This week in the Civil War: March 1, 1865

Lincoln's second inaugural address

Astride the momentum of a string of Northern battlefield victories, Abraham Lincoln was sworn in this week 150 years ago to a second term as U.S. president. Lincoln's second inauguration opened on a damp, muddy day on March 4, 1865, in Washington, D.C. Where his oath four years earlier had been administered amid a growing, warlike atmosphere, his second swearing-in came as many sensed war was nearing an end with the North prevailing. Tens of thousands gathered as he delivered his second inaugural address on a day with sun breaking from the clouds. He spoke in stirring words of healing a nation long divided by war. And he delivered the oft-recalled phrase as he concluded his speech: "With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nations wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow, and his orphan — to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations."