Burning of Bridges a Spectacular Success
Assistant Editor
of The News-Enterprise
Jan. 2, 1993
…’Twas the very reason for the bold march from Tennessee into Union-held Kentucky in the first place—two colossal railroad bridges just five miles away on Muldraugh Hill. Both were about 500 feet long and sprang up from the bottom of the gorge more than 100 feet.
Gen. John Hunt Morgan’s mission to cut the telegraph lines and
halt food and ammunition deliveries by burning railway bridges, while
successful to date, had only hampered Union forces. But, torching the Muldraugh Hill bridges near Colesburg would
devastate the bluecoat’s Civil War cause just as a vindictive winter loomed on
the horizon.
When Morgan's
men broke through a clearing at midmorning Dec. 28, 1862, the Rebels gazed upon
a glorious site. Two bridges sprawled
out only a few hundred yards below them, but so, too, did Fort Sands and Fort
Boyle. Though still under construction,
500 Uni0on soldiers were barricaded to guard the southern structure, 250 to
protect the northern.
A surrender
was requested, but predictably rejected.
And so, the
familiar Morgan tactic was played out once
more. An innovator in guerrilla
warfare, the general traveled lightly and quickly--hence his nickname
"Thunderbolt of the Confederacy"--and used
cannon fire to do most of the work, which kept his casualties to a minimum.
Morgan split
his forces, one led by Col. Basil Duke and the other by Col. William C.P. Breckenridge,
and launched simultaneous attacks. Two hours later, white flags scurried up the fort's flagpoles.
…The general had
"Lightning" Ellsworth tap into the telegraph line once more. Today had marked the second time Morgan
captured the 71st Indiana Infantry in recent months, and Morgan
simply had to talk to Indiana Governor Oliver Morton.
The general,
a swashbuckling sort, wired to "thank his to just send oilcloths and
overcoats next time and save him the trouble of making out paroles," wrote
John Allan Wyeth, one of the Raiders.
Under the
parole system, prisoner's names were placed on a roll and they were required to
sign oaths promising not to bear arms against the Confederacy until exchanged
for Rebel prisoners. After this, they
were set free to return home--minus guns, overcoats and oilcloths, of course.
It was here
the 17-year-old Wyeth captured his first prisoner, claiming the Yankee's
newly-issued Enfield rifle, the premier infantry weapon of the day.
"The gun
and its former owner were my first personal captures," Wyeth later wrote.
"And for the unwarlike, and almost absurd, features of this incident, I
relate it now.
When our
shells made it too hot for the Hoosiers to stay inside the stockade, some of
them, hoping to escape, ran out and hid behind logs and in underbrush of nearby
woods," Wyeth recalled. "When
the white flag went up, Gen. Morgan led the way, all of us on foot, practically
sliding down the steep hillside. I was
so close to him that once in the descent when my feet slipped from under me, I
nearly slid between his legs.
"When we reached the stockade, we were ordered to scour
the woods for fugitives," Wyeth said.
"About 200 or 300 yards from the fort, I came upon a stripling,
who, hearing me approach, jumped up from behind the trunk of a fallen tree and held up one hand in token of
surrender.
"He
seemed no older than myself, a good-looking lad with peachdown cheeks, which
had tears trickling over them. His crying quickly aroused my sympathy, and I tried
to reassure him saying, 'Don't be afraid; nobody shall harm you. You'll be paroled now and can go home.
"At
this, he sobbed out, 'I've got a good mother at home; and if I ever get back,
I'll never leave her again.'
"By this
time, my own feelings were getting the best of me; and when he mentioned his
mother, the thought of my own overwhelmed me, and I began to cry, too, doing my
best to comfort the poor fellow.
"All
this occurred," Wyeth said, "as we were walking side by side to the
stockade, my war spirit no little dampened, and the pride of my capture about
lost in the sympathy. How often I have
recalled to mind this "Comedy of Two Bloodthirsty Warriors!"
Morgan's men…collected and piled limbs from the forest and
debris from the forts at the base of the mammoth bridges, igniting the fires
just as the sun faded into evening.
"The
destruction of this immense network of timber made the most brilliant display
of fireworks I have ever seen," Wyeth recalled. "The flames climbed swiftly along the timbers until every
upright and crosspiece was blazing in outline, more vividly defined than if it
had been strung with Chinese lantern.
"When at last they were burned through, the flaming beams
began to fall, and as the whole structure came down, the heavens were brilliant
with the column of sparks which shot skyward."
Return to Morgan's Christmas Raid