The news delivered on the original Juneteenth freed enslaved people in Texas, but it also offered vague guidance on what they should do next.

As Juneteenth celebrations spread throughout the country, they sometimes went by different names and took place on different days.

Juneteenth celebrates the day that the last enslaved people were notified of the Emancipation Proclamation, 2 years after it was signed.

The origins and growth of the Juneteenth holiday

The American holiday of Juneteenth celebrates the emancipation of African American slaves, a process which unfolded over the four years of the Civil War and several months afterward. June 19 took on special significance as the day Union officials proclaimed slaves free in Texas in 1865, the last holdout after the Civil War ended. Roughly 4 million people were freed from slavery as a result of emancipation. Read this brief article summarizing the holiday's development.

Read the original handwritten General Order 3, the proclamation from the first Juneteenth that declared the end of slavery.

Despite the Juneteenth announcement that they were free, some enslaved people were still held captive.

Formerly enslaved people in Houston purchased a plot of land in Houston in 1872 so they could have a place to celebrate Juneteenth.

The Emancipation Proclamation shifted the purpose of the war for the Union

Issued on Jan. 1, 1863, the Emancipation Proclamation declared enslaved people in Confederate-held territory free, redefining the Union's cause from merely preserving the nation to abolishing slavery.

The Royal Governor of Virginia offered slaves their freedom if they escaped and fought for the British in the American Revolutionary War.

Support for slavery helped drive Texas to revolt against Mexico

Mexico abolished slavery in 1829, but many Anglo-American settlers in Texas brought enslaved people and refused to comply. Their desire to preserve slavery was a major factor in Texas’s 1836 rebellion and independence from Mexico.

A Mexican village celebrates Juneteenth, honoring its past as a refuge for thousands of Black people who'd escaped slavery in Texas.

Read Truth's account of escaping slavery in 1826

After her enslaver broke his promise to free her, Truth left before dawn, carrying her infant daughter and a bundle of clothes. She later found refuge with the Van Wagener family, who paid her master $20 for her freedom and $5 for her infant daughter.

Most Confederate soldiers and leaders after the Civil War were pardoned

After surrender, most Confederate soldiers were pardoned and returned home, while leaders like Jefferson Davis faced short imprisonment. The South came under military occupation, Confederate money became worthless, and many former officers were barred from public office.

The story of Opal Lee, 'grandmother' of Juneteenth

Opal Lee, an activist from Texas, is considered one of the major reasons Juneteenth is now an official federal US holiday. In 2016, Lee walked from Fort Worth, Texas, all the way to Washington, DC, to garner support for the cause of making the day an official national holiday. Read about her experience and victory in this brief overview of her role in the creation of the holiday.

Read an annotated 1866 essay by abolitionist Frederick Douglass, where he laid out his vision for reshaping America after the Civil War.

The 13th Amendment's criminal exception enabled new forms of forced labor

Southern states exploited the amendment's clause allowing slavery "as punishment for crime" to arrest thousands of Black Americans on minor charges, leasing them to private employers through convict labor systems that persisted for decades.

Learn how Mexico’s anti-slavery stance shaped the US–Texas conflict

Historian Alice Baumgartner explores how Mexico’s abolition of slavery clashed with Anglo settlers' ambitions in Texas. The episode reveals how enslaved people fled south to freedom, reshaping the politics that led to Texas independence and the Mexican-American War.

The Freedmen's Bureau was created to assist formerly enslaved people after the Civil War

Created in 1865, the Freedmen's Bureau aided 4 million formerly enslaved people and some poor Southern whites—distributing food; mediating labor disputes; and founding thousands of schools, including HBCUs Howard, Fisk, and Morehouse. Despite major achievements, the bureau was dissolved in 1872.

Red foods are often featured in Juneteenth celebrations, which some scholars say is symbolic of enslaved people's bloodshed.

Southern Black Codes sought to preserve prewar racial labor structures

With little federal oversight, Southern states enacted laws effectively reestablishing slavery's economic and social order. These laws, known as the "Black Codes," restricted freed people's movement, labor, and property rights.

The Reconstruction Amendments aimed to rebuild the nation and secure freedom after slavery

Ratified between 1865 and 1870 after the conclusion of the war, the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments abolished slavery, guaranteed citizenship and equal protection, and extended voting rights to Black men—transforming the Constitution's definition of liberty and equality.

Lincoln's original reconstruction vision prioritized reconciliation

Proposed in 1863, Lincoln's Ten Percent Plan offered lenient readmission for Southern states once 10% of voters pledged loyalty and ended slavery. It was adopted in a few Union-occupied areas but was only partially implemented before his assassination in 1865.

The 13th Amendment permanently abolished slavery in the United States

Ratified in December 1865, the 13th Amendment outlawed slavery nationwide except as punishment for a crime. Southern states were required to ratify it under President Andrew Johnson's initial Reconstruction plan before regaining representation, though Congress later imposed stricter conditions.

What's the role of forced prison labor in a land where slavery is illegal?

Companies across the South profited off the forced labor of people in prison after the Civil War. This hourlong investigative podcast episode explores the role forced (and often unpaid) prison labor has played in the US since slavery was abolished.

Later in life, Washington privately grew critical of slavery—while continuing to uphold it publicly

His private letters increasingly described slavery as unjust and incompatible with Republican ideals, and his final will ordered the eventual emancipation of those he legally owned. At the same time, he enforced slave labor, signed pro-slavery laws, and took no public action to dismantle the system.

One grandmother walked from Texas to Washington, DC, to garner support for making Juneteenth a federal holiday.

Listen to firsthand accounts of how Black Americans fought to end slavery and shape Reconstruction

This podcast explores the actions of Black Americans who fought for freedom before, during, and after the Civil War—highlighting their key role in abolition and the Reconstruction era.

Robert Smalls escaped slavery by piloting a stolen Confederate ship to freedom, then became an influential Black political leader during Reconstruction.

Congress's Wade-Davis Bill demanded harsher terms for Southern reentry

Passed in 1864, the Wade-Davis Bill required 50% of white male voters to swear loyalty and guarantee emancipation before readmission. Lincoln pocket-vetoed it, rejecting Congress's stricter approach.

The southbound Underground Railroad: finding freedom in Mexico

Until recently, the southbound Underground Railroad, as some scholars call it, has been largely overlooked, mainly because it left so few traces in surviving records. Read this article to learn more about this dangerous path and its travelers.

Hear the story of the largest single escape attempt by enslaved people in American history

On April 15, 1848, 77 enslaved individuals in Washington, DC, boarded a ship named the Pearl in the largest single escape attempt in US history. Their capture led to riots and intensified the conflict over fugitive slave laws.

The NAACP encouraged and accommodated the early Harlem Renaissance

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, a civil rights organization better known as the NAACP, recognized the disenchantment Black soldiers who served in World War I experienced when returning home to a segregated country and began advancing, and, in many ways, funding a "New Negro Movement," which would lead to the Harlem Renaissance.

One of the earliest Memorial Day ceremonies was held by newly freed Black Americans in South Carolina

On May 1, 1865, roughly 10,000 people, mostly freed slaves, paraded around a Charleston racetrack where Union prisoners had been buried, predating the first national commemoration at Arlington National Cemetery by three years.

What was life like as a slave in the US?

Over 2,500 former slaves were interviewed by writers and journalists in the late 1930s as part of the US Federal Writer's Project. The collection recorded images and firsthand verbal accounts of life as a slave, eight of which are highlighted in this article at the Library of Congress. See the humanity in each of these individuals with their firsthand accounts.

After emancipation, many slaves went from working for free to working for tips.

That time General Ulysses Grant barred Jewish residents from the war zone

In 1862, General Ulysses S. Grant issued an order that banned all "Israelites" (meaning Jews) from a military zone consisting of parts of Tennessee, Kentucky, and Mississippi. After much outcry, the order was rescinded by President Abraham Lincoln and Grant feebly explained it was a misunderstanding. Learn more about this odd bit of history here,

Hear how the world reacted to the American Civil War

European nations closely watched the Civil War for its economic and political consequences. Some European nations quietly engaged diplomatically with the Confederacy but withheld recognition. When the Union made slavery's abolition a central cause, European public opinion turned sharply against the South.

The South was placed under federal military rule during Reconstruction

Beginning in 1867, the Reconstruction Acts divided 10 former Confederate states into five military districts, each governed by a Union general. Federal troops supervised elections, enforced civil rights, and maintained order under direct congressional authority.

Ulysses S. Grant's leadership proved decisive in victory—and shaped postwar America

Elevated to general-in-chief in 1864, Ulysses S. Grant unified the Union strategy and forced a Confederate surrender at Appomattox. Elected president in 1868, he worked to enforce Reconstruction laws and protect the civil rights of freed African Americans.

Slavery in the US: a timeline

In 1619, a ship with 20 captives landed at Point Comfort in Virginia, ushering in the era of American slavery. Scroll through this timeline to learn more about slavery in the US and its long lasting effects.

In the midst of the Civil War, Lincoln rapidly expanded presidential power

Abraham Lincoln suspended habeas corpus, expanded the army without congressional approval, and issued the Emancipation Proclamation—despite likely lacking authority to unilaterally alter national slave law. His actions set precedents for expanded presidential power in wartime.

Whitman's view on slavery was informed by a trip to New Orleans

In 1848, Walt Whitman traveled with his brother to New Orleans to pursue a job opportunity at the Daily Crescent newspaper. While there, he witnessed firsthand the horrors of the slave trade, an experience that would inform the political and artistic projects that followed.

Radical Reconstruction began in response to the lenient policies of Andrew Johnson

In 1867, Congress passed the Reconstruction Acts—overriding Johnson's vetoes—placing the South under military rule and requiring new state constitutions, Black male suffrage, and ratification of the 14th Amendment before readmission.

John Marshall owned enslaved people and ruled against them in slavery cases

Though Marshall wrote that slavery was "contrary to the law of nature," he enslaved nearly 200 people at his death in 1835 and ruled against enslaved claimants in several cases. His will offered conditional emancipation to Robin Spurlock, his first slave.

Nineteenth-century, hand-drawn infographics on US slavery and race

In the second half of the 19th century, researchers studying the behavior of the millions of emancipated Americans after the Civil War used "information graphics" to cut through the noise of racially charged debate. In this collection from Stanford, you can see century-old, stunningly hand-drawn data visualizations showing racial demographics, the effects of emancipation on cotton prices, and more.

Hamilton opposed slavery in principle but participated in the institution

Alexander Hamilton spoke against slavery, helped found the New York Manumission Society, and supported gradual emancipation while also participating in transactions involving enslaved people through his in-laws—and possibly within his own household, though historians debate this.

More than 2,000 Black Americans were victims of racial terror lynchings from 1865 to 1876

The Equal Justice Initiative documented over 2,000 lynchings of Black people during Reconstruction—violence that attempted to restore white supremacy, suppress Black political power, and terrorize communities in the aftermath of emancipation.

Whitman's antislavery writing often focused on white Americans

The poet was openly opposed to slavery, though some of his writing focuses on abolition’s benefits for white people rather than for the lives of the enslaved.

The 14th Amendment aimed to guarantee citizenship for formerly enslaved people

The 14th Amendment was crafted to overturn Dred Scott by granting birthright citizenship to formerly enslaved people and their descendants, securing their legal status under federal law.

According to Confederate leaders, the defense of slavery was the primary reason for secession.

Mississippi didn't officially ratify the Thirteenth Amendment banning slavery until 2013, nearly 150 years after it passed.