Second Friday Lecture Series

Friday, May 12: Vicksburg After the Fall

Speaker: Gene Eric Salecker

With the capture of Vicksburg in July 1863, the Bluff City became a Union citadel within the Confederacy, accessible only via the Mississippi River. Turned into a major Union supply base, Vicksburg was the main starting point for a number of Union expeditions or raids throughout the rest of the war. At the same time, the city became a haven for thousands of liberated enslaved people. And at the very end of the war, Vicksburg became a way station for Union ex-prisoners-of-war being sent back home from Andersonville and other Confederate prisons. On May 12, you will hear “the rest of the story” concerning the city Abraham Lincoln famously called “the Key” to the Confederacy.