What was the most significant event on May 6 during the U.S. Civil War?

1861: Tennessee votes 66-25 to secede from the Union, to be ratified by a public referendum on June 8.
1863: Clement Vallandigham, arrested for disloyalty and interfering with the Draft, now a prisoner in a Federal military prison in Cincinnati, Ohio sends a letter out to be published: To the Democracy of Ohio: I am here in a military bastile for no other offense than my political opinions, and the defence of them, and of the rights of the people, and of your constitutional liberties. Speeches made in the hearing of thousands of you in denunciation of the usurpations of power, infraction of the Constitution and laws, and of military despotism, were the sole cause of my arrest and imprisonment. I am a Democrat – for Constitution, for law, for the Union, for liberty – this is my only "crime." For no disobedience to the Constitution: for no violation of law; for no word, sigh, or gesture of sympathy with the men of the South who are for disunion and southern independence, but in obedience to their demand, as well as the demand of northern abolition disunionists and traitors, I am here in bonds to-day; but "Time, at last, sets all things even!"
Pictures: 1862 Jackson Shenandoah Valley map; 1864 0500 Wilderness May 6-2 Hancock attacks A.P. Hill; 1864_0600 -1000 Wilderness May 6-3 Longstreet's Counterattack, 0600; 1864 1400 - 1800 Wilderness May
Since RallyPoint truncates survey selection text I am posting events that were not included and then the full text of each survey choice below:
A. Monday, May 6, 1861: Arkansas votes 69 to 1 to secede from the Union. (Apparently, this was made possible by threatening scores of pro-Union delegates with violence not to come. Many who showed up anyway were denied entrance.)
B. Tuesday, May 6, 1862 Shenandoah Campaign: CSA Gen Stonewall Jackson’s move takes an interesting twist: rather than march directly west across the valley, he leaves his camp near Swift Run Gap with his 8,000 men and marched south to the town of Port Republic---and then across the Blue Ridge, as if headed toward Richmond. At Mechum’s Station on the Virginia Central Railroad, he puts his troops on trains, and runs them back west to the town of Staunton, where he joins up with Gen. Allegheny Johnson’s brigade of 3,600. At the same time, Maj. Gen. Richard Ewell, and his division of 8,000 men cross the Blue Ridge from the east side and camp at Jackson’s old spot at Conrad’s Store at Swift Run Gap, to keep the Luray Valley route plugged.
To the east of the ridge, U.S. Gen. McDowell, whose job is to keep Jackson from reinforcing Johnston, is put on alert, and halts his progress southward to hook up with McClellan near Richmond.
C. Friday, May 6, 1864: Battle of The Wilderness in Spotsylvania and Orange Counties, Virginia. The Federals resumed the offensive the following morning. A.P. Hill’s exhausted troops were forced back and the Confederates seemed on the verge of collapse until the Texas Brigade of Longstreet’s corps arrived, and staved off disaster. A pair of flank attacks—made by CSA General James Longstreet on the southern portion of the field and by Gordon to the north—helped break the stalemate, forcing the Federals behind breastworks. However, just as Longstreet’s men were on the brink of success, Lee’s Old Warhorse was felled by an errant volley from his own troops. Lee himself had to organize for the final push against the Yankees along the Brock Road—a time-consuming effort in the Wilderness. The ensuing lull allowed Hancock the chance to rally his men and supervise the construction of earthworks.
Lee’s final assault turned out to be a colossal failure. Hampered by the heavy brush, the Confederates stumbled forward without cohesion until they reached obstructions in front of the Union line. There they were stopped cold by the crashing volleys from Hancock’s veterans. In one spot, Confederate troops dashed forward and planted their flags on the burning works. But their success was short-lived. Within minutes, Union troops counterattacked and reclaimed the works.
D. Friday, May 6, 1864 Battle of Walthall Junction, Virginia: Maj. Gen. Benjamin Butler, in command of 33,000 troops as the new Army of the James, has been landed at Bermuda Hundred, between the Appomattox and James Rivers, and is advancing west towards Petersburg to threaten the railroad between Petersburg and Richmond. Rebel General Johnson Hagood’s brigade, understrength at about 1,000, strikes Butler’s advance troops and pushes them back.
1. Monday, May 6, 1861: Tennessee votes 66-25 to secede from the Union, to be ratified by a public referendum on June 8.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=May+6%2C+1861
2. Monday, May 6, 1861: Tennessee votes to put the question of secession before the people in a popular referendum
http://blueandgraytrail.com/year/186105
3. Tuesday, May 6, 1862 --- Brig. Gen. Robert Milroy, with his brigade of Union troops, is rapidly approaching Staunton from the mountainous region to the west.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=May+6%2C+1862
4. Tuesday, May 6, 1862 --- Josiah Marshall Favill, a young officer in the Army of the Potomac, writes about his regiment taking up new bivouac in liberated Yorktown, and going swimming: Arrived at Yorktown at four P.M. and bivouacked in close column of division near to the shore. As soon as the tents were pitched and guards established, leave was given to all off duty to go in swimming. Of course, every one went and enjoyed themselves immensely, it being the first swim the men have had since their enlistment. The shore is formed of beautiful white sand and shelves out so gradually that one can walk out for three or four hundred yards without getting into deep water. It was a lively scene, as we saw it from the high bank, nearly ten thousand men, splashing and swimming in the sea at one time. After dinner, when the men were all in camp, we made up a party of officers and enjoyed a swim ourselves.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=May+6%2C+1862
5. Tuesday, May 6, 1862 --- Mary Boykin Chestnut writes her discouragement about continual Southern retreats: It is this giving up that kills me. Norfolk they talk of now; why not Charleston next ? I read in a Western letter, “Not Beauregard, but the soldiers who stopped to drink the whisky they had captured from the enemy, lost us Shiloh.” Cock Robin is as dead as he ever will be now; what matters it who killed him?
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=May+6%2C+1862
6. Wednesday, May 6, 1863 --- Pres. Lincoln, after trying all day to get news of the battles in Virginia, gets evasive answers via telegraph from Hooker or his Chief of Staff, Gen. Butterfield. Finally, Sen. Charles Sumner comes by the White House with definitive news that Hooker has lost the battle. By 4:00 PM, Lincoln and General Henry W. Halleck, the commander of the armies, leave Washington for The army’s camps near Falmouth.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=May+6%2C+1863
7. Wednesday, May 6, 1863 --- Clement Vallandigham, arrested for disloyalty and interfering with the Draft, now a prisoner in a Federal military prison in Cincinnati, Ohio sends a letter out to be published: May 5, 1862. [sic]
To the Democracy of Ohio: I am here in a military bastile for no other offense than my political opinions, and the defence of them, and of the rights of the people, and of your constitutional liberties. Speeches made in the hearing of thousands of you in denunciation of the usurpations of power, infraction of the Constitution and laws, and of military despotism, were the sole cause of my arrest and imprisonment. I am a Democrat – for Constitution, for law, for the Union, for liberty – this is my only "crime." For no disobedience to the Constitution: for no violation of law; for no word, sigh, or gesture of sympathy with the men of the South who are for disunion and southern independence, but in obedience to their demand, as well as the demand of northern abolition disunionists and traitors, I am here in bonds to-day; but "Time, at last, sets all things even!"
Meanwhile, Democrats of Ohio, of the North west, of the United States, be firm, be true to your principles, to the Constitution, to the Union, and all will yet be well. As for myself, I adhere to every principle, and will make good, through imprisonment and life itself, every pledge and declaration which I have ever made, uttered, or maintained from the beginning. To you, to the whole people, to TIME, I again appeal. Stand firm! Falter not an instant! C.L. VALLANDIGHAM
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8.
9. Wednesday, May 6, 1863 --- Gen. Hooker, seeing that there is nothing more he can do in the Wilderness, continues to draw his troops back across the Rappahannock. The Chancellorsville Campaign is a dead loss to the Union: they fought three battles in the space of six days, and lost them all.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=May+6%2C+1863
10. Friday, May 6, 1864: A half-hearted attack by the Army of the James on the Southside Railroad in Virginia is repulsed by George Pickett [CS].
http://blueandgraytrail.com/year/186405
11. Friday, May 6, 1864: In the first engagement of the Atlanta Campaign, a division from the Army of the Cumberland strikes a Confederate regiment at Tunnel Hill and easily overpowers the outnumbered Rebels.
http://blueandgraytrail.com/year/186405
12. Friday, May 6, 1864 --- George Michael Neese, an artilleryman serving in Chew’s Battery in Lee’s army, writes in his journal of his impressions of the battle, and the hellish vision he sees in one of the most savage battles on this continent: May 6 — Very heavy musketry and some cannonading for about three hours this morning, in the direction of Chancellorsville, which was the opening chorus of a general battle that raged furiously all day along our lines. Our battery was engaged nearly all day, and had some very warm and dangerous work on hand just on the right of General Longstreet’s line. We fought cavalry and infantry, and were under the fire of a battalion of Yankee artillery for awhile, but held our position all day, and so did the Yanks in our immediate front. The fierce, sharp roar of deadly musketry filled our ears from morning till night, and a thick white cloud of battle smoke hung pall-like over the fields and woods all day along the battle lines. The smoke was so thick and dense sometimes during the day that it was impossible to discern anything fifty paces away, and at midday the smoke was so thick overhead that I could just make out to see the sun, and it looked like a vast ball of red fire hanging in a smoke-veiled sky. The country all along the lines, which is mostly timber land, was set on fire early in the day by the explosion of shell and heavy musketry; a thousand fires blazed and crackled on the bloody arena, which added new horrors and terrors to the ghastly scene spread out over the battle plain. A thousand new volumes of smoke rolled up toward the sky that was already draped with clouds of battle smoke. The hissing flames, the sharp, rattling, crashing roar of musketry, the deep bellowing of the artillery mingled with the yelling of charging, struggling, fighting war machines, the wailing moans of the wounded and the fainter groans of the dying, all loudly acclaimed the savagery of our boasted civilization and the enlightened barbarism of the nineteenth century. Even the midday sun refused to look with anything but a faint red glimmer on the tragical scene that was being enacted in the tangled underbrush where the lords of creation were struggling and slaughtering each other like wild beasts in a jungle.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=May+6%2C+1864
13. Friday, May 6, 1864 --- Stephen Minot Weld, an officer in the Federal army at the Wilderness battle, tells of a heart-breaking incident of treachery as his troops show care and compassion for a Confederate wounded soldier: When we were advancing on this morning we passed several rebels lying on the ground, who had been wounded a little while before. One of them asked one of our men for some water. The man stopped at the brook, got him some water, and then went ahead. As soon as we had gone fifty yards or so, the fellow we had given water to drew himself up and shot one of our men. Some of the others went back and quickly put him out of the world. It was a mean, cowardly thing for a man to do who had been treated as we treated him.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=May+6%2C+1864
14. Saturday, May 6, 1865: Shouting "Hurrah for Jeff Davis..." Philip Henry Mulkey was arrested in Eugene, Oregon. A pro-Union mob broke down the jail door but Mulkey escaped harm.
http://blueandgraytrail.com/year/186505
A Monday, May 6, 1861: Arkansas votes 69 to 1 to secede from the Union. (Apparently, this was made possible by threatening scores of pro-Union delegates with violence not to come. Many who showed up anyway were denied entrance.)
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=May+6%2C+1861
B Tuesday, May 6, 1862 ---: Eastern Theater – Shenandoah Campaign – However, CSA Gen Stonewall Jackson’s move takes an interesting twist: rather than march directly west across the valley, he leaves his camp near Swift Run Gap with his 8,000 men and marched south to the town of Port Republic---and then across the Blue Ridge, as if headed toward Richmond. At Mechum’s Station on the Virginia Central Railroad, he puts his troops on trains, and runs them back west to the town of Staunton, where he joins up with Gen. Allegheny Johnson’s brigade of 3,600. At the same time, Maj. Gen. Richard Ewell, and his division of 8,000 men cross the Blue Ridge from the east side and camp at Jackson’s old spot at Conrad’s Store at Swift Run Gap, to keep the Luray Valley route plugged.
To the east of the ridge, U.S. Gen. McDowell, whose job is to keep Jackson from reinforcing Johnston, is put on alert, and halts his progress southward to hook up with McClellan near Richmond.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=May+6%2C+1862
C Friday, May 6, 1864: Battle of The Wilderness in Spotsylvania and Orange Counties, Virginia. The Federals resumed the offensive the following morning. A.P. Hill’s exhausted troops were forced back and the Confederates seemed on the verge of collapse until the Texas Brigade of Longstreet’s corps arrived, and staved off disaster. A pair of flank attacks—made by CSA General James Longstreet on the southern portion of the field and by Gordon to the north—helped break the stalemate, forcing the Federals behind breastworks. However, just as Longstreet’s men were on the brink of success, Lee’s Old Warhorse was felled by an errant volley from his own troops. Lee himself had to organize for the final push against the Yankees along the Brock Road—a time-consuming effort in the Wilderness. The ensuing lull allowed Hancock the chance to rally his men and supervise the construction of earthworks.
Lee’s final assault turned out to be a colossal failure. Hampered by the heavy brush, the Confederates stumbled forward without cohesion until they reached obstructions in front of the Union line. There they were stopped cold by the crashing volleys from Hancock’s veterans. In one spot, Confederate troops dashed forward and planted their flags on the burning works. But their success was short-lived. Within minutes, Union troops counterattacked and reclaimed the works.
http://www.civilwar.org/battlefields/the-wilderness.html?tab=facts
Friday, May 6, 1864: Battle of the Wilderness, Virginia
Day 1: As the day opens, Grant has called for all three army corps to attack at 5:00 AM. Assuming that Hill’s Third Corps is badly damaged, he intends for the Army of the Potomac to exploit the gap between Ewell and Hill, and to send Burnside’s IX Corps through it. However, the Rebels slightly anticipate the Federal attack, and strike against troops under Sedgwick that form the Federal right flank at 4:45 AM. Soon, the firing is general all along the northern flank of the Union lines.
By 6:00 AM, Lee assures Hill, Longstreet will come up to save the position. But by then, Hancock attacks Hill, who has failed to entrench, and is about to break through Hill’s line and flank the whole Army of Northern Virginia, and Longstreet is not there. When Longstreet’s troops arrive in the nick of time, just as Hill’s line begins to break.
The first to arrive is Brig. Gen. John Gregg’s Texas Brigade, which has been reduced to only 800 men. Gen. Lee, who is on the site, sees the Texas men and cheers them, waving his hat, yelling, “Texans always move them!” Lee rides to lead the Texans into battle, when some of the soldiers grab the bridle of Lee’s horse, Traveler, and insist he go to the rear before they will charge: “Lee to the rear! Lee to the rear!” they cry. The Texans go in with their customary elan, and only 250 of the 800 emerge without wounds. Longstreet, meanwhile, has lined up Fields’ division on the left, and Kershaw’s on the right, and both divisions strike Hancock’s line and drive it back some ways.
In the meantime, A.P. Hill and his tattered corps sidesteps to the left, and by the time that Burnside gets his tardy IX Corps into position, and begins to push through the gap, the Yankees find that there is no more gap: Hill is there to block him, and it is block enough.
Around 10:00 AM, Longstreet’s staff engineer reports that he has found an unfinished railroad bed that would provide a clear path to deploy troops for an attack on the Union flank. Longstreet lines up four fresh brigades on his right, the senior Brigadier being William Mahone, with Lt. Col. Sorrel to guide them. Longstreet launches this attack on the Union left, flanking Hancock’s men, and it succeeds quite well. Hancock later relates that Longstreet rolled up his line “like a wet blanket.” Catching up with advance units, Longstreet rides forward to push the attack onward. As he rides with Generals Jenkins and Kershaw, he is shot (and Jenkins killed) by his own men who mistake the riders for Federals. The attack slows and is finally blunted, because of the delay in passing on command authority. Longstreet will be injured for many months, and be out of action. In the command vacuum, the Rebel attack slows and halts, as Hancock is able to deploy troops to counter the threat. Grant wants Meade to push Hancock and Burnside forward, but Hancock protests that his men are out of ammunition and daylight.
John B. Gordon is finally given permission late in the afternoon to strike again at Sedgwick right flank. The Federals fall back, and are turned, but Gordon cannot push the attack and cut the Yankees off from their supply line because darkness falls.
At one point during Gordon’s assault, an officer in the Army of the Potomac begins pointing out how Lee is turning the Federal flank, and threatening to cut them off. Grant, sitting and whittling, loses his composure and offers this gem of military wisdom: “Oh, I am heartily tired of hearing about what Lee is going to do. Some of you always seem to think he is suddenly going to turn a double somersault, and land in our rear and on both of our flanks at the same time. Go back to your command, and try to think what we are going to do ourselves, instead of what Lee is going to do."
As night draws on, the fighting dies down, but brushfires have started again, and soldiers from the two armies even declare truces in places, so that they can recover their wounded comrades to prevent their being burned in the fires. Even so, over 200 Federal wounded perish in the flames. In the end, Lee has desperately fought the Yankees to a standstill, and stopped their bid to steal a march on the Southern army and thus get between Lee and Richmond---and, the Federal losses are fearfully high. Confederate Victory.
LOSSES Killed Wounded Missing/Capt. Total
Union 2,246 12,037 3,383 17,666
Confederate 1,477 7,866 1,690 11,033
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D Friday, May 6, 1864 --- Battle of Walthall Junction: Maj. Gen. Benjamin Butler, in command of 33,000 troops as the new Army of the James, has been landed at Bermuda Hundred, between the Appomattox and James Rivers, and is advancing west towards Petersburg to threaten the railroad between Petersburg and Richmond. Rebel General Johnson Hagood’s brigade, understrength at about 1,000, strikes Butler’s advance troops and pushes them back.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=May+6%2C+1864
FYI CSM Charles Hayden SGT Tiffanie G. SGT Mary G.CPL Ronald Keyes Jr SPC Michael Duricko, Ph.D MAJ Roland McDonald SSG Franklin BriantCPO William Glen (W.G.) Powell1stSgt Eugene Harless PO3 (Join to see)MSG Greg KellyMSG Joseph Christofaro]CPL Ronald Keyes Jr LTC Greg Henning CPT (Join to see) SGT John " Mac " McConnell LTC John Griscom LTC Thomas Tennant MAJ Robert (Bob) Petrarca SFC George Smith

Excellent map with fine commentary!

Great post!!!