![]() ![]() The Commonwealth was further bound to the South by the Mississippi River and its tributaries, which were the main commercial outlet for her surplus produce, although railroad connections to the North were beginning to diminish the importance of this tie. ![]() In 1860, slaves composed 19.5% of the Commonwealth's population, and many Unionist Kentuckians saw nothing wrong with the " peculiar institution". Kentucky's citizens were split regarding the issues central to the Civil War. Approximately 24,000 Black Kentuckians, free and enslaved, served as Union soldiers. Lincoln had declared, early in the war, "I think to lose Kentucky is nearly the same as to lose the whole game." ģ5,000 Kentuckians served as Confederate soldiers an estimated 125,000 Kentuckians served as Union soldiers. Kentucky was the birthplace of Abraham Lincoln, his wife Mary Todd, and his southern counterpart, Confederate President Jefferson Davis. Kentuckian John Hunt Morgan further challenged Union control, as he conducted numerous cavalry raids through the state. ![]() Forrest proved to be a scourge to the Union Army in western Kentucky, even making an attack on Paducah. Grant on the Union side, who first encountered serious Confederate gunfire coming from Columbus, Kentucky, and Confederate cavalry leader Nathan Bedford Forrest. It was the arena to such military leaders as Ulysses S. Kentucky was the site of several fierce battles, including Mill Springs and Perryville. In the historiography of the Civil War, Kentucky is treated primarily as a 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. After early 1862 Kentucky came largely under Union control. 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. Kentucky was a border state of key importance in the American Civil War. ![]()
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