V. Analysis and Recommendations for Future Work
The purpose of this project was not to provide a narrative of events in the Purchase region but to attempt to identify sites and structures related to the Civil War in the region, survey them, assess their significance, and propose future actions for their preservation and interpretation. Because of the project's goals we did not attempt to provide a full history of the War in the Purchase. There is no single, fully satisfactory work that discusses the war in the region in a comprehensive way. Berry Craig's work on the secession crisis is thoroughly researched and well presented but stops at the point when military action begins. In writing about the career of Nathan Bedford Forrest several writers have discussed action in the Purchase, but their focus has been on the career of Forrest which ranged well beyond the region. The work of Robert and, especially, Hunter Whitesell offers a thorough overview of military action in the region but are marred by a strongly pro-Southern bias and a defensiveness about the racial views of Purchase residents that affects the discussion of the black Union troops who served in the area and Union efforts to protect freed slaves and recruit slaves into the Union army. Given the resurgence of interest in the Civil War and the important role the Purchase played in its early phases a book on the war in the Purchase is needed.
Before turning to specific sites there are several general points to make.
First, many of the more significant sites in the region have been lost to the changing courses of the Mississippi and Ohio rivers especially after the major floods of the 1920s and 1930s. Fort Anderson in Paducah, major portions of the fortifications at Columbus, and Island #10 have been destroyed or severely compromised by these changes. The flooding of the Tennessee River as a result of the construction of Kentucky Dam between 1938 and 1944 has adversely affected a number of resources along the eastern edge of the Purchase either directly or, as in the case of Fort Heiman, indirectly.
On more occasions than we anticipated, or care to remember, field work led to the river's edge and local informants confirmed that the river had swallowed the resource years earlier. Field work in the spring of 1994 brought us into direct contact with the aftermath of the floods of 1993. One whole day was spent driving along levees between Columbus and the Tennessee line looking at water covering land that once had rifle pits and other minor fortifications according to the OR. There appears to be no real strategy for protecting the historical resources of the Purchase from the main factor that created them, the great rivers that flow though the region.
A second general problem is related to the nature of the action in the region. The many skirmishes and guerrilla activities that characterized action in the region are very hard to locate more than one hundred years later given the vague descriptions available. Even when the 1860s road routes were identified and allowances made for the estimation of mileage by a cavalry officer versus a modern odometer identifying which of several corn or tobacco fields was the site of the particular action was difficult. Since most actions were small scale skirmishes it is not certain, and probably doubtful, that use of sophisticated technology such as underground radar or metal detectors would be of much use in settling the issue. While "vicinity" is often close enough, a string of sites that are only in the vicinity of action does not offer much potential for interpretive development. In one case where we felt initially that we had sufficient information to be much more precise about a small scale skirmish was "Bill Pryor's farm" in Pryorsburg. There were several farms in Pryorsburg in the 1 860s in the area where this incident occurred owned by Bill Pryors.(52) Small scale skirmishes are simply not easy to locate after a hundred years and since much of the action in the Purchase fit this description. This was a general problem during the survey.
In fact, our survey found that as significant as the Purchase region was in the Civil War there are few identifiable sites left in the region with any significant degree of integrity.
Despite the erosion of a large part of the fortifications that earned it the designation, "The Gibraltar of the West," over the last 130 years Columbus remains the premier Civil War site in the Purchase region. The Kentucky State Park Department offers protection for the fortifications and some interpretation. Integrity has suffered more from trees and other vegetation growing up to obscure the scale of the fortifications than from the intrusion of park structures. As the Park Department adapts to the growing interest in heritage tourism the interpretation of the fortifications and their preservation will increase in significance. Murray State's public history program is already working with the park on several programs along these lines.
At the opposite end of what was the Confederate defense line in the Purchase is Fort Heiman. The earthworks at Fort Heiman are at least as impressive even today, generally, as those at Columbus and maybe more so because the Tennessee has been less erosive of the Fort which was on a high bluff above the river. (The fortifications at Columbus are also on a high bluff, but the more powerful Mississippi has eroded the bluff itself.) The outer works at Heiman running through the woods are fairly intact. As one approaches the water, now Kentucky Lake, one sees the results of real estate development, including one very large house built in the middle of a fortification with a cut through the earthwork for a driveway. Despite the prominence of the Fort's national register designation in the billboards offering lots for sale, the future of Fort Heiman, based on what has happened already, is not nearly as positive as that of Columbus. It is a shame that it was not added to the state park system years ago. On a recent visit (November 1995) access to the site was blocked by a metal gate and no trespassing signs.
A site with good integrity and some potential for preservation and interpretation is Camp Beauregard near Feliciana in Graves County. The area around the camp is still very rural and the vistas are largely untouched by modern incursions. The hill which was part of the camp and on which a number of soldiers, most from Mississippi, were buried, has become a cemetery. At the center of the cemetery is a monument erected by the United Daughters of the Confederacy and the grave stones of the troops who died while garrisoned there. The monument and graves are a powerful reminder of the cost of the war, while the site with its unobstructed view for a considerable distance makes it clear why the site was chosen for a camp. The story of Camp Beauregard is a part of the Civil War that does not receive much attention -- the diseases that ravaged camps. Between 1200 and 1500 men died there from successive epidemics of measles and meningitis.
A relatively minor site with good integrity is the Bethel Church on the Mayfield-Dukedom Road in Graves County. The original building has been replaced and it is not possible to determine how much the current building resembles the original one. The setting, however, has some integrity. Bethel was and is a country church and today, as in the 1860s, it is in the country surrounded by a small cemetery and fields of corn and tobacco. Setting aside the asphalt paving and the unfortunate storage of older headstones in an outbuilding, the site offers very good sense of the Civil War in the Purchase small skirmishes in rural areas along the roads that connected towns to railroads or river landings.
A significant site with problems in site survival and integrity similar to many in the region is Paducah. With Columbus and Fort Heiman it was a center of Union occupation and the focal point of a great deal of action. One of the few battles, perhaps the only true battle, in the Purchase took place there. The site of Fort Anderson is either underwater or paved with no visible remnant. First Riverside Hospital and now the convention center have covered over what was left by the ravages of the river. The current waterfront park in Paducah is the site where Grant arrived when he occupied the city. The development of the park and the erection of a flood wall have changed the appearance of the area dramatically as has a large parking lot adjacent to the waterfront. Little remains to give one any sense of authenticity from the Civil War era, although the sites and few surviving structures are well marked.
While Columbus-Belmont State Park provides a strong anchor for a public interpretive trail in the Purchase region the large distances involved in such a tour and the uneven nature of the sites to be visited make such a tour a poor prospect for development. There are a limited number of people who will be willing to look at one corn or tobacco field after another and read signs that begin "Somewhere near this spot Nathan Bedford Forest and his troops .… " or "Approximately 100 feet offshore stood ...."
The number of incidents in the region was rather large, but due to the focus of activity on the rivers and railroads they took place in a finite number of places, few more than thirty by our best estimate. In each case all primary sources describing each incident were carefully checked and compared with period maps to attempt to determine as precise a location as possible. This material was brought into the field so that it could be consulted on site in an effort to locate the sites referred to in the narrative and the list of incidents.
Turning now to the specific sites listed in Section IV.
1. Graves County Courthouse Already on National Register
2. Columbus, KY Townsite Town moved after 1927 Flood
3. Paducah - RR Insufficient detail in sources
4. Elliott’s Mill Insufficient detail in sources
5. Mayfield Insufficient detail in sources
6. Milburn hanging Insufficient detail in sources
7. Murray hanging Insufficient detail in sources
8. Murray Meeting Insufficient detail in sources
9. Paducah In river - naval incident
10. Ballard County Insufficient detail in sources
11. Hickman Surveyed
12. Columbus fortifications Already on National Register
13. Paducah - Waterfront Surveyed
14. Camp Burnett Insufficient detail in sources
15. Camp Beauregard Surveyed
16. Fort Heiman Already on National Register
17. Cayce Surveyed
18. Island #10 Destroyed by River
19. Moscow Surveyed
20. Hickman; Columbus Surveyed; town moved after 1927 Flood
21. Dukedom Insufficient detail in sources
22. Clinton Surveyed
23. Mayfield; Fancy Farm Insufficient detail in sources
24. Paducah Fort Anderson Site destroyed by river and development
25 Bill Pryor's farm Insufficient detail in sources
26. "Near Mayfield" Insufficient detail in sources
27. Dublin & Baltimore Insufficient detail in sources
28. Paducah & Mayfield Insufficient detail in sources
29. Little Obion River Insufficient detail in sources
30. Clinton Surveyed
31. Bethel Church Surveyed
52. Local informants, several named Bill Pryor, were unable to help resolve this dilemma. Since the author has a father, son, and cousin who share with him the name William Henry Mulligan, this is not a completely unfamiliar problem. Return to Text
Updated 3/14/98 Comments to: William H. Mulligan, Jr.