Juneteenth !! Ancestors Rejoice !
For those unfamiliar with its history, June 19, 1865, commonly referred to as Juneteenth, is the date that the Union Army’s Major General Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston, Texas and announced the end of both the Civil War and slavery. The declaration came almost two and a half years after President Abraham Lincoln announced the Emancipation Proclamation, which freed all slaves in the Confederacy. The two and a half year delay was due, in part, to the fact that Texas was the western most slave-holding state and saw only limited battles and Union troops. This meant that few slaves in Texas were aware of President Lincoln’s declaration, as well as their freedom. Subsequently, legal freedom for all enslaved people in the United States came with the end of the Civil War and the passage of the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
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