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"Cumberland Gap" 
 
 -A PAPER- 
 
 READ BEFORE THE OHIO COMMANDERY 
 
 MILITARY ORDER 
 
 JJoye:! JJe(2ri0r) ©t f Jhe Clnifcd ^ic3ii<z.Sj 
 
 JUNE 3, 1BB5, 
 
 BY COMPANION 
 
 \ B. r. §5£YfiD§on, 
 
 Zaie Surgeon (Major) 2 2d Kentucky Vol. Mfantry. 
 
 CINCINNATI 
 
 H. C. SHERICK & CO. 
 
 188S. 
 
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 04 
 
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 Cumberland Gap 
 
 On the 1 8th day of June, 1861, the rebel military 
 authorities seized and occupied Cumberland Gap, the most 
 available door for military access by the Nation to East 
 Tennessee, and thus held in check the most loyal portion 
 of the people of that State. From this stronghold they 
 made frequent incursions into the contiguous mountain 
 counties of Kentucky, which may also justly be said to 
 have been the stronghold of loyalty to the Nation in that 
 State. These raids were generally undertaken by maraud- 
 ing bands of midnight plunderers, whose chief objects 
 were private gain and the gratification of personal malice 
 engendered in the heated political contests of former years. 
 In the execution of their fell purposes neither property 
 rights nor the sanctity of human life was regarded. 
 
 On the 20th day of October, 1861, the rebels received 
 at "Camp Wild Cat," in Laurel county, Ky., the first 
 repulse to an organized command encountered by them in 
 the mountain region of Kentucky. The National troops 
 engaged in this action were nominally under the command 
 of Gen. Schoepff, but they were really commanded by Col. 
 Theophilus T. Garrard, of Clay county, Ky,, who had 
 with patriotic ardor during the preceding summer recruited 
 and organized the 7th Regiment of Kentucky Volunteer 
 Infantry. His regiment was made up of mountain boys, 
 thoroughly imbued with sentiments of devotion to the 
 integrity and unity of the Nation. 
 
 The 17th Ohio and the 33d Indiana Regiments of 
 Volunteer Infantry were also engaged in the battle. 
 
 The Kentucky troops were undrilled and without a 
 
 knowledge of the first rudiments of military discipline or 
 
 (3) 
 
tactics, but they were patriotic ; they were woodsmen, and 
 accustomed to the use of fire-arms ; they were standing on 
 their own soil, and were familiar with all the mountain 
 passes through which the enemy could approach them ; 
 and, above all, they were burning with anxiety to punish 
 the rebel troops for marauding outrages and wrongs per- 
 petrated on their families and their friends throughout the 
 entire section, and 'Gen. SchoepfF wisely deferred to the 
 opinions and advice of the senior officers commanding the 
 Kentucky troops. 
 
 The battle, viewed alone, may be regarded as only a 
 skirmish of outposts, but it was important in the results 
 which speedily followed. It was the fixed purpose of the 
 rebel leaders to drag Kentucky into rebellion against the 
 National authorities in despite of the well-settled con- 
 victions of the people expressed at the polls, and with 
 triumphant majorities on three different occasions during 
 the preceding summer. It was the misfortune of the State 
 to have as its chief executive officer, for the time being, 
 one who was but too willing to second all the ulterior 
 designs of the insurgents by claiming sovereign power 
 within the State for all local laws over those enacted by 
 the National Congress. 
 
 Acting on this theory of State and of National obliga- 
 tion, he had already appointed S. B. Buckner to the com- 
 mand of the State Guard — a man well known to be a • 
 party to the great conspiracy against the National Govern- 
 ment, and he had also armed that body in hostility to the 
 Government with arms drawn from the National work- 
 shops. Felix K. Zollicofter, of Tennessee, was chosen by 
 the rebel authorities as the proper agent for the accomplish- 
 ment of this purpose. He was a man of great natural 
 endowments and mental energy, who had forced his way 
 from the humble walks of life to a commanding position in 
 his State. He had twice represented the Nashville district 
 in the National Congress, where b}'^ force of talent and 
 deliberative ability he had won a commanding position. 
 
On the stump and before the people he had always 
 vehemently denounced the heresy of secession as pre- 
 posterous. His popularity with the people in the mountain 
 section of Tennessee and Kentucky before the outbreak of 
 the rebellion was very great. But unfortunately for his 
 fame, when his State, or rather when the official authorities 
 of his State, in violation of constitution and law and the 
 deliberately expressed will of the people, determined to 
 link her fortunes with the fate of the Confederacy, and 
 join issues with the Nation in the impending conflict, Gen. 
 Zollicoffer consented to abandon all the well-settled con- 
 victions of his life, and join with his enemies, and the 
 enemies of the Government, in the effort to accomplish its 
 overthrow. , 
 
 The result of his first essay on the mountain section of 
 Kentuck}^ proved to him that the passes into the State 
 were better guarded than he was before aware of, and that 
 the wrongs which had been perpetrated by prowling bands 
 of midnight plunderers had roused in the people a spirit 
 of stern and determined resistance to rebel misrule. 
 
 Following his repulse at Wild Cat, Gen. Zollicoffer 
 fell back on his reserves in Tennessee, and after reorgan- 
 izing his defeated force, he attempted at a lower point on 
 the Cumberland river to enforce and carry out the pro- 
 gramme of the Confederate authorities in Kentucky by an 
 occupation in force and a subjugation of the people to rebel 
 military law. In pursuance of this policy, he met at Mill 
 Spring, in Pulaski county, Ky., on the 19th day of Jan- 
 uary, 1862, the National forces, under command of Gen. 
 George H. Thomas. Here the first signal defeat of a 
 rebel army was encountered, in the overthrow and rout 
 of an arm}'^ corps, together with the death of its com- 
 mander, slain in battle — slain in the prosecution of a cause 
 which had the approval of neither his judgment nor his con- 
 science. And here, too, was first revealed to the earnest 
 gaze of the Nation the great qualities for command in the 
 presence of embattled hosts, and the still rarer attribute of 
 
stern and unyielding tenacity of purpose in the progress of 
 battle, which are all possessed by Gen. Thomas in so 
 eminent a degree, and which time has since developed into 
 grand and majestic proportions. "Recorded honors shall 
 gather round his monument and thicken over him. It is a 
 solid fabric, and will support the laurels that adorn it." 
 
 The rebels still held possession of Cumberland Gap 
 notwithstanding their defeat in the field. As a strategic 
 point it was deemed an indispensable necessit}'- by both of 
 the parties to the great conflict in which the Nation had 
 unfortunately become involved. 
 
 On the organization of the Army of the Cumberland, 
 under Gen. D. C. Buell, Gen. Thomas was assigned to 
 one of its divisions. A portion of the troops previously 
 under his command was still held in the mountain region 
 to restrain and punish predatory incursions and raids into 
 the State, and to support the loyal sentiment predominant 
 in that section. 
 
 The purpose of the Government to take and to hold 
 the position was never relaxed, but was held in abeyance 
 only for the time being, for what were deemed at that 
 moment more urgent and vital considerations. 
 
 The intuitions of men often bear to the future the 
 stamp and impress of genius. President Lincoln was a 
 civilian, not an educated military man, but his far-seeing 
 military capacity enabled him to see at a glance the mani- 
 fest importance of holding with a firm and unyielding 
 grasp this door of entrance to the heart of the Confed- 
 eracy. It is central in position, and from it blows could 
 have been safely dealt out to the right or left, as occasion 
 might have demanded. It is on the direct and shortest 
 line, "from the Ohio down to the sea," and rebellion could 
 more speedily from this than any other point east of the 
 Mississippi river have been bi-sected and rent in twain. 
 His proposition to Congress to construct a miHtar}^ rail- 
 road from Lexington, Ky., to Cumberland Gap was made 
 a butt of by the enemies of the Government and the writ- 
 
— 7 — 
 
 ings of the day as an impracticable suggestion. No wiser 
 investment of the National resources could have been made 
 at that day. But with all his influence with that body, 
 he failed to induce Congress to adopt his policy. Could 
 that position have been held by the National forces from 
 the day it was occupied by Gen. Morgan, June i8, 1862, 
 few military critics will venture the assertion that it would 
 not have shortened the duration of the war a full twelve 
 months. With it under National control, and linked to 
 the great North by a railroad, Gen. Bragg would never 
 have made his irruption into Kentucky as he did in August, 
 1862, or if guilty of such temerity he would only have 
 passed from the State into some of the military prisons of 
 the North. In a speech made by that rebel commander 
 at Camp Dick Robinson the day before he issued his order 
 to retreat, he said : 
 
 "Buell is massed on our right and closes access to 
 Nashville. We whipped him at Perryville, but another 
 such a victory will be fatal to us. He is near his supplies 
 and reinforcements ; we are distant from ours. Kentucky 
 won't come to our relief. Wallace is in our rear, with the 
 great North fully roused and at his back. If we attempt 
 to reach Virginia through the mountain passes of Eastern 
 Kentuck}^, we will starve. We are in a jug and with but 
 a simple outlet, and that is through Cumberland Gap. 
 We must take that route and take it now, or the last man 
 of us all will be captured." 
 
 The troops left in the neighborhood of the Gap on the 
 transfer of Gen. Thomas to his new field of operations, 
 were the ist Brigade of Tennessee Volunteers, under com- 
 mand of Brigadier-General Spears, composed of the ist, 
 2d, 3d and 4th Regiments ; 2d Brigade, under command 
 of Brigadier-General Carter, 5th and 6th Tennessee and 
 7th Kentucky and 49th Indiana Regiments of Infantry ; 
 3d Brigade, under Brigadier-General Absalom Baird, 
 U. S. A., composed of the 14th and 19th Kentucky and 
 33d Indiana Regiments of Infantry. A fourth brigade, 
 under command of Col. John F. DeCourcey, consisting of 
 
the i6th and 426 Ohio and the 226. Kentucky, reached the 
 Cumberland Ford during the first week of May. 
 
 George W. Morgan, of Ohio, wavS assigned to the 
 command of the districts and honored with a Brigadier's 
 Commission of U. S. Volunteers, He had served with 
 distinction as colonel, commanding a regiment of Ohio 
 Volunteer Infantry in the war with Mexico, and in one of 
 the brilliant, dashing battles of that brief contest he won 
 his brevet of Brigadier by gallant action in the field. 
 
 Gen. Morgan reached his field of action with his 
 recruits during the first week in May, and at once assumed 
 command. Here the troops were held in camp for dail}' 
 drill and to accustom them to combined action, until the 
 7th day of June, when^the demonstration was made on the 
 Gap by a flank movement into Powell's Valley, which was 
 the source of subsistence supplies for the rebel force in 
 occupation of the post. The brigades of Gens. Spears 
 and Carter entered the valley through Big Creek Gap, a 
 pass thirty miles west of Cumberland Gap. The other 
 brigades, under the immediate command of Gen. Morgan, 
 passed ten miles east of Big Creek, through a mere notch 
 or defile in the 'Cumberland range, which had not been 
 guarded. The road on Gen. Morgan's line of march had 
 much of it to be made as the army advanced, as it was but 
 following neighborhood bridle paths over sharp ridges and 
 through deep ravines, where the track of a wheel had 
 never been seen before. The troops, however, had stout 
 arms and willing minds, and the good work went bravely 
 and rapidly on. 
 
 At noon on the nth, the crest of the Cumberland 
 Range was attained, and a landscape of unsurpassed 
 beauty was open to view. A fertile, cultivated, blooming 
 valley, land-locked by mountain ridges north and south, 
 but stretching from east to west far as the eye could reach, 
 ]ay in all the luxuriance of teeming ripening fields of 
 grain immediately below us. Dotted all over with farm- 
 houses and enclosures, with its sylvan-fringed stream coil- 
 
ing serpent-like round open fields, now disclosing and now 
 concealing its course behind clumps and groves of trees ; 
 with the golden harvest, ready for the reaper, swaying to 
 the breezes of heaven, catching and giving back light and 
 shadow to the eyes of the gazer. To men who during the 
 long weary, dreary months of winter had been cooped up 
 under canvas, with only bleak and barren hills in view, it 
 was a picture to be seen but once to have it photographed 
 on the memory ever afterward. 
 
 Gen. Morgan's strategy was well conceived and 
 promptly executed. While the rebels were kept on the 
 qui vive with the threats of an assault in force on their 
 front, the greater portion of his force had already assumed 
 a position which commanded Powell's Valley on their 
 Hank, and he had but to descend and assert the national 
 right of domain. But then came the question. Would 
 Gen. Raines, who held the Gap, contest for the masterv of 
 the valley? On the 12th, Gen. Morgan occupied the val- 
 ley in force, and on the 15th, the brigades of Spears and 
 Carter joined him, and at i A. m. on the i8th he was under 
 march with all his force to meet the enemy, who were re- 
 ported to be entrenched midway between our forces and 
 the Gap, with the determination to measure swords for the 
 possession of the valley. As the troops advanced, rumors 
 came fast and faster that the post had been abandoned, 
 and as we approached the locality of the reported en- 
 trenchments it was manifest that there was to be no pas- 
 sage of arms for the possession of Cumberland Gap. At 
 4 p. M., after a march of twenty miles, the advance of 
 Gen. Morgan's force took formal possession of the aban- 
 doned works, and with the hearty shouts of the soldiery 
 and the reverberations of cannon, the National flag was 
 unfurled to the breezes of heaven from the topmost peak 
 above the stronghold. 
 
 The Cumberland Range, an offshoot from the Alleghen}^ 
 mountains, constitute that series of high hills rather than 
 mountains which form the natural boundary between the 
 
States of Kentucky and Tennessee. It is an elevated 
 plateau, or high range, cut heie and there by deep chasms 
 or channels. The range reaches a mean elevation of two 
 thousand feet from the low land and valleys on either side, 
 and trends from northeast to southwest. Throughout its 
 entire extent the vast power of the upheaval force by which 
 the chain was elevated is displayed in a wonderful degree. 
 It belongs in its formation to the carboniferous period of 
 the geological era, and presents strata of sandstone 
 hundreds of feet in thickness, dislocated, rent and thrown 
 into every imaginable angle and dip to the horizon. The 
 Gap, a cleft in the chain at a point where the convulsive 
 action of the upheaval had left only a narrow spinal ridge 
 as a connecting isthmus between expanded bodies, and so 
 narrow that wagons descending either wa}^ lock wheels on 
 the same level space. The chasm is nine hundred feet 
 below the point of highest elevation on the left, as one 
 approaches it from the north, and it converges to a width 
 barely sufficient for a roadwa}^ The pinnacles on either 
 side, clearly defined and in bold relief, stand in bleak and 
 barren grandeur and desolation, having been almost 
 entirely denuded of forest and' shrub in obedience to 
 military necessity. Huge masses of sandstone lie scat- 
 tered in promiscuous confusion over the surrounding sur- 
 face, and to the spectator it seemed .as "if the genii of 
 ruin had here fought out one of their Titanic battles with 
 great masses of sandstone wrenched from the mountain 
 side as missiles. The roads from the valleys on either side 
 wind and zigzag their way up the eleven hundred feet of 
 elevation to reach the Gap, and are commanded through- 
 out by earthwork fortresses erected at appropriate positions 
 on the heights above. To a tyro in militar}' science, it 
 presented all the characteristics of an invulnerable natural 
 fortress. Its strength is its weakness. Situated in the 
 midst of a bleak, barren, untilled mountain region, and 
 requiring a heavy force to man it, because of its vastness, 
 and having to rely on a distant point for its subsistence, its 
 
armament and its munitions of war, it is liable at any 
 moment to have its communications broken and its supplies 
 cut off, when it must of necessity be abandoned or fall an 
 easy prey to a foe powerful enough to invest it. 
 
 Roaming over the hills and through the abandoned 
 camps of the enemy in compan}'^ of a messmate, and 
 before the coming up of our troops, we found the following 
 morceau of rebel humor in one of the abandoned tents. 
 The truth of its most material allegation, our short supplies, 
 gave point to its wit : 
 
 FOR A YANKEE SURGEON. 
 
 Mv Last Will and Testament 
 
 Whereas, In the fortunes of war, it may soon be necessary for me 
 to bid adieu to the climate, scenery and crystal fountains of Cumber- 
 land Gap ; therefore, to the first Yankee Surgeon who plants his foot on 
 the threshold of my deserted quarters, I will, devise and bequeath, 
 
 Item ist. — All my interests and rights to said premises, together 
 with all and singular the tenements, hereditaments and appurtenances 
 thereunto belonging. 
 
 Item 2d.— I further desire and direct that the said Yankee Surgeon 
 shall have free and unmolested control and use of all the old clothes, 
 bottles, blankets and medicines left on the aforesaid premises. 
 
 Item jd. — Knowing that the above-mentioned Yankee Surgeon 
 has for some time past subsisted on half rations, badly prepared, and in 
 consequence of which his health may suffer, I further desire and direct 
 that he may have unrestrained control, and be sole proprietor of a 
 small cooking stove, a few paces hence on the hillside, where the tes- 
 tator has often eaten and enjoyed well-cooked biscuit, beef, bacon, mut- 
 ton, tarts, etc., regretting, however, that the usages of war will not per- 
 mit me to leave him a supply of these articles. 
 
 Item 4th. — I hereby revoke all previous testaments 
 
 In witness whereof I hereunto set my hand and affix my seal. 
 R. B. Gardner, [seal.] 
 
 Attest: Asst. Surgeon 3d Georgia Battalion. 
 
 W. J Carmichael. 
 
 Henry J, Burton. 
 
 If the testator and his subscribing witnesses have 
 escaped the casualties of battle and the diseases of camp 
 life, it may afford them some pleasure to learn that the 
 Jeit d" Sprit came direct to the hands of a Kentucky 
 Yankee surgeon, who would esteem it a pleasure to grasp 
 
— 12 — 
 
 each of them by the hand, and round the social board com- 
 pare notes of bygone times, fight over our battles again, 
 "show how fields are won," and in the bright hopes of the 
 future greatness and glory of our common country, bury 
 in the deep sea of forgetfulness all memory of past strife, 
 contention and bitterness. 
 
 Gen. Morgan held possession of Cumberland Gap just 
 three months, during which period much labor was ex- 
 pended and valuable additions made to the defensive 
 works. Roads were improved and new ones made to 
 facilitate movements from fort to fort. And under the 
 supervision of Lieut. Craighill, of the Engineer Corps, a 
 series of case-mated bomb-proof earthworks were erected 
 at the base of the mountain on the south side of the Gap, 
 guarding all the approaches from that direction, each one 
 of which was in turn commanded by one on its flank and 
 rear up to the defenses of the Gap proper. The task of 
 supplying from ten to twelve thousand men with sub- 
 sistence, arms, ammunition, clothing, and grain and forage 
 for stock by the army wagon, with the base of supply one 
 hundred and thirty miles distant, will never be found 
 a desirable one, and in the then condition of the country it 
 was a most onerous and perplexing duty. During the 
 month of July, John Morgan headed one of his raids into 
 the State, and was on the line of our supplies. The rebels 
 at that earl}'^ day outnumbered us on the Tennessee side of 
 the Gap, and thus cut off' all supplies of forage for animals. 
 Foraging in force was not unattended with danger, as 
 DeCourcey's Brigade, two thousand strong, came near 
 being surrounded and cut oft' on the 6th of August, at 
 Tazewell, Tenn, Only gallant fighting and skillful hand- 
 ling prevented ils capture by a three-fold greater force of 
 the enem3^ 
 
 The gravest positions are at times accompanied by 
 ludicrous scenes which tend to relieve their gravity, and 
 occasion amusement to the soldiery. The Battle of Taze- 
 well was fought just south of that town. In falhng back 
 
— 13 — 
 
 the troops all filed through its main street. The 22d 
 Kentucky was in the rear. It was not running, only 
 making good quick-step time. The town is in a deep 
 valley, and on the hills on each side were the batteries of 
 the opposing hosts, which were worked to their utmost 
 activity, whilst the rear was being pressed by the pursuing 
 enemy. Near the center of the town a great tall, obese, 
 "sable sister," in the undress uniform of the laundry 
 brigade — a sleeveless bodice and a red flannel petticoat, 
 which, like "Wee Nannie's cutty sark," was in "longitude 
 sorely scanty," — emerged from a side street. Bubbling 
 all over with excitement, and gesticulating wildly, she 
 screamed at the top of her voice, ''Oh, oh! you Tanks is 
 skecdadliiig, is yoii,?'" She exposed to the profane gaze of 
 the soldiery an amazing extent of rotund nudities. The 
 grotesque humor of the situation was sufficient to have 
 provoked an audible smile under the ribs of death. 
 
 Coincidences of the War. 
 
 At the battle of Tazewell the 22d Kentucky and the 
 22d Tennessee regiments of infantry were arrayed in line 
 of battle against each other. Ten months later, at the 
 siege of Vicksburg— a week before the strife there ended— 
 a truce was called, and the officers in the rebel works im- 
 mediately in front of the trench occupied by the 22d Ken- 
 tucky came on the neutral ground, and one of them, ad- 
 dressing Col. Lindsay, asked, "What regiment have you 
 here?" and learning that it was the 22d Kentucky ex- 
 claimed : " Now, that beats hell ; last year at Tazewell we 
 were in Hue against each other, and there my regiment re- 
 ceived the hardest blow it has had in the service ; and now 
 we are face to face again, and in a few days we shall all 
 have to surrender to Grant" 
 
 In August, Gen. Bragg made his inroad into Ken- 
 tucky. Kirby Smith, passing in through Big Creek Gap, 
 formed the right wing of his army, and he occupied our 
 line of communications with Lexington, Ky., thus cutting 
 
— 14 — 
 
 off all supplies. On the 29th of that month, he delivered 
 a crushing blow to the troops under command of Gen. M. 
 D. Mason, who confronted him near Richmond, with a 
 few regiments of undrilled recruits. Defeat was inev- 
 itable. For weeks anterior to this date the troops at the 
 Gap had been on half rations, and the horses and mules 
 were making the air resonant with indications that they 
 were suffering with the pangs of hunger. All the fields of 
 growing corn in available distance had already been cut 
 up and fed to the stock, in the milk stage. They could not 
 be turned loose to browse without the danger of having 
 them stampeded and lost in the ravines and dense jungles 
 of undergrowth which covered the surface of the surround- 
 ing country. 
 
 Gen. Morgan has been censured for the abandonment 
 of the post with acerbity, and the Chief-of-Staff of the 
 U. S. Army, Gen. Halleck, in his report on the general 
 situation, under date of January i, 1863, was pleased to 
 refer to it as "the unexpected abandonment" of a post 
 which he was instructed to hold at all hazards. 'Tis easy 
 to condemn in the absence of knowledge, but the proper 
 rule is always to be governed by the lights which the 
 responsible commander had to guide him in the emerg- 
 ency. And then if wrong has been perpetrated, or tlie 
 honor of the Nation been tarnished, let public justice brand 
 him as recreant to duty who has failed to meet its just 
 expectations. Gen. Morgan, and those engaged with him 
 in that campaign, will be content to abide such an enlight- 
 ened judgment. But short of this, censure without ex- 
 amination and without trial is a gross mockery and 
 perversion of all the instincts of National justice. 
 
 On the 8th of September, DeCourcey's Brigade, two 
 thousand strong, with Capt. Foster's (ist Wisconsin) Bat- 
 tery, were ordered to Manchester, in Clay county, Ky., 
 fifty miles north of the Gap, with orders to accumulate at 
 that point all the subsistence and forage supplies to be 
 procured, but instead of accumulating stores, they had 
 
— 15 — 
 
 a hard struggle to supply their immediate daily wants. 
 On the 14th, a survey of all the subsistence in store at 
 the Gap was ordered, when it was ascertained that not 
 more than ten days of half rations remained on hand. 
 
 Telegrams of the day, purporting to proceed from 
 Gen. Morgan, and saying that he had sixty days of 
 rations, were published. These deluded the world, and 
 may to some extent have deceived high public functionaries. 
 For weeks previous to the evacuation the rebels held 
 his only line of telegraphic communication in their hands. 
 Under these circumstances, a conference with the 
 commanders of brigades was called, and the emergencies 
 of the situation was laid before the Board. 
 
 Gen. Morgan had at the Gap twelve thousand men to 
 subsist. He held a vast amount of Government propert}- 
 for which he was responsible. He had thirty pieces of 
 cannon, a number of them Parrott guns, much coveted by 
 the rebels, as superior to any possessed by them. He had 
 a ten thousand stand of muskets, with all their accoutre- 
 ments, in store. He had all the horses, mules, wagons, 
 ambulances incident to the service, with such a body as he 
 commanded. He was shut up, cut off from all communi- 
 cation with the Government, without the remotest intima- 
 tion from the authorities as to how or when he might prob- 
 ably be succored. 
 
 He was two hundred and thirty miles from the Ohio 
 river. If the attempt were made, then and now, to reach 
 that region, while his stock had some remaining strength, 
 they might, peradventure, get through. 
 
 If they remained until the animals were further 
 reduced by active starvation, it would be but to surrender, 
 not alone the position, but all his army, as prisoners of 
 war, and all his mateiial into the hands of rebels. 
 
 Headquarters, Cumberland Gap, ] 
 September 14, 1862. \ 
 
 A Council of War, convened by Brigadier-General Morgan, com- 
 manding the forces at Cumberland Gap, assembled at headquarters at 
 
— i6 — 
 
 1 1 A. M. to-day. Present, Brigadier-General Morgan, commanding, Brig- 
 adier-General Spears, Brigadier-General Baird, Brigadier-General Carter. 
 The brigade of Col. DeCourcey absent on detached service. The pro- 
 ceedings were opened by Gen. Morgan stating in detail the informaton 
 in his possession relating to the position and numbers of the Union and 
 rebel forces in Virginia, Kentucky and Tennessee, and as to the prob- 
 abilities of succor both of men and supplies reaching this post, and the 
 condition of the troops as to supplies of food, clothing and amunition. 
 Gen. Morgan stated that the council was convened to consider the 
 question of remaining at the Gap or evacuating the position, and that 
 he should be governed by the decision of the council, so far as that 
 question was concerned. 
 
 After a free interchange of opinion, it was agreed unanimously 
 that, in view of all the circumstances of the case, the position should 
 be vacated. 
 
 (Signed) Geo. W. Morgan, Brigadier-Genet al, 
 
 J. G. Spears, Brigadier- General , 
 A. Baird, Brigadier-General, 
 S. P. Carter, Brigadier-General, 
 W. P. Craighill, jst. Lt. Eng's, U.S.A. 
 
 Recorder of Council. 
 
 Statement of subsistence stores on the 17th day of September, the 
 day of evacuation, submitted to the Council of War by Brigadier- 
 General Morgan : 
 
 50,384 lbs. Bacon, 
 
 12,000 men, 5X days' rations 
 
 336 bushels Beans, 
 
 . " " 15 
 
 9,000 lbs. Rice, 
 
 ;; ;; jyi ;; 
 
 1,300 lbs. Sugar, 
 
 
 19,230 lbs. Coffee, 
 
 " 16 '^ " 
 
 11,860 lbs. Mixed Vegetables, 
 
 " 17 
 
 3,630 lbs. Dessicated Potatoes, 
 
 " " yA " 
 
 5,650 lbs. Soap, 
 
 
 73 barrels Salt, 
 
 
 295 gallons Vinegar. 
 
 G. M. Adams, 
 
 Commissary of Subsistence, U. S. A. 
 
 In addition, it should be stated that for three weeks 
 not a pound of subsistence stores had reached the post, 
 and that the horses and mules were absolutely starving. 
 
 These were the considerations, and this the pressure 
 under which the conference with his subordinates was 
 called. After a full and free interchange of opinions, 
 it was unanimously decided that the post should be 
 abandoned. This conclusion was reached with reluctance 
 by all, as the position was regarded as of indispensable 
 strategic importance to the National cause. 
 
 Tlie troops under Gen. Morgan trusted with implicit 
 
— 17 — 
 
 faith in his judgment and skill, and they entertained un- 
 
 assl tlh™ "^ -"k*"'^ ^'""'^ '" -P"'- -y direct 
 them hi .7"'^ ' ""'""" "'^ stronghold, and to 
 U^em the order of evacuation was a source of chagrin and 
 mortification. ^ 
 
 of fh^'T ^ """""^ "'"' """ ''"'<= <"■ J"^"« °f 'he author 
 of the 'American Conflict," Mr. Greeley, to sneer at Gen 
 
 rl7fro"mTh '' tr' '"' "^"S^g""^ - ^ P-"P!'ate 
 do L , r ' ''"' «^^°"«ble, candid men.willing to 
 dojusfce to all parties, will not be found such swift wit- 
 nesses to .mpeach the judgment of cotemporaries in situ- 
 a^^ions calculated to test the discretion and firmness of the 
 most resolute and determined. 
 
 rhin °°, "^! '^"' """^ '^"^ ""= '■"'■'^ "'<=■■<= "'"ed and all 
 H r ' '"<■ "^*"^^^ f"^ "^^ -°* °f destruction. 
 
 and 17'''' . r "°"' ""■" "' """""^ P°i""* detached 
 and made ready for a blast of powder to turn them into the 
 .Md and at other points the roads were mined and great 
 p.ts blown ou, after the rear guard had passed. Durinj; 
 wi^h , *e heavy guns captured with the post, together 
 wtth two thtrty-pounder Parrotts. were rendered useless. 
 
 Tohl 7"l """ ''"^ "^" '^^^d of the retreating 
 
 column passed through the Gap from the Tennessee side 
 of the works. At 2 a. m. on the i8th, the rear filed out, 
 leavtng only Capt. Wm. F. Patterson and his squad o 
 pioneers to spnng the mines and accomplish the work of 
 destrucfon. H,s orders were to remain forty minutes 
 after the rear had passed before applying the torch. The 
 night was moonless, and the heavens overcast with clouds, 
 shutting out the feeble rays of the glimmering star-Iigh 
 valley " '"' «'°°'" hooded over mountain and 
 
 On the expiration of the appointed time and at an 
 agreed signal, the mines were in rapid succession exploded, 
 
 vallevlTb"- r ^^'r='"°"= ™hich shook mountain and 
 yalley^debris of earth and sandstone was rained over the 
 
 •When this paper was wiuen Mr. Greeley was living. 
 
hillsides. The destruction of the commissary buildings 
 and the magazines was left for the last sad act. The burn- 
 ing of these illuminated the road for miles on the retreat. 
 The supply of shot and shell was large, and the inter- 
 mittent explosion of the latter continued until the head of 
 the column was miles away, and sounded so much like a 
 hotly contested battle that it was repeatedly halted to ascer- 
 taic that the rear was not assailed by pursuing and exulting 
 rebels. 
 
 Gen. Morgan reached Manchester on the 19th, and 
 here the first pause in the retreat occurred, the entire 
 column remaining en bivouac for two days to call in all 
 detachments, and to strip for the fight or foot-race, which- 
 soever it might prove to be. 
 
 And here for the first time was witnessed by many of 
 the soldiers the swift, stern, rigorous justice of martial law. 
 A private of the 7th Kentucky Infantry wantonly killed a 
 comrade. He was known to be actuated by malice, as he 
 had indulged in previous threats. The homicide was com- 
 mitted on Friday. Saturday a Court Martial convened, 
 tried, convicted and sentenced him to death, and on Sun- 
 day he was shot to death as a murderer in the presence of 
 the assembled army. 
 
 Early on Sunday night, the 21st, the work of destruc- 
 tion was resumed. A hundred army wagons had accumu- 
 lated at Manchester. There were no animals to take them 
 through, and they were burned. 
 
 At I A. M. on the 22d the march was resumed. The 
 brigade to which the writer belonged was assigned to the 
 rear of the column, and his regiment was in the rear of the 
 brigade. The pickets had all been called in. The rebels 
 were believed to be close on us, and we were in momentary 
 expectation of an attack. Only those who have passed 
 through such an ordeal can realize the quickened appre- 
 hension, the painful hours of suspense which intervened 
 from the time when the head of the column commenced to 
 stretch out its slow length over the rough, narrow ob- 
 
— 19 — 
 
 structed road of the dark valley, through which the first 
 portion of the march lay. The east was dappled with the 
 approach of dawn before the rear moved. Such hours of 
 anxiety are infinitely more trying to the courage and con- 
 stancy of the soldier than the direct call to battle. The 
 order of retreat assigned to each brigade a battery of 
 artillery, and the guns being of longer range than any the 
 rebels brought against us, they were kept at long range. 
 
 A heavy rebel force under Gen. Stevenson, who had 
 invested the Tennessee side of the Gap, took possession of 
 it on our evacuation, and detachments from his command 
 hung on our rear and picked up stragglers. John Morgan's 
 cavalry harrassed our front and flanks at all available 
 points. Once we were assailed in the rear, and once they 
 attempted to mass on our front and arrest the onward 
 march, but they were readily repulsed. 
 
 The rebels holding possession of the blue grass region 
 and all the thickly settled portions of the State, the line of 
 retreat was confined to the mountain or hill region of 
 Eastern Kentucky, and across the upper portion of the 
 Cumberland, Kentucky and Licking rivers, and the spurs 
 ot the Cumberland mountain range which dips down 
 between them. The roads of this region, everywhere im- 
 perfect before the rebellion, had now become by neglect 
 almost impassable. Bridges were everywhere burned or 
 torn up in front of the advancing column, but fords were 
 speedily found across the spent streams. Trees were felled 
 across the mountain roads at narrow passes where they 
 could not be flanked ; but Capt. Patterson and his pioneer 
 corps, armed with axes, cross-cut saws and with blocks 
 and tackle, removed all obstructions in half the time it 
 required to place them in the line of our march. The 
 ringing blows of the ax and the crashing sound of falling 
 tress were heard day and night in our advance. 
 
 It seemed to be the policy of the people of this entire 
 district to cut oft' all means of inter-communication with 
 the outside world. To keep the roads in good condition 
 
only invited attack by marauding guerilla bands, who 
 swept everything before them with unsparing rigor. 
 
 To the civilian it may seem strange to learn that block 
 and tackle and cross-cut saws were made a portion of 
 the armament of a mountain fortress ; but to these instru- 
 ments, wielded by stalwart arms and guided by sound 
 judgment, was the safe accomplishment of the retreat to a 
 great measure due. 
 
 On the second day out from Manchester, the 23d, the 
 last rations were issued, consisting of a pound or two each 
 of flour, sugar and coffee to each mess, and on the evening 
 of the same day a small herd of beef cattle which were 
 driven in the rear of the column was captured by John 
 Morgan's cavalry. 
 
 The disturbing effect of the war on the labor of the 
 country was everywhere visible along the line of march. 
 Farms were untilled, and the fields were in fenceless 
 desolation and overgrown with weeds — their occupants 
 seemed anxious to exhibit only the evidence of their 
 poverty. Little patches of corn, all the visible means of 
 subsistence for families during the approaching winter, 
 were consumed in a single night. The grain had passed 
 from the milk to the semi-solid stage of the matured ear, 
 and was grated into meal on extemporized graters made 
 by punching holes through the tin plates of the soldiers, 
 each mess having two or three of them. Cooking utensils 
 we had none, except our tin cups and coffee pots. Our 
 corn meal was baked into hoe cakes on smooth heated 
 stones, or into ash pone, the sweetest method of cooking 
 corn meal. Everything edible along the line of march in 
 view was gobbled up on sight. The writer recalls the 
 amusement excited in witnessing the robbery of three 
 stands of bees beside the road. A soldier approaching 
 each hive, boldly threw it on his shoulder and marched off 
 with the open end of the hive in the rear ; the bees swarm- 
 ing out flew back to the former site of the stands to find 
 themselves houseless and homeless. 
 
Evidence of the confusion worse confounded in mil- 
 itary affairs, both National and rebel, was apparent during 
 this retreat. Humphrey Marshall's rebel command— five 
 or six thousand strong — camped near West Liberty, Mor- 
 gan county, Ky., on the 22d of September, marching west 
 under stringent orders to aid in intercepting Gen. G. W. 
 Morgan at Mount Sterling, and on the ensuing night, the 
 23d, Gen. Morgan's force occupied the same camping 
 ground, marching north, each commander anxious to avoid 
 a passage at arms just then — Morgan because it would 
 have given time for the rebels to concentrate a superior 
 force on him, and Marshall because of our superiority in 
 numbers and equipments. 
 
 Gen. Morgan's force ran the gauntlet of two hundred 
 and thirty miles with the foe in front and rear and on his 
 flanks, reaching the Ohio river at the town of Greenup on 
 the 3d of October. On the 4th the troops crossed into 
 Ohio at Wheelersburg, and went into camp at Portland, 
 Jackson county, where they remained en bivouac for two 
 weeks for rest, and awaiting supplies and equipments. 
 
 Gen. Morgan brought with him the greater portion of 
 the heavy ordnance held at the Gap ; and, best of all, he 
 brought out 12,000 seasoned troops with their morale pre- 
 served, and ready at other and distant points to aid in the 
 vindication of the dignity, the honor and the rights of the 
 Nation. 
 
 Audacity and dash in battle often accomplished 
 wonders ; a retreat, however, tests the mettle of a com- 
 mander. This one was conducted with sleepless vigilance 
 and with untiring energy. The enemy was met at all 
 points and foiled, and the many obstructions placed in the 
 way of the onward march were speedily overcome. 
 
 And now to say that, a retreat of such a distance was 
 accomplished in thirteen marching days with the loss 
 of but two soldiers slain, and with no loss of material 
 en route, is a high tribute to Gen. Morgan. 
 
 The influence of mountain ranges in forming the 
 
thoughts and directing the actions of man has been the 
 subject of philosophical inquiry to the historian. 
 
 The Cumberland range, an offshoot from the great 
 Alleghany mountains, thrust as a wedge between the 
 cotton-growing States of the South and the grazing and 
 cereal States of the middle section, is a district of country 
 unsuited for the profitable cultivation of the products of 
 slave labor. 
 
 The early emigrants to that elevated region carried 
 with them to their chosen homes the sentiments of personal 
 and political freedom engendered in the great Revolution- 
 ary struggle through which they had passed. They had 
 witnessed in the fertile lowlands the oppressions and 
 wrongs inevitably incident to slavery, and they impressed 
 on their oflTspring its bitter fruits, alike to the dominant 
 race and to the patient, suffering, abject beings held in 
 subjection. 
 
 The battle-cry of the Moslem through centuries of 
 carnage has ever been, "The Koram or the sword ;" that 
 of our Revolutionary fathers was, "Give me liberty or 
 give me death;" with the rebels it was, "Give us slavery 
 or perish the Government." 
 
 The Nation accepted the defiant gage of battle, and 
 rising in the dignity and majesty of its might, trampled 
 out the offensive claim. 
 
 The results achieved vindicates God's providential 
 control over human action and human government, and 
 has established personal manhood rights on the broadest 
 and most immutable foundations — his sovereign justice and 
 the will of a regenerated people. 
 
 "Here the free spirit of mankind at length 
 Throws its fetters off; and who shall place 
 A limit to the giant's unchained strength, 
 Or curb its swiftness in the forward race ; 
 Far like the comet's way through infinite space, 
 Stretches the long untraveled path of light 
 Into the depths of ages, we may trace 
 Distant the brightening glory of its flight 
 Till the receding rays are lost to human sight." 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
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 013 701 676 ft " i