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Tennessee in the Civil War
Tennessee in the Civil War

Selected Contemporary Accounts of Military and Other Events, Month by Month

Memphis
Civil War Tennessee

American Civil War
June 6, 1862

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Naval Strategies of the Civil War: Confederate Innovations and Federal Opportunism
Compare and contrast the strategies of the Southern Secretary of the Navy, Mallory, against his rival in the North, Welles. Mallory used technological innovation and the skill of individuals to bolster the South's seapower against the Union Navy's superior numbers

After the Confederate River Defense Fleet, commanded by Captain James E. Montgomery and Brigadier General M. Jeff Thompson (Missouri State Guard), bested the Union ironclads at Plum Run Bend, Tennessee, on May 10, 1862, they retired to Memphis.

Confederate General P.G.T. Beauregard ordered troops out of Fort Pillow and Memphis on June 4, after learning of Union Major General Henry W. Halleck's occupation of Corinth, Mississippi. Thompson's few troops, camped outside Memphis, and Montgomery's fleet were the only force available to meet the Union naval threat to the city.

From Island No. 45, just north of Memphis, Flag-Officer Charles H. Davis and Colonel Charles Ellet launched a naval attack on Memphis after 4:00 am on June 6. Arriving off Memphis about 5:30 am, the battle began. In the hour and a half battle, the Union boats sank or captured all but one of the Confederate vessels; General Van Dorn escaped.

Immediately following the battle, Colonel Ellet's son, Medical Cadet Charles Ellet, Jr., met the mayor of Memphis and raised the Union colors over the courthouse. Later, Flag-Officer Davis officially received the surrender of the city from the mayor. The Indiana Brigade, commanded by Colonel G.N. Fitch, then occupied the city. 

Memphis, an important commercial and economic center on the Mississippi River, had fallen, opening another section of the Mississippi River to Union shipping.

Result(s): Union victory

Location: Shelby County

Campaign: Joint Operations on the Middle Mississippi River (1862) Previous Battle in Campaign Campaigns

Date(s): June 6, 1862

Principal Commanders: Flag-Officer Charles H. Davis and Colonel Charles Ellet [US]; Captain James E. Montgomery and Brigadier General M. Jeff Thompson [CS]

Forces Engaged: U.S. Ironclads Benton, Louisville, Carondelet, Cairo, and St. Louis and U.S. Army Rams Queen of the West and Monarch [US]; C.S. Navy Rams General Beauregard, General Bragg, General Price, General Van Dorn, General Thompson, Colonel Lovell, Sumter, and Little Rebel [CS]

Estimated Casualties: 181 total (US 1; CS 180)


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John Hunt Morgan Raiders

John Hunt Morgan and His Raiders
The "Thunderbolt of the Confederacy" John Hunt Morgan from Tompkinsville, Kentucky to Greeneville, Tennessee.

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Civil War Firearms

Standard Catalog of
Civil War Firearms




Civil War: Uniforms, US and Confederate Armies, c.1895
Civil War: Uniforms, US and Confederate Armies
48 in. x 31.5 in. $169.99
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Framed


Ironclads and Big Guns of the Confederacy : The Journal and Letters of John M. Brooke
Information about the Confederate Navy's effort to supply its fledgling forces, the wartime diaries and letters of John M. Brooke tell the neglected story of the Confederate naval ordnance office, its innovations, and its strategic vision.
"The Total Annihilation of the Rebel Fleet by the Federal Fleet under Commodore Davis."
"On the Morning of June 6th 1862, off Memphis, Ten."

Lithograph by Middleton, Strobridge & Co.
In the foreground, the print depicts the Confederate ships (from left to right): General M. Jeff Thompson (shown sinking); Little Rebel (shown burning); General Sterling Price ; General Beauregard (shown being rammed by the Ellet Ram Monarch ); General Bragg (shown aground) and Colonel Lovell (shown sinking).

In the background are the Federal warships (from left to right): Queen of the West ; Cairo ; Carondelet ; Louisville ; Saint Louis ; a tug; and Benton .
The city of Memphis is in the right distance, with a wharf boat by the shore.
Mephis Civil War Naval Battle Ironclads
More Confederate and Union Navy Ships and Battles
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Men of Fire: Grant, Forrest, and the Campaign That Decided the Civil War
In the winter of 1862, on the border between Kentucky and Tennessee, two extraordinary military leaders faced each other in an epic clash that would transform them both and change the course of American history forever
Tennessee State Battle Map
State Battle Maps
American Civil War Exhibits
Documents of the Civil War
Civil War Timeline
Women in the War
Ships and Naval Battles
Confederate Supplies

Sid Meier's Civil War Collection
Take command of either Confederate or Union troops and command them to attack from the trees, rally around the general, or do any number of other realistic military actions. The AI reacts to your commands as if it was a real Civil War general, and offers infinite replayability. The random-scenario generator provides endless variations on the battles

American Civil War Book Titles

Kentucky Cavaliers in Dixie
Reminiscences of a Confederate Cavalryman

Mosgrove was born in Kentucky, in 1844, and enlisted in the Fourth Kentucky Cavalry Regiment on September 10, 1862. His eyewitness account illuminates the western theater of the Civil War in Kentucky, east Tennessee, and southwest Virginia
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Patriotic Treason
John Brown and the Soul of America

The life of the first citizen committed to absolute racial equality. His friendships in defiance of the culture around him, He turned his twenty children into a dedicated militia. He collaborated with black leaders such as Frederick Douglass, Martin Delany, and Harriet Tubman to overthrow slavery.

The Camden Expedition of 1864 and the Opportunity Lost by the Confederacy to Change the Civil War
The Confederacy had a great opportunity to turn the Civil War in its favor in 1864, but squandered this chance when it failed to finish off a Union army cornered in Louisiana because of concerns about another Union army coming south from Arkansas. The Confederates were so confused that they could not agree on a course of action to contend with both threats, thus the Union offensive advancing from Arkansas saved the one in Louisiana and became known to history as the Camden Expedition.

A Stranger And a Sojourner: Peter Caulder, Free Black Frontiersman in Antebellum Arkansas
An illiterate free black man, defied all generalizations about race as he served with distinction as a marksman in the U.S. Army during the War of 1812, repeatedly crossed the color line, and became an Arkansas yeoman farmer, thriving and respected by white neighbors until he fell victim of new discriminatory legislation on the eve of the Civil War

The Indians and the Civil War - Effects of the American Civil War on the Native American History
Native American history has always been a study full of ambiguous points. Nowadays, when the outlived tribes still live on poor circumstances and try to keep step with our running world despairingly, their unique culture deserves more attention than used to.
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Civil War in the Indian Territory
When the war broke out, both sides wanted the Five Civilized Tribes, led by the Cherokees, and each got around half. The Confederacy sent Brigadier General Albert Pike to recruit them, and he did a pretty good job. A strange, brilliant, man, Pike's career as a General is a minor footnote in his long life

The Cherokee Nation in the Civil War
The Cherokee people, who had only just begun to recover from the ordeal of removal, faced an equally devastating upheaval in the Civil War. The Cherokee Nation, with its sovereign status and distinct culture, had a wartime experience unlike that of any other group of people

Black Flag: Guerrilla Warfare on the Western Border, 1861-1865: A Riveting Account of a Bloody Chapter in Civil War History
The guerilla warfare along the Kansas-Missouri boarder brought forth some of the bloodiest incidents of the Civil War




Sources:
U.S. National Park Service
U.S. Library of Congress.

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