Benson J. Lossing, Pictorial Field Book of the Civil War. Volume 2.

[189] grand plan for expelling the Confederates from Kentucky, and liberating Tennessee from their grasp.

We have seen how the loyalists in the Kentucky Legislature foiled the efforts of the Governor and his political friends to link the fortunes of that State with those of the “Southern Confederacy.” These efforts were met, as we have observed, by the occupation of the whole southern portion of the commonwealth by Confederate troops, all of which were within the Department

Albert Sidney Johnston.

commanded by General Albert Sidney Johnston. That officer had been an able veteran in the army of the Republic, and was then about sixty years of age. He was a Kentuckian by birth, and his sympathies were with the conspirators. He was on duty in California when the war was kindling, and was making preparations, with other conspirators there, to array that State on the side of the Confederacy,¹ when he was superseded in command by Lieutenant-Colonel E. V. Sumner, of Massachusetts. Johnston then abandoned his flag, joined the conspirators in active rebellion, and was appointed by Jefferson Davis to the command of the “Western Department,” with his Headquarters at Nashville.

Under the shadow of Johnston's protection, and behind the cordon of Confederate troops stretched across the State, the disloyal politicians of Kentucky proceeded to organize an independent government for the commonwealth. They met at Russellville, the capital of Logan County, in the southern part of the State, on the 29th of October. They drew up a manifesto, in which the grievances of Kentucky were recounted, and the action of its Legislature denounced. They then called upon the people of the State to choose, “in any manner” they might see fit, “delegates to attend a ‘Sovereignty convention,’ ” at Russellville, on the 18th of November. At the appointed time, about two hundred men from fifty-one counties, not elected by the people, assembled, and with difficult gravity adopted a “Declaration of Independence,” and an “Ordinance of Secession,”

Nov. 20, 1861.

and then proceeded to organize a “Provisional Government,” by choosing a governor, a legislative council of ten, a treasurer, and an auditor.² Bowling Green was selected as the new capital of the State. Commissioners were appointed to treat with the “Confederate Government,” for the admission of Kentucky into the league;³ and before the close of December the arrangement was made, and so-called