Louisville in The American Civil War - 1862-63: Louisville Under Threats of Attack

1862-63: Louisville Under Threats of Attack

By early 1862, Louisville had 80,000 Union troops throughout the city. With so many troops, entrepreneurs set up gambling establishments along the north side of Jefferson from 4th to 5th Street, extending around the corner from 5th to Market, then continuing on the south side of Market back to 4th Street. Photography studios and military goods shops, such as Fletcher & Bennett on Main Street, catered to the Union officers and soldiers. Also capitalizing on the troops, brothels were quickly opened around the city.

In January 1862, Union General George Thomas defeated Confederate General Felix Zollicoffer at the Battle of Mill Springs, Kentucky. In February 1862, Union General Ulysses Grant and Admiral Andrew Foote's gunboats captured Fort Henry and Fort Donelson on the Kentucky and Tennessee border. Confederate General Albert Sidney Johnston's defensive line in Kentucky crumbled rapidly. Johnston had no choice but to fall back to Nashville, Tennessee. No defensive preparations had been made at Nashville, so Johnson continued to fall back to Corinth, Mississippi.

Although the threat of invasion by Confederates subsided, Louisville remained a staging area for Union supplies and troops heading south. By May 1862, the steamboats arrived and departed at the wharf in Louisville with their cargoes. Military contractors in Louisville provided the Union army with two hundred head of cattle each day, and the pork packers provided thousands of hogs daily. Trains departed for the south along the L&N railroad.

In July 1862, Confederate generals Braxton Bragg, commander of the Army of Mississippi, and Edmund Kirby Smith, commander of the Army of East Tennessee, planned an invasion of Kentucky. On August 13, Smith marched with 9,000 men out of Knoxville toward western Kentucky and arrived in Barbourville. On August 20, Smith announced that he would take Lexington. On August 28, Bragg's army moved west. At the Battle of Richmond, Kentucky, on August 30, Smith's Confederate forces defeated Union General William "Bull" Nelson's troops, capturing the entire force. This left Kentucky with no Union support. Nelson managed to escape back to Louisville. Smith marched into Lexington and sent a Confederate cavalry force to take Frankfort: Kentucky's capitol.

Union General Don Carlos Buell's army withdrew from Alabama and headed back to Kentucky. Union General Henry Halleck, commander of all Union forces in the West, sent two divisions from General Ulysses Grant's army, stationed in Mississippi, to Buell. Confederate General John Hunt Morgan, of Lexington, Kentucky, managed to destroy the L&N railroad tunnel at Gallatin, Tennessee, cutting off all supplies to Buell's Union army. On September 5, Buell reached Murfreesboro, Tennessee and headed for Nashville. On September 14, Bragg reached Glasgow, Kentucky. On that same day, Buell reached Bowling Green, Kentucky.

Bragg decided to take Louisville. One of the major objectives of the Confederate campaign in Kentucky was to seize the Louisville and Portland Canal and sever Union supply routes on the Ohio River. One Confederate officer suggested destroying the Louisville canal so completely that "future travelers would hardly know where it was." On September 16, Bragg's army reached Munfordville, Kentucky. Col. James Chalmers attacked the Federal garrison at Munfordville, but Bragg had to bail him out. Bragg arrived at Munfordville with his entire force, and the Union force soon surrendered.

Buell left Bowling Green and headed for Louisville. Fearing that Buell would not arrive in Louisville to prevent Bragg's army from capturing the city, Union General William "Bull" Nelson ordered the construction of a hasty defensive line around the city. He also ordered the placement of pontoon bridges across the Ohio to facilitate the evacuation of the city or to receive reinforcements from Indiana. Two pontoon bridges built of coal barges were erected, one at the location of the Big Four Bridge, and the other from Portland to New Albany. The Union Army arrived in time to prevent the Confederate seizure of the city. On September 25, Buell's tired and hungry men arrived in the city.

Bragg moved his army to Bardstown but did not take Louisville. Bragg urged General Smith to join his forces to take Louisville, but Smith told him to take Louisville on his own.

With the Confederate army under Bragg preparing to attack Louisville, the citizens of Louisville panicked. On September 22, 1862 General Nelson issued an evacuation order: "The women and children of this city will prepare to leave the city without delay." He ordered the Jeffersonville ferry to be used for military purposes only. Private vehicles were not allowed to go aboard the ferry boats without a special permit. Hundreds of Louisville residents gathered at the wharf for boats to New Albany or Jeffersonville. With Frankfort in Confederate hands for about a month, Governor Magoffin maintained his office in Louisville and the state legislature held their sessions in the Jefferson County Courthouse. Troops, volunteers and impressed labor worked around the clock to build a ring of breastworks and entrenchments around the city. New Union regiments flowed into the city. General William "Bull" Nelson took charge of the defense of Louisville. He sent Union troops to build pontoon bridges at Jeffersonville and New Albany to speed up the arrival of reinforcements, supplies and, if needed, the emergency evacuation of the city.

Instead of taking Louisville, Bragg left Bardstown to install Confederate Governor Richard Hawes at Frankfort. On September 26, five hundred Confederate cavalrymen rode into the area of Eighteenth and Oak, capturing fifty Union soldiers. Confederates placed pickets around Middletown on the 26th, and on the 27th their soldiers repelled Union forces from Middletown near Shelbyville Pike. Southern forces reached two miles from the city, but were not numerous enough to invade it. On September 30, Confederate and Union pickets fought at Gilman's Point in St. Matthews and pushed the Confederates back through Middletown to Floyd's Fork.

The War Department ordered "Bull" Nelson to command the newly formed Army of the Ohio. When Louisville prepared for the Confederate army under Bragg, General Jefferson C. Davis (not to be confused with Confederate President Jefferson Davis), who could not reach his command under General Don Carlos Buell, met with General Nelson to offer his services. General Nelson gave him the command of the city militia. General Davis opened an office and assisted organizing the city militia. On Wednesday, General Davis visited General Nelson in his room at the Galt House. General Davis told General Nelson that his brigade he assigned Davis was ready for service and asked if he could obtain arms for them. This led to an argument in which Nelson threatened Davis with arrest. General Davis left the room, and, in order to avoid arrest, crossed over the river to Jeffersonville, where he remained until the next day, when General Stephen G. Burbridge joined him. General Burbridge had also been relieved of command by General Nelson for a trivial cause. General Davis went to Cincinnati with General Burbridge and reported to General Wright, who ordered General Davis to return to Louisville and report to General Buell, and General Burbridge to remain in Cincinnati.

General Davis returned to Louisville and reported to Buell. When General Davis saw General Nelson in the main hall of the Galt House, fronting the office, he asked the Governor of Indiana, Oliver Morton to witness the conversation between him and General Nelson. The Governor agreed and the two walked up to General Nelson. General Davis confronted General Nelson and told him that he took advantage of his authority. Their argument escalated and Nelson slapped Davis in the face, challenging him to a duel. In three minutes, Davis returned, with a pistol he had borrowed, and shot and killed Nelson. The General whispered: "It's all over," and died fifteen minutes later.

With General Nelson dead, the command switched over to General Don Carlos Buell. On October 1, the Union army marched out of Louisville with sixty thousand men. Buell sent a small Federal force to Frankfort to deceive Bragg as to the exact direction and location of the Federal army. The ruse worked. On October 4, the small Federal force attacked Frankfort and Bragg left the city and headed back for Bardstown, thinking the entire Federal force was headed for Frankfort. Bragg decided that all Confederate forces should concentrate at Harrodsburg, Kentucky, ten miles (16 km) northwest of Danville. On October 8, 1862, Buell and Bragg fought at Perryville, Kentucky. Bragg's 16,000 men attacked Buell's 60,000 men. Federal forces suffered 845 dead, 2,851 wounded and 515 missing, while the Confederate toll was 3,396. Although Bragg won the Battle of Perryville tactically, he wisely decided to pull out of Perryville and link up with Smith. Once Smith and Bragg joined forces, Bragg decided to leave Kentucky and head for Tennessee.

After the battle, thousands of wounded men flooded into Louisville. Hospitals were set up in public schools, homes, factories and churches. The Fifth Ward School, built at 5th and York Streets in 1855, became Military Hospital Number Eight. The United States Marine Hospital also became a hospital for the wounded Union soldiers from the battle of Perryville. Constructed between 1845 and 1852, the three-story Greek revival style Louisville Marine Hospital contained one hundred beds. It became the prototype for seven U.S. Marine Hospital Service buildings, including Paducah, Kentucky, which later became Fort Anderson. Union surgeons erected the Brown General Hospital, located near the Belknap campus of the University of Louisville, and other hospitals were erected at Jeffersonville and New Albany, Indiana. By early 1863, the War Department and the U.S. Sanitary Commission erected nineteen hospitals. By early June 1863, 930 deaths had been recorded in the Louisville hospitals. Cave Hill Cemetery set aside plots for the Union dead.

Louisville also had to contend with Confederate prisoners. Located at the corner of Green Street and 5th Street, the Union Army Prison, also called the "Louisville Military Prison", took over the old "Medical College building." Union authorities moved the prison near the corner of 10th and Broadway Streets. By August 27, 1862, Confederate prisoners of war were taken to the new military prison. The old facility continued to house new companies of Provost Guards. From October 1, 1862 to December 14, 1862 the new Louisville Military Prison housed 3,504 prisoners. In December 1863, the prison held over 2,000 men, including political prisoners, Union deserters, and Confederate prisoners of war.

Made of wood, the prison covered an entire city block, stretching from east to west between 10th and 11th Streets and north to south between Magazine and Broadway Streets. Its main entrance was located on Broadway near 10th Street. A high fence surrounded the prison with at least two prison barracks. The prison hospital was attached to the prison and consisted of two barracks on the south and west sides of the square with forty beds in each building. The Union commander at the Louisville Military Prison was Colonel Dent. In April 1863, Captain Stephen E. Jones succeeded him. In October 1863, military authorities replaced Captain Jones with C. B. Pratt.

A block away, Union authorities took over a large house on Broadway between 12th and 13th Streets and converted it into a military prison for women.