In preparation for a lengthened absence, Burnside had turned over to me some extra duties. He ordered the District of Michigan to be added to my command, and gave general directions that the current business of the department headquarters should pass through my hands. As General Parke, his chief of staff, had gone to Vicksburg in command of the Ninth Corps, Burnside made informal use of me to supply in some measure his place. Our relations therefore became closer than ever. He hoped his troops would soon come back to him, as was promised, and in resuming business at the Cincinnati headquarters, he tried to keep it all in such shape that he could drop it at a moment's notice.
To keep the enemy occupied he organized two expeditions, one under Brigadier-General Julius White into West Virginia, and the other under Colonel W. P. Sanders into East Tennessee. The latter was one of the boldest and longest raids made during the war, and besides keeping the enemy on the alert, destroying considerable military stores and a number of important railway bridges, it was a preliminary reconnoissance of East Tennessee and the approaches to it through the mountains, which was of great value a little later. The force consisted of 1500 mounted men, being detachments from different regiments of cavalry and mounted infantry, among which were some of the loyal men of East Tennessee under Colonel R. K. Byrd. Sanders was a young officer of the regular army who was now colonel of the Fifth Kentucky Cavalry. He rapidly made a first-class reputation as a bold leader of mounted troops, but was unfortunately killed in the defence of Knoxville in November of this same year. His expedition started from Mount Vernon, Kentucky, on the 14th of June, marched rapidly southward sixty miles to Williamsburg, where the Cumberland River was fordable. Thence he moved southwest about the same distance by the Marsh Creek route to the vicinity of Huntsville in Tennessee. Continuing this route southward some fifty miles more, he struck the Big Emory River, and following this through Emory Gap, he reached the vicinity of Kingston on the Clinch River in East Tennessee, having marched in all rather more than two hundred miles. Avoiding Kingston, which was occupied by a superior force of Confederates, he marched rapidly on Knoxville, destroying all the more important railway bridges. Demonstrating boldly in front of Knoxville, and finding that it was strongly held and its streets barricaded for defence, he passed around the town and advanced upon Strawberry Plains, where a great bridge and trestle crosses the Holston River, 2100 feet in length, a place to become very familiar to us in later campaigning. Crossing the Holston at Flat Creek, where other bridges were burned, he moved up the left (east) bank of the river to attack the guard at the big bridge, the Confederate forces being on that side. He drove them off, capturing 150 of the party and five cannon. He not only destroyed the bridge, but captured and burnt large quantities of military stores and camp equipage. On he went along the railway to Mossy Creek, where another bridge 300 feet long was burned. He now turned homeward toward the north-west, having greatly injured a hundred miles of the East Tennessee Railroad. Turning like a fox under the guidance of his East Tennessee scouts, he crossed the Clinch Mountains and the valley of the Clinch, and made his way back by way of Smith's Gap through the Cumberland Mountains to his starting-place in Kentucky. He had captured over 450 prisoners, whom he paroled, had taken ten cannon and 1000 stands of small arms which he destroyed, besides the large amounts of military stores which have been mentioned. He marched about five hundred miles in the whole circuit, and though frequently skirmishing briskly with considerable bodies of the enemy, his losses were only 2 killed, 4 wounded, and 13 missing. Of course a good many horses were used up, but as a preliminary to the campaign which was to follow and in which Sanders was to have a prominent place, it was a raid which was much more profitable than most of them. He was gone ten days. [Footnote: Sanders' Report, Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. i. pp. 385, 386.]
The expedition under Brigadier-General Julius White was sent to beat up the Confederate posts in the Big Sandy valley and to aid incidentally the raid under Sanders into East Tennessee. Burnside sent another southward in the direction of Monticello, Kentucky. The object of these was to keep the enemy amused near home and prevent the raids his cavalry had been making on the railway line by which Rosecrans kept up his communication with Louisville. They seem rather to have excited the emulation of the Confederate cavalryman Brigadier-General John H. Morgan, who, a few days before Rosecrans's advance on Tullahoma, obtained permission to make a raid, starting from the neighborhood of McMinnville, Tenn., crossing the Cumberland near Burkesville, and thence moving on Louisville, which he thought he might capture with its depots of military stores, as it was supposed to be almost stripped of troops. His division consisted of about 3000 horsemen, and he took the whole of it with him, though Wheeler, his chief, seems to have limited him to 2000. His instructions were to make a rapid movement on the line of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad in Kentucky and to get back to his place in Bragg's army as quickly as possible. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. i. p.817.]
Morgan's reputation as a soldier was a peculiar one. He had made a number of raids which showed a good deal of boldness in the general plan and a good deal of activity in the execution, but it cannot be said that he showed any liking for hard fighting. Like boys skating near thin ice, he seemed to be trying to see how close he could come to danger without getting in. A really bold front showed by a small body of brave men was usually enough to turn him aside. It is instructive to compare his career with Forrest's. They began with similar grade, but with all the social and personal prestige in Morgan's favor. Forrest had been a local slave-trader, a calling which implied social ostracism in the South, and which put a great obstacle in the way of advancement. Both were fond of adventurous raids, but Forrest was a really daring soldier and fought his way to recognition in the face of stubborn prejudice. Morgan achieved notoriety by the showy temerity of his distant movements, but nobody was afraid of him in the field at close quarters.
The official order to Morgan to start on his expedition was dated on the 18th of June, but he did not get off till the close of the month. It would seem that he remained in observation on the flank of Rosecrans's army as the left wing moved upon Manchester, and began his northward march after Bragg had retreated to Decherd on the way to Chattanooga. At any rate, he was first heard of on the north side of the Cumberland on the 2d of July, near Burkesville and marching on Columbia. Burnside immediately ordered all his cavalry and mounted infantry to concentrate to meet him, but his route had been chosen with full knowledge of the positions of our detachments and he was able to get the start of them. Brigadier-General H. M. Judah, who commanded the division of the Twenty-third Corps which covered that part of our front, seems to have wholly misconceived the situation, and refused to listen to the better information which his subordinates gave him. [Footnote: Sketches of War History, vol. iv. (Papers of the Ohio Commandery of the Loyal Legion). A paper by Capt. H. C. Weaver, Sixteenth Kentucky Infantry, who was on the staff of Brigadier-General E. H. Hobson during the pursuit of Morgan.] After a slight skirmish at Columbia, Morgan made for the Green River bridge at Tebb's Bend, an important crossing of the Louisville Railroad. The bend was occupied by Colonel O. H. Moore of the Twenty-fifth Michigan Infantry, who, under previous instructions from Brigadier-General E. H. Hobson, intrenched a line across the neck of the bend, some distance in front of the stockade at the bridge. Morgan advanced upon the 4th of July, and after a shot or two from his artillery, sent in a flag demanding the surrender of Moore's little force, which amounted to only 200 men. Moore did not propose to celebrate the national anniversary in that way, and answered accordingly. The enemy kept up a lively skirmishing fight for some hours, when he withdrew. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. i. p. 645.] Moore had beaten him off with a loss of 6 killed and 23 wounded of the brave Michigan men. He reported Morgan's loss at 50 killed and 200 wounded. The Confederate authorities admit that they had 36 killed, but put their wounded at only 46, an incredibly small proportion to the killed.
The raiders continued their route to Lebanon, where was the Twentieth Kentucky Infantry under Lieutenant-Colonel Charles S. Hanson, numbering less than 400 men, without artillery. A brigade ordered to reinforce the post delayed its advance, and Hanson was left to his own resources. After several hours of a lively skirmishing fight without much loss, he surrendered to save the village from destruction by fire, which Morgan threatened. The loss in the post was 4 killed and 15 wounded. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. i. p. 649.] Hanson reported 29 rebel dead left on the field and 30 wounded, also abandoned. No doubt others of the wounded were taken care of and concealed by their sympathizers in the vicinity. Some military stores had been burned with the railway station-house before Hanson surrendered. He and his men were paroled in the irregular way adopted by Morgan on the raid.
Bardstown was the next point reached by the enemy, but Morgan's appetite for Louisville seems now to have diminished, and he turned to the westward, reaching the Ohio River on the 8th, at Brandenburg, some thirty miles below the city. The detachments of mounted troops which were in pursuit had been united under the command of General Hobson, the senior officer present, and consisted of two brigades, commanded by Brigadier-General J. M. Shackelford and Colonel F. Wolford. They approached Brandenburg on the evening of the 8th and captured the steamboat "McCombs" with a remnant of Morgan's men and stores the next morning when they entered the town. They saw on the opposite bank the smoking wreck of the steamboat "Alice Dean" which Morgan had set on fire after landing his men on the Indiana shore. The steamboat "McCombs" was sent to Louisville for other transports. A delay of twenty-four hours thus occurred, and when Hobson's command was assembled in Indiana, Morgan had the start by nearly two days. [Footnote: Hobson's Report, Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. i. p. 659.]
It is claimed by Morgan's intimate friend and chronicler that he intended to cross the Ohio from the day he left camp in Tennessee, although it would be contrary to his orders; [Footnote: Id., p. 818. History of Morgan's Cavalry, by B. W. Duke, p. 410.] and that he had made investigations in advance in regard to fords on the upper Ohio and particularly at Buffington Island, where he ultimately tried to cross into West Virginia. If true, this would forfeit every claim on his part to the character of a valuable and intelligent subordinate; for operations on a large scale would be absolutely impossible if the commander of a division of cavalry may go off as he pleases, in disobedience to the orders which assign him a specific task. Except for this statement, it would be natural to conclude that when he approached Louisville he began to doubt whether the city were so defenceless as he had assumed, and knowing that twenty-four hours' delay would bring Hobson's forces upon his back, he then looked about for some line of action that would save his prestige and be more brilliant than a race back again to Tennessee. It is quite probable that the feasibility of crossing the Ohio and making a rapid ride through the country on its northern bank had been discussed by him, and conscious as he was that he had thus far accomplished nothing, he might be glad of an excuse for trying it. This interpretation of his acts would be more honorable to him as an officer than the deliberate and premeditated disobedience attributed to him. But whether the decision was made earlier or later, the capture of the steamboats at Brandenburg was at once made use of to ferry over his command, though it was not accomplished without some exciting incidents. A party of the Confederates under Captain Hines had crossed into Indiana a few days before without orders from Morgan, being as independent of him, apparently, as he was of General Bragg. Hines's party had roused the militia of the State, and he had made a rapid retreat to the Ohio, reaching it just as Morgan entered Brandenburg. It may be that the lucky daredeviltry of Hines's little raid fired his commander's heart to try a greater one; at any rate, Morgan forgave his trespass against his authority as he prayed to be forgiven by Bragg, and turned his attention to driving off the Indiana militia who had followed Hines to the bank of the river and now opened fire with a single cannon. Morgan's artillery silenced the gun and caused the force to retreat out of range, when he put over two of his regiments, dismounted, to cover the ferrying of the rest. At this point one of the "tin-clad" gunboats of the river fleet made its appearance and took part in the combat. The section of Parrot guns in Morgan's battery proved an overmatch for it, however, and it retired to seek reinforcements. The interval was used to hasten the transport of the Confederate men and horses, and before further opposition could be made, the division was in the saddle and marching northward into Indiana.
At the first news of Morgan's advance into Kentucky, Burnside had directed General Hartsuff, who commanded in that State, to concentrate his forces so as to capture Morgan if he should attempt to return through the central part of it. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. i. pp.13, 679, etc.] Judah's and Boyle's divisions were put in motion toward Louisville, and the remainder of the mounted troops not already with Hobson were also hurried forward. These last constituted a provisional brigade under Colonel Sanders. It may help to understand the organization of the National troops to note the fact that all which operated against Morgan were parts of the Twenty-third Corps, which was composed of four divisions under Generals Sturgis, Boyle, Judah, and White. The brigades were of both infantry and mounted troops, united for the special purposes of the contemplated campaign into East Tennessee. For the pursuit of Morgan the mounted troops were sent off first, and as these united they formed a provisional division under Hobson, the senior brigadier present. Quite a number of the regiments were mounted infantry, who after a few months were dismounted and resumed their regular place in the infantry line. For the time being, however, Hobson had a mounted force that was made up of fractions of brigades from all the divisions of the corps; and Shackelford, Wolford, Kautz, and Sanders were the commanders of the provisional brigades during the pursuit. Its strength did not quite reach 3000 men. [Footnote: Official Records, vol. xxiii. pt. i. p. 658.]
Morgan's first course was due north, and he marched with some deliberation. On the 10th he reached Salem, about forty miles from the river, on the railway between Louisville and Chicago. [Footnote: Id., pp. 717, 719.] A small body of militia had assembled here, and made a creditable stand, but were outflanked and forced to retreat after inflicting on him a score of casualties. The evidences Morgan here saw of the ability of the Northern States to overwhelm him by the militia, satisfied him that further progress inland was not desirable, and turning at right angles to the road he had followed, he made for Madison on the Ohio. There was evidently some understanding with a detachment he had left in Kentucky, for on the 11th General Manson, of Judah's division, who was on his way with a brigade from Louisville to Madison by steamboats under naval convoy, fell in with a party of Morgan's men seeking to cross the river at Twelve-mile Island, a little below Madison. Twenty men and forty-five horses were captured. [Footnote:Id., pt. ii. pp. 729, 745.] If any of this party had succeeded in crossing before (as was reported) they would of course inform their chief of the reinforcements going to Madison, and of the gunboats in the river. Morgan made no attack on Madison, but took another turn northward in his zigzag course, and marched on Vernon, a railway-crossing some twenty miles from Madison, where the line to Indianapolis intersects that from Cincinnati to Vincennes. Here a militia force had been assembled under Brigadier-General Love, and the town was well situated for defence. Morgan, declining to attack, now turned eastward again, his course being such that he might be aiming for the river at Lawrenceburg or at Cincinnati.