The Twenty-Five Days of Morgan - July 12, 1863

By marching his cavalry division the previous afternoon southeast from Vernon to Dupont, General Morgan had unwittingly shortened the distance between himself and the dreaded Union cavalry under General Edward Hobson. This morning, Hobson’s Provisional Division leaves their camp at Lexington and heads east (instead of north) toward Dupont, where Hobson’s incoming dispatches have located his foe. Dupont is seventeen miles from Lexington – a half-day’s ride. Hobson’s stalwart soldiers are keeping pace with Morgan’s Division, which is traveling an average of forty miles per day, and its men are riding in the saddle 21 of every 24 hours. Severe sleep deprivation among the ranks becomes rampant. Both Morgan’s and Hobson’s divisions are leaving scores of soldiers behind from sheer exhaustion. They cannot go any farther. This is ultimately fine for Hobson’s troopers, who are traversing through friendly territory, but for Morgan’s men left by the roadside, they are easily captured by Hobson’s cavalry or by the home guards. The 2,100-man contingent that had crossed the Ohio River with Morgan at Brandenburg, Kentucky, will lose one hundred men killed, wounded, and captured within the borders of the Hoosier State.

Morgan’s troopers depart Dupont, Indiana, around 3:00am. They burn the railroad depot as they ride out of town, and they take $1,600 worth of merchandise from Frank Mayfield’s store. They also steal the 2,000 hams and sides of bacon curing within Mayfield’s Smokehouse. Civilians will see numerous Confederate soldiers with hams strapped to the sides of their horses as they pass by their homes over the next couple of days. In the broiling July sun, the exposed hams become the targets of swarms of flies, and many of these hunks of rotting meat are found dumped by the roadside, where frugal civilians pick them up for their own use.

A 19-year-old Confederate cavalryman from Kentucky named Harry Snook has become infatuated with a seven-year-old redhead, Josephine Mayfield, the daughter of the unfortunate storekeeper and smokehouse owner. Before Snook joins his comrades leaving Dupont, he promises Josephine that he will return and marry her after she grows up. Snook will keep his word. They will marry on December 19, 1878. And, amazingly, Mr. Mayfield would bless the marriage!

Morgan’s troopers head directly east to Bryantsburg, Indiana. Flankers burn multiple railroad trestles of the Madison & Indianapolis Railroad, including the tall bridge at Big Creek. From Bryantsburg, the main column turns northeast and rides on the Old Michigan Road through the villages of Rexville and Correct. The Rebel advance guard encourages women along the raiders’ path to make cakes, breads, and biscuits so that by the time the center of the main column reaches their homes, these baked goods are ready to be gathered up and eaten in the saddle. One woman, Margaret Rawlings, bakes all day today for not only Morgan’s Raiders, but also for Hobson’s Union boys. However, the ladies of the towns and villages through which the Union cavalry pass are more than delighted to serve their saviors in blue.

If the women have plenty of advanced notice, they bring out baskets full of breads, fruits, nuts, and fried chicken and line the streets to hand them out to their heroes in blue as they rode by. They give the Union soldiers glasses of fresh water, milk, and buttermilk, too, to cool them down on their hot summer ride. One officer nicknames Morgan’s Great Raid the “600 Miles of Fried Chicken.” A few lucky soldiers pass through their hometowns, thus allowing them the unique pleasure to visit their families and friends for the first time since they had joined the Union Army. However, these homesick veterans cannot stay more than a few hours to see their loved ones, because they must ride out with the rear guard. They have an important job to do, after all – to catch Morgan and his men!

Morgan’s troopers reach Versailles, Indiana, the seat of Ripley County. Union colonel James Cravens, a veteran soldier, commands three hundred home guards who have positioned themselves in the courthouse square, ready to defend the town. However, after Morgan directs Captain Byrne to unlimber one cannon within plain sight of Cravens’s nervous men, Cravens immediately surrenders his troops without firing a shot. Morgan’s men steal $5,000 from the county treasury, and as usual, the men pillage the stores throughout town and take horses from the residents. They also confiscate whiskey from the saloons, but not generally for drinking pleasure, but rather for medicinal use. However, when General Morgan, a member of the Freemasonry, hears that one of his soldiers had stolen the Masonic jewels from the Masonic Hall in Versailles, he personally hunts down the man responsible and orders him to ride back to Versailles to return the jewels to their rightful owner. The soldier obeys.

When news reaches General Ambrose Burnside in Cincinnati this afternoon that Morgan’s troopers have entered Versailles, he realizes that the Rebel general intends to enter Ohio. Burnside plans to be ready to defend the Buckeye State and, especially, Cincinnati, the largest Northern city west of the Appalachian Mountains and the third most productive manufacturing city in the United States. Much of the Union war effort in the Western Theater depends on Cincinnati for its men, supplies, wagons, ambulances, food, accoutrements, weapons, gunboats, and uniforms. The metropolis is also home to many political influencers. Allowing Morgan to enter Cincinnati could be disastrous to the Union cause and certainly to Burnside’s military career. Burnside contacts Ohio Governor David Tod to arrange a state of military emergency so that Tod can call out the Ohio militia. Tod and Burnside agree to the need, and Governor Tod calls out the Ohio militia this evening while Burnside declares martial law on the huge city. Nearly 60,000 volunteers, militiamen, and home guards from the Buckeye State will respond to the governor’s call.

The Confederate main column departs Versailles in the afternoon on the road heading northeast to Pierceville and [Old] Milan in Indiana. General Morgan orders Colonel J. Warren Grigsby, 6th Kentucky Cavalry, to lead about sixty men to Osgood to burn the large Laughery Creek trestle of the Ohio & Mississippi Railroad. This mission would also serve as a feint toward Greensburg, Indiana, which is full of Union troops. Grigsby is successful in burning the important bridge and several other trestles and depots along the railroad at Delaware Station and Moore’s Hill. Union transportation on the Ohio & Mississippi is halted.

As dark approaches, Morgan’s troopers pass through North Hogan, Brandt’s Corner, [Old] Milan and Clinton, which sits on the Napoleon-Cincinnati Pike. General Morgan instructs all his troopers in the various columns to converge on the Ferris Schoolhouse, located two miles south of Sunman, Indiana. The general spends the night in between the pupils’ desks of the school as he mauls over maps of Cincinnati and Hamilton County, Ohio. A big day lays ahead of him and his men. He knows very well that Burnside, his primary adversary, will have thousands of Union troops ready to defend the Queen City of the West – but where will they be?

Meanwhile, a troop train containing 2,500 Indiana Legionnaires and home guards under Colonel James Gavin steams onto a side rail at Sunman. This line is the Indianapolis, Lawrenceburg & Cincinnati Railroad, which up until now, had remained untouched by the firebrand of the Confederate cavalry. These raw militiamen are under the indirect command of Major General Lew Wallace, the man who had been shamed at the Battle of Shiloh but who had been redeemed by his defense of Cincinnati the previous September. Wallace had arrived by train in Vernon, Indiana, with 1,300 infantrymen from Indianapolis only an hour after Morgan’s rear guard had evacuated their positions on July 11. Wallace had ordered his infantry to steal horses from the civilians to form a mounted infantry regiment. This regiment would get the closest to Morgan’s rear guard than any other Indiana unit within the Hoosier State.

Wallace directs the train load of militiamen to stop for the night at Sunman and prepare to place themselves in front of Morgan’s Division. However, mysteriously, these Union soldiers either do not receive the order or are unable to find the front of their enemy. They sleep all night in their passenger cars at Sunman, with Morgan’s pickets only yards away, and the next morning, the militiamen unwittingly steam by Morgan’s advance guard without stopping until they reach Lawrenceburg, Indiana. Is this move General Wallace’s real intention? Does he want to avoid unnecessary bloodshed among the Hoosiers, knowing very well that Morgan is going to Ohio? That question may never be answered.

Sources:

Cahill, Lora Schmidt. The John Hunt Morgan Heritage Trail in Indiana: A Tour Guide to the Indiana Portion of Morgan’s Great Raid, July 8–13, 1863. Attica, OH: K-Hill Publications, 1997, pp. 6-51.

Duke, Basil W. A History of Morgan's Cavalry. Cincinnati, OH: Miami Printing and Publishing Co., 1867, pp. 402-465.

Johnson, Adam R. The Partisan Rangers of the Confederate States Army. Louisville, KY: George G. Fetter Co., 1904, pp. 142-150, 438-467.

Mowery, David L. Morgan’s Great Raid: The Remarkable Expedition from Kentucky to Ohio. Charleston, SC: History Press, 2013, pp. 73-80.

U.S. War Department. The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. Ser. 1, Vol. 23, Pt. 1. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1880–1901, pp. 11-15, 632-818.