armies that fought mostly where?
A: In the South.
Intense combat left 620,000 to 750,000 people dead, more than the number of U.S. military deaths in what?
A: All other wars combined.
Much of the South's infrastructure was destroyed, especially the what?
A: Transportation systems.
Most academic scholars identify what, as a central cause of the war?
A: Slavery.
In the 1850s, what was the central source of escalating political tension?
A: Slavery.
A: Slavery.
Many Southern leaders had threatened “what", if the Republican candidate, Lincoln, won the 1860 election?
A: Secession.
Most northern soldiers were largely indifferent on the subject of what?
A: Slavery.
Confederates fought the war largely to protect a southern society of which slavery was what?
A: An integral part.
Southern whites believed that the emancipation of slaves would destroy the South's economy, due to what?
A: The large amount of capital invested in slaves and fears of integrating the ex-slave black population.
Slavery was illegal in much of the North, having been outlawed when?
A: In the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
It was also fading in the border states and in Southern cities, but it was expanding where?
A: In the highly profitable cotton districts of the rural South and Southwest.
A: Secede at any time.
Northerners rejected that notion as opposed to the will of the Founding Fathers who said they were setting up a what?
A: A perpetual union.
Slave owners preferred what kind of labor?
A: Low-cost manual labor with no mechanization.
Northern manufacturing interests supported tariffs and protectionism while southern planters demanded what?
A: Free trade.
While the South moved towards a Southern nationalism, leaders in the North were also becoming more what?
A: Nationally minded.
The election of Lincoln caused the legislature of South Carolina to do what?
A: To call a state convention to consider secession.
The convention summoned unanimously voted to what?
A: Secede on December 20, 1860.
A: In January and February 1861.
The small U.S. Navy of 1861 was rapidly enlarged to what?
A: 6,000 officers and 45,000 men in 1865, with 671 vessels, having a tonnage of 510,396.
What was its mission was to what?
A: Blockade Confederate ports, take control of the river system, defend against Confederate raiders on the high seas, and be ready for a possible war with the British Royal Navy.
Meanwhile, the main riverine war was fought where?
A: In the West, where a series of major rivers gave access to the Confederate heartland.
The U.S. Navy eventually gained control of what rivers?
A: The Red, Tennessee, Cumberland, Mississippi, and Ohio rivers.
In the East, the Navy supplied and moved army forces about, and occasionally shelled what?
A: Confederate installations.
What happened to the Southern economy during the war?
A: It nearly collapsed.
Most historians agree that the blockade was a major factor in what?
A: Ruining the Confederate economy.
Practically, the entire Confederate cotton crop was useless (although it was sold to Union traders), costing the Confederacy it’s what?
A: Main source of income.
To fight an offensive war, the Confederacy purchased ships from Britain, converted them to warships, and did what?
A: Raided American merchant ships in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans .
