History of Morgan's Cavalry

by Basil Wilson Duke

General Smith's forces were arranged at Lawrenceburg (which was not occupied by the enemy) and on the road thence to Harrodsburg on the 6th. Sill's division fell back across Salt river and into the rugged Chaplin hills, pressed by a portion of General Smith's infantry, Colonel Thomas Taylor's brigade in advance. Several hundred prisoners were taken. The position of General Smith's forces was not materially changed during that day and the next, although they continued to draw nearer to Harrodsburg. The main body of the enemy had in the mean time concentrated its marching columns and moved to the vicinity of Perryville, 58,000 strong, on the evening of the 7th.

The detachments which advanced to Frankfort and toward Lawrenceburg, were not more than 12,000 strong in all. So rugged and difficult of passage is the country through which these detachments had to pass, that a comparatively small force could have prevented their junction at Lawrenceburg and held both at bay, leaving the bulk of the Confederate army free to concentrate at Perryville. Even had their junction been permitted, three thousand such cavalry as Bragg had at his disposal could have retarded their march to Harrodsburg for several days. They could not have forced their way along the road in less than two or three days, and as many would have been required to make a detour and join Buell. In that time the battle of Perryville could have been decided. But so completely was General Bragg in the dark about Buell's movements that, when he first heard of the advance from Louisville, he supposed it was a movement of the whole Federal army upon Frankfort, and he ordered General Polk "to move from Bardstown, by way of Bloomfield, toward Frankfort, to strike the enemy in flank and rear," while General Smith should take him in front. This order was evidently issued under an unaccountable and entire misapprehension of the true state of affairs, but showed a nerve and purpose which promised well. General Bragg must certainly, when he issued it, have supposed that General Buell's whole army was coming from that direction. How strange is it that a commander who could thus resolve to fight his foes, when he believed them to be united, should fear to encounter them separately. Whatever may be the verdict upon General Polk's disobedience of orders, whether it was one of those cases in which a subordinate can rightfully exercise this discretion or not, the fact of General Bragg's incompetency looms up in unmistakable proportions.

The most remarkable feature of General Bragg's conduct was this strange, unexampled vacillation. There was perhaps never afforded such an instance of perfect infirmity and fickleness of purpose. He had, there can be little doubt, resolved to retreat without delivering battle before the 1st of October. He nevertheless sought to fight at Frankfort (as has been seen) a few days afterward. Again, immediately afterward, he did his best to avoid battle when it could have been delivered (as all but himself thought) under far more favorable circumstances. No one now doubts, I presume, that General Bragg fought at Perryville with a fragment of his army, not to win a victory, but to check the enemy and cover his retreat.

After General Polk moved to Perryville, General Bragg, of course, learned of the advance of the enemy in that direction, and must have known that it was in strong column, or he would not have permitted sixteen thousand troops to collect there to oppose it. He was still in error regarding the other movements, and left the larger part of his army to confront the forces maneuvering about Lawrenceburg and Frankfort. One glance at the map will show the reader that, if the enemy was really advancing in heavy columns by these different routes, it was clearly General Bragg's best policy to have struck and crushed (if he could) that body threatening him from the south. If he crushed that his line of retreat would be safe, and he could have fought the other at his leisure, or not at all, as he chose. He could have fought (if it had continued to advance) at Bryantsville, or gone after and attacked it. If, on the contrary, he had concentrated to fight at Frankfort or Lawrenceburg, defeat, with this other force on his line of retreat, would have been ruinous. Even complete and decisive victory would have left him still in danger, having still another army to defeat or drive away. He would have been, in either case, between his foes, preventing their junction, and in a situation to strike them in succession; but in the one case his rear was safe, and in the other it was threatened.

With the true trimming instinct, he elected to take a middle course; he divided his army, and sought to meet both dangers at the same time. Is it saying too much that he was saved from utter destruction by the heroic courage, against vast odds, of that fragment of his army which fought at Perryville? It is the popular idea that a commander is out-generaled when he is deceived. Military phraseology can mystify the popular mind, but it can not eradicate from it this idea. Buell certainly deceived Bragg, and by sending detachments, numbering in all not more than twelve thousand, through a country from which a mere handful of men could have prevented them from debouching, he kept thirty thousand men, the bulk of General Bragg's army, idle, and rendered them useless until the game was decided.

After the battle of Perryville (where he certainly got the better of the forces opposed to him)—an earnest of what might have been done if the whole army had been concentrated—and after an accurate knowledge had been obtained, of how Sill's and Dumont's detachments had deceived him into the belief that they were the whole Federal army—General Bragg had his entire army concentrated at Harrodsburg. The two armies then fairly confronted each other, neither had any strategic experiments to fear, on flank or rear, for Sill's division was making a wide and prudent circuit to get to Buell, and Dumont was stationary at Frankfort. It would have been a fair, square, stand up fight. It is, now, well known that there was not the disparity in numbers which General Bragg and his friends claimed to have existed. There was less numerical inequality, between the armies, than there has been on many battlefields—where the Confederate arms have been indisputably victorious. Buell's strength was less than at any other period of the eight or ten days that a battle was imminent. Sill had not gotten up—the Federal army was fifty-eight thousand strong—minus the four thousand killed and wounded at Perryville, and the stragglers. Buell had in his army, regiments and brigades, of raw troops, thirty-three thousand in all. Bragg had not more than five thousand; most of them distributed among veteran regiments. There were no full regiments, nor even full companies of recruits in Bragg's army, except in the Kentucky cavalry commands. The two armies faced each other, not more than three miles apart. The belief was almost universal, in each army, that next morning we would fight. The troops thought so, and, despite the pouring rain, and their uncomfortable bivouacs, were in high and exultant spirits. I know, for I saw them late in the night, that some officers of high rank confidently looked for battle, and were cheerful, and sanguine of victory.

What General Bragg really intended to do that night—perhaps he himself only knows—and it is quite as probable that even he does not know. He retreated on the next morning to Bryantsville. There was no undignified haste about this movement—the troops moved off deliberately, and in such order, that they could have been thrown quickly, if it had become necessary, into line of battle. General Bragg manifested no great anxiety to get away from the vicinity of his enemy, and Buell certainly manifested no strong desire to detain him.

On the next day (the 12th), the army remained at Bryantsville, and took up its march for Lancaster about ten o'clock of that night. It reached Lancaster on the morning of the 13th, and divided. General Smith going to Richmond, and over the Big hill, to Cumberland Gap, General Bragg with the troops which had come into Kentucky under his immediate command, passing through Crab Orchard.

It was hoped, and thought probable, that Buell would overtake and force Bragg to fight at Crab Orchard. He did, indeed, come very near doing so. Sending one division to Lancaster, he moved with the bulk of his army toward Crab Orchard. He failed, however, to intercept Bragg, and the latter moved on out of Kentucky.

Thus ended a campaign from which so much was expected, and which, had it been successful, would have incalculably benefited the Confederate cause. Able writers have exerted all their skill in apologies for this campaign, but time has developed into a certainty, that opinion then instinctively held by so many, that with the failure to hold Kentucky, our best and last chance to win the war was thrown away.