Description
Book Synopsis The Mobile & Ohio Railroad was the longest line in the nation when it was completed in spring of 1861--the final spike driven a few weeks after Confederate artillery shelled Fort Sumter. Within days, the M&O was swept up in the Civil War as a prime conveyor of troops and supplies, a strategic and tactical asset to both Confederate and Union armies, who fought to control it.
Its northern terminus at Columbus, Kentucky saw some of the earliest fighting in the war. The southern terminus in Mobile, Alabama was the scene of some of the last. U. S. Grant, William T. Sherman, Nathan Bedford Forrest, Newton Knight of the Free State of Jones and others battled over the M&O, the Federals taking it mile-by-mile. This book chronicles the campaigns and battles for the railroad and the calamity endured by the civilians who lived along it.
Table of Contents
- Table of Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Preface
- Chapter One. The Politics of Secession
- Chapter Two. The Two Gibraltars
- Chapter Three. Columbus Is Ours
- Chapter Four. Corinth
- Chapter Five. Iuka and Second Corinth
- Chapter Six. Van Dorn in Mississippi, Forrest in Tennessee
- Chapter Seven. Mobile, 1863: A City and Its Lifelines
- Chapter Eight. The Meridian Campaign
- Chapter Nine. Fort Powell, Paducah, and Brice's Crossroads
- Chapter Ten. Tupelo and Memphis
- Chapter Eleven. Grierson and Hood on the M&O
- Chapter Twelve. Last Stop: The Fall of Mobile
- Epilogue
- Chapter Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
