When [Lyman Beecher] moved his family to Boston in 1826, the enthusiasm for the activity and diversity of urban life that made [Henry Ward Beecher] join a boy's gang and play on the dangerous docks mirrored the excitement of other Americans about the possibilities of life in the growing cities. Henry Beecher experienced westward expansion firsthand when, as a newly ordained minister, he accepted the call of a rural Indiana church. He signed on to the anti-slavery movement late, but once established at the influential Plymouth Congregational church in Brooklyn, he became one of the movement's religious leaders. Beecher's stance rallied Northerners to the Union during the Civil War, earning him [Abraham Lincoln]'s gratitude and Southerners' hatred.