The Battle of Tebbs Bend (or Tebb's Bend or Green River Bridge) was fought on July 4, 1863, near the Green River in Taylor County, Kentucky during Morgan's Raid in the American Civil War. Despite being badly outnumbered, elements of the Union Army defeated Confederate Brig. Gen. John Hunt Morgan's dismounted cavalry.
Confederate Brigadier General Morgan and 2,460 Confederate cavalrymen rode west from Sparta in middle Tennessee on June 11, 1863, intending to divert the attention of the Union Army of the Ohio from Southern forces in the state. Morgan moved northward on June 23, bound for Kentucky. On the night of July 2, he crossed the rain-swollen Cumberland River. He advanced into Kentucky, proceeding as far as Cane Valley, camping between Campbellsville and Columbia. The next day, he planned to cross the Green River at Tebbs Bend, guarded by five companies of about 200 men of the 25th Michigan Infantry led by Colonel Orlando Hurley Moore (July 13, 1827 to October 31, 1890). Moore had erected earthworks in the woods near the river crossing, guarded by a line of abatis of felled trees and several forward rifle pits. Moore aimed to protect the Lebanon-Campbellsville-Columbia Turnpike, a vital supply line and the easiest route for Morgan to reach Louisville.
Morgan divided his force, sending the bulk of his cavalry to flank the small garrison and cut off their avenue of retreat. At sunrise on July 4, Union pickets opened fire on approaching enemy cavalrymen. Soon, Morgan's artillery answered, wounding two Union soldiers in the rifle pits. About 7 a.m., Morgan called for a cease-fire and sent forward three officers under a flag of truce, demanding that Moore surrender, wishing to avoid further bloodshed. However, the Union commander refused, and firing resumed. Sharpshooters soon silenced Morgan's artillery battery of four guns.
Morgan sent forward two dismounted regiments under Col. Adam R. Johnson, about 400 troopers, who easily overran the advanced rifle pits. However, the attack stalled under heavy fire from U.S. soldiers behind the abatis. Morgan then deployed the 5th Kentucky Cavalry from Col. Basil W. Duke's brigade to support Johnson. Over three hours, Morgan attempted a total of eight separate attacks, with each one being repulsed, including the flanking column. Finally acknowledging that he could not seize the fortifications, Morgan sent another delegation under a flag of truce to Colonel Moore to request permission to collect his wounded and bury his dead. That task completed, Morgan withdrew southward along the bluffs of the Green River, finally crossing the bend at Johnson Ford and heading back towards Campbellsville. The next day, he would fight again at the Battle of Lebanon.
The American Civil War (1861–1865) was the deadliest conflict in American history, killing an estimated 620,000 to 750,000 soldiers and an unknown number of civilians. The Confederate States of America, formed by eleven seceding Southern states, faced the Union in four years of warfare across 23 states and territories. Major engagements included First and Second Bull Run, Antietam (the bloodiest single day in American history, September 17, 1862), Chancellorsville, Gettysburg (July 1–3, 1863), Vicksburg (surrendered July 4, 1863), and Sherman's March through Georgia and the Carolinas (1864–1865). President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, transforming the war's stated purpose to include the abolition of slavery and enabling the enlistment of approximately 180,000 Black men in the United States Colored Troops. Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865. The war resolved the question of secession and ended American slavery, though Reconstruction would face sustained resistance in its attempt to secure civil rights for formerly enslaved people.
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