The Tullahoma Campaign begins, 1863

On today's date, Wednesday, in 1863, Union Gen. William S. Rosecrans finally begins his attack on the Confederate forces under Gen. Braxton Bragg, whose headquarters is in Tullahoma, Tennessee. It was a cool and dry day for June in this part of Tennessee, one of the last in a short campaign that will be fought in nearly constant rain and mud.

Rosecrans had an elaborate plan. While Bragg's attention was focused on what he expected to be the main attack on his strongly defended poison at Shelbyville, Rosecrans would attack Bragg's right flank at Hoover's and Liberty Gaps, which were defended by Lieut. Gen. William J. Hardee's Corps.

Leading the Union cavalry on a demonstration toward Shelbyville, Maj. Gen. David S. Stanley advanced a strong force from Triune down the Lewisburg Pike. His troops were first to encounter Confederate resistance. Outside of Eagleville the Federals ran up against units from Wheeler's cavalry. In the fighting, the Confederates fell back from hill to hill, making the Federal advance difficult. The fight eventually reached the village of Rover, where Union troops took the abandoned Rebel post. The Federal force then pushed on near to Unionville, where it ran up against the main line of the infantry corps of Gen. Leonidas Polk.

The Confederates mounted a flank attack, but night put an end to the first day of fighting. Overnight, Gen. Stanley pulled his force back to Rover. Although Rosecrans had made no significant gains on this first day of his Tullahoma Campaign, he had accomplished his feint of diverting Bragg's attention to the west, away from his main objective to attack Hardee's force in the east against the Confederate army's right flank.

Source: Civil War Maps by Hal Jesperson

Sources: Tullahoma: The Campaign for the Control of Middle Tennessee, Michael R. Bradley; The Army of Tennessee, Stanley F. Horn

The eve of the Tullahoma Campaign, 1863

On the eve of the fighting known as the 9-day Tullahoma Campaign, Union Gen. William S. Roscrans’s army was 60,000 strong. Confederate Gen. Braxton Bragg had an army whose effective strength was about 43,000 troops, of whom about 14,000 were cavalry.

The 2 opposing armies were separated by a range of foothills, almost mountainous in height. Through these hills ran roads that connected Murfreesboro (where Rosecrans's army was headquartered) and Tullamoma (where Bragg's army was centered). The roads crossed these hills in 3 steep gorges:  Hoover's, Guy's, and Liberty Gaps. These gaps in the mountains soon will become strategic points in the imminent conflict. It will be through Hoover's and Liberty Gaps that Rosecrans's main force will strike the right and rear of Hardee's Corps in which Great Grandfather Oakes was serving.

To the east of Bell Buckle (Railroad Gap), the range of hills terminates a little beyond Hoover’s Gap. The narrow road through Hoover’s Gap continued narrow and winding to Manchester, 20 miles southeast. West of Bell Buckle, that chain of hills begins to level off north of Shelbyville and terminates a short distance northwest of town. 

In view of the favorable terrain and wide turnpikes between Murfreesboro and Shelbyville, Bragg expected Rosecrans to advance toward Shelbyville, or at least he hoped to draw him there. Bragg arranged his troops accordingly. The larger part of his army, 3 of Gen. Leonidas Polk’s corps, remained at Shelbyville. Gen. Wheeler moved his cavalry division to Shelbyville where he heard heavy Federal strength had been reported, leaving the right wing almost without cavalry cover. Cleburne’s Division of Hardee’s Corps, in which my great grandfather's 32nd Mississippi Regiment served, held Wartrace on the railroad, as well as Bell Buckle and Liberty Gaps. Gen. Stewart’s troops were placed along a stretch of several miles from the south end of Hoover’s Gap past the village of Fairfield (5 miles northeast of Wartrace). Bragg hoped to attack Rosecrans’s flank as he passed through Hoover’s Gap.

Rosecrans's strategy was to advance simultaneously toward Shelbyville, Liberty Gap, and Hoover’s Gap. The advance against Shelbyville was to be a feint, and Liberty Gap was merely to be seized and held. The main body of the Federal army would move through Hoover’s Gap, with one corps going around the eastern end of the range of hills. From Hoover’s Gap they would push on to Manchester, where all of Rosecrans’s forces would be consolidated.

Sources: Pat Cleburne: Confederate General, Howell ad Elizabeth Purdue; The Army of Tennessee, Stanley F. Horn; Autumn of Glory: The Army of Tennessee, 1862-1865, Thomas Lawrence Connelly; The Stones River and Tullahoma Campaigns, Christopher L. Kolakowski

Morgan's Raid, 1863

Brig. Gen. John Hunt Morgan

On today's date in 1863, Brig. Gen. John Hunt Morgan and 2,400 mounted Confederates and 2 pieces of artillery, set off on a raid that would take them into Indiana and Ohio. For 46 days they rode over 1,000 miles and covered a region from Tennessee to Northern Ohio.

Ostensibly, Confederate Gen. Braxton Bragg's plan was for the "Great Raid" to draw the Federal army's attention away from his Army of Tennessee, which was fortified in Tullahoma. However, Morgan had bigger plans. He wanted to strike terror in Northern states by rampaging through the enemy homeland.*

Source: Touring Ohio

The raid did bring terror on the Northern civilian population. However, it actually had little military importance. Before the end of July, Morgan and almost all his men were captured in northeastern Ohio and placed in various state penitentiaries. Morgan managed to escape in late November. Then, taking a train to Cincinnati, he crossed the Ohio River, and made his way back to the Confederacy. In less than a year, Gen. Morgan will be killed in Tennessee by Union cavalry.

Ironically, at the very time Union Gen. Rosecrans was moving his force to attack Gen. Braxton Bragg's position—when Bragg could have most used the additional cavalry support—Morgan was crossing the Cumberland River and making his way for Ohio.

"Morgan's Ohio Raid" by Mort Kunstler pictures Morgan and his Raiders

entering the town of Montgomery, Ohio. I've driven past  the Universalist

Church (pictured) on Montgomery and Remington Roads many times. The

building, with its unique brick columns, looks today much as it did when

Gen. John Hunt Morgan raided through the town on July 14, 1863.

* Raiding through Clermont County on July 14, 1863, Morgan's Raiders stormed down the Branch Hill-Guinea Pike, which fronted the subdivision where we once owned a home. In fact, we lived on a road named (apparently) for Lieut. Thomas Paxton, who with his Loveland militiamen, tried to stop the Raiders from burning a derailed train and tearing up the track. One of the Rebels was shot and died at the village of Ward's Corner, now a tiny shopping center, just down the street from where we lived. One of my sons' summer jobs was working at the UDF convenience store on the corner there. He scooped some really great ice cream that summer!

Source: The Army of Tennessee, Stanley F. Horn; Military Reminiscences of the Civil War, Jacob Dolson Cox; The Army of the Cumberland, Henry Martyn Cist; Clermont County Historical Society

Rosecrans makes up his mind

On today's date in 1863, Union General William S. Rosecrans polls his senior commanders about whether to move on the Confederate force under Gen. Braxton Bragg, headquartered at Tullahoma, Tennessee. While the consensus was to take a wait-and-see approach, depending on the outcome of Union General Grant's siege of Vicksburg, Rosecrans's chief of staff (and future US president), James A. Garfield, urged immediate action. Feeling the pressure of the Union's War Department, Rosecrans makes up his mind and concurs with Garfield. By the time he makes his move on June 23, Rosecrans's Army of the Cumberland had been static for 169 days. He will make a massive feint towards Bragg's left, while striking with his own left toward Manchester, and beyond, at the road and rail bridges over the Elk River. Some of the first Confederate troops to receive Rosecrans's attack in a few days will be Great Grandfather Oakes's comrades in Cleburne's Division, stationed between Liberty Gap and Bell Buckle.

Rosecrans's delay has frustrated more than just his own high command. On the other side of the battle lines, common Confederate soldiers were also left guessing. One of Great Grandfather Oakes's comrades in Co. D of the 32nd Regiment, Thomas Settle, wrote home (dated 4/4/63): 

We have very little that is worth sharing here to send in a letter to you as camps here are just like ever other place filled with rumors & very few that are correct. I am completely at a loss to know when how or which way we will move from here. I made a guess when we were here only a few days that we would stay here until the last of May. I am now a little inclined to think the same thing. Rosen Crans [sic] may advance on us but I don't think he will. We are fortified here but not very strongly...

Sources: Tullahoma: The 1863 Campaign for the Control of Middle Tennessee, Michael R. Bradley; "Settle Letters," a transcription of which was generously shared with me by descendant Raymond Settle. Many of these letters are now available on the Fanin County TxGen Website. The original letters are part of the Settle Family Collection, 1860-1864, in the University of Mississippi Department of Archives and Special Collections.

Cleburne's force on reconnaissance

In early June, Confederate General Braxton Bragg became concerned that his Union counterpart, Gen. Rosecrans, might be preparing to advance south in Tennessee or sending a portion of his army to Grant in Mississippi to add pressure to the beleaguered Confederate forces at Vicksburg.

On today's date in 1863, Bragg ordered a reconnaissance toward Murfreesboro by Hardee’s Corps to determine the enemy’s intention. Gen. Patrick R. Cleburne, in whose division my great grandfather, Nathan Oakes served, moved 2 columns over a narrow muddy road in hard rain, through the 4-mile length of Hoover’s Gap, to within 4 miles of Murfreesboro. The gap was guarded by a regiment from Gen. John A. Wharton's Calvary Division, in which Great-Great Grandfather David C. Neal was serving. Cleburne's men drove in Federal pickets, had light skirmishes with the enemy, then returned to Wartrace the next day.

Source: Pat Cleburne: Confederate General, Howell and Elizabeth Purdue; Autumn of Glory: The Army of Tennessee, 1862-1865, Thomas Lawrence Connelly; Huntsville Historical Review, Vol 26, No. 2. 1999: Transcription of Capt. Daniel Coleman Diary, Univ. North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Loving that which we defend

McGavock Cemetery, Franklin, TN                                                     Photo by Mark Dolan, June 2010

War must be, while we defend our lives against a destroyer who would devour all; but I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend. 

JRR Tolkien, The Two Towers

32nd Mississippi Infantry | Guarding Tyner's Station

According to Company D's Captain F.S. Norman, during the months of May and June, my great grandfather's, along with several other companies of the 32nd Mississippi Infantry Regiment, were posted at the rail station in Tyner, Tennessee. Tyner's Station was located 10 miles east of Chattanooga, on the East Tennessee, Virginia & Georgia Railway. Company D would have moved from its headquarters in Wartrace about 100 miles northwest of Tyner, likely traveling on the Nashville & Chattanooga railroad. Today, Tyner is located within the city limits of Chattanooga.

Present day location of Tyner Station, TN
Source: CivilWarAlbum.com

Tyner was not only a key station along this vital line of Bragg's communication with Chattanooga, it was also the main arrival and departure point for Confederate troops. In addition, Tyner was the site of the army's hospital, and those who died in hospital are buried in the adjacent Silverdale Confederate Cemetery, which is still maintained today (off Old Highway 11, near I-75).

Soldiers from Gen. Patrick Cleburne's Division will continue to occupy this important rail station through the Chickamauga Campaign. They will be back in force in July. Cleburne’s troops eventually built 4 forts to guard the Tyner Station on the East Tennessee & Georgia Railroad and the village.

Sources: 32nd Mississippi Infantry, Company D Return, May-June, 1863; The Chattanoogan: "Civil War Fortifications in Chattanooga," 2/21/13

The death of Maj. Gen. Earl Van Dorn

Maj. Gen. Earl Van Dorn

Earl Van Dorn (September 17, 1820–May 7, 1863), whose mother was the niece of President Andrew Jackson, was a career U.S. Army officer who fought with distinction in the Mexican-American War. After the war, he was once again sent to outposts in the South and took part in action against the Seminole and against Comanche Indians. During the War Between the States he served as a Confederate cavalry major general. Although he had military successes, including his successful raid on Grant's forces at Holly Springs, Tennessee, Van Dorn is also noted for his defeats at Pea Ridge and Corinth in 1862.

But on today's date in 1863, Gen. Van Dorn is remembered for having been slain by a jealous husband. 

Known to be brusque, impulsive, and highly emotional, Van Dorn was also a noted painter, writer of poetry, respected for his skill at riding a horse. A married man, sadly he was also alleged to be a womanizer. Regrettably, this reputation led to a self-induced tragedy on this date. 

Van Dorn was murdered in his headquarters at Spring Hill, Tennessee by Dr. James Bodie Peters, who claimed that the general had carried on an affair with his young and attractive wife. Alone in his office, Peters entered and shot Van Dorn in the back of the head. Peters was later arrested by Confederate authorities but was never brought to trial for the killing. In defense of his actions, Peters claimed that Van Dorn had "violated the sanctity of his home.” 

My Great-Great Grandfather David Crockett Neal’s 6th Tennessee Regiment escorted General Van Dorn's remains to Columbia, Tennessee. Later, Van Dorn's body was brought back to Mississippi and buried at Wintergreen Cemetery in Port Gibson.

General Van Dorn is one of the 2 major generals—both cavalry officers that one time or another commanded Great-great Grandfather Neal’s 6th Tennessee Regiment—who died violently, but not from enemy action. The other was Maj. Gen. John A. Wharton, shot as the result of an argument with Col. George Wythe Baylor, in April 1865.

Sources: eHistory Archive; The Civil War Trust

The Battle of Chancellorsville, 1863

While Confederate Gen. Braxton Bragg held his Army of Tennessee in the area around Tullahoma, Tennessee on this date in 1863, on another field in Spotsylvania County, Virginia, near the village of Chancellorsville,  a great battle between the North and the South was taking shape.

When Union Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker crossed the Rappahannock on this date, he placed his Army of the Potomac on Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee’s vulnerable flank.  His advance would signal the beginning of the 7-day Battle of Chancellorsville.

Rather than retreat before this sizable Federal force, (130,000 Federals to Lee's 60,000) Lee opted to risk an attack against Hooker while he was still within the thick wilderness. Late the following day, Lee and and his Lt. Gen. Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson conceived one of the boldest plans of the war. Jackson, with 30,000 Confederates, would follow a circuitous route to the Union right and from there conduct an attack on that exposed flank.

Jackson, having completed his legendary circuit around the enemy, unleashed his men in an overwhelming attack on Hooker's right flank and rear on May 2. His attack stunned the Union XI corps and threatened Hooker’s position, pushing the Northern army back more than 2 miles.

Tragically, the victorious Confederate attack ended with the mortal wounding of Stonewall Jackson, mistakenly fired upon by his own men. Jackson, with 8 other Confederate horsemen were riding forward through the dense woods and thickets on the night of May 2. Returning towards the Confederate lines, his party came under fire from combat weary Confederates. Jackson was struck by 3 different balls. As he was being evacuated, his litter bearers stumbled and dropped the general twice, further worsening his loss of blood. Later that night, Jackson’s left arm was amputated, and he was subsequently evacuated to Guinea Station, where he died of pneumonia eight days later.

On May 3, 1863, the Confederates resumed their offensive and drove Hooker’s larger army back to a new defensive line nearer the fords. Swinging east, Lee then defeated a separate Federal force near Salem Church, just west of Fredericksburg, that had threatened his rear. Lee went to the fight in person to ensure final success on the 4th, then returned to Chancellorsville to mop up Hooker's defeated army. With nowhere else to go, on May 6th, Hooker recrossed the Rappahannock River from where he had come 6 days earlier.

Having been outnumbered more than 2 to 1, Lee's victory at Chancellorsville is widely considered to be his greatest. The campaign had cost him about 13,000 casualties, but his enemy about 18,000. However, none of the losses on either side would resonate as loudly and long as the death of Stonewall Jackson. As Jackson lay dying, Lee sent a message, saying "Give General Jackson my affectionate regards, and say to him: he has lost his left arm but I my right." On his death bed, remaining spiritually strong, although he was growing physically weaker, the godly warrior said, "It is the Lord's Day; my wish is fulfilled. I have always desired to die on Sunday."

Sources: Civil War Trust; Wikipedia

Lowrey's Regiment at Wartrace, Tennessee

On this date in 1863, Gen. Hardee, with Cleburne's Division in the vanguard, moved his corps from Tullahoma, Tennessee, 12 miles north to Wartrace, about 20 miles south of Murfresboro. Cleburne will set up his headquarters at Wartrace, with his brigades—including Wood's in which Great Grandfather Oakes is serving—encamped around that village, and guarding the Nashville & Chattanooga Railroad. Cleburne will use the next 2 months drilling his division and practice marksmanship.

My great grandfather's regimental commander, Col. Mark Lowrey, wrote that until this point in the war there had been little opportunity to drill and train his regiment. But now, he said, "we drilled for several months, and my regiment became very proficient in drill. In an inspection by Gen. Hardee of each regiment of Wood's brigade, drilling separate, my regiment was pronounced by him the best drilled regiment of the brigade, and the regiment was complimented in a general order."

Some of Lowrey's enthusiasm may have been lost on the common soldier. One of Great Grandfather's comrades in his Co. D, Thomas Settle, wrote home (dated 3/27/13): "We are having a very good time now [that] we don't have much drilling to do. We have been having several Gen Reviews and Inspections but they are a mere matter of moon shine now." A few days later, however, Settle did concede in another letter that the drilling had paid off: "We have a much better drilled Army than when we arrived here."

Source: Library of Congress

Sources: Company D Return, March-April; The Third Battalion Mississippi Infantry and the 45th Mississippi Regiment, David Williamson; Mark P. Lowrey Autobiography; "Settle Letters," a transcription of which was generously shared with me by descendant Raymond Settle

The First Battle of Franklin, 1863

The 1863 Battle of Franklin, Tennessee was fought on this date, 150 years ago, between 2 opposing cavalry forces. The 6th Tennessee Cavalry Regiment, Great-great Grandfather David Crockett Neal's unit, had a significant role in the action.

The engagement began as a reconnaissance in force led by Confederate cavalry Maj. Gen. Earl Van Dorn against a Union force commanded by Union Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger. Van Dorn, with about 6,000 Confederates, advanced northward from Spring Hill along the Columbia pike on this date in 1863, making contact with Federal skirmishers just outside the town of Franklin. Van Dorn’s attack was so weak that when Granger received a false report that nearby Brentwood was under attack, he sent away most of his cavalry thinking that the Confederate general was undertaking a diversion. When the truth became known that there was no threat to Brentwood, Granger decided to attack Van Dorn. However, he soon was surprised to learn that a subordinate, Brig. Gen. David S. Stanley's cavalry brigade had already done so without orders. Stanley had crossed the Harpeth River at Hughes’s Ford, behind the Confederate right rear. His cavalry attacked and captured a Tennessee battery on the Lewisburg Road but lost it when Brig. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest counterattacked, breaking the Federal assault. Stanley’s troopers quickly withdrew across the Big Harpeth River.

This incident in his rear caused Van Dorn to cancel his operations and withdraw to Spring Hill, leaving the Federals in control of the area.

The Federal loss was 10 killed, 23 wounded and 51 taken prisoner. The Confederate casualties were 5 killed, 32 wounded and 33 captured or missing.

Sources: 6th Tennessee Cavalry (unpublished manuscript), John F. Walter; CWSAC Battle Summaries

Rosecrans slowly prepares his army

Following the Battle of Murfreesboro/Stones River, December 31 through January 3, Union Maj. Gen. William S. Rosecrans, commanding the renamed Army of the Cumberland, remained in the Murfreesboro area for nearly 6 months. To counter the Federals, Gen. Braxton Bragg, commander of the Army of Tennessee, established a fortified line along the Duck River from Shelbyville to Wartrace. On the Confederate right, infantry and artillery detachments guarded Liberty, Hoover's, and Bellbuckle gaps through the mountains. 

Rosecrans's superiors, fearing that Bragg might detach some of his own units to oppose Grant in Mississippi, pressured him throughout the winter and spring to attack the Confederates at Tullahoma. Rosecrans argued that if he attacked Bragg, Bragg would withdraw to Mississippi. Therefore, he reasoned, by not attacking Bragg in Tennessee, he actually was aiding Grant in Mississippi.

Rosecrans will finally yield to Washington's pressure, but not before June 24th, when he will begin moving his troops to begin the Tullahoma Campaign. He will force Bragg to withdraw to Chattanooga.

Source: The Army of Tennessee, Stanley F. Horn