“‘Frankfort to Lexington:
“‘Tell General Ward our pickets are just driven in. Great excitement. Pickets say force of enemy must be two thousand.
“‘Operator.’
“It was now 2 P. M., and as Colonel Morgan wished to be off for Georgetown, I ran a secret ground connection, and opened the circuit on the Lexington end. This was to leave the impression that the Frankfort operator was skedaddling, or that Morgan’s men had destroyed the telegraph.”
General Morgan was the only cavalry commander who extensively or successfully used the telegraph to learn the plans and position of his enemies and to thwart their arrangements for disturbance of his progress, or to place troops in his front. The country through which he operated did much to aid him in this respect, but it was also due in great part to the marvellous skill of his operator, George A. Ellsworth. The story of how he misled his foes, and deceived them as to his intentions and line of march, is not only one of the most amusing but one of the most surprising of the war’s happenings. He passed through four years of war, followed telegraphy and died in Texas about 1910.
The Federals were so thoroughly alarmed that they were unwilling to risk engines and cars and men on the road. Reports of atrocities and barbarities of Morgan’s command were circulated through the country. They were called murderers and thieves and assassins and horse thieves. Bad names did not worry Morgan’s followers. They cared little what they were called if they could harass their foes. They settled down to a feeling of pride that they had been able to excite in the minds and hearts of the enemy such bitter and malignant hate. Neither Morgan’s nor Forrest’s command were much troubled over Federal abuse. They knew that if their foes cussed them, their foes must have suffered to arouse such maledictions, and they rode on and fought on, oblivious of what reports were circulated about their doings. Those who did not have southern sympathies escaped hurriedly from the contemplated line of march and hastened to Lexington and Frankfort for protection. Having obtained all the information that was necessary, at sundown Morgan appeared at Georgetown, the county seat of Scott County, twelve miles from Midway. With Lexington demoralized and Frankfort terrorized and with the Federal commanders at both places afraid that Morgan was going to attack them, he sat down at Georgetown to have a really good rest. A detachment had been left at Midway to delay operations between Lexington and Frankfort, and Captain John B. Castleman of Company D was sent to destroy the bridges between Lexington and Paris on the Kentucky Central Railroad. Captain Castleman did thorough work. He was ordered to proceed up and down the railroad, tear up the track, and burn the bridges. The country outside of the cities was now completely dominated by Morgan. Lexington and Frankfort were too fully garrisoned to justify their assault. Captain Castleman, after fully carrying out his orders, marched to Winchester. These were ready heroes when the highest daring was demanded, and the young men who served under Morgan were equal to any emergency. On reaching Winchester, after the destruction of the Kentucky Central Railroad, Captain Castleman would pass near the home of his parents. He had secretly entered Lexington in disguise and obtained full information as to the numbers and position of the enemy. Safely performing this hazardous work, he rejoined his command.
On the way to Winchester he ran afoul of the advance guard of Metcalf’s brigade. Without a moment’s hesitation he ordered his eighty men to charge the three thousand Federals. The boldness and fierceness of this assault demoralized the enemy. They judged that no sagacious leader with such odds against him would undertake such reckless work, and they receded before the assault, leaving their dead and wounded behind. The valiant young captain, not satisfied with the morning’s experience, returned to Horeb Presbyterian Church, a few miles away. Here his family had worshipped for many years. Behind the structure his command were hidden when a company of Federal cavalry came down a cross road. These also outnumbered the company which had, with such reckless valor, dispersed their comrades a few hours before. With the recollection of their previous splendid success, they did not hesitate to assault this new column. Waving their hats and filling the air with the rebel yell, they rode at the advancing foe. Visions of Morgan’s entire regiment flashed before their surprised minds, and not waiting for the moment of impact, they turned and rode away, leaving as testimonials of the fierce courage of the Confederate assailants a number of dead and wounded.
With these thrilling experiences attesting the intrepidity of his boys, a large proportion of whom were born and reared in the neighborhood, the youthful commander withdrew his company and pushed on to Winchester, where later Colonel Morgan found him awaiting his arrival.
Morgan was now alone in the face of his foes. He could depend upon no aid from his fellows. Insofar as help was concerned, he had “burned the bridges” behind him. There were none upon whom he could fall back. He was as far from all supports as it would be from Richmond to New York. The supreme audacity of such a campaign had never been known before. In no country, in no war, had any leader ever undertaken such a hazard or invited such peril. There were Federal troops three hundred miles south of him and thousands around him. The way he had come was lined with Federal garrisons, and urgent calls were made for Federals to face him and equally as urgent for those behind him to prevent his escape and crush the little company he had brought with him so far into the Federal lines. He was smashing all military precedents. The books written for the guidance of soldiers contained nothing like the history this bold rider was making, and there was, in all military annals, no parallel to what he had now accomplished. This new soldier Daniel had come to judgment, and there were none who could fathom or interpret his decrees. Later, others would rise up to emulate him in the pathway he had blazed. He was the pioneer, and the first cavalryman who had undertaken such marvellous marches, or defied the formulas and maxims that military authors had written for the guidance of those who went to war. Sage generals decreed him reckless, rash, heedless and prophesied destruction, capture, failure. They reread the books generals read and in all these there was nothing, they said, for this knight errant, but sure and certain disaster. But Morgan’s great mind had taken in all the chances he must face. He knew the country and the people whither he had come. He knew the courage and almost superhuman endurance of the youths who rode behind him, and so he bade defiance to axioms and precedents and pushed on where his genius and daring told him he would win victory and discomfit his foes, make new records for his horsemen, show others the effects of bold, dashing movement, and give to cavalry a power and efficacy of which the soldiery of the world had not hitherto written or prophesied.
With Federal forces about in every direction, in Frankfort, Lexington, Falmouth, Danville, Winchester, Cynthiana, it looked as if escape was well-nigh impossible. Morgan had now fully carried out his plans and so he turned his eyes toward Cynthiana, the county seat of Harrison County. It was twenty-two miles distant from Georgetown over a beautifully-graded macadam road. It was sixty-six miles from Cincinnati, and if Morgan could reach Cynthiana and capture it, this would still further disquiet and disturb Lexington and alarm the people of Cincinnati.