General Granger and Emancipation

General Granger and Emancipation. . In early 1863 President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation. Also that year U.S. Gen. Gordon Granger and several thousand Union troops were stationed in and around Franklin. That spring those troops, with the help of some escaped slaves, constructed a formidable earthen fort that overlooked the town and protected the route of the Nashville and Decatur Railroad. It became known as Fort Granger. By the summer of 1863 as the military front pushed south, Union troops abandoned the fort but later returned. Fort Granger was the location of Federal artillery that shelled Confederate troops during the Battle of Franklin on November 30, 1864. Much of the original walls remain as they were over 150 years ago., By June 1865, Gen. Granger was stationed at Galveston, Texas. On June 19 he signed an order that notified everyone in the state that “all slaves are free.” The Emancipation Proclamation had been released two and a half years earlier and ratification of the 13th Amendment was underway by the time Granger signed his order. Nonetheless, news of emancipation had not spread uniformly and in many cases the enslaved had never been told the news. Granger's order broke the wall of silence for countless people who longed for freedom., The celebration known as Juneteenth was thus born. African Americans have celebrated this special event since 1866, and at long last hundreds of other American communities annually acknowledge Juneteenth and its important step forward for American democracy., Captions , (bottom left) Excerpt from the Emancipation Proclamation Courtesy National Archives , (top right) “Emancipation” illustrated print by Thomas Nast depicting life before and after emancipation. Originally printed in Harper's Weekly on January 24, 1863. Courtesy Library of Congress