Kentucky Neutrality.

[FlorianWarth]

Curious to hear some opinions: how long might Kentucky have remained neutral had certain southern generals not chosen to invade in September 1861{or if Davis had chosen to make clear that it was NOT to be done}? I believe that the violation of Kentucky neutrality was a major factor that led to the south's losing the war. Of course, Union forces didn't do much there for a while but once Kentucky came into the war Union generals had more options. I say by the middle of 1862 the south clearly was losing the war in the west. Also wondering if there are any books specifically dealing with that question of Kentucky neutrality.

 

[ErnieMac]

Before Polk occupied Columbus the 1861 state elections had returned veto-proof Unionist majorities and both Federal and Confederate encampments had been established within the state. IMO Kentucky's neutrality was nearing its end.

 

[USS ALASKA]

Neutrality vs. Secession | Additional Discussion on Secession

The recent threads on neutrality took a while to soak into my pea brain but a question finally bubbled up from the murk... Question - as has been discussed many times here, if states did not have the right to seceded, how do they have the right to claim 'neutrality' when the nation they belong...

civilwartalk.com

HTHs,
USS ALASKA

 

[USS ALASKA]

Sirs, an older paper from 1925...

University of Louisville
ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository
Electronic Theses and Dissertations
1-1925

The neutrality of Kentucky in 1861.
Jennie Angell Mengel 1872-1934
University of Louisville

This Master's Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository. This title appears here courtesy of the author, who has retained all other copyrights. For more information, please contact [email protected].

Abstract
During the year 1924 - 1925 a seminar on the Civil War in Kentucky was held in the University of Louisville under the direction of Dr. R. S. Cotterill of the Department of History. Among the subjects studied the Neutrality of the State in 1861 seemed to arouse the most discussion and the most divergent opinions. For this reason I have been interested in pursuing the subject further and in embodying the results of my study in this thesis. Most of the material on which the thesis is based has been presented to the seminar and been criticized by the members.

https://ir.library.louisville.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1963&context=etd

File too large to attach - please see above link.

Cheers,
USS ALASKA

 

[leftyhunter]

Curious to hear some opinions: how long might Kentucky have remained neutral had certain southern generals not chosen to invade in September 1861{or if Davis had chosen to make clear that it was NOT to be done}? I believe that the violation of Kentucky neutrality was a major factor that led to the south's losing the war. Of course, Union forces didn't do much there for a while but once Kentucky came into the war Union generals had more options. I say by the middle of 1862 the south clearly was losing the war in the west. Also wondering if there are any books specifically dealing with that question of Kentucky neutrality.

Neutrality is not an option in a civil war. Both sides need resources and manpower . In a civil war one joins either one side or the other or leaves the country and more then a few young men did just that mostly going to Canada. It's just that simple.
Leftyhunter

 

[FlorianWarth]

Before Polk occupied Columbus the 1861 state elections had returned veto-proof Unionist majorities and both Federal and Confederate encampments had been established within the state. IMO Kentucky's neutrality was nearing its end.

You're missing the point, though. It suited both sides to keep Kentucky neutral, at least for a while. For the Confederates Kentucky was a barrier protecting Tennessee, at least as long as the Union respected Kentucky's neutrality. For the Union it was important not to violate Kentucky's neutrality in order to avoid having Kentucky join the Confederacy. The occupation of Columbus was a gift to the Yankees; especially since Polk didn't bother to send more forces to occupy Paducah.

 

[FlorianWarth]

Neutrality is not an option in a civil war. Both sides need resources and manpower . In a civil war one joins either one side or the other or leaves the country and more then a few young men did just that mostly going to Canada. It's just that simple.
Leftyhunter

It's an option for a while. That's the point. Lincoln didn't want to offend Kentucky. He was treading carefully. I recognize that it wasn't likely to last but the south could have waited for a northern attack and benefitted from the bad feeling generated by that. It's not as if they accomplished anything by going into Kentucky.

 

[leftyhunter]

Curious to hear some opinions: how long might Kentucky have remained neutral had certain southern generals not chosen to invade in September 1861{or if Davis had chosen to make clear that it was NOT to be done}? I believe that the violation of Kentucky neutrality was a major factor that led to the south's losing the war. Of course, Union forces didn't do much there for a while but once Kentucky came into the war Union generals had more options. I say by the middle of 1862 the south clearly was losing the war in the west. Also wondering if there are any books specifically dealing with that question of Kentucky neutrality.

Neutrality is not an option in a civil war. Both sides need resources and manpower . In a civil war one joins either one side or the other or leaves the country and more then a few young men did just that mostly going to Canada. It's just that dimple

It's an option for a while. That's the point. Lincoln didn't want to offend Kentucky. He was treading carefully. I recognize that it wasn't likely to last but the south could have waited for a northern attack and benefitted from the bad feeling generated by that. It's not as if they accomplished anything by going into Kentucky.

Then again the Confederacy could not afford a long war. In a conventional war time is not on the weaker side in particular because the Confederacy unlike the Colonial Rebels is fighting on its own. The Confederacy had to fight to win and that means taking chances.
Leftyhunter

 

[ErnieMac]

You're missing the point, though. It suited both sides to keep Kentucky neutral, at least for a while. For the Confederates Kentucky was a barrier protecting Tennessee, at least as long as the Union respected Kentucky's neutrality. For the Union it was important not to violate Kentucky's neutrality in order to avoid having Kentucky join the Confederacy. The occupation of Columbus was a gift to the Yankees; especially since Polk didn't bother to send more forces to occupy Paducah.

I agree with you that Kentucky's neutrality was beneficial to both sides for a while for the reasons you stated. My point is that time was over from the Federal perspective. The most effective way to attack Tennessee was through Kentucky and troops were gathering in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Missouri, in addition to Camp Dick Robinson in Central Kentucky, for that purpose. Polk realized Kentucky was slipping away and said as much in a September 14 letter to Jefferson Davis when he stated:

"I believe, if we could have found a respectable pretext, it would have been better to have seized this place some months ago, as I am convinced we had more friends then in Kentucky than we have had since, and every hour's delay made against us. Kentucky was fast melting away under the influence of the Lincoln Government. If we make the stand now, and do it vigorously, we shall find we have more allies in the State than we shall ever have at any future day, and if our arms should be successful in a few battles, the State will soon abandon the position which fear of the power of the Federal Government alone constrains her now to maintain."​

​

I'm not sure there were many people left that had not chosen a side at that time, whether it was pro-Union, pro-Confederate or go away and leave me alone. Were there that many fence sitters left to impact?

 

[USS ALASKA]

University of Louisville
ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository
Electronic Theses and Dissertations
5-2012

"The greatest evil that can befall us": Unionism in antebellum era Kentucky, 1849-1861.
Curtis Lushawn Parmley
University of Louisville

This Master's Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository. This title appears here courtesy of the author, who has retained all other copyrights. For more information, please contact [email protected].

ABSTRACT
During the secession winter of 1860-61 the Commonwealth of Kentucky found itself caught in the middle of the great sectional controversy. With the Union's fate hanging in the balance Kentucky figured as a prominent player in the outcome of that conflict. While the Commonwealth of Kentucky featured strong social and cultural ties to the South, its economic ties ran to both sections. Further, a majority of the people of the Commonwealth of Kentucky shared a nationalist perspective rooted in the old line Whig political ideology that they had a constitutional right to hold property in persons which contributed to their pro-Union sentiment. In the end, Kentucky, an Upper South border slave state, remained loyal to the Union. This master's thesis examines the origins and development of Kentuckian's Unionist sentiment during the Antebellum era and addresses the question: Why did Kentucky, a border slave state, forgo secession and remain loyal to the Union? Although cultural, social, economic, and political factors contributed to Kentuckian's pro-Union sentiment, in the end, Whig ideology constituted the key factor in Kentucky's decision to remain loyal to the Union.

https://ir.library.louisville.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2095&context=etd

Cheers,
USS ALASKA

 

[C.J.]

I agree with you that Kentucky's neutrality was beneficial to both sides for a while for the reasons you stated. My point is that time was over from the Federal perspective. The most effective way to attack Tennessee was through Kentucky and troops were gathering in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Missouri, in addition to Camp Dick Robinson in Central Kentucky, for that purpose. Polk realized Kentucky was slipping away and said as much in a September 14 letter to Jefferson Davis when he stated:

"I believe, if we could have found a respectable pretext, it would have been better to have seized this place some months ago, as I am convinced we had more friends then in Kentucky than we have had since, and every hour's delay made against us. Kentucky was fast melting away under the influence of the Lincoln Government. If we make the stand now, and do it vigorously, we shall find we have more allies in the State than we shall ever have at any future day, and if our arms should be successful in a few battles, the State will soon abandon the position which fear of the power of the Federal Government alone constrains her now to maintain."​

​

I'm not sure there were many people left that had not chosen a side at that time, whether it was pro-Union, pro-Confederate or go away and leave me alone. Were there that many fence sitters left to impact?

Plenty, a third i would guess (manly people who did want anything to do with the civil war who joined the union historically thanks to Confederate action) and this is polk were talking about he didn't have many good takes during his career, more likely he lost far more allies then he gaind doing his stunt.

 

[ErnieMac]

Plenty, a third i would guess (manly people who did want anything to do with the civil war who joined the union historically thanks to Confederate action) and this is polk were talking about he didn't have many good takes during his career, more likely he lost far more allies then he gaind doing his stunt.

I would be interested to know how you derived the 1/3 figure. Polk was a difficult subordinate, but that does not mean his instincts were not correct. He was certainly correct in his choice of Columbus as the proper location to try to defend the Mississippi Valley. The Confederate government was given the opportunity to order Polk to withdraw and restore the status quo but chose not to do so.

 

[FlorianWarth]

I would be interested to know how you derived the 1/3 figure. Polk was a difficult subordinate, but that does not mean his instincts were not correct. He was certainly correct in his choice of Columbus as the proper location to try to defend the Mississippi Valley. The Confederate government was given the opportunity to order Polk to withdraw and restore the status quo but chose not to do so.

What I've read indicates that Davis originally wanted Polk to withdraw but was persuaded to change his mind. One point I add is that I've read that it was PILLOW who decided to take Columbus but that Polk was happy with the situation after the fact.

 

[USS ALASKA]

University of Louisville
ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository
Electronic Theses and Dissertations
1-2020

A forgotten shade of blue: support for the union and the constitutional republic in southeastern Kentucky during the civil war era.
Howard Muncy
University of Louisville

This Master's Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository. This title appears here courtesy of the author, who has retained all other copyrights. For more information, please contact [email protected].

ABSTRACT
This thesis analyzes Southeastern Kentucky's political and military support for the Union during the Civil War era. In the decades prior to the 1860 election, Kentucky developed deep social and economic ties with all sections of the country. After the secession winter that followed Abraham Lincoln's presidential election, the statewide population divided and pockets of significant Confederate sympathies emerged. Kentucky's southeastern counties aligned with the Union at the outbreak of the Civil War because of a strong national identity and the absence of a large slave population. As the war unfolded, Southeastern Kentuckians played an important role in the disruption of repeated Confederate invasions. Kentucky split again in the emancipationist phase of the war when guerilla warfare engulfed the slave state, but southeastern Kentuckians continued to support federal efforts with votes, enlistments, and service. In the final months of the conflict, and the years that followed, a core of Kentucky's southeastern counties did not drift toward the Confederacy's "lost cause," nor to the Democratic Party, as did much of the state. Instead, citizens from Southeastern Kentucky offered robust support for Union veterans and other Republican candidates who ran for both state and federal offices. This thesis illuminates the political activity and military service of citizens from Southeastern Kentucky during those turbulent years with attention to national events and other local populations proximate to the region of study.

https://ir.library.louisville.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4586&context=etd

Cheers,
USS ALASKA

 

[Lubliner]

@USS ALASKA you have made bookworms' dreams come truly delightful. Unfortunately, I can't speed read. Oh, but if only I could!
Lubliner.

 

[USS ALASKA]

Loyola University Chicago
Loyola eCommons
Master's Theses
Theses and Dissertations
1937

The Importance of Kentucky in the Civil War
Mary Raphael Hayden
Loyola University Chicago

This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Theses and Dissertations at Loyola eCommons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Master's Theses by an authorized administrator of Loyola eCommons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License. Copyright © 1937 Mary Raphael Hayden

INTRODUCTION
A pre-view of Kentucky's history previous to the Civil War, explaining conditions, forces, and events, which gave her a position of importance during that period. The state of Kentucky, the oldest Commonwealth west of the Allegheny Mountains has had bequeathed to her an heritage of geographic determinants, historical movements and sociological trends Which may claim a title of distinction in the history of the Nation. A deeper knowledge of this inheritance and a broader acquaintance of those simultaneous and consecutive forces which made for this importance, are the essential elements that form a background to this study. Kentucky's ideals, traditions, achievements or the past and their causes constitute the raw material from which the attempt has been made to construct one more little block in the monument of her fame.

https://ecommons.luc.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1626&context=luc_theses

Cheers,
USS ALASKA

 

[Paul Yancey]

Sirs, an older paper from 1925...

University of Louisville
ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository
Electronic Theses and Dissertations
1-1925

The neutrality of Kentucky in 1861.
Jennie Angell Mengel 1872-1934
University of Louisville

This Master's Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ThinkIR: The University of Louisville's Institutional Repository. This title appears here courtesy of the author, who has retained all other copyrights. For more information, please contact [email protected].

Abstract
During the year 1924 - 1925 a seminar on the Civil War in Kentucky was held in the University of Louisville under the direction of Dr. R. S. Cotterill of the Department of History. Among the subjects studied the Neutrality of the State in 1861 seemed to arouse the most discussion and the most divergent opinions. For this reason I have been interested in pursuing the subject further and in embodying the results of my study in this thesis. Most of the material on which the thesis is based has been presented to the seminar and been criticized by the members.

https://ir.library.louisville.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1963&context=etd

File too large to attach - please see above link.

Cheers,
USS ALASKA

Thank You for posting. This Theses was well written and I highly recommend for anyone interested in Kentucky's role in the war. I recently read the book Divided Loyalties by James W. Finck. In the book Mr. Finck goes into great detail the turmoil and hard decisions that faced Kentuckians in their role as a border state.

Mr. Finck states that there is general agreement that 90,000 Kentucky troops fought for the Union while only about 30,000 to 40,000 troops fought for the Confederacy. However, the author makes the point that this number can be misleading regarding the loyalties of the people of the state. I quote from the book - "By the end of the war, Unionism would appear to have triumphed in Kentucky as far as enlistments, but again there is more to the numbers. To begin with, around 24,000 black troops made up over a quarter of the 90,000 Union troops from Kentucky. Without the black troops, that leaves 66,000 troops fighting for the North. That was still at least 26,000 more than the number fighting for the Rebels, but two other factors should be considered in judging Union sentiment. First, Kentucky was subject to the Union draft but not the Confederate, which leads to the conclusion that at least some men were forced to fight for the Union. Second, many historians suggest that elsewhere men fought for the Confederacy due to loyalty to their state. After the Confederates invaded Kentucky, the state sided with the Union, and floods of Kentuckians joined the Federal army. Historian Daniel Crofts and others explain how many Southerners in border states that seceded, such as Virginia, North Carolina, and Tennessee, supported the Union but joined the Confederacy out of loyalty to their states."

The author further explains that "When it comes to troops, even after the Commonwealth ended neutrality, most of its citizens did not. The 90,000 men who fought only made up 29 percent of those eligible. Seventy-one percent of the men instead decided not to fight, the highest percentage of all the slave states. It can be conjectured that some Kentuckians were loyal to the South but could not fight against their state, so instead chose not to fight at all. Others may have taken neutrality to heart."

 

[Sheltowee]

Thank You for posting. This Theses was well written and I highly recommend for anyone interested in Kentucky's role in the war. I recently read the book Divided Loyalties by James W. Finck. In the book Mr. Finck goes into great detail the turmoil and hard decisions that faced Kentuckians in their role as a border state.

Mr. Finck states that there is general agreement that 90,000 Kentucky troops fought for the Union while only about 30,000 to 40,000 troops fought for the Confederacy. However, the author makes the point that this number can be misleading regarding the loyalties of the people of the state. I quote from the book - "By the end of the war, Unionism would appear to have triumphed in Kentucky as far as enlistments, but again there is more to the numbers. To begin with, around 24,000 black troops made up over a quarter of the 90,000 Union troops from Kentucky. Without the black troops, that leaves 66,000 troops fighting for the North. That was still at least 26,000 more than the number fighting for the Rebels, but two other factors should be considered in judging Union sentiment. First, Kentucky was subject to the Union draft but not the Confederate, which leads to the conclusion that at least some men were forced to fight for the Union. Second, many historians suggest that elsewhere men fought for the Confederacy due to loyalty to their state. After the Confederates invaded Kentucky, the state sided with the Union, and floods of Kentuckians joined the Federal army. Historian Daniel Crofts and others explain how many Southerners in border states that seceded, such as Virginia, North Carolina, and Tennessee, supported the Union but joined the Confederacy out of loyalty to their states."

The author further explains that "When it comes to troops, even after the Commonwealth ended neutrality, most of its citizens did not. The 90,000 men who fought only made up 29 percent of those eligible. Seventy-one percent of the men instead decided not to fight, the highest percentage of all the slave states. It can be conjectured that some Kentuckians were loyal to the South but could not fight against their state, so instead chose not to fight at all. Others may have taken neutrality to heart."

Finck's assertion seems to ring true in my own family story. I haven't compiled the numbers, but most of my military-aged members appear to have just opted to sit this one out. The majority who did "serve", only did so in the capacity of very brief stints in a Tennessee home guard (Union) role.

I would love to know why they did/ didn't serve in one army or the other. Divided loyalty? Family persuasion? Lack of conviction- or even courage? I dunno.

I will offer that geography had some bearing. My people are from a secluded portion of the state- probably little external influence. Coupled with the fact they were continuously two meals away from starvation……. Perhaps they had a bigger fight on their hands.

 

[Kyle Kalasnik]

Finck's assertion seems to ring true in my own family story. I haven't compiled the numbers, but most of my military-aged members appear to have just opted to sit this one out. The majority who did "serve", only did so in the capacity of very brief stints in a Tennessee home guard (Union) role.

I would love to know why they did/ didn't serve in one army or the other. Divided loyalty? Family persuasion? Lack of conviction- or even courage? I dunno.

I will offer that geography had some bearing. My people are from a secluded portion of the state- probably little external influence. Coupled with the fact they were continuously two meals away from starvation……. Perhaps they had a bigger fight on their hands.

The same is with the majority of my ancestors who were in Southern West Virginia at the time.

I'm sure there are many reasons why they did not serve ( I have even found where they registered for the draft, but were never drafted, and have no service records) but like you said maybe they had a bigger fight on their hands.

 

[USS ALASKA]

Title; Tactically sound, strategically inept: Union and Confederate missteps in neutral Kentucky, 1861.
Author; Small, Logan J.
Branch/Country; US Army

Abstract
In May 1861, Kentucky declared neutrality in the burgeoning US Civil War. Both the Union and Confederacy vied for the state's loyalty by overtly respecting its neutrality and covertly currying support within it. By August 1861, the Union appeared to have the upper hand. Pro-Union supporters had won recent local elections and a Union recruitment camp was operating within the state's borders. However, the Union's gains were nearly erased when Union General John C. Fremont declared all slaves in Missouri free on August 30, 1861. This proclamation caused an uproar in slave-holding Kentucky. The state threatened to tilt toward the Confederacy when, just days after Fremont's proclamation, Confederate General Leonidas Polk ordered troops to occupy Columbus, Kentucky. With its neutrality overtly violated by Polk, Kentucky declared its loyalty to the Union on September 18, 1861. Both Fremont's and Polk's actions were contrary to the policies of Presidents Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis. Why did two senior military commanders ignore the strategic implications of their tactical actions? Using Eliot Cohen's "unequal dialogue" as a standard, this monograph argues that neither commander engaged in an adequate dialogue with their respective policymaker. A dialogue which adhered to Cohen's model could have avoided disaster for either commander. Additionally, both commanders' inexperience at military command, ignorance of Kentucky's political situation, and exclusive focus on tactical issues contributed to their mistakes. Fremont's and Polk's actions serve as an important lesson for current and future military leaders charged with implementing policy.

Series; Command and General Staff College (CGSC), School of Advanced Military Studies (SAMS) Monograph
Publisher; Fort Leavenworth, KS : US Army Command and General Staff College,
Date, Original; 2018-05-24
Date, Digital; 2018-05-24
Release statement; Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited. The opinions and conclusions expressed herein are those of the student-author and do not necessarily represent the views of the US Army Command and General Staff College or any other governmental agency. (References to this study should include the foregoing statement.)
Repository; Combined Arms Research Library
Library; Combined Arms Research Library Digital Library
Date created; 2019-04-16

CONTENTdm

cgsc.contentdm.oclc.org

Cheers,
USS ALASKA