CIVIIL WAR KENTUCKIANS

Among the border states in the Civil War, only Kentucky took the division of loyalties to the extreme of declaring neutrality at the beginning of the war. Fortunately for the future of the Union cause, Confederate General Leonidas Polk blundered into making an attack into the state, leading to its decision to remain in the Union.

One of the most vivid examples of the division in this state is that both Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis were born in Kentucky. Further, Lincoln's in-laws made the situation worse for him. Among Mary Todd Lincoln's Kentucky family, more than half supported the rebellion, often virulently. The fact that Mary was likely mentally ill and suffered deep angst when her children died only increased the burden on the President.

There were few major battles in Kentucky during the war, but often armies passed through it on the way to Tennessee, which saw the second-most battles of any state in the war. Thus, perhaps the most important "battle" came when Grant took Paducah, Kentucky, without a fight, leading to his successful campaign to take Forts Henry and Donelson and establish Union dominance in Nashville. The major Battle of Perryville, Kentucky, did threaten Union control for a short period, but fortunately Braxton Bragg proved more incompetent than his Union opponent Don Carlos Buell, and the threat to Kentucky was over by the end of 1862.

Despite the lack of military activity in the state, Kentucky did contribute many leaders in the Civil War era beyond Lincoln and Davis. This book documents 50 of those men and women, most born and raised in the state, but a few who only played key roles in major military movements. They, like the men and women discussed in the other books in this series, are the major players in the drama that was the Civil War from this critically-important border state.