1865

Field Order No. 15 (Forty Acres and a Mule)

Lowcountry, Georgia and South Carolina, GA

Field Order No. 15 (Forty Acres and a Mule)

Field Order No. 15 (Forty Acres and a Mule)

General William Tecumseh Sherman issued Field Order No. 15 on January 16, 1865, redistributing approximately 400,000 acres of confiscated Confederate land to freed Black families in 40-acre plots. The Freedmen’s Bureau later granted legal title to many of these plots, marking the first major federal attempt at land …

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