The document outlines key events during the American Civil War and Reconstruction era from 1861 to 1877. It describes the formation of the Ku Klux Klan, Southern secession from the Union in 1861, the attack on Fort Sumter that started the Civil War, major battles like Antietam and Gettysburg, the Emancipation Proclamation freeing slaves, the Gettysburg Address, and the assassinations of Abraham Lincoln and the surrender at Appomattox Courthouse in 1865. It also summarizes the passage of amendments outlawing slavery and granting citizenship to freed slaves, acts related to Reconstruction, the impeachment of President Andrew Johnson, and the elections of Ulysses S. Grant and the Compromise of 1877 ending Reconstruction