Campbell County Men of the 23rd Ky. Infantry at Pickett’s Mill

As I posted recently, I unexpectedly found information significant to my research, specifically stories about the 23rd Kentucky Infantry, in which almost 180 Campbell County men had enlisted. I learned about its role in the Battle of Pickett’s Mill, Georgia on May 27, 1864, thanks to the second part of David Powell’s Atlanta Campaign series. I also realized that Ambrose Bierce had been with William Hazen's brigade that included the 23rd Kentucky and that his essay, The Crime at Pickett's Mill, discussed action and reactions that the men of the 23rd had seen and experienced that day.

In this post, I examine Bierce's observations along with two 1890s accounts of this fight from officers in the 23rd, stories I only found by reading that book. These stories help me better understand what the Campbell County men in the regiment experienced and witnessed as they offer more battlefield specifics of the unit’s service than I have seen elsewhere. (A review of my records indicates that 64 Campbell County men remained in the unit by this point in the war. Two men were assigned to the 5th Kentucky, who was also in Hazen's brigade at the time, and one was a clerk at brigade headquarters. One was working as a division wagoner and three were on duty with the pioneer /engineering corps, while one more was in the ambulance corps. One man was serving as a regimental quartermaster. Records for others do not show definitively if the men were still with the regiment at the time, so the exact number who actually carried rifles into the fight is uncertain.  

I also came across a pair of postwar books that add context to this story.

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On December 17, 1896, 1st Lieutenant Arnold Bradley, who had served in company C of the 23rd, published his recollections of Pickett's Mill in the National Tribune. Much of what he describes is likely similar to what the Campbell County men (a few in company C, but most in companies B, D, E, F, G, and I) saw and experienced.

On May 27, 1864, the 23rd marched towards the enemy. Bradley noted that companies in other nearby regiments used a bugler to signal to the men which way to go, his instrument creating "a perfect din of sounds.”

They marched through the woods, “over brush and logs until about 4 o’clock in the evening, when, crossing a small creek, we halted. A few scattering shots came from the front.” 

Unfortunately, this movement did not surprise the enemy, as the Rebels were “informed by our bugles the direction we had taken.” 

Along the way, Bradley found an opportunity to fill his canteen with water, a much-valued commodity: “All soldiers looked out for that necessary article before going into battle.” 

As he did so, Generals Oliver Howard and William Hazen passed closely by, speaking to each other. The nosy lieutenant eavesdropped and heard Howard tell his subordinate, “General, you will have to charge and storm the enemy’s flank, if you sacrifice your brigade.”

Being part of that brigade, Bradley was naturally alarmed by this and rushed to his fellow sergeants in the company to report the intelligence he had gathered. Their orders soon came - “Fix bayonets! Charge bayonets! Forward - Double-quick - March!”

Bierce sheds light on the mindset of these men at this moment as they headed towards combat. "It is seldom, indeed, that a subordinate officer knows anything about the disposition of the enemy’s forces—except that it is unaimable—or precisely whom he is fighting. As to the rank and file, they can know nothing more of the matter than the arms they carry. They hardly know what troops are upon their own right or left the length of a regiment away. If it is a cloudy day they are ignorant even of the points of the compass." They were simply obeying orders, marching toward whatever destiny awaited them.

In general, the author noted, "a soldier’s knowledge of what is going on about him is coterminous with his official relation to it and his personal connection with it; what is going on in front of him he does not know at all until he learns it afterward."

Bradley's report continued. “Away we went through the timber, up a hill, over a fence to an open field, down to a ravine, up another hill to another fence.”

National Tribune Dec. 17, 1896

It was a dangerous task. “Many brave comrades fell before reaching the second fence. What a shower of bullets met us! We fought each other through that fence.”

A bullet struck Bradley. Soon another slammed against his gun, rendering it inoperable, but saving his life. He did what became routine for soldiers during the war: “I picked up a dead comrade’s gun” and kept firing. 

The fight took its toll. “Our line was considerably thinned by this time.” Bradley noticed that he and his colleagues were on the extreme left of the Union line, their flank dangerously at risk of Confederate attack. He did observe other Unionists on the field, but “so far in our rear that they were no protection.”

Bradley and two others followed advice they had heard General Howard give: “Take good aim, and be sure you do good execution.” 

The 23rd Kentucky neared the enemy. The Rebels placed rocks and other obstacles in and around the fence, hoping they would provide some protection, but initially did not seem to notice the bluecoats nearing them.

They did not remain oblivious much longer. Their men were not “showing their heads any longer,” so, Bradley wrote, “we made up a squad and charged.” Here, Bradley “saw enough there to make my blood run cold; plenty of dead men, with a very lively line behind them. We hastily fired into them and hastily retreated; not before they shot the most of our squad.”

The Rebels offered their own attack: “Some of them got over the fence and were making their way under the brow of the hill we occupied, so as to gain our rear.”

Bradley now “notified Capt. Tifft (Claudius Tifft, a resident of Newport, Campbell County and the captain of company H) of our danger, he being occupied in encouraging what few men were left. He went with me to the left, and very cooly focused a pair of fieldglasses to his eyes, with which he overlooked the crawling rebels.”

"’Lower your glasses Captain; don't you see them, not 25 feet from you?’ I said.”

“Before he got the range with the glasses they fired at us. One of the balls penetrated the Captain's knee. It made him spin around on one leg, but failed to down him. The wounded man showed an unusual amount of nerve and grit. He replaced the glasses.”

"Can I help you? I asked.”

"No; go tell Lieut. Whiting to take charge of the company."

“That day ended the Captain's military campaigns. He crawled away from the enemy and made his escape. We never net again until 31 years after, when I had the pleasure of shaking his hand at Capt. Wm. Mundy's office, Louisville, Ky. I was so overcome with feeling that I was unable to speak to him for minutes. He was blind. Kind relatives had assisted him all the way from Sanborn, Iowa, to the State he once so nobly defended and represent in the struggles.”

Claudius Tifft late in life from ancestry.com

 The contest did not grow any easier. “Our ammunition supply was about exhausted.  We had already emptied our own and the dead comrades' cartridge boxes.”

A panic ensued as someone nearby yelling at others to retreat. “The command was repeated by those having authority. Most of our regimental survivors rallied around our colors in the hands of Serg's Henry. He leisurely rolled up the flag around the pole, after which we started."

(Bierce's account contradicted this version: “No command to fall back was given, none could have been heard. Man by man, the survivors withdrew at will, sifting through the trees into the cover of the ravines, among the wounded who could drag themselves back; among the skulkers whom nothing could have dragged forward.” Perhaps Bradley’s proximity to his fellow soldiers enabled him to hear something Bierce could not. Another thought is that maybe one of them misremembered such a detail.)

Bradley continued: “There were hardly enough able-bodied men left in the regiment to look after the wounded,” who were near the creek where Bradley had gathered water earlier. “Our troubles had not yet ended for that day. The enemy commenced shelling our wounded. Several shells exploded right among them.” 

The remaining soldiers quickly moved most of their injured comrades to a safer place, behind a larger hill, “more protected from the artillery.” (A handful of Campbell County soldiers were wounded on this field. Were they among those moved to safety?)

“Darkness soon after spread her black wings over the mournful sight of wounded and dying soldiers.”

From  https://civilwartalk.com/threads/picketts-mill.195452/ 

Another perspective of this fight comes from the memory of Sergeant Gregory McDermott, who published his story in the National Tribune of October 28, 1897, less than a year after Bradley’s account. Perhaps reading that one inspired him to record his own observations for posterity.

Sergeant McDermott was in the 23rd’s company I, which originally included 16 of the Campbell Countians I’m studying, at least before attrition took its toll. It appears that 8 of the county's men were still with the company, but one was under arrest at the time and another was with the engineering/pioneer corps.) 

He described how the 23rd moved forward on May 25th to connect with General Joseph Hooker’s XX Corps. They were too far behind to reach their colleagues that night, so they "camped where we were, in the mud and slush."

The next day, they continued to advance, their skirmishers leading the way. "We arrived in front of a large open field" where these veterans quickly noticed that "the Johnnies had already a strong line of earthworks." McDermott and his fellow soldiers quickly began "digging some for our own protection," finishing their own strong position by nightfall.

As they awoke the next morning, May 27th, they did not immediately see combat, and were, instead, "enjoying ourselves the best we knew how,” probably eating breakfast and perhaps reading or writing letters to or from home.

This tranquility ended soon enough. Generals William T. Sherman, Oliver O. Howard (commander of the XIV corps, including the 23rd Kentucky), David Stanley, and Thomas Wood (commander of that corps third division and the 23rd Kentucky) arrived in camp to take a peek at the enemy's works and determine how to proceed.

"It wasn't long before we were ordered to fall in." They did so and moved towards their left, but it was not easy. "The country we were passing over was wild. The underbrush was very thick. Nothing could be seen ahead. It was like groping in the darkness," a more detailed version that agreed with Bradley's.

McDermott noted one other issue that Bradley had also observed. A nearby bugler sounded his horn as a guide, but it was not necessarily a welcome one. "We objected to it on account of it attracting the Johnnies’ shells so often, for every now and then one would burst over head, breaking the branches of the trees and causing a scattering.”

They struggled through the brush, dodging enemy missiles and tramping onward for four miles before halting, at which point skirmishing began with "our boys driving straight ahead; then we moved forward in line-of-battle down through the woods.”

The intensity of the gunfire picked up, then "came a hurrah, and away we went," headed directly to their awaiting foe until coming "to a rail fence down in a hollow at the edge of a clearing of about 15 acres." After a brief pause, they climbed the fence and crossed into the clearing from where they charged "up a slight rise, into a hollow, up the hill to the top.”

The Rebels stopped behind another fence on the opposite side of the field while the attackers kept up their approach until arriving at the same barrier. Crossbars in the fence slowed the Confederate men from crossing it to attack the Yankees. McDermott and his colleagues then "drove them into the woods."

Nearby high ground provided the Confederates an effective position for their line, and they took advantage of it by "firing from that bluff at us on our left and did a great deal of damage to our front and our right."

The 23rd returned fire as long as they could but soon had used up all its ammunition and found it necessary to fall back as no help from other Union brigades had arrived and the Rebels were "giving it to us on all sides."

The regiment retreated to the other end of the field where the men assumed a prone position, but to no avail. "A lot of the boys were killed and wounded in the clearing and close to the fence.” How many Campbell County soldiers were among this group?

Sergeant McDermott then described his own wounding and the aid he received, including from a fellow member of the regiment who found him and carried him on his back until the enemy came too close and the good Samaritan had to put him down for both men’s safety.

He asserted that the men of Wood's division had been “hurled into that slaughter-pen” and that Hazen’s brigade was “almost destroyed." after Hazen had heard his division commander Wood inform Howard:

Bierce detailed a specific incident he had witnessed as the fighting wound down, this one involving the 23rd, which was on the left of Hazen's line.  "The left of our short line had fought at the corner of a cornfield, the fence along the right side of which was parallel to the direction of our retreat. As the disorganized groups fell back along this fence on the wooded side, they were attacked by a flanking force of the enemy moving through the field in a direction nearly parallel with what had been our front. This force, I infer from General Johnston’s account, consisted of the brigade of General Lowry, or two Arkansas regiments under Colonel Baucum. I had been sent by General Hazen to that point and arrived in time to witness this formidable movement. But already our retreating men, in obedience to their officers, their courage and their instinct of self-preservation, had formed along the fence and opened fire. The apparently slight advantage of the imperfect cover and the open range worked its customary miracle: the assault, a singularly spiritless one, considering the advantages it promised and that it was made by an organized and victorious force against a broken and retreating one, was checked."

Hazen reported his brigade had been “withdrawn for this attack from a position in the line where for forty-eight hours it had been very actively engaged. Many felt that this imposed on us an additional service of very great severity out of our turn. General Wood's report shows that he protested stubbornly. In a conversation with General Howard, our corps commander, when we were given the advance, he said to me that he had selected the force he thought gave the greatest promise of succeeding in the work in hand. Hazen had also heard Wood tell Howard: “We will put in Hazen and see what success he has.” (Hazen p. 256)

This proved to be a difficult and deadly fight for these soldiers, one forever ingrained in their minds, but did their superiors understand or appreciate their struggles?

Robert Kimberly, a resident of Dayton, Campbell County in the postwar years, served as a Lieutenant Colonel and brevet Brigadier General of the 41st Ohio Infantry. While living in Dayton, he co-authored a history of his regiment. Like the 23rd, the 41st had been in Hazen’s Brigade at Pickett’s Mill, though on the right side of the Union line while the 23rd was on the left. In addition to his specific comments about the 41st’s experiences he wrote: “It is a fact worth notice, that while the Confederate reports of the Atlanta campaign minutely record the Pickett's Mill battle as one of the most prominent and important events of the campaign, Gen. Sherman's memoirs wholly ignore the action.” (Kimberly p. 87)

Hazen made a similar observation in his book. This battle “is scarcely noticed in any of the reports of the Union commanders, and is ignored by Sherman in his memoirs." (Hazen p. 256)

Bierce stated it with obvious disapproval: “Buried in the official reports of the victors there are indeed imperfect accounts of the engagement: the vanquished have not thought it expedient to relate it. It is ignored by General Sherman in his memoirs, yet Sherman ordered it. General Howard wrote an account of the campaign of which it was an incident, and dismissed it in a single sentence; yet General Howard planned it, and it was fought as an isolated and independent action under his eye.”

Sherman also left this engagement out of his campaign reports, but the men remembered it well and realized how all too real it was. The hard-fought contest on overgrown, hilly ground cost the Yankees about 1,600. Perhaps Sherman or others felt that this figure was minor compared to other battles, but these losses were real to the men on the field.

Another theory is that Sherman was embarrassed by this defeat and simply denied it happened.

Hazen, however, knew and acknowledged what his men had face, calling Pickett's Mill "the most fierce, bloody and persistent assault of the Atlanta campaign." (Hazen p. 256)

According to Kimberly, “Sometime afterward, when the army had passed on toward Atlanta, several of these trenches were opened, that certain bodies might be rescued, for friends in the North. Union and Confederate were found piled together, and none could be identified.” (Kimberly p. 87)

The Campbell County men were not immune to the fates of war, of course. Two died here, while seven others were wounded and three more captured.  The two fatalities, George H. Morgan of company D  and Jerry Rose of company E, both have headstones in Marietta National Cemetery, so their remains were identified.

This fight, though relatively small and not greatly known did matter. It had “delayed Sherman’s progress; when his forces emerged from the wilderness, they were no closer to Atlanta than they had been almost two weeks earlier. The real significance of the battle was that it marked the beginning of trench warfare.”

The details on what the soldiers of the 23rd Kentucky witnessed and the challenges they faced in this battle are unlike anything else I have found; they fascinate me. 

Knowing these men fought in several deadly battles and knowing specifics of what they experienced therein are two different matters. Obviously, other contests differed from this one, but this does provide an example of their wartime adventures. It is far more than I had seen before.

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(I must add the usual disclaimer that these (except Bierce's account) were written more than 30 years after the battle, so it is reasonable to wonder about the accuracy of all the details, but the overall stories are likely at least reasonable versions of what happened on that ground on May 27, 1864. Kimberly and/or Hazen may have still had copies of period reports that added accuracy to their writings. Perhaps Bradley and/or McDermott had kept a wartime journal.)

Books cited:

Kimbery, Robert L. and Holloway, Ephraim S. The Forty-First Ohio Veteran Volunter Infantry in the War of the Rebellion 1861 - 1865. 1897 W.R. Smellie, Printer and Publisher. Cleveland, Ohio

Hazen, William Babcock. A Narrative of Military Service 1885 Ticknor and Company, Boston

What I Unexpectedly Learned About the 23rd Kentucky Infantry

Like what I presume virtually all Civil War students or enthusiasts do, I read about the Civil War to learn more about it and hopefully, enjoy some good writing. Sometimes, however, books take readers in unexpected directions. Such an instance for me occurred while reading volume 2 of David Powell's series on the Atlanta Campaign (see my thoughts on it here), a work that pleasantly surprised me by including details that apply to my own research, information unlike anything I had seen previously.

A few years ago, when I began my project exploring Campbell County, Kentucky in the Civil War, I started my research by identifying soldiers from the area, focusing on their individual lives and service. One of my first finds was that more than 150 of these men had enlisted in the 23rd Kentucky Infantry. I was caught off-guard to see so many names in one unit, but it was a good early discovery, a sign that I would find more information than I expected at the time.

Since then, any mention of the 23rd grabs my attention, but while I try to maintain a basic understanding of the unit’s record, I honestly spend much more effort looking into the individual soldiers than on the details of battles and military maneuvering.

The 23rd marched and fought in most of the largest fights and campaigns in the Western Theater of the war, from their reserve role in Thomas Crittenden's II Corps at Perryville, to active fighting at Stones River, Chickamauga, and the Atlanta Campaign, plus involvement with the Tullahoma Campaign, a difficult task despite the lack of bloodshed during it. As I continued to read about these fights and campaigns, I never really saw any especially memorable descriptions of their work. They fought and suffered casualties in various battles but usually came off as supporting players in most battles (though maybe I’m still missing something about another fight.)

Eventually I learned about the fight at Brown’s Ferry, Tennessee in October of 1863, where the Federals began to work to get more supplies to their troops in Chattanooga. The 23rd took a leading part in this battle, with some of its soldiers being the first men to land on the Confederate-held western bank of the Tennessee River. This lesser-known contest was a Union success, allowing the opening of what was quickly dubbed the "Cracker Line." Until now, I took that contest as being their most notable action, but some fighting on Georgia soil may change that view.

In chapter 8 of this book, Powell explores the Battle of Pickett’s Mill on May 27, 1864. I was not familiar with the details of this contest, but perhaps that lack of knowledge left me more excited when I learned that the 23rd (in William Hazen’s brigade of Thomas Woods’ division of the IV Army Corps commanded by Oliver Howard) was among the Federal units at the front of this fight. This work gives a terrific recap of this fight, painting a picture of what a tough contest it was and the many challenges the men, including in the 23rd, faced.

From battlefields.org

I started dog-earing the pages in this chapter, so now that section of my book is full of bent corners, but I don’t care. I certainly will re-read that chapter, maybe soon.

Additionally, I had never before realized that Ambrose Bierce’s The Crime at Pickett’s Mill was about the action Hazen’s men, including the 23rd, saw. I guess I had not read it since I started paying attention to the 23rd. His essay must be the most literary account of any of the 23rd’s fighting from the entire war. I have not seen any regimental history of the 23rd, or even any writings by local soldiers describing their work. Heck, even Spared & Shared appears to have nothing from the regiment, so Bierce’s essay is a nice perspective to have.

More good fortune soon fell into my lap in the shape of a pair of National Tribune stories written by members of the 23rd. (I also have an article from that newspaper about the regiment at Chickamauga, written by the same lieutenant who authored one of these reports. It is quite long, so I’ll have to re-read it.

I planned to discuss these accounts in this post, but that will take quite a bit of space, so I’ll make a separate post. Combined with Powell's work and Bierce’s account, I stumbled upon intriguing new information for my research. (And I do know that here is a book concerning this battle, a new title now on my list of future acquisitions.)

I would not have seen any of these details had I not read this book. I certainly did not expect to find information relevant to my project in a book on the Atlanta Campaign. Discoveries like this are one of the joys of reading. You never know what you might find.

A Few Thoughts on The Atlanta Campaign, Volume 2

Atlanta Campaign Volume 2 : From the Etowah River to Kennesaw Mountain, May 20 to June 27, 1864
David A. Powell
Copyright 2025
Savas Beatie

In the study of the Civil War, reading books is still a primary way of learning more about it. Some of the many books on the subject deliver exactly what readers want, while others fall short of hopes, and a few even manage to exceed expectations.

This book exceeded what I hoped to read, as it revealed information relevant to my own research, a most pleasant surprise that certainly influences my opinion of this work.

Aside from that personal benefit (which I will discuss more in a later post), this book is just what readers have come to expect from this author. It is a detailed, heavily-researched exploration of not only the battlefield encounters, but also the maneuvering and countermoves of the opposing forces, the decision making, and the mistakes both sides made or opportunities they missed. It recounts what happened and analyzes of this stretch of the campaign. 

One feature that especially grabbed my attention is the heavier-than-usual focus on the formations that companies, regiments, brigades, and divisions employed when moving into battles. Maybe I have overlooked this in past books, but it struck me bluntly in this one, especially when Powell explained what these formations were and their suitability (or lack thereof) for the situation instead of just mentioning them. This really brought home how moving to face the enemy force was more than just heading straight towards it. It also magnified the work that officers did to start these maneuvers and attempt to keep them in order as the men approached the enemy. Terrain features such as woods, thick undergrowth, and waterways, along with man-made obstacles such as fences or felled trees, left these movements even more difficult for the soldiers to perform in the face of the enemy.

The confusion in battle as units tried to overcome these barriers and unfamiliarity with the ground to reach assigned locations or to even to know which company or regiment was next to them in the midst of this chaos comes through clearly on these pages, which even depict a diagram of the "column of division" deployment a regiment would use, right as the text describes this formation.

For those who are not experts on Civil War tactics (I raise my hand) this focus is a welcome discussion.

Powell also pays significant attention to numbers, such as the sizes of the armies and their regiments, brigades, divisions, and corps, especially right before battles. How many men were attacking or defending against how many enemies is obviously crucial information in battle studies and receives much attention on these pages.

The total casualties these units suffered during the fighting is also a frequent topic. Such data is not always easily found, especially on the Confederate side, where reports - if they even existed - were frequently lost to history. Assembling these numbers as accurately as possible was obviously a priority. Due to lack of reports or sources, the author occasionally uses his own estimates of these figures, especially battle losses, but he does provide the basis for his deductions. Analysis of such issues is strength of this book. 

This is, unsurprisingly, a stellar examination of this stretch of the fight for Atlanta, not only looking at the fights and movements, but the leaders as well. William Sherman does not come out of it looking especially good, though part of that is that the book ended at the Federals’ failed attack on Kennesaw Mountain. From his perspective, this book ended on a sour note, leaving a bad final impression.

James B. McPherson comes off as being too tentative, even when Sherman ordered him to attack and he agreed to it.

On the Confederate side, Joseph E Johnston may have missed opportunities to transition from defense to offense and exploit Federal weaknesses, and he and Rebel leaders also had problems communicating clearly and concisely, such as expressing how heavy enemy forces facing them truly were. Attacks sometimes happened or did not happen based on uncertain or incorrect information. 

This book certainly deserves a place on Civil War bookshelves and in the hands of those who enjoy studying the war. It is another high-quality work that examines its subject in great depth, a fine telling of these few weeks of this crucial campaign.

My 1st Confederate Ancestor: Levi Gross, 5th Ky Mounted Infantry

One topic I’ve discussed over the years on this page has involved the exploration of the lives and service of Civil War ancestors I discovered, and I even have created  a separate page  to list them and provide some basic information about them their places in my lineage.

Recently a cousin found another link to the war, but this one was different - this one was a Confederate soldier, the first of his kind in my family history.

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Levi Gross, my first cousin five times removed, was born in 1844 in Breathitt County, Kentucky to Thomas and Sally (McIntosh) Gross, the latter of whom was my 4 times great grandaunt (the sister of my 4x great-grandfather.)

The family remained in Breathitt County - from where many of my maternal ancestors lived - in  both 1850 and 1860.

When the Civil War started in April of 1861, Levi did mot immediately enlist, perhaps due to his age, as he was under 18 years of age. Many young men found ways around this regulation, but Levi did not.

By September of 1862, he had turned 18 and on September 11 ventured to the county seat of Jackson, where he enlisted as a private in company B of the 5th Kentucky Mounted Infantry. Breathitt County, like much of Kentucky, contained divided loyalties, a two of Levi's first cousins (my 3x great grandfather Nimrod McIntosh and his brother Richard) joined U.S. units.

Levi's regiment had originally formed in the summer of 1861 as a one-year unit, though many of its men refused to re-enlist for the rest of the war. 

His wartime experience was not always happy. In October of 1862, he deserted his company at Saylersville, Kentucky, and did not return until April of 1863, when General William Preston had him restored to duty. He forfeited all pay for the time he was gone, a fairly lenient but common punishment.

As the war progressed, the 5th Kentucky eventually became part of the famous Orphan Brigade, a collection of Kentucky regiments and men who served the Confederacy but never fought in their home state. These men fought in the September 1863 contest at Chickamauga in northern Georgia, the largest and bloodiest battle in the war's Western Theater, an overwhelming Confederate triumph.

A form dated in February of 1864 reports him as being “destitute” of a pair of pants, a pair of drawers, and a blanket. A special requisition apparently resolved that issue. Levi “made his mark” on the requisition document.

His records also show that he owed $3 in April of that year due to “damage done to gun.” Unfortunately, it does not specify the type of gun it was.

Levi and his fellow orphans  then joined in the famous Atlanta Campaign through the spring and summer of 1864, a long, hard-fought series of contests that led Levi to his unfortunate destiny. (Some might contend it did the same for the Confederacy.)

As the year  progressed, the Federal and Rebel armies were still contesting Georgia soil, and on July 22,  William Hardee’s Corps of Confederates met Federals near a waterway called Intrenchment Creek  Hardee’s men attacked, but the bluecoats defeated them. 

Among the Orphan Brigade’s casualties was Levi Gross, who was injured and left on the field, where his Yankees recovered him and moved him to the hospital of the second division of their XVI Corps.

Despite this attempted care, his wound proved to be fatal and he passed away on September 14, 1864. He is buried in the Marietta Confederate Cemetery, his name engraved on a monument with 18 fellow Confederate casualties. (Not only is he my first CSA ancestor, but is also just my second ancestor to have fought and died in the war.)

His father Thomas Gross (who had married into my family tree) also served the Confederacy, joining the 5th Regiment, Kentucky Cavalry, which formed in the summer of 1862. Like his son, he became a casualty of war, though with better fortune than Levi as Union forces led by Colonel Frank Wolford’s 1st Kentucky Cavalry captured Thomas in Richmond, Ky., around July 30 or August 1, during the small engagement mentioned toward the end of this page.)

He spent time at a military prison in Louisville, then at both McLean Barracks and Kemper Barracks in Cincinnati, followed by stays at Camp Chase in Columbus, Ohio and Rock Island, Illinois, where he took the Oath of Allegiance on October 24, 1864.

 He survived his confinement and the war, but not for terribly long. He died on September 24, 1864, two years after his son succumbed to his war wounds. Thomas was buried in the Combs Cemetery in Breathitt County.   

He Could Whip any Lincolnite: The Arrest of James Digby, Part 2

Part One

Just after Chancellor Livingston had his freedom affirmed, the Civil War started and men on both sides began learning how to kill and be killed. Bloodshed gradually increased as did the distrust of rumored “disloyal” citizens in border areas like Campbell County. In Kentucky, Union authorities contracted what one historian described as “secession fever,” a sort of paranoia that southern sympathizers were conspiring to move the state into the Confederacy. To combat this fear, they “began arresting prominent pro-Confederate civilians and spiriting them to out-of-state prisons without warning, formal charges, or trial.” [Sanders, Stuart. Anatomy of a Duel University Press of Kentucky 2023. p. 32]

This tactic showed up in Campbell County, where, on September 27, soldiers under orders from General Ormsby Mitchell, commander of the Department of the Ohio, apprehended Robert Maddox and Hubbard Helm for treason against the U.S. and giving aid and comfort to the enemy. They nabbed both in Newport, then transported them to Cincinnati to await further orders from Mitchel.

Helm was a former county sheriff who had been embroiled in public disputes during the James Waggoner case. Provost Marshal Henry C. Gassaway, meanwhile, described Maddox as a man of means who had “great influence with his money particularly in this neighborhood.” He spent his funds “freely to effect his end.” The officer considered Maddox “a dangerous man to our Government,” and believed that locking him up in jail for significant time would “do much good in quelling outbursts among the Rebels in this County.” 

At the same time, two companies of Home Guards, also under orders from General Mitchel, attempted to serve arrest warrants on local attorneys Albert S. Berry and Thomas L. Jones. They did not find their targets on this day. Jones remained in Newport, only to be arrested in September of 1862 while Berry avoided arrest and joined the Confederate Marines in early 1863, eventually being captured at the Battle of Sailor’s Creek in April 1865.

A court order freed Helm and Maddox in mid-November, but Mitchell’s men immediately arrested them again, revealing the General’s determination to stamp out suspected disloyalty. The back-and-forth continued, as they were released from confinement in Louisville just weeks later, in late November and arrived back home on the 27th. They were arrested yet again in the following year.

General Ormsby Mitchel

On October 5, the U.S. Deputy Marshall, also under orders from General Mitchel, arrested well-known lawyer and future judge James R. Hallam, sending him to military headquarters in Cincinnati, accused of “sympathizing with the Rebels.” This was a reasonable assumption since it was no secret that he had two sons in the Confederate army, but he denied the charge, even as one newspaper labelled him “an active and influential Secessionist in Newport,” while another tabbed him “a political trickster.” He was released on December 4 per an order from General Don Carlos Buell and returned to his work as a lawyer in Newport. (He was arrested again on July 18, 1862, and sent to Camp Chase in Columbus, Ohio.)

As the cases of Helm, Maddox, and Hallam demonstrate, these late 1861 arrests foreshadowed what was to come in 1862.

In the middle of that new year, with the conflict a year old, growing more violent, and without an end in sight, political arrests resumed in Campbell County. Union authorities, firmly in political and military control of the county, again sought to clear it of suspected Rebels, this time much more aggressively.

New Provost Marshal Gassaway and his staff resolutely arrested dozens of men from around the county - north, middle, and south - in a local “reign of terror” over the next few weeks, particularly from July 18th to the 20th. Many of these detainees ended up at Camp Chase, where they stayed until they took the Oath of Allegiance and were released. 

James Smith Digby, a county native and lifelong resident, was among the men snared in this roundup, taken  on July 19. His records, though not large in number, describe in detail the specific cause of his detention, leaving his arrest as the most well-documented in the county.

Two participants in the fracas left virtually identical accounts of what happened.

In his telling of the encounter, John G Youtsey declared that he was

acquainted with James Digby the prisoner arrested by the Provost Marshall in this county. In the month of May last I met him on the Alexandria Pike about 8 miles from Newport. He came down the road in company with Frank Harrison. He was hurrahing for Jeff Davis and the Southern Confederacy. I told him to shut up. He then used some very indecent language, swore he could whip any damn blue bellied Lincolnite. I showed fight, he got off of his horse and took off his coat and unbuttoned his vest and exhibited a Bowie Knife & pistol on his belt. The young man Harrison interfered and took him away. Since then I have been informed by my neighbors that he threated to shoot me and states that if I had advanced on him that day he would have shot me."

The other version is from John L Harrison. Youtsey may have misremembered his name as Frank in the previous recounting, but this second man also stated that he knew the detainee, and that

 in April or May last I was in company with James Digby. He had been drinking and was on his way home down the Alexandria Pike at Youtsey Place. He hurrahed for Jeff Davis and the Southern Confederacy. Youtsey told him to shut his mouth. He then used insulting language to Youtsey. Youtsey told him he could come and kick him. He got off of his horse and took off his coat and was preparing to fight. He had a dirk knife on his waist belt. I then took him away and we went home. 

(The threat of violence may not have been an empty one, as in July of 1860, Digby, a Stephen Douglas supporter, had a physical altercation with Dr. John Q. A. Foster (the same from part one of this story) who favored John Bell. Digby “beat him so severely that he is now confined to his bed”).

Provost Marshal Gassaway took these statements as evidence to confirm Digby's alleged disloyalty.

Digby was far from alone. Other men around the county had suffered the same indignity in what might be termed the “Summer of Gassaway.” A story in late July reported that Thomas Jones and thirty-seven other unnamed “Newport and Campbell county Rebels” had been sent to Camp Chase “under a strong guard.” (As in Digby’s story, some of these cases included statements from loyal citizens supporters questioning the fidelity of the suspects.) 

Camp Chase

A few days following his arrest, Digby was among 93 Kentucky men (an amazing 27, or 29%, from Campbell County) at that Ohio facility who signed a letter addressed to Kentucky Governor Beriah Maggofin asserting that “We were brought here by the force of arms, against our will and consent, in violation of the laws of Kentucky and the laws of the United States.”

They virtually begged Maggofin to inform the state legislature of their status so that it could do something for their benefit. They insisted they were “law-abiding citizens” and repeated that they “had not violated laws” of either Kentucky or “our common country,” and were “confined and restrained of our rights and liberty that we are justly entitled to.”

Just weeks after Gassaway and his men arrested Digby and others now at Camp Chase, General Horatio Wright, now commanding the reorganized Department of the Ohio, removed Gassaway from his role, with the Cincinnati Daily Enquirer of September 14 rejoicing that "justice" had finally taken place. 

This newspaper described Gassaway as the man who has, "by his tyrannical acts, made himself so obnoxious to the citizens of our city" (i.e. Newport), revealing the reputation he had quickly earned in his short time in office, which lasted only from June until mid-September. 

On November 4, Digby took the Oath of Allegiance, pledging to give no aid to “the so-called Confederate States,” and to support the Unites States’ Constitution and government. He agreed to a $500 bond as a guarantee he would abide by the terms of his release. Violation of these conditions could theoretically result in his execution.

At the time he regained his freedom, the 33-year-old James stood 5 feet 8 inches tall, with brown eyes, dark hair, and sandy-tinted whiskers to go with his light complexion. Upon his release, he returned to Campbell County where he spent the test of his days, mostly in Cold Spring, a Democrat in politics and a collector and farmer in his work life.

In June of 1863, he was one of more than a dozen men who filed lawsuits in the Campbell County Circuit Court against “various parties” on allegations of “false imprisonment in Camp Chase.” Each plaintiff sought $50,000 in damages.

Gassaway and other Union men were the defendants in these suits, informally called the “Camp Chase cases.” They spent years in the legal system before the courts dismissed them on a technicality in December 1866.

James Digby lived out his life and passed away at his Cold Spring home on July 15, 1904. His obituary noted that he was “at one time prominent in Campbell County politics.”

—

After the rash of apprehensions in 1861 and 1862, and the local scare known as the “Siege of Cincinnati,” in September 1862, Campbell County began to settle down. No more mass arrests occurred, though other occasional reminders of civil war still took place, such as the 1863 execution at Johnson’s Island, Ohio of two county residents convicted of being spies, some horse-stealing in 1864, and other smaller incidents.

Even as those arrests linked Campbell County to similar happenings around the state, a pair of national elections showed one way the county diverged from the state's direction.

In 1860, Abraham Lincoln received 314 votes, or 11.85% of the 2,648 ballots cast in Campbell County, the highest raw number among any of the state’s counties, several of which tallied zero votes for him. (Neighboring Kenton County offered Lincoln another 267 votes.) The Republican had received only 1,364 votes statewide, but Campbell County gave him an eye-opening 23% of those, even as Lincoln finished fourth and last in the county. (John Bell won the state, but Stephen Douglas took Campbell County.)

In Lincoln’s second run for President in 1864, Democrat George McClellan easily won the state, but Campbell County was one of 25 Kentucky counties (out of 101 reporting results) that Lincoln took, as he received 27,787 votes statewide, a significant increase from 1860. 1,504 (about 5%) of those votes came from Campbell County, 53.9% of the county’s 2,790 ballots. Lincoln was the choice of more voters in the county in 1864 than in the entire state in 1860 (though having only two candidates instead of four certainly helped that.)

The Kentucky Historical Society noted: “Whether the Lincoln vote signified Unconditional Unionism or traditional Whig nationalism, this strain of Kentucky politics would prove short-lived.” That showed in the 1868 Presidential contest, when Democrat Horatio Seymour won both the state and Campbell County over General U.S. Grant. Kentucky again had bucked the national trend, as Grant won the national balloting

—

In spite of the abolition controversies five years earlier, the adoption of emancipation as a war aim, the arming of African American troops, and the struggles of the 1864 military campaigns, all of which could have angered or concerned residents, the overall progress of the war was satisfactory enough for most 1864 voters in Campbell County to support the existing administration instead of “swapping horses while crossing a stream,” as Lincoln had famously advised against doing.

Unlike so many areas throughout the nation, no major battles or bloodshed marred the county’s land during these four years, but the difficult and violent conflict retained an inescapable presence in the county. The experiences of James Digby and dozens more like him show how the long arm of war reached beyond combat and into everyday civilian life, including in Campbell County, Kentucky.

The Arrest of James Digby Part 1: Setting the Scene

This was supposed to be a short, quick story about Union authorities arresting a southern sympathizer in Campbell County, not an unusual tale in the Commonwealth, but a topic I have not  yet explored much during my research or on this site.

I started this story and it was going well, but I decided to add context about the local situation as the war arrived. I found an approach I liked but then kept going down rabbit holes of ideas and topics relevant to the subject, finding perspectives I had not considered and information I did not know, and suddenly this grew into a much longer project, leading me to split it into two parts. I think this is the best way to tell this story. 

One other decision I made was to omit citation numbers and endnotes as I feared they would be distracting and only make this post longer. Most sources are the various Cincinnati newspapers. I have included a few links and one mention of a book that provided valuable context. I hope this arrangement works out well.

This first part will focus on Campbell County and its relationship with slavery and abolition as the war approached while part two will discuss the arrest that initiated this project.

—

Kentucky, of course, was a border state in the Civil War, a slave state next to sister slave states like Virginia, Tennessee, and Missouri, while also alongside free states Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, with West Virginia soon joining that latter group. The Bluegrass State was snuggly in the middle of the separate sections, caught between two differing worlds.

Campbell County sits at the top of the state, its eastern and northern borders along the Ohio River, just a few hundred yards from Ohio. It was truly a "border county in a border state.”

From 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campbell_County%2C_Kentucky#/media/File%3AMap_of_Kentucky_highlighting_Campbell_County.svg

Like its home state, which famously attempted to remain neutral, Campbell County found itself in a conundrum when the Civil War came. Families of both northern and southern backgrounds had settled here, as had immigrants from Europe, especially Germany, mirroring the state’s awkward position. Its access to the Ohio River connected it to distant parts of the state - where different cultures, topography, and economies, including the reliance on slavery, existed - as well as to other states both free and slave. The Licking River on the county’s western border served as a route from further south and east all the way to the Ohio River. (I jokingly call it the Campbell County Peninsula.)

Economically, its position along the Ohio River was vital to the state, which “depended heavily on northern trade.” For instance, “ferries from Cincinnati made over 1,000 weekly crossings.” Campbell County was a natural destination for such deliveries.

On the other hand, as that link shows, Kentuckians in general “disagreed with the South’s anti-tariff policy, valuing manufacturing more than most southern states.” Despite this difference, the state did share one important trait with the Deep South - “slavery was vital” to its economy. Kentucky was like the rope in a game of tug-of-war, pulled in opposing directions by northern and southern economies and laws. That role would continue into 1861 and 1862.

The future of that peculiar economic, political, and social institution was a frequent matter of national debate over much of the nineteenth century - would it be maintained only where already allowed, banned from new lands, completely abolished everywhere, or expanded and legalized everywhere? Entire political parties formed and/or dissolved over the decades due to their stances on such contentious issues.

Slavery was, of course, legal in Campbell County, yet was far from a dominating presence. In 1860, the 115 slaves in the county were 62 fewer than at the previous census, and the 0.55 percent of the county's population of 20,909 that slaves represented was the third lowest rate of the state’s 109 counties.

By contrast, Kentucky in that same year held a population of 225,843 slaves, who made up 19.5% of the state’s total population, 35.5 times more ubiquitous than in Campbell County, a significant difference.

As those numbers show, slavery was alive but not thriving in Campbell County as the 1860s began, but the low number of slaves was not because residents disapproved of human bondage. As one local historian puts it, this county was in no way “a bastion of abolitionist sentiment.”

A series of incidents in 1859 - mostly local, but one of significant national concern - revealed the distrust and dislike many locals held towards abolition. Additional happenings in 1860 and early 1861, however, may have had led to some questions or re-thinking over slavery’s effects even on free people in free states.

This was an eventful era in Campbell County.

—

William Shreve Bailey was a native Ohioan who in 1839 had moved to Newport, where he purchased a newspaper in 1850. 

He first grabbed the attention of slavery’s supporters the following year when he added an “abolitionist tone” to his writings, escalating his rhetoric, not a popular tactic in a slave state.

By October of that year, he had agitated enough locals that a group soon "burned the store and residence where Bailey was publishing.”

Bailey and his family survived this attack, then local friends and citizens raised money to enable him to resume his publication. He pressed forward with life, even as he faced other challenges in the remainder of the decade. Of course, nationwide debates about slavery also continued.

As the 1850s marched forward, and the nation’s slavery dispute unknowingly approached a cataclysmic end, Bailey named his newspaper The Free South, setting the stage for an experience reminiscent of the 1851 affair, bookending his decade with turmoil.

His journal, “the only Republican newspaper in the state at the time,” maintained its anti-slavery theme, but a violent event in Virginia shocked the nation, frightened slaveholders, and refocused local attention on Bailey and his writings.

In the middle of October 1859, radical abolitionist John Brown led a raid on Harper's Ferry, an attempt to arm slaves to fight for their freedom, resulting in the deaths of several  of Brown’s followers and his eventual execution. This failed uprising alarmed slavery’s supporters, including those in Campbell County. Bailey was an obvious target of the strong emotions Brown had stirred.  

John Brown

The Cincinnati Enquirer of October 29, 1859, described local reaction to Brown’s raid.

It can not be denied that the Captain Brown insurrection case, now being tried at Charleston, has had its affect upon the people every-where in the South. The statement made in the examination of Brown and his confederates, that an outbreak of the same kind that occurred at Harper’s Ferry would be commenced at the same time some-where in Kentucky, led some of our citizens to believe that it might occur at Newport Barracks, and they have been on the qui vive for such an outbreak ever since. 

Newport Barracks, behind the Ohio River

In connection with this matter we will state that there has been published in Newport for the past several months a paper entitled the Free South, the proclivities of which have been decidedly Black-Republican, and since the late outbreak of Harper’s Ferry, a portion of our citizens have been of the opinion that Mr. Bailey, who is publishing said paper, was in some way connected with the movement, and they have felt that some approval or disapproval should be manifested on the occasion.

Last night the fire-bell rang, and in a few minutes after a large number of our citizens assembled at County-house Square, to see what it meant. Some one suggested that they should go down to Taylor-street and “move” the press of the Free South and following that suggestion a party started down to the office. 

Arriving there, some fifteen in number, they went up into the office, took the forms on the press for the printing of to-day’s paper, and moved them into the street, all of which was done very quietly, and then made an attempt to move the press, which proved too heavy for them. Finding they could not move the press, and after distributing the “forms” of the paper, the crowd advised Mr. Bailey that he had better move his office to the opposite side of the river, and if it was not done within the course of fifteen days, they would do it for him. 

Over two days and nights, the mob eventually succeeded in destroying Bailey's press, then demanded he leave town, but he refused to do so as he gathered weapons to defend his office. He continued to print his views until authorities arrested him under the charge of publishing “incendiary” articles.

Local supporters again came to his rescue, bailing him out of jail as he awaited trial. They sent him on a tour of Europe, where he continued speaking on slavery. He was gone so long that his criminal trial was postponed until his return, but the arrival of war led to its outright cancellation, giving the anti-slavery faction a small victory in a much larger fight.

Bailey then moved his operations to Cincinnati.

—

Three weeks after the attack on Bailey’s newspaper, anti-abolition agitation was again in the news. 

In mid-November, Dr. J.R. Whittemore, a Newport Republican and candidate for Congress, received a letter in the mail and had it published in the newspapers.

Sir, the citizens of Newport have decided that they will no longer permit any person to promulgate such “principles” as you and your brethren in the cause of Abolitionism have been promulgating for the last four years in their city. Therefore, you are hereby notified to leave the city of Newport on or before the first day of December, 1859. Otherwise, you must abide the consequences of your own folly and obstinacy, which, we assure you, will be serious. DETERMINED CITIZENS  

In contrast to that letter’s insinuation, other sources described Whittemore’s reputation as that of “a good citizen” and a “quiet gentleman” who was not “one of the Abolition stripe of politicians” and had “never waged war” against slavery other than wanting to stop its expansion into new territory. Despite that gentle touch in his social and political lives, at least this one anonymous writer was convinced that he was among the group of anti-slavery zealots.

Two other dramas played out in public, bringing slavery and its potentially far-reaching effects to the forefront. 

In August of 1859, shortly before those public controversies, a young and free man named James Waggoner was kidnapped in Cincinnati (in an ostensibly free state) and brought against his will to Campbell County (in an unquestioned slave state.)

Newport officials discovered his presence, and quickly placed him in jail to investigate his status, initiating a fatiguing year-long saga.

The case dragged on, with Waggoner trying to escape his cell at least twice, and in mid-1860, Newport Mayor Edmund Hawkins, in charge of the trial, (and himself the largest slaveowner in the county, with ten pieces of  human property), ruled him a slave. The city then sold him at auction in Alexandria to Dr. John Q. A. Foster, Newport’s postmaster. The court had issued an injunction to stop the sale, but Foster had made his purchase before that ruling reached him, though what he knew and when he knew it became a point of contention. Foster hid Waggoner from pursuers trying to stop the sale, and soon thereafter tried to resell his property for a profit in Lexington, but no acceptable offer was forthcoming. 

As this was going on, newspapers claimed that "public sentiment" in favor of Waggoner was growing, and that it "demanded fair play." Once Foster learned of skepticism over the handling of the Waggoner affair, he agreed to return the man to Newport for a more thorough investigation, restarting the legal process. At least one paper speculated that the public's interest in Waggoner's welfare and treatment had influenced Foster's decision.

Brown's raid was months in the past by this time, but it remained influential. It had “made some excitement” before the arrest of the kidnappers, but after the attack on The Free South, the “slavery feeling became so excited that the Newport witnesses would not attend” the trial for the kidnappers in Ohio. Even residents not directly involved in slavery and/or abolition, were influenced by these issues that clouded the nation's future.

After more legal back-and-forth, with continuing detailed newspaper attention and commentary, another trial took place, and a second verdict arrived. On August 17, a year after the kidnapping, Judge Samuel Moore announced:

“From the proof in the case there can be no doubt, but that plaintiff is a free man, wherefore it is adjudged that the injunction be perpetuated, and that any sale of plaintiff be taken for naught; that he may be released from custody and enjoy his freedom in some other country than this Commonwealth” (emphasis added).

Even a court ruling in favor of liberty left Waggoner unwelcome in Campbell County, or Kentucky itself. Waggoner returned to Ohio, probably happy to do so, closing this difficult chapter of his life.

Even

(This is a basic summary of the main aspects of the Waggoner case. For a more detailed account, see the book I am a Free Man by Shirlene Jensen, available at that link or at the Campbell County Historical & Genealogical Society office.)

—

On January 15, 1861, an incident unrelated to slavery, but that was a result  of the political atmosphere in the county caused a local stir.

On that day, the “Union-loving portion" of Newport residents planned a ceremony to fire 100 shots in honor of Major Robert Anderson and the Union. 

A local artillery unit, using two guns Kentucky Governor Beriah Magoffin had sent, was about to begin the firing when Dr. John Foster, who had purchased Waggoner the previous summer, waited until the last second before running to the flagpole and cutting the lanyard, stopping the raising of the U.S. flag. Foster declared that this was a “Bell and Everett” pole, and that he, a proponent of those candidates in the recent Presidential election, would allow “no stars and stripes” to hang from it in his presence.

Foster moved quickly, catching onlookers by surprise, and almost immediately after he cut the cord, the cannonade started. Because of the timing and noise of it all, “no one resisted the act,” as it happened, though a few moments later, attendees realized what they had seen and “were loud in their denunciations” of the doctor, with some attendees even demanding Foster be lynched.

News of this event quickly spread. “There is no mistake but the affair has created a great sensation in the quiet city of Newport.” Days later, a jury convicted Foster of breach of the peace and fined him $20.

Compared to the violence of Brown's raid and the attack on Bailey, this was a minor incident, but it showed the potential for trouble as tension among opposing loyalties grew.

—

Three months after the disrupted ceremony and just eight months after the Waggoner drama had concluded, another episode of “Slave or Freeman?” found its way to Newport, ending just two days before the firing on Fort Sumter.

On April 4, 1861, a white man arrived in Newport, accompanied by a young African American named Chancellor Livingston.

Curious bystanders noticed the unknown duo and approached them, soon finding a chance to speak to Livingston, who insisted that he was not a slave, and that he could provide evidence of his freedom. The bystanders, perhaps recalling the Waggoner story, suspected this was a kidnapping and sent for police.

City Marshall William Bennett arrived shortly and spoke to Livingtson, leaving his companion with a deputy as he attempted to learn what the two men were doing in Newport.

Livingston, about 20 years old, again swore he was not a slave. He stated that the other man, whom he called Jones, had tricked him into leaving New York by promising him work. One account said the job was supposed to be in Ohio, a free state, but another stated the duo was going to Kentucky, which Jones had convinced his victim was also a free state.

The marshal then turned his attention to the alleged kidnapper, but he had escaped the deputy's careless watch. Local attorney Albert S. Berry (a future Confederate soldier) was nearby and said that the man was supposedly in his office. When this group arrived there, the stranger had vanished again. 

While the search for Jones proceeded, the not-so-hospitable authorities “lodged” Livingston in the Newport jail, where he awaited a court hearing.

This situation with Livingston was obviously not Newport’s first experience in the contest between servitude and liberty, and because of the previous case of “tampering with the rights of free negros,” the city found itself rather “desirous” to bring this new case to a quick end. Even a city where slavery existed was tired of such moral and legal dilemmas.

George Webster, who had worked on Waggoner’s behalf, now represented Livingston before Mayor Hawkins. He presented the key evidence, an affidavit from a Lockport, New York resident whose testimony provided a “description of a negro named Chancellor Livingston, who had recently vanished from that place, and as the description corresponded with the defendant in Court.”  

Hawkins weighed this information and on April 10, pronounced Chancellor free. He also ordered Marshall Bennett “to give him a safe transit to the opposite side of the river,” (emphasis again added) to Ohio, as, like with James Waggoner, this free African American was not welcome in Newport.

Livingston, now officially free, went “on his way rejoicing,” preferring not to stay in the slave state of Kentucky, even had the choice been his. 

As a postscript to this case, a local man had raised money “sufficient to pay his [Livingston’s] expenses home.” That some white Campbell County men were even willing to pay to remove an African American from their presence speaks loudly. Despite the sympathy felt for Waggoner and the assistance given to Livingston, the results of these cases confirm that local attitudes on race had not evolved much. Even indisputably free men were escorted out of the state.

—

Thus stood the Campbell County scene as the Civil War arrived - a cocktail of slavery’s supporters, combined with few actual slaves, blended with even fewer vocal abolitionists, all assembled among a silent majority who took no public stance, forming a fitting mixture of perspectives in this land on the border of freedom and slavery.

How would such a mash-up handle civil war, and how would civil war handle it? The story of James Digby is a fair representation of Campbell County during the early war years. 

Part two, He Could Whip any Linconite, will follow shortly.

Edit: Link to part two.