During the American Civil War , the Ohio River port city of Cincinnati, Ohio , played a key role as a major source of supplies and troops for the Union Army. It also served as the headquarters for much of the war for the Department of the Ohio, which was charged with the defense of the region, as well as directing the army's offensives into Kentucky and Tennessee.
Antebellum Cincinnati played a large role in the abolitionist movement, partially due to its location as a major city in the free state of Ohio directly across the river from the slave state Kentucky. The "Queen City" became a major migration path for escaped slaves. Leading abolitionists such as Lyman Beecher, James Birney, Salmon P. Chase, Levi Coffin, and Theodore Weld frequently spoke or wrote in support of freeing the slaves. They often encountered local resistance, including violent actions from those with opposing viewpoints. Several locations in the region were alleged to be stops on the Underground Railroad. Debates held at the Lane Theological Seminary fueled the anti-slavery controversy.
Cincinnati had mixed political views. Many of the city's swelling immigrant population, including Germans, embraced the fledgling Republican Party. In 1859, Abraham Lincoln made his first political visit to Cincinnati, where he challenged presidential hopeful Stephen Douglas's views on slavery. The political editor of the Cincinnati Daily Gazette later wrote the positive biography, The Life of Abraham Lincoln, which was used as campaign propaganda during Abraham Lincoln's 1860 presidential campaign. The Cincinnati Daily Times, a Democratic newspaper, openly supported the South's right to secede.
At the outset of the war in early 1861, hundreds of Cincinnati's young men flocked to military service. Among the more prominent regiments raised in Cincinnati was the 9th Ohio Infantry, the first almost all-German unit to enter the Union Army. The city gave $250,000.00 for the organization of this unit. [1] In May 1861, the United States Sanitary Commission recruited associate members in Cincinnati, who began supplementing the government in providing comfort for the soldiers. Through their efforts, the Good Samaritan Hospital was completed as a medical facility for injured or wounded soldiers. A year later, they established a Soldiers' Home.
The city became noted as a major source of gunboats and other Union Navy vessels from the burgeoning shipyards in the east side Fulton neighborhood along the Ohio River. Boilers, armor plating, and cast iron cannons were also manufactured in Cincinnati. The city also was a major distribution point for grain, pork, beef, other food, and military supplies to the Union armies serving in the Western Theater.
With the outbreak of the Civil War, George B. McClellan, a prominent Cincinnati resident and the commander of Ohio's state militia, was charged with selecting a site for a recruitment and training center for southern Ohio. The Cincinnati region was a possible target for the Confederate Army due to its Ohio River location and proximity to slave states such as Kentucky and Virginia, from which invasions could be launched. He chose a level tract of land near Indian Hill, Ohio, 17 miles from Cincinnati. More than 50,000 Union soldiers were mustered in or out of service at Camp Dennison. As many as 12,000 occupied the camp at any one time. Among the post's commanders was Cincinnati horticulturalist and former Ohio Militia general Melancthon Wade.
Shortly after the Battle of Shiloh in April 1862, a military hospital was established on the grounds of Camp Dennison, with over 200 beds situated in a series of wooden barracks. The nearby Waldschmidt Cemetery served as the temporary gravesite for Union soldiers and Confederate prisoners of war. As the war progressed, Camp Dennison became a significant base of operations for Federal military units heading south to the front lines.
Another significant U.S. Army training camp near Cincinnati was Camp Harrison, located six miles north of Cincinnati, on the Cincinnati, Hamilton and Dayton Railroad. The post was named for President William Henry Harrison, who was from Hamilton County. The soldiers at Camp Harrison usually remained at the camp for only a short time for training.
In September 1862, Confederate Brig. Gen. Henry Heth was sent north from Lexington, Kentucky to "make a demonstration" in front of Cincinnati, then the sixth largest city in the United States, according to Heth's memoirs. Mayor George Hatch declared martial law, and Union Maj. Gen. Lew Wallace organized the citizens for defense and raised the Black Brigade of Cincinnati. Along eight miles of hilltops from Ludlow to present-day Fort Thomas, Kentucky, volunteers and soldiers constructed rifle pits and other defensive works, which were defended by 22,000 Union soldiers and 50,000 local militia volunteers, called "Squirrel Hunters." On September 5, Governor Tod announced to the public that no more volunteers would be needed for the defense of Cincinnati, but he advised that all military organizations be kept up for future needs. [2]
Cincinnati was briefly threatened by the Confederate cavalry of Brig. Gen. Albert G. Jenkins, who bypassed Cincinnati to the east and entered Ohio near Buffington Island. General Heth and his men marched up the Lexington Road in Northern Kentucky towards the Ohio River. He soon encountered the strong line of Federal defenses and wisely decided not to attack. He lingered in the region for one day and then retreated on September 13. Union General Wallace soon earned the nickname "Savior of Cincinnati" for his energetic defensive actions. The Squirrel Hunters returned to their homes. [3]
By war's end, Cincinnati was defended by 27 earthwork forts and batteries. Six of these artillery positions remain; Hooper Battery and Shaler Battery are open to the public.
Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside, the new commander of the Department of the Ohio as of March 1863, established his headquarters in Cincinnati and garrisoned the area with veteran units from his newly created XXIII Corps. During Morgan's Raid in July, troops from Camp Dennison, at Burnside's orders, responded to the invasion by Confederate cavalry under Brig. Gen. John Hunt Morgan. Gunboats dispatched from Cincinnati played a large role in contributing to Morgan's defeat at the Battle of Buffington Island.
In December 1863, the United States Sanitary Commission opened the "Cincinnati Sanitary Fair" at the opera house as a way of focusing attention on local relief efforts for the soldiers. Bazaars, food stands, art galleries, lectures, and concerts were among the attractions. The Fair ran until April 1864 and garnered $234,000 in revenues and donations, $175,000 collected from Cincinnatians themselves. [4]
Cincinnati became the scene of numerous military courts-martial and trials of civilians accused of treason or aiding the Confederate cause. Among those convicted in these tribunals was Ohio Copperhead Clement Vallandigham.
During the 1864 Presidential Election, Cincinnatians voted heavily for President Lincoln over General McClellan, whose strong personal Cincinnati ties were not enough to carry Hamilton County.
With the cessation of hostilities in 1865, Cincinnati became a major place for Federal troops to disembark from river steamers and reenter Northern soil. A network of roads and railroads carried soldiers back to Camp Dennison or to their home cities to be mustered out of the service.
Note that Ulysses S. Grant was born in Point Pleasant, about 25 miles (40 km) east of Cincinnati. He maintained Cincinnati ties. For much of the Civil War, his favorite mount was a large horse named "Cincinnati".
See "Philander P. Lane; Colonel of Volunteers in the Civil War, Eleventh Ohio Regiment; by William Forse Scott, 1920
William Dennison Jr. was a Whig and Republican politician from Ohio. He served as the 24th governor of Ohio and as U.S. Postmaster General in the Cabinet of President Abraham Lincoln during the American Civil War.
Henry Heth was a career United States Army officer who became a Confederate general in the American Civil War.
Gustav Tafel was a German-born colonel in the Union Army during the American Civil War, and the mayor of Cincinnati, Ohio, from 1897 to 1900.
Camp Chase was a military staging and training camp established in Columbus, Ohio in May 1861 after the start of the American Civil War. It also included a large Union-operated prison camp for Confederate prisoners during the American Civil War.
During the American Civil War, the State of Ohio played a key role in providing troops, military officers, and supplies to the Union army. Due to its central location in the Northern United States and burgeoning population, Ohio was both politically and logistically important to the war effort. Despite the state's boasting a number of very powerful Republican politicians, it was divided politically. Portions of Southern Ohio followed the Peace Democrats and openly opposed President Abraham Lincoln's policies. Ohio played an important part in the Underground Railroad prior to the war, and remained a haven for escaped and runaway slaves during the war years.
Camp Dennison was a military recruiting, training, and medical post for the United States Army during the American Civil War. It was located near Cincinnati, Ohio, not far from the Ohio River. The camp was named for Cincinnati native William Dennison, Ohio's governor at the start of the 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 Union 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.
Louisville in the American Civil War was a major stronghold of Union forces, which kept Kentucky firmly in the Union. It was the center of planning, supplies, recruiting and transportation for numerous campaigns, especially in the Western Theater. By the end of the war, Louisville had not been attacked once, although skirmishes and battles, including the battles of Perryville and Corydon, Indiana, took place nearby.
The Black Brigade of Cincinnati was a military unit of African-American soldiers, that was organized in 1862 during the American Civil War, when the city of Cincinnati, Ohio, was in danger of being attacked, by the Confederate Army. The members of the Cincinnati "Black Brigade" were among the first African Americans to be employed in the military defense of the Union. The fortifications—including forts, miles of military roads, miles of rifle pits, magazines, and hundreds of acres of cleared forests—at the border of Northern Kentucky thwarted the major threat to Cincinnati during the Civil War.
Camp Harrison was one of several Union Army training posts in Hamilton County, Ohio, established during the American Civil War.
The Defense of Cincinnati occurred during what is now referred to as the Confederate Heartland Offensive or Kentucky Campaign of the American Civil War, from September 1 through September 13, 1862. Confederate Brigadier General Henry Heth was sent north from Lexington, Kentucky, to threaten Cincinnati, Ohio, then the sixth-largest city in the United States. Heth was under orders from his superior, Major General Edmund Kirby Smith, not to attack the city, but to instead make a "demonstration". Once Heth arrived and reconnoitered the defenses, he realized an attack was pointless. After a few minor skirmishes, he took his men back to Lexington.
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.
Indiana, a state in the Midwest, played an important role in supporting the Union during the American Civil War. Despite anti-war activity within the state, and southern Indiana's ancestral ties to the South, Indiana was a strong supporter of the Union. Indiana contributed approximately 210,000 Union soldiers, sailors, and marines. Indiana's soldiers served in 308 military engagements during the war; the majority of them in the western theater, between the Mississippi River and the Appalachian Mountains. Indiana's war-related deaths reached 25,028. Its state government provided funds to purchase equipment, food, and supplies for troops in the field. Indiana, an agriculturally rich state containing the fifth-highest population in the Union, was critical to the North's success due to its geographical location, large population, and agricultural production. Indiana residents, also known as Hoosiers, supplied the Union with manpower for the war effort, a railroad network and access to the Ohio River and the Great Lakes, and agricultural products such as grain and livestock. The state experienced two minor raids by Confederate forces, and one major raid in 1863, which caused a brief panic in southern portions of the state and its capital city, Indianapolis.
Joshua Hall Bates was a lawyer, politician, and Ohio militia general in service to the Union during the early part of the American Civil War. He was a leading recruiter and organizer of many of the first regiments of Ohio troops who volunteered after President Abraham Lincoln's call to arms in the spring of 1861.
The 3rd Ohio Infantry Regiment was an infantry regiment in the Union Army during the American Civil War. It served in several important campaigns in the Western Theater in Kentucky, Tennessee, and Alabama.
The 137th Ohio Infantry Regiment, sometimes 137th Ohio Volunteer Infantry was an infantry regiment in the Union Army during the American Civil War.
The 156th Ohio Infantry Regiment, sometimes 156th Ohio Volunteer Infantry was an infantry regiment in the Union Army during the American Civil War.
The 165th Ohio Infantry Regiment, sometimes 165th Ohio Volunteer Infantry was an infantry regiment in the Union Army during the American Civil War.
The 168th Ohio Infantry Regiment, sometimes 168th Ohio Volunteer Infantry was an infantry regiment in the Union Army during the American Civil War.
During the American Civil War, the state of Illinois was a major source of troops for the Union Army, and of military supplies, food, and clothing. Situated near major rivers and railroads, Illinois became a major jumping off place early in the war for Ulysses S. Grant's efforts to seize control of the Mississippi and Tennessee rivers. Statewide, public support for the Union was high despite Copperhead sentiment.