6.7Meanwhile, elsewhere (1854–1861)

As the United States fractured, other nations were being built. In Europe, movements to unify Italy and Germany gathered force, soon to create powerful new states through war and diplomacy. Britain and France fought Russia in the Crimean War (1853–1856), a bloody conflict that exposed the horrors of modern combat.

Elsewhere, empires strained. In 1857 a massive rebellion against British rule in India led Britain to abolish the East India Company and impose direct crown control. Russia moved toward emancipating its serfs in 1861, the same year America went to war partly over its own system of bondage. Around the world, the mid-century was an age of consolidation, empire, and reckoning with unfree labor.