S01E01 The Cause: 1861
Beginning with a searing indictment of slavery, this first episode dramatically evokes the causes of the war, from the Cotton Kingdom of the South to the northern abolitionists who opposed it. Here are the burning...
The Civil War
S01E05: The Universe of Battle: 1863
This episode opens with a dramatic account of the turning point of war: the Battle of Gettysburg, the greatest ever fought in the Western Hemisphere. For three days 150,000 men will fight to the death in the Pennsylvania countryside, culminating in Pickett's legendary charge. This extended episode then goes on to chronicle the fall of Vicksburg, the New York draft riots, the first use of black troops, and the western battles at Chickamauga, Georgia and Chattanooga, Tennessee. The episode closes with the dedication of a new Union cemetery at Gettysburg in November, where Abraham Lincoln struggles to put into words what is happening to his people.
Overview
A documentary on the American Civil War narrated by Ken Burns, covering the secession of the Confederacy to the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.
Episodes
S01E02 A Very Bloody Affair: 1862
1862 saw the birth of modern warfare and the transformation of Lincoln's war to preserve the Union into a war to emancipate the slaves. Episode Two begins with the political infighting that threatened to swamp...
S01E03 Forever Free: 1862
This episode charts the dramatic events that led to Lincoln's decision to set the slaves free. Convinced by July 1862 that emancipation was now morally and militarily crucial to the future of the Union, Lincoln...
S01E04 Simply Murder: 1863
The nightmarish Union disaster at Fredericksburg comes to two climaxes that spring: at Chancellorsville in May, where Lee wins his most brilliant victory but loses Stonewall Jackson; and at Vicksburg, where Grant's attempts to take...
S01E05 The Universe of Battle: 1863
This episode opens with a dramatic account of the turning point of war: the Battle of Gettysburg, the greatest ever fought in the Western Hemisphere. For three days 150,000 men will fight to the death...
S01E06 Valley of the Shadow of Death: 1864
Episode six begins with a biographical comparison of Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee and then chronicles the extraordinary series of battles that pitted the two generals against each other from the wilderness to...
S01E07 Most Hallowed Ground: 1864
The episode begins with the presidential election of 1864 that sets Abraham Lincoln against his old commanding general, George McClellan. The stakes are nothing less than the survival of the Union itself: with Grant and...
S01E08 War is All Hell: 1865
The episode begins with William Tecumseh Sherman's brilliant march to the sea, which brings the war to the heart of Georgia and the Carolinas and spells the end of the Confederacy. In March, following Lincoln's...
S01E09 The Better Angels of Our Nature: 1865
This extraordinary final episode of The Civil War begins in the bittersweet aftermath of Lee's surrender and then goes on to narrate the horrendous events of five days later when, on April 14, Lincoln is...
Cast
David McCullough
Narrator
Sam Waterston
Abraham Lincoln
Julie Harris
Mary Chestnut
Jason Robards
Ulysses S. Grant
Morgan Freeman
Frederick Douglass
Paul Roebling
Joshua Chamberlain
Garrison Keillor
Walt Whitman
George Black
Robert E. Lee
Arthur Miller
William Tecumseh Sherman
Christopher Murney
Elisha Hunt Rhodes
Charles McDowell
Samuel R. Watkins
Horton Foote
Jefferson Davis
