The Yankees are coming! The Yankees are coming!
“As we approached the settled part of the country we were greeted everywhere with shouts for the Union, cheers for the old flag, and the most unmistakable evidences of loyalty. At every house the entire family would appear, often with buckets of fresh water and fruit for the welcome Yankees, and some of the people would scarcely ask for pay for the forage which we had seized to feed our animals, although the corn we had taken was all they had to look to for their winter’s food. Sometimes the Stars and Stripes would be carried out to the gate of the door-yard by one of the girls, and the General and Staff would take off their hats, while the escort following gave three cheers. Old gray-haired men would come out and seize the General’s hand, bidding him God-speed, and men would flock in at every halt to be armed and join us. The sufferings of these people have been terrible.”
Those were the words of an unidentified Union soldier, writing for Harper’s Weekly on October 24, 1863. At long last, the Federal troops had entered East Tennessee.
* * *
It had been two years since President Abraham Lincoln had been persuaded by Senator Andrew Johnson and Congressman Horace Maynard to liberate East Tennessee from the Confederacy, two years since Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman had called off the planned invasion that Union troops — including men like Scott County’s Hamilton and Fielding Griffith — had been training for at Camp Dick Robinson in Kentucky.
Two years isn’t so long, but for Scott Countians, and for East Tennesseans in general, it must have felt like an eternity. It had been two years of unceasing guerrilla conflict, of near-constant raids and many murders, of bloodshed and torment.
Men like Ambers Strunk had been killed while trying to fend off Confederate forces seeking to capture or kill Scott County Unionists. Men like Lark Cross and Ranson Vanover had been lynched because of their loyalty to the Union. Boys like the Tackett brothers at Station Camp had died in an effort to avoid being pressed into war on the side of the Confederacy. Homes had been burned, food and supplies had been stolen, families had been forced to flee. Scott County’s price for its loyalty to the Union had been steep.
But now the Yankees were coming, and East Tennessee was on the verge of being wrested from Confederate control for good.
“‘Glory be to God, the Yankees have come!’ ‘The Flag’s coming back to Tennessee!’”the Union soldier wrote for Harper’s Weekly. “I never knew what the Love of Liberty was before. After two years of servitude under the most tyrannical despotism, they now hold up their heads and thank God they are free. The old flag has been hidden in mattresses and under carpets. It now floats to the breeze at every staff in East Tennessee. Ladies wear it — carry it — wave it! Little children clap their hands and kiss it.
“Can you imagine the effect of this on me? Suppose you walked down (the) street, after riding 250 miles on horseback, with a saber on one side and a pistol on the other, and every man, woman, and child would bow to you with a glad smile of welcome, or shake hands with you and say God bless you? I could go on much longer, but I can’t do justice to the subject. My heart is so full, and I am so thankful to Almighty God for this bloodless and yet glorious victory, that I will not attempt to say any more on the subject.”
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Confederate Gen. Felix Zollicoffer had feared that the Union army would try to invade East Tennessee through the Cumberland Gap. That’s why he had worked so hard to build up his defenses in that area before his ill-fated decision to invade eastern Kentucky in January 1862.
As it turned out, the Union army would invade East Tennessee several hours away — by horseback — to the west of the Cumberland Gap, by way of the Cumberland Plateau.
Zollicoffer had been worried about this possibility, too. There were four roads leading from Kentucky into Fentress County, and two more in Scott County. He was concerned about those roads. And, it turned out, he had reason to be.
Gen. Ambrose Burnside, the Union officer best known for his flamboyant facial hair, was stationed in Lexington, Kentucky when he received orders in August 1863 to go to Knoxville, Tennessee.
President Lincoln had turned to Burnside the previous year to take command of the Union army after finally becoming fed up with the inaction of General George McClellan. But the Battle of Fredericksburg a month later had ended disastrously — so badly that Burnside was labeled the Butcher of Fredericksburg — and ultimately led to Lincoln replacing him with Gen. Joseph Hooker.
At the time, Burnside — who had offered to resign his command — also offered to leave the army entirely, but Lincoln refused; he felt there was still a place in the army for Burnside.
That place, it turned out, was the invasion of East Tennessee. The Confederates, still believing that the Cumberland Gap was their most vulnerable point in the region, continued to maintain a heavy force there. Had Burnside marched his army of 16,000 men through the famous mountain passageway, he would have likely overwhelmed the entrenched Rebel forces. But his advancement would not have come without bloodshed.
Burnside redeemed himself and is remembered as one of the Union army’s greatest generals because of his decision to bypass the Cumberland Gap and move his troops to Knoxville by way of an alternate route: through Scott County, Tennessee.
The decision to bypass the Cumberland Gap by traveling through Scott County wasn’t made by Burnside alone. It was influenced by men who knew the rugged plateau terrain best, including Major A.T. Keen, who was the grandfather of Congressman Howard H. Baker Sr., and Col. Frank Wolford, the Union officer who would later be arrested and discharged from the army after becoming critical of Lincoln, but who — after being elected to Congress after the war — helped Scott County Civil War heroine Julia Marcum obtain a war pension.
Wolford was in command of the 1st Kentucky Cavalry, a regiment that included a number of men from Scott County. According to historian Paul Roy, in his 2001 book “Scott County in the Civil War,” the 1st Kentucky Cavalry was “a fast riding, hard hitting branch of daring mountaineers who, in their own words, said they were not afraid of hell or high water.”
Earlier in the summer, on June 14, 1863, Col. William Price, commander of the 5th Kentucky Cavalry, had led a force of 1,500 men through Scott County. It was an exercise that had been ordered by Burnside as a precursor to the main army’s invasion. Sanders and his forces disrupted communication networks, seized supplies, and captured 104 Confederate soldiers in Wartburg.
After receiving the go-ahead to invade East Tennessee, Burnside sent Wolford and Keen with a group of 50 men to scout the roads through Scott County and determine whether they were suitable for the huge army that would be moving on Knoxville. It didn’t take long for the men to return and report that, yes, the roads were suitable. That settled it: Burnside’s army would be moving over the plateau instead of through the Cumberland Gap.
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It was on August 26, 1863 that the Union army arrived in Scott County. And what a sight it was — men marching four abreast, row after row — cavalry riders on horseback, horses pulling cannons, horses pulling supply wagons.
They came through Scott County via two roads: some — including Burnside himself — following the route of what would eventually become U.S. Hwy. 27 and entering Scott County at what is now Winfield. That portion of the army had been split into two columns through Kentucky, with General George Lucas Hartsuff commanding the right-hand column and Burnside commanding the left-hand column before they converged in McCreary County, with Burnside’s column traveling across what is roughly the present-day route of Ky. Hwy. 92 from Williamsburg to Pine Knot, and Hartsuff’s column traveling from Somerset to Pine Knot.
Others followed the Monticello Road, crossing the Big South Fork River at the No Business settlement before converging with the main army at what is now Oneida.
Still another part of the army, commanded by Brigadier General Julius White, traveled through Champ Ferguson’s hometown of Albany, Ky. to Tinker Dave Beaty’s Pall Mall and then to Jamestown, eventually rendezvousing with Burnside’s forces at Montgomery, which was then the county seat of Morgan County.
The force of 1,500 men led by Col. Wolford and Maj. Keen through Scott County in June 1863 must have been a sight to behold, one of the biggest troop advancements through Scott County since the war began. But it was nothing compared to the more than 10,000 soldiers who would march through Scott County that August. As the army moved, hundreds of men were devoted to the process of widening the road so that the surge of troops could pass.
The impacts of the Union army’s march through Scott County could still be found many years later. In 1914, some 51 years after the fact, the first automobile trip was attempted from Huntsville to Oneida, along the route that would become U.S. Highway 27. Dan Chambers, whose Oldsmobile was one of the first vehicles owned in Scott County, had been hired to drive a family from Huntsville to Helenwood. Once he got to the end of the paved road at Helenwood, Chambers’ driver decided to keep going, since his passengers were headed to Oneida, anyway. When he reached High Point, he became helplessly mired in a mudhole, and the car ws abandoned. In his book, “Dusty Bits,” H. Clay Smith speculated that the mudhole had been created when Ambrose’s army marched through in 1863.
The march along the unimproved roads was so rough that Burnside called for a railroad to be built through the region, connecting Knoxville to the North. It didn’t happen during the war, but a railroad would indeed be built across the Cumberland Plateau several decades later, when the Cincinnati-Southern Railroad was built.
Burnside’s men encamped at Chitwood, which is present-day Winfield, near where the Winfield city park is now located on Pine Grove Road. There were also encampments at Huntsville, Brimstone and elsewhere as the Union army journeyed through.
Upon reaching Oneida, Burnside made his headquarters at the home of Esquire Blevins, the man whose farm had been raided by Confederate guerrillas the previous year. He lived near where the Boss Glove factory would later be located, not far from the Scott County Fairgrounds.
For many Scott Countians, the sight of the army moving through left quite an impact.
“My dad said there was a whole regiment come through there once, when he was just a little boy. They passed through day and night, pulling the cannons with horses,” Will Miller — the son of No Business store owner France Miller — told interviewers with the National Park Service.
Bill Miller, the grandson of Will Miller and great-grandson of France Miller, recalled his grandfather telling him that it took two days and nights for the troops to move through the Big South Fork area.
“…constant, never stopped, troops after troops after troops,” Miller said. “Can you imagine on that little road?”
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Scott Countians didn’t just stand and watch in awe as the Union army passed through. Many of them joined the columns of marching soldiers, enlisting in the army. This included a number of members of the Scott County Home Guard.
Historian H. Clay Smith, in his book “Dusty Bits of the Forgotten Past,” said that the men who enlisted were sworn in at the Blevins house in Oneida, where Burnside had made his headquarters.
After leaving Oneida, Burnside’s forces split again. Some crossed New River at the New River settlement, then traveled up Brimstone Creek. Others crossed at Low Gap. The two groups met at the Walker farm at Brimstone, where Indian Fork Creek empties into Brimstone Creek. From there, they continued their journey deeper into the mountains, eventually crossing over to Montgomery, near present-day Wartburg. After leaving Montgomery, the infantry regiments moved through the Emory Gap, which is within present-day Frozen Head State Forest, and Winter’s Gap, which is near present-day Oliver Springs. The cavalry regiments moved through Big Creek Gap, which is now Highway 25W in LaFollette.
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Thanks to the decision to bypass the Cumberland Gap and move on Knoxville by way of Scott County, Burnside’s 16,000-man-strong Army of the Ohio had made it to the Confederate stronghold on the banks of the Tennessee River without any bloodshed.
By September 2, Burnside had reached Knoxville. The following day, the Union forces occupied the city. From there, Burnside and an infantry brigade marched north to the Cumberland Gap and prompted the surrender of the Confederate forces there, thus also giving the Union control of the strategic mountain passageway.
Fearing that Burnside’s army would continue southward to Chattanooga, which was indeed what President Lincoln intended, Confederate President Jefferson Davis ordered Gen. James Longstreet to move his forces to Knoxville and mount a counter-attack. Longstreet objected, knowing that the roughly 15,000 men under his command would be out-numbered by the some 20,000 under Burnside’s command, and also realizing that U.S. generals Ulysses S. Grant and William Tecumseh Sherman were advancing on Chattanooga, where the 40,000-strong Confederate army could scarcely stand to divide itself.
But Longstreet advanced on Knoxville anyway, and what resulted were battles at Campbell’s Station, Kingston and Fort Sanders in November 1863.
A part of Longstreet’s efforts at the Siege of Knoxville was Confederate Gen. John W. Vaughn, the man who had led the Rebels in the Battle of Brimstone on April 1, 1862, in an attempt to capture Scott County Home Guard organizer William Robbins. Vaughn had had success after being driven away from Brimstone, helping the Confederates take control of the Cumberland Gap, before moving to Mississippi for action north of Vicksburg.
Union Gen. William P. Sanders, the commander who had led a force of 1,500 soldiers through Scott County in June 1863 as a precursor to Burnside’s march on Knoxville, was killed during the siege on November 18, 1863, when he was shot by a sharpshooter under the command of Confederate Col. Edward Porter Alexander, who had been his classmate and roommate at West Point. But Sanders was successful in slowing down the Confederates’ advance in the area of present-day Kingston Pike in West Knoxville before he was shot. After his death, Fort Loudon — which had been built by the Confederate army but was now in the hands of the Union — was renamed Fort Sanders in his honor.
Longstreet suffered a decided setback in the Battle of Fort Sanders shortly after Thanksgiving, suffering more than 800 casualties to just 13 for the Union. Just five days later — on December 4, 1863 — Longstreet received word that Gen. Braxton Bragg’s army had been soundly defeated at the Battle of Chattanooga the day before Thanksgiving.
The Confederates’ siege of Knoxville was now a losing battle. The loss at Chattanooga had freed up Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman to move his forces up the Tennessee Valley and reinforce Burnside’s army. Longstreet was forced to abandon the siege and withdraw his army to Rogersville, the village established by the grandparents of Davy Crockett, more than 60 miles away.
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In the lore of Civil War history, the Knoxville campaign is considered quite minor. It is never mentioned alongside battles like Bull Run, Gettysburg or Shiloh. But in the grand scheme of things, this relatively minor series of battles played a significant role in the war.
On a personal level, Gen. Ambrose Burnside had restored his military credibility after the humiliating defeat at Fredericksburg.
On a broader level, Burnside’s capture of Knoxville had given the Union control of East Tennessee for the first time. The region, which had been staunchly loyal to the Union since secession, and a priority for President Lincoln, was no longer subjected to the whims of the marauding Confederate guerrillas who had made life hell for the past two years. In places like Scott County, the guerrilla warfare, so prevalent since Julia Marcum had fended off Confederate soldiers with an axe in the fall of 1861, was nearly over.
And on a still broader scale, the Union capture of Knoxville paved the way for the end of the war. By seizing Knoxville, Burnside was able to force Longstreet to move his forces away from Chattanooga — where Bragg had Grant’s army under siege — and to Knoxville to prevent Burnside from advancing to back up Grant. Without the aid of Longstreet’s army, Bragg was defeated by Grant and Sherman, and Chattanooga was controlled by the Union. Burnside then drove Longstreet out of Knoxville, further weakening the Confederates’ strength.
For the first time in the war, the Union had control of both Knoxville and Chattanooga. With the Tennessee Valley out of the Confederates’ grasp, the door was opened to an invasion of the Deep South. That would set up Sherman’s attack on Atlanta the following summer, and a victory there set the stage for Sherman’s March to the Sea, which would effectively break the back of the Confederacy and help lead to its eventual surrender.
And it started with Burnside’s march of more than 16,000 men through Scott County. The isolated Cumberland Plateau wilderness that had held no strategic advantage for either side at the beginning of the fight, the area whose residents had defied Tennessee and the Confederacy by declaring themselves the Independent State of Scott and had withstood the withering consequences that resulted, had played an important role in helping the Union to which they had remained loyal gain an upper hand in the role.