USA HISTORY

Detailed explanation-1: -Contents. The Freedmen’s Bureau, formally known as the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands, was established in 1865 by Congress to help millions of former black slaves and poor whites in the South in the aftermath of the Civil War.

Detailed explanation-2: -On March 3, 1865, Congress passed “An Act to establish a Bureau for the Relief of Freedmen and Refugees” to provide food, shelter, clothing, medical services, and land to displaced Southerners, including newly freed African Americans.

Detailed explanation-3: -Ulysses S Grant was the supreme Union general during the civil war and then later 18th President of the United States. Grant was instrumental in the battlefield defeat of the Confederacy and then as President worked to implement Reconstruction.

Detailed explanation-4: -The Freedmen’s Bureau provided assistance to tens of thousands of formerly enslaved people and impoverished whites in the Southern States and the District of Columbia in the years following the war. It helped freedpeople establish schools, purchase land, locate family members, and legalize marriages.

Detailed explanation-5: -Under-funded by Congress and opposed by President Andrew Johnson, the Bureau only operated between 1865 and 1872. The Freedmen’s Bureau plays a key role in the Museum’s Slavery and Freedom and Defending Freedom, Defining Freedom: The Era of Segregation, 1877-1968 exhibitions.