Tennessee in the American Civil War

• 1. The Secession Crisis

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  On the 9th of February 1861, a secret circular circulated among pro-slavery Tennesseans urging them to organize Southern Rights Anti-Coercion Societies. The document signed by Wm. Williams and others demanded that men devote their entire energies to the work from that hour until the election closed. They instructed readers not to wait for general meetings but to appoint committees in each Civil District immediately. This propaganda campaign aimed to convince voters that the secessionist movement was overwhelming when it was actually fragile. In February 1861, 54 percent of Tennessee voters rejected sending delegates to a convention on secession. The vote count reached 69,675 against the proposal compared to 57,798 in favor. Unionists displayed the American flag in every section of Nashville with zeal equal to the late 1860 presidential campaign. A crowd gathered around a bagpipe player playing Yankee Doodle on the corner across from the newspaper office. Ex-mayor John Hugh Smith gave a speech that received loud cheers from the assembled citizens. Governor Isham G. Harris convened an emergency session of the General Assembly in January 1861 to discuss the crisis. He described the secession of Southern states as caused by long continued agitation over slavery. Harris identified grievances with the Republican Party including high taxes on slave labor and the Underground Railroad. Despite these tensions, most Tennesseans showed little enthusiasm for breaking away from the nation they had shared struggles with for so long.

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• 2. Rivers And Strategy

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  In February 1862, Ulysses S. Grant and the United States Navy captured control of the Cumberland and Tennessee Rivers. These waterways served as major military highways during the age of steamboats. Union gunboats had been scanning Confederate fort-building on the twin rivers for months before the campaign began. The idea of using the rivers to breach the Confederate defense line was well known by the end of 1861. Capture of Memphis and Nashville gave the Union control of the Western and Middle sections of the state. Control was confirmed at the battle of Murfreesboro in early January 1863. Andrew Johnson, an East Tennessean from Greeneville, was appointed military governor after Nashville fell. This marked the first time a Confederate state capital had fallen to Union forces. During this period, the military government abolished slavery though its legality remained questionable. The Confederates continued to hold East Tennessee despite strong Unionist sentiment there. Exceptions included strongly pro-Confederate Sullivan and Rhea Counties. The Battle of Shiloh occurred in April 1862 when Grant held off a Confederate counterattack. His area commander Henry Halleck received a promotion to General-in-Chief following these victories. The Tullahoma campaign led by William Rosecrans drove Confederates from Middle Tennessee with few casualties.

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• 3. East Tennessee Resistance

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  Tennesseans representing twenty-six East Tennessee counties met twice in Greeneville and Knoxville to agree on secession from Tennessee. They petitioned the state legislature in Nashville which denied their request to separate. Confederate troops under Felix Zollicoffer occupied East Tennessee to prevent further secession efforts. The region came under Confederate control from 1861 until 1863. Nevertheless, East Tennessee supplied significant numbers of troops to the Federal army. Many East Tennesseans engaged in guerrilla warfare against state authorities by burning bridges and cutting telegraph wires. They also acted as spies for the North. Generals Felix K. Zollicoffer, Edmund Kirby Smith, and Sam Jones oscillated between harsh measures and conciliatory gestures. These commanders arrested hundreds of Unionist leaders yet allowed men to escape the Confederate draft. Union forces finally captured the region in 1863 after years of resistance. East Tennessee became an early base for the Republican Party in the South. Strong support for the Union challenged Confederate commanders who controlled most of the area throughout the war. The area had only 9 percent slaves compared to 29 percent in Middle Tennessee and 34 percent in West Tennessee. Most slaves were house servants rather than the base of plantation operations. This demographic difference contributed to the dominant mood strongly opposing secession.

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• 4. Battles And Leadership

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  After winning a victory at Chickamauga in September 1863, Confederates besieged Chattanooga but were driven off by Grant in November. Many Confederate defeats can be attributed to the poor leadership of General Braxton Bragg. He led the Army of Tennessee from Shiloh through the Chattanooga campaign. Historian Thomas Connelly concluded that although Bragg was an able planner he failed repeatedly in operations. His inability to collaborate effectively with subordinates contributed to these failures. The last major battles came when General John Bell Hood led Confederates north in November 1864. He was checked at Franklin where his army suffered heavy losses. George Thomas routed the Army of Tennessee under Hood at Nashville in December 1864. This engagement marked the final major battle fought in the state. The Confederate army was virtually destroyed by Thomas's greatly superior forces. Anthony's Hill, Bean's Station, Blountville, Blue Springs, Brentwood, Britton's Lane, Brown's Ferry, Bull's Gap, Campbell's Station, and Collierville all witnessed combat during the war. Fort Donelson, Fort Henry, Fort Pillow, and Fort Sanders also became sites of significant fighting. First Battle of Memphis and Second Battle of Memphis occurred alongside other engagements like Jackson and Johnsonville.

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• 5. Economy And Society

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  Refugees poured into Nashville during the war because jobs were plentiful in depots warehouses and hospitals serving the effort. The city offered a much safer place than the countryside for those fleeing violence. Unionists and Confederate sympathizers both flooded into the urban center along with free blacks and escaped slaves. Businessmen from the North also arrived seeking opportunity. There was little heavy industry in the South but the Western Iron District in Middle Tennessee produced the most iron in 1861. One of the largest operations was the Cumberland Iron Works which the Confederate War Department tried to protect without success. Memphis and Nashville had flourishing red light districts due to their large transient populations. Union wartime regulations forced prostitutes to purchase licenses and pass medical exams primarily to protect soldiers from venereal disease. Their trade was deregulated once military control ended. The state provided the second largest number of troops for the Confederacy overall. It also supplied more southern unionist soldiers for the Union Army than any other state within the Confederacy. This dual contribution reflected the deep divisions within Tennessee society itself.

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• 6. Reconstruction Aftermath

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  In January 1865, a convention decided it could propose amendments to the Tennessee state constitution. Dominated by pro-Union forces allied with Military Governor Andrew Johnson, the body proposed two changes. One amendment abolished slavery except as punishment for crime while another repudiated allegiance with the Confederate States of America. Both passed by voters on the 22nd of February 1865 before going into effect later that spring. The state legislature ratified the Fourteenth Amendment on the 18th of July 1866 making Tennessee the first state readmitted to the Union on the 24th of July 1866. Because it ratified this amendment, Tennessee became the only seceded state without a military governor during Reconstruction. It was not part of any Reconstruction military districts despite unhappy feelings about the defeat. However, martial law returned in 1869 under Governor Parson Brownlow through Enforcement Acts targeting the Ku Klux Klan. Many white Tennesseans resisted efforts to expand suffrage and civil rights to freedmen. When the state Supreme Court upheld African American suffrage in 1867 reactions grew stronger still. The Nashville Republican Banner published an editorial calling for a revolutionary movement to restore legal inferiority of black populations. Only a few African Americans served in the Tennessee legislature during Reconstruction though they held about one-third of council seats in Nashville. According to the 1860 census African Americans made up 25 percent of the population yet could not dominate politics.

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