Vox: 37 Maps That Explain the American Civil War

April 1865 was a momentous month in American history. On April 9, the Confederate army under Robert E. Lee surrendered to the Union forces of Ulysses S. Grant, effectively ending the Civil War. Then on April 14, the victorious President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. The Civil War is often called the Second American Revolution. It ended the scourge of slavery while boosting the relative economic power of the North over the South. Here are 37 maps that explain the origins of the war, why the North won, and how the war transformed the United States of America.