Sunday · September 27, 2026
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The events of September 2 · Read the full edition → · More from September 2 →
18621776 Club

Lincoln, out of options, hands the beaten army back to McClellan

The general he sidelined months earlier is now the only man Washington trusts to hold the line.

Washington was in a panic: Confederate troops stood within marching distance of the capital. John Pope's army had just been broken at the Second Battle of Bull Run, and Confederate troops stood within marching distance of the capital. On September 2, 1862, Abraham Lincoln reluctantly restored George B. McClellan, the general he had removed from top command only weeks before, giving him charge of the city's defenses and the demoralized Union forces. The two men trusted each other very little, but Lincoln had run out of alternatives…

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More from September 2
1945

Aboard the Missouri in Tokyo Bay, Japan signs its surrender; the war is over

Foreign Minister Shigemitsu puts his name to the document at dawn; the Japanese delegation is gone within the hour.
1901

Roosevelt tells a Minnesota crowd: speak softly and carry a big stick

The vice president frames his foreign policy as an old proverb, twelve days before he became president.
1864

Atlanta falls: Mayor Calhoun rides out under a flag of truce and gives up the city

Mayor James Calhoun hands over the city hours after Confederate forces torch what they cannot carry away.
17891776 Club
The act names a Secretary, Comptroller, Auditor, Treasurer, and Register, before anyone knows who will fill the top chair.
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More from Civil War & Reconstruction
1868

Logan names May 30 a national day to decorate soldiers' graves; the order goes to every post in the Union

General Order No. 11 puts the commander-in-chief of the Grand Army of the Republic behind a practice Southern women began two years ago.
1862

Seward and Lyons sign a treaty giving both navies the right to search and seize slave ships

The Senate ratifies unanimously the same day, ending half a century of U.S. resistance to British calls for mutual search rights on African and Cuban waters.
1861

Tennessee votes to leave the Union; the eleventh state is also the last

Middle Tennessee swings from 51 percent against secession in February to 88 percent in favor today, providing the decisive margin, though East Tennessee refuses to accept the result.
1863

Pleasonton crosses the Rappahannock at dawn; Stuart's cavalry fights all day to hold Fleetwood Hill

Eleven thousand Union horsemen hit the Confederate camps from two directions at once, and though the Federals withdraw by nightfall, the aura of easy Southern dominance on horseback does not survive the day.
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