The Battle of Mount Sterling was a minor action in the American Civil War that occurred in June 1864 in Mount Sterling, Kentucky.
U.S. and C.S. forces alternated control of Mount Sterling during the American Civil War. On March 22, 1863, about 300 Confederate cavalrymen under Colonel Leroy Cluke captured the city, taking 438 prisoners, 222 wagon loads of military goods, 500 mules, and 1000 stand of arms. Confederate troops burned the Mount Sterling courthouse, resulting in the loss of early city records. About one-half of Kentucky county courthouses were deliberately burned down during the Civil War, resulting in a vast loss of records.
On June 8, 1864, General John Hunt Morgan's Cavalry attacked U.S. forces guarding a vital supply depot at Mount Sterling. The C.S. forces attacked the U.S. Army camp in Mount Sterling under the command of Captain Edward Barlow. The Confederates captured 380 prisoners and material and took $59,000 from Farmers' Bank. Leaving a force under Colonel H. L. Giltner, Morgan moved west with the 2nd Brigade.
Early in the morning on June 9, 1864, U.S. forces under General Stephen G. Burbridge attacked the Confederates camped on Camargo Pike under the command of Colonel R. M. Martin. Colonel H. L. Giltner brought a force from Levee Road to support Martin's besieged men, but both forces were driven back through the town. The Confederate counterattack failed to overcome the opposing force, and losses were incurred on both sides.
The battle continued sporadically throughout the surrounding countryside, leaving relics like ammunition and sabers buried in the ground, some of which are still being found as fields are plowed. The battle ended with the defeat of the outnumbered Confederates, marking the last of the actual fighting for Montgomery County, Kentucky. The aftermath of the battle included 8 killed, 13 wounded for the Confederates and 4 killed, 10 wounded for the United States.
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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