This article is about the Kentucky commonwealth government-in-exile between 1861 and 1865. For other uses, see Kentucky (disambiguation).
Seal of the provisional government of Kentucky, showing an arm holding the 13th star of the Confederacy. The motto voce populi is Latin for "by the voice of the people".
The Confederate government of Kentucky was a shadow government established for the Commonwealth of Kentucky by a self-constituted group of Confederate sympathizers and delegates sent by Kentucky counties, during the American Civil War. The shadow government never replaced the elected government in Frankfort, in which the state legislature had strong Union sympathies while the governor was pro-Confederate. Neither was it able to gain the whole support of Kentucky's citizens; its jurisdiction extended only as far as Confederate battle lines in the Commonwealth, which at its greatest extent in 1861 and early 1862 encompassed over half the state. Nevertheless, the provisional government was recognized by the Confederate States of America, and Kentucky was admitted to the Confederacy on December 10, 1861. Kentucky, the final state admitted to the Confederacy, was represented by the 13th (central) star on the Confederate battle flag.[1]
Bowling Green, Kentucky, was designated the Confederate capital of Kentucky at a convention in nearby Russellville. Due to the military situation in the state, the provisional government was exiled and traveled with the Army of Tennessee for most of its existence. For a short time in the autumn of 1862, the Confederate Army controlled Frankfort, the only time a Union capital was captured by Confederate forces. During this occupation, General Braxton Bragg attempted to install the provisional government as the permanent authority in the Commonwealth. However, Union General Don Carlos Buell ambushed the inauguration ceremony and drove the provisional government from the state for the final time. From that point forward, the government existed primarily on paper and was dissolved at the end of the war.
The provisional government elected two governors. George W. Johnson was elected at the Russellville Convention and served until his death at the Battle of Shiloh. Richard Hawes was elected to replace Johnson and served through the remainder of the war.
Background
Kentucky senator and 1860 Presidential candidate John Breckinridge represented the states' rights position.
Kentucky's citizens were split regarding the issues central to the Civil War. The state had strong economic ties with Ohio River cities such as Pittsburgh and Cincinnati while at the same time sharing many cultural, social, and economic links with the South. Unionist traditions were strong throughout the Commonwealth's history, especially in the east. With economic ties to both the North and the South, Kentucky had little to gain and much to lose from a war between the states. Additionally, many slaveholders felt that the best protection for slavery was within the Union.
The presidential election of 1860 showed Kentucky's mixed sentiments when the state gave John Bell 45% of the popular vote, John C. Breckinridge 36%, Stephen Douglas 18%, and Abraham Lincoln less than 1%. Historian Allan Nevins interpreted the election results to mean that Kentuckians strongly opposed both secession and coercion against the secessionists. The majority coalition of Bell and Douglas supporters was seen as a solid moderate Unionist position that opposed precipitate action by extremists on either side.[2]
The majority of Kentucky's citizens believed the state should be a mediator between the North and South. On December 9, 1860, Kentucky GovernorBeriah Magoffin sent a letter to the other slave state governors, suggesting that they come to an agreement with the North that would include strict enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act, a division of common territories at the 37th parallel, a guarantee of free use of the Mississippi River, and a Southern veto over slave legislation. Magoffin proposed a conference of slave states, followed by a conference of all the states to secure the concessions. Because of the escalating pace of events, neither conference was held.[3]
Governor Magoffin called a special session of the Kentucky General Assembly on December 27, 1860, to ask the legislators for a convention to decide the Commonwealth's course in the sectional conflict.[4] The Louisville Morning Courier on January 25, 1861, articulated the position that the secessionists faced in the legislature, "Too much time has already been wasted. The historic moment once past, never returns. For us and for Kentucky, the time to act is NOW OR NEVER."[5] The Unionists, on the other hand, were unwilling to surrender the fate of the state to a convention that might "in a moment of excitement, adopt the extreme remedy of secession."[6] The Unionist position carried after many of the states rights' legislators, opposing the idea of immediate secession, voted against the convention.[7] The assembly did, however, send six delegates to a February 4 Peace Conference in Washington, D.C., and asked Congress to call a national convention to consider potential resolutions to the secession crisis, including the Crittenden Compromise, proposed by Kentuckian John J. Crittenden.[8]
As a result of the firing on Fort Sumter, President Lincoln sent a telegram to Governor Magoffin requesting that the Commonwealth supply four regiments as its share of the overall request of 75,000 troops for the war.[9] Magoffin, a Confederate sympathizer, replied, "President Lincoln, Washington, D.C. I will send not a man nor a dollar for the wicked purpose of subduing my sister Southern states. B. Magoffin."[10] Both houses of the General Assembly met on May 7 and passed declarations of neutrality in the war, a position officially declared by Governor Magoffin on May 20.[11]
In a special congressional election held June 20, Unionist candidates won nine of Kentucky's ten congressional seats.[12] Confederate sympathizers won only the Jackson Purchase region,[12] which was economically linked to Tennessee by the Cumberland and Tennessee Rivers.[13] Believing defeat at the polls was certain, many Southern Rightists had boycotted the election; of the 125,000 votes cast, Unionists captured close to 90,000.[14] Confederate sympathizers were dealt a further blow in the August 5 election for state legislators. This election resulted in veto-proof Unionist majorities of 76–24 in the House and 27–11 in the Senate.[12] From then on, most of Magoffin's vetoes to protect southern interests were overridden in the General Assembly.[12]
Historian Wilson Porter Shortridge made the following analysis:
These elections demonstrated that a majority of the people of Kentucky were opposed to secession, but they could not be interpreted as an approval of the war policy of the Lincoln administration, as was quite generally done at the north at that time. Perhaps the best explanation at that time was that the people of Kentucky desired peace and thought that the election of the union candidates was the best way to get it.[15]
With secession no longer considered a viable option, the pro-Confederate forces became the strongest supporters for neutrality. Unionists dismissed this as a front for a secessionist agenda. Unionists, on the other hand, struggled to find a way to move the large, moderate middle to a "definite and unqualified stand with the Washington government." The maneuvering between the two reached a decisive point on September 3 when Confederate forces were ordered from Tennessee to the Kentucky towns of Hickman and Columbus. Union forces responded by occupying Paducah.[16]
On September 11, the legislature passed a resolution instructing Magoffin to order the Confederate forces (but not the Union forces) to leave the state. The Governor vetoed the resolution, but the General Assembly overrode his veto, and Magoffin gave the order. The next week, the assembly officially requested the assistance of the Union and asked the governor to call out the state militia to join the Federal forces. Magoffin also vetoed this request. Again the assembly overrode his veto and Magoffin acquiesced.[17]
Formation
A pro-Confederate peace meeting, with Breckinridge as a speaker, was scheduled for September 21. Unionists feared the meeting would lead to actual military resistance, and dispatched troops from Camp Dick Robinson to disband the meeting and arrest Breckinridge.[18] Breckinridge, as well as many other state leaders identified with the secessionists, fled the state. These leaders eventually served as the nucleus for a group that would create a shadow government for Kentucky. In his October 8 "Address to the People of Kentucky," Breckinridge declared, "The United States no longer exists. The Union is dissolved."[19]
On October 29, 1861, 63 delegates representing 34 counties met at Russellville to discuss the formation of a Confederate government for the Commonwealth.[20] Despite its defeats at the polls, this group believed that the Unionist government in Frankfort did not represent the will of the majority of Kentucky's citizens.[9]Trigg County's Henry Burnett was elected chairman of the proceedings.[20]Scott County farmer George W. Johnson chaired the committee that wrote the convention's final report and introduced some of its key resolutions.[9] The report called for a sovereignty convention to sever ties with the Federal government.[9] Both Breckinridge and Johnson served on the Committee of Ten that arranged the convention.[20]
On November 18, 116 delegates from 68 counties met at the William Forst House in Russellville.[21] Burnett was elected presiding officer. Fearing for the safety of the delegates, he first proposed postponing proceedings until January 8, 1862.[22] Johnson convinced the majority of the delegates to continue.[22] By the third day, the military situation was so tenuous that the entire convention had to be moved to a tower on the campus of Bethel Female College, a now-defunct institution in Hopkinsville.[21]
The first item was ratification of an ordinance of secession, which proceeded in short order.[22] Next, being unable to flesh out a complete constitution and system of laws, the delegates voted that "the Constitution and laws of Kentucky, not inconsistent with the acts of this Convention, and the establishment of this Government, and the laws which may be enacted by the Governor and Council, shall be the laws of this state."[23] The delegates proposed a provisional government to consist of a legislative council of ten members (one from each Kentucky congressional district); a governor, who had the power to appoint judicial and other officials; a treasurer; and an auditor.[24] The delegates designated Bowling Green (then under the control of Confederate general Albert Sidney Johnston) as the Confederate State capital, but had the foresight to provide for the government to meet anywhere deemed appropriate by the council and governor.[23] The convention adopted a new state seal, an arm wearing mail with a star, extended from a circle of twelve other stars.[21]
Officials of the Confederate government of Kentucky[25]
Position
Officeholder
Governor
George W. Johnson
Lieutenant Governor
Horatio F. Simrall
Secretary of State
Robert McKee
Treasurer
Theodore Legrand Burnett
Auditor
Josiah Pillsbury
The convention unanimously elected Johnson as governor.[21]Horatio F. Simrall was elected lieutenant governor, but soon fled to Mississippi to escape Federal authorities.[26] Robert McKee, who had served as secretary of both conventions, was appointed secretary of state.[27]Theodore Legrand Burnett was elected treasurer, but resigned on December 17 to accept a position in the Confederate Congress.[27] He was replaced by Warren County native John Quincy Burnham.[27] The position of auditor was first offered to former Congressman Richard Hawes, but Hawes declined to continue his military service under Humphrey Marshall.[28] In his stead, the convention elected Josiah Pillsbury, also of Warren County.[27] The legislative council elected Willis Benson Machen as its president.[27]
On November 21, the day following the convention, Johnson wrote Confederate president Jefferson Davis to request Kentucky's admission to the Confederacy.[12] Burnett, William Preston, and William E. Simms were chosen as the state's commissioners to the Confederacy.[29] For reasons unexplained by the delegates, Dr. Luke P. Blackburn, a native Kentuckian living in Mississippi, was invited to accompany the commissioners to Richmond, Virginia.[27] Though Davis had reservations about circumvention of the elected General Assembly in forming the Confederate government, he concluded that Johnson's request had merit, and on November 25, recommended Kentucky for admission to the Confederacy.[30] Kentucky was admitted to the Confederacy on December 10, 1861.[9]
Activity
On November 26, 1861, Governor Johnson issued an address to the citizens of the Commonwealth blaming abolitionists for the breakup of the United States.[12] He asserted his belief that the Union and Confederacy were forces of equal strength, and that the only solution to the war was a free trade agreement between the two sovereign nations.[12] He further announced his willingness to resign as provisional governor if the Kentucky General Assembly would agree to cooperate with Governor Magoffin.[12] Magoffin himself denounced the Russellville Convention and the provisional government, stressing the need to abide by the will of the majority of the Commonwealth's citizens.[31]
During the winter of 1861, Johnson tried to assert the legitimacy of the fledgling government but its jurisdiction extended only as far as the area controlled by the Confederate Army which at its height was over half the state.[12] Johnson came short of raising the 46,000 troops requested by the Confederate Congress.[12] Efforts to levy taxes and to compel citizens to turn over their guns to the government were similarly unsuccessful.[12] On January 3, 1862, Johnson requested a sum of $3 million ($88million as of 2024) from the Confederate Congress to meet the provisional government's operating expenses.[32] The Congress instead approved a sum of $2 million, the expenditure of which required approval of Secretary of War Judah P. Benjamin and President Davis.[32] Much of the provisional government's operating capital was probably provided by Kentucky congressman Eli Metcalfe Bruce, who made a fortune from varied economic activities throughout the war.[32]
The council met on December 14 to appoint representatives to the Confederacy's unicameral provisional congress.[33] Those appointed would serve for only two months, as the provisional congress was replaced with a permanent bicameral legislature on February 17, 1862.[33] Kentucky was entitled to two senators and 12 representatives in the permanent Confederate Congress.[34] The usual day for general elections being passed, Governor Johnson and the legislative council set election day for Confederate Kentucky on January 22.[34] Voters were allowed to vote in whichever county they occupied on election day, and could cast a general ballot for all positions.[34] In an election that saw military votes outnumber civilian ones, only four of the provisional legislators were elected to seats in the Confederate House of Representatives.[34] One provisional legislator, Henry Burnett, was elected to the Confederate Senate.[34]
The provisional government took other minor actions during the winter of 1861. An act was passed to rename Wayne County to Zollicoffer County in honor of Felix Zollicoffer, who died at the Battle of Mill Springs.[35] Local officials were appointed in areas controlled by Confederate forces, including many justices of the peace.[12] When the Confederate government eventually disbanded, the legality of marriages performed by these justices was questioned, but eventually upheld.[12]
Withdrawal from Kentucky and death of Governor Johnson
Following Ulysses S. Grant's victory at the Battle of Fort Henry, General Johnston withdrew from Bowling Green into Tennessee on February 7, 1862. A week later, Governor Johnson and the provisional government followed. On March 12, the New Orleans Picayune reported that "the capital of Kentucky [is] now being located in a Sibley tent."[12]
Governor Johnson, despite his presumptive official position, his age (50), and a crippled arm,[36] volunteered to serve under Breckinridge and Colonel Robert P. Trabue at the Battle of Shiloh.[9] On April 7, Johnson was severely wounded in the thigh and abdomen, and lay on the battlefield until the following day.[9] Johnson was recognized and helped by acquaintance and fellow Freemason, Alexander McDowell McCook, a Union general.[9] However, Johnson died aboard the Union hospital ship Hannibal,[12] and the provisional government of Kentucky was left leaderless.
Richard Hawes as governor
Richard Hawes, the second Confederate governor of Kentucky
Prior to abandoning Bowling Green, Governor Johnson requested that Richard Hawes come to the city and help with the administration of the government, but Hawes was delayed due to a bout with typhoid fever.[37] Following Johnson's death, the provisional government elected Hawes, who was still recovering from his illness, as governor.[38] Following his recovery, Hawes joined the government in Corinth, Mississippi, and took the oath of office on May 31.[39]
During the summer of 1862, word began to spread through the Army of Tennessee that Generals Bragg and Edmund Kirby Smith were planning an invasion of Kentucky.[39] The legislative council voted to endorse the invasion plan, and on August 27, Governor Hawes was dispatched to Richmond to favorably recommend it to President Davis.[9] Davis was non-committal, but Bragg and Smith proceeded, nonetheless.[38]
On August 30, Smith commanded one of the most complete Confederate victories of the war against an inexperienced Union force at the Battle of Richmond.[40] Bragg also won a decisive victory at the September 13 Battle of Munfordville, but the delay there cost him the larger prize of Louisville, which Don Carlos Buell moved to occupy on September 25.[41] Having lost Louisville, Bragg spread his troops into defensive postures in the central Kentucky cities of Bardstown, Shelbyville and Danville and waited for something to happen, a move that historian Kenneth W. Noe called a "stupendously illogical decision".[42][43]
Meanwhile, the leaders of Kentucky's Confederate government had remained in Chattanooga, Tennessee, awaiting Governor Hawes' return.[38] They finally departed on September 18,[38] and caught up with Bragg and Smith in Lexington, Kentucky on October 2.[37] Bragg had been disappointed with the number of soldiers volunteering for Confederate service in Kentucky; wagon loads of weapons that had been shipped to the Commonwealth to arm the expected enlistees remained unissued.[44][45] Desiring to enforce the Confederate Conscription Act to boost recruitment, Bragg decided to install the provisional government in the recently captured state capital of Frankfort.[37] On October 4, 1862, Hawes was inaugurated as governor by the Confederate legislative council.[46] In the celebratory atmosphere of the inauguration ceremony, however, the Confederate forces let their guard down, and were ambushed and forced to retreat by Buell's artillery.[45][46][47]
Decline and dissolution
Following the Battle of Perryville, the provisional government left Kentucky for the final time.[38] Displaced from their home state, members of the legislative council dispersed to places where they could make a living or be supported by relatives until Governor Hawes called them into session.[48] Scant records show that on December 30, 1862, Hawes summoned the council, auditor, and treasurer to his location at Athens, Tennessee for a meeting on January 15, 1863.[48] Hawes himself unsuccessfully lobbied President Davis to remove Hawes' former superior, Humphrey Marshall, from command.[49] On March 4, Hawes told Davis by letter that "our cause is steadily on the increase" and assured him that another foray into the Commonwealth would produce better results than the first had.[50]
The government's financial woes also continued. Hawes was embarrassed to admit that neither he nor anyone else seemed to know what became of approximately $45,000 that had been sent from Columbus to Memphis, Tennessee during the Confederate occupation of Kentucky.[50] Another major blow was Davis' 1864 decision not to allow Hawes to spend $1 million that had been secretly appropriated in August 1861 to help Kentucky maintain its neutrality.[38] Davis reasoned that the money could not be spent for its intended purpose, since Kentucky had already been admitted to the Confederacy.[38]
Late in the war, the provisional government existed mostly on paper. However, in the summer of 1864, Colonel R. A. Alston of the Ninth Tennessee Cavalry requested Governor Hawes' assistance in investigating crimes allegedly committed by Brigadier General John Hunt Morgan during his latest raid into Kentucky. Hawes never had to act on the request, however, as Morgan was suspended from command on August 10 and killed by Union troops on September 4, 1864.[37]
There is no documentation detailing exactly when Kentucky's provisional government ceased operation. It is assumed to have dissolved upon the conclusion of the Civil War.[37]
The Confederate States of America (CSA), commonly referred to as the Confederate States (C.S.), the Confederacy, or the South, was an unrecognized breakaway republic in the Southern United States that existed from February 8, 1861, to May 9, 1865. The Confederacy comprised eleven U.S. states that declared secession and warred against the United States during the American Civil War. The states were South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina.
John Cabell Breckinridge was an American lawyer, politician, and soldier. He represented Kentucky in both houses of Congress and became the 14th and youngest-ever vice president of the United States. Serving from 1857 to 1861, he took office at the age of 36. He was a member of the Democratic Party, and ran for president in 1860 as a Southern Democrat. He served in the U.S. Senate during the outbreak of the American Civil War, but was expelled after joining the Confederate Army. He was appointed Confederate Secretary of War in 1865.
In the context of the American Civil War (1861–65), the border states were slave states that did not secede from the Union. They were Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri, and after 1863, the new state of West Virginia. To their north they bordered free states of the Union, and all but Delaware bordered slave states of the Confederacy to their south.
Beriah Magoffin was the 21st Governor of Kentucky, serving during the early part of the Civil War. Personally, Magoffin adhered to a states' rights position, including the right of a state to secede from the Union, and he sympathized with the Confederate cause. Nevertheless, when the Kentucky General Assembly adopted a position of neutrality in the war, Magoffin ardently held to it, refusing calls for aid from both the Union and Confederate governments.
Henry Cornelius Burnett was an American politician who served as a Confederate States senator from Kentucky from 1862 to 1865. From 1855 to 1861, Burnett served four terms in the United States House of Representatives. A lawyer by profession, Burnett had held only one public office—circuit court clerk—before being elected to Congress. He represented Kentucky's 1st congressional district immediately prior to the Civil War. This district contained the entire Jackson Purchase region of the state, which was more sympathetic to the Confederate cause than any other area of Kentucky. Burnett promised the voters of his district that he would have President Abraham Lincoln arraigned for treason. Unionist newspaper editor George D. Prentice described Burnett as "a big, burly, loud-mouthed fellow who is forever raising points of order and objections, to embarrass the Republicans in the House".
Richard Hawes Jr. was a United States representative from Kentucky and the second Confederate Governor of Kentucky. He was part of the politically influential Hawes family. His brother, uncle, and cousin also served as U.S. Representatives, and his grandson Harry B. Hawes was a member of the United States Senate. He was a slaveholder.
George Washington Johnson was the first Confederate governor of Kentucky. A lawyer-turned-farmer from Scott County, Kentucky, Johnson, a supporter of slavery who owned 26 slaves, favored secession as a means of preventing the Civil War, believing the Union and Confederacy would be forces of equal strength, each too wary to attack the other. As political sentiment in the Commonwealth took a decidedly Union turn following the elections of 1861, Johnson was instrumental in organizing a sovereignty convention in Russellville, Kentucky, with the intent of "severing forever our connection with the Federal Government." The convention created a Confederate shadow government for the Commonwealth, and Johnson was elected its governor. This government never controlled the entire state though it controlled about half the state early in the war, Kentucky remained in the Union after 1862 throughout the rest of the war.
Florida participated in the American Civil War as a member of the Confederate States of America. It had been admitted to the United States as a slave state in 1845. In January 1861, Florida became the third Southern state to secede from the Union after the November 1860 presidential election victory of Abraham Lincoln. It was one of the initial seven slave states which formed the Confederacy on February 8, 1861, in advance of the American Civil War.
Kentucky was a southern border state of key importance in the American Civil War. It officially declared its neutrality at the beginning of the war, but after a failed attempt by Confederate General Leonidas Polk to take the state of Kentucky for the Confederacy, the legislature petitioned the Union Army for assistance. Though the Confederacy controlled more than half of Kentucky early in the war, after early 1862 Kentucky came largely under U.S. control. In the historiography of the Civil War, Kentucky is treated primarily as a southern border state, with special attention to the social divisions during the secession crisis, invasions and raids, internal violence, sporadic guerrilla warfare, federal-state relations, the ending of slavery, and the return of Confederate veterans.
Alabama was central to the Civil War, with the secession convention at Montgomery, the birthplace of the Confederacy, inviting other slaveholding states to form a southern republic, during January–March 1861, and to develop new state constitutions. The 1861 Alabaman constitution granted citizenship to current U.S. residents, but prohibited import duties (tariffs) on foreign goods, limited a standing military, and as a final issue, opposed emancipation by any nation, but urged protection of African-American slaves with trials by jury, and reserved the power to regulate or prohibit the African slave trade. The secession convention invited all slaveholding states to secede, but only 7 Cotton States of the Lower South formed the Confederacy with Alabama, while the majority of slave states were in the Union. Congress had voted to protect the institution of slavery by passing the Corwin Amendment on March 4, 1861, but it was never ratified.
The American Civil War significantly affected Tennessee, with every county witnessing combat. It was a divided state, with the Eastern counties harboring pro-Union sentiment throughout the conflict, and it was the last state to officially secede from the Union, in protest of President Lincoln's April 15 Proclamation calling forth 75,000 members of state militias to suppress the rebellion. Although Tennessee provided a large number of troops for the Confederacy, it would also provide more soldiers for the Union Army than any other state within the Confederacy.
During the American Civil War, North Carolina joined the Confederacy with some reluctance, mainly due to the presence of Unionist sentiment within the state. A popular vote in February, 1861 on the issue of secession was won by the unionists but not by a wide margin. This slight lean in favor of staying in the Union would shift towards the Confederacy in response to Abraham Lincoln's April 15 proclamation that requested 75,000 troops from all Union states, leading to North Carolina's secession. Similar to Arkansas, Tennessee, and Virginia, North Carolina wished to remain uninvolved in the likely war but felt forced to pick a side by the proclamation. Throughout the war, North Carolina widely remained a divided state. The population within the Appalachian Mountains in the western part of the state contained large pockets of Unionism. Even so, North Carolina would help contribute a significant amount of troops to the Confederacy, and channel many vital supplies through the major port of Wilmington, in defiance of the Union blockade.
The American state of Virginia became a prominent part of the Confederacy when it joined during the American Civil War. As a Southern slave-holding state, Virginia held the state convention to deal with the secession crisis, and voted against secession on April 4, 1861. Opinion shifted after the Battle of Fort Sumter on April 12, and April 15, when U.S. President Abraham Lincoln called for troops from all states still in the Union to put down the rebellion. For all practical purposes, Virginia joined the Confederacy on April 17, though secession was not officially ratified until May 23. A Unionist government was established in Wheeling and the new state of West Virginia was created by an act of Congress from 50 counties of western Virginia, making it the only state to lose territory as a consequence of the war. Unionism was indeed strong also in other parts of the State, and during the war the Restored Government of Virginia was created as rival to the Confederate Government of Virginia, making it one of the states to have 2 governments during the Civil War.
The Missouri Constitutional Convention of 1861–1863 was a constitutional convention held in the state of Missouri during the American Civil War. The convention was elected in early 1861, and voted against secession. When open fighting broke out between Pro-Confederate governor Claiborne Fox Jackson and Union authorities, and Union forces occupied the state capital, the convention formed a provisional state government, and functioned as a quasi-legislature for several years. The convention never did produce a new constitution; that task was delegated to a new convention, elected in 1864.
The Confederate Heartland Offensive, also known as the Kentucky Campaign, was an American Civil War campaign conducted by the Confederate States Army in Tennessee and Kentucky where Generals Braxton Bragg and Edmund Kirby Smith tried to draw neutral Kentucky into the Confederacy by outflanking Union troops under Major General Don Carlos Buell. Though they scored some successes, notably a tactical win at Perryville, they soon retreated, leaving Kentucky primarily under Union control for the rest of the war.
In the United States, Southern Unionists were white Southerners living in the Confederate States of America opposed to secession. Many fought for the Union during the Civil War. These people are also referred to as Southern Loyalists, Union Loyalists, or Lincoln's Loyalists. Pro-Confederates in the South derided them as "Tories". During Reconstruction, these terms were replaced by "scalawag", which covered all Southern whites who supported the Republican Party.
The East Tennessee Convention was an assembly of Southern Unionist delegates primarily from East Tennessee that met on three occasions during the Civil War. The Convention most notably declared the secessionist actions taken by the Tennessee state government on the eve of the war unconstitutional, and requested that East Tennessee, where Union support remained strong, be allowed to form a separate state that would remain part of the United States split from the rest of Confederate Tennessee. The state legislature denied this request, and the Confederate Army occupied the region in late 1861.
The political career of John C. Breckinridge included service in the state government of Kentucky, the Federal government of the United States, as well as the government of the Confederate States of America. In 1857, 36 years old, he was inaugurated as Vice President of the United States under James Buchanan. He remains the youngest person to ever hold the office. Four years later, he ran as the presidential candidate of a dissident group of Southern Democrats, but lost the election to the Republican candidate Abraham Lincoln.
The Virginia Secession Convention of 1861 was called in the state capital of Richmond to determine whether Virginia would secede from the United States, govern the state during a state of emergency, and write a new Constitution for Virginia, which was subsequently voted down in a referendum under the Confederate Government.
Harrison, Lowell Hayes (Winter 1981). "George W. Johnson and Richard Hawes: The Governors of Confederate Kentucky". The Register of the Kentucky Historical Society. 79 (1): 3–39.
Heck, Frank H. (August 1955). "John C. Breckinridge in the Crisis of 1860–1861". The Journal of Southern History. Southern Historical Association. 21 (3): 316–346. doi:10.2307/2954954. JSTOR2954954.
Kleber, John E., ed. (1992). The Kentucky Encyclopedia. Associate editors: Thomas D. Clark, Lowell H. Harrison, and James C. Klotter. Lexington, Kentucky: The University Press of Kentucky. ISBN0-8131-1772-0.
Klotter, James C.; Harrison, Lowell; Ramage, James; Roland, Charles; Taylor, Richard; Bush, Bryan S; Fugate, Tom; Hibbs, Dixie; Matthews, Lisa; Moody, Robert C.; Myers, Marshall; Sanders, Stuart; McBride, Stephen (2005). Rose, Jerlene (ed.). Kentucky's Civil War 1861–1865. Clay City, Kentucky: Back Home In Kentucky, Inc. ISBN0-9769231-1-4.
Shortridge, William Porter (March 1923). "Kentucky Neutrality in 1861". The Mississippi Valley Historical Review. Organization of American Historians. 9 (4): 283–301. doi:10.2307/1886256. JSTOR1886256.
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