About the lecture

In this module, we follow events as we move towards the outbreak of the American Civil War (1861-65), focusing in particular on the discovery of gold in California, sparking the California Gold Rush, the election of Lincoln in 1860, and the involvement of several Native American communities in the Civil War, which led to events such as the Sand Creek Massacre in 1864.

About the lecturer

Kevin Waite is an assistant professor in American history at Durham University, where he teaches and writes on slavery, imperialism, and the American West. His book-in-progress explores how slaveholders extended their political dominion across the American West in the mid-19th century, and in the process, hastened the coming of the Civil War. His scholarly articles and book chapters have covered a wide range of subjects: manliness in Napoleonic-era English public schools; the political struggle over America’s first transcontinental railroad; the evolving myth of George Armstrong Custer in Hollywood film; and the Civil War in Indian Territory.