Season 1
2. Irregular Warfare in Kentucky with Derrick Lindow
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Transcript
0:0 Steve Phan: Welcome to the park podcast, Echoes of Camp Nelson: Uncovering the Stories of the Civil War Era, at Camp Nelson National Monument. My name is Steve Phan, and I serve as the Chief of Interpretation, Education, and Visitor Services. This is the second episode of the podcast, and we’re thrilled to launch a new, digital series to connect visitors to the national significance of Camp Nelson during the Civil War era and our development as the 418th unit of the National Park Service. The podcast will feature unique and interesting stories, interviews with subject matter experts, and an assortment of other topics.
The podcast launches with the 4th annual Winter Lecture Series. The interview provides an overview of the Winter Lecture Series presentation delivered by special guests at the park. 2025 marks the 4th annual Winter Lecture Series and the 160th anniversary of Camp Nelson.
On June 13, 1864, the U.S. War Department issued General Orders Number 20, which authorized the unrestricted enlistment of African American men in the U.S. Army and established 8 recruiting and training centers in Kentucky at Bowling Green, Camp Nelson, Covington, Lebanon, Louisville, Louisa, Owensboro, and Paducah. General Orders Number 20 codified Camp Nelson’s dramatic and evolutionary transformation from supply depot to recruitment and training center for over 10,000 African American men and a site of refuge for thousands of freedom seekers.
The U.S. Army was authorized to recruit, enlist, and train U.S. Colored Troops in, quote, “as rapidly as possible,” end quote. At war’s end, nearly 24,000 African American men joined a U.S.C.T. regiment organized in Kentucky, and thousands of freedom seekers self-emancipated at U.S. Army bases across the Commonwealth.
However, the process of emancipation through black enlistment was complicated, contested, and deadly. Black enlistment and the subsequent destruction of the institution of slavery added fuel to an already chaotic breakdown of civil and military order in Kentucky, and was marked by the rise of irrever… irregular combat, guerrilla activity, extralegal violence, and open hostility to the Lincoln administration, federal government, and the U.S. military. Opposition came in many forms and included many white Kentuckians, including elected officials and even U.S. Army officers and soldiers.
So how did we get here? Let’s find out.
Our speaker today is Derrick Lindow, who is an 8th grade U.S. history teacher in Owensboro, Kentucky. He is the author of We Shall Conquer or Die: Partisan Warfare in 1862 Western Kentucky, which was published by Savas Beatie in March of 2024, and he also runs The Western Theater in the Civil War website. He has a Bachelor's degree in history from Kentucky Wesleyan College and a Master’s in history from Western Kentucky University. Derrick is married to Allie, and the two have two boys: Ezra and Owen.
So the program that he delivered today is, uhm, an expansion of the work that he published last year, and this is the program description: “Irregular warfare in Kentucky saw drastic changes from 1862 through 1865. In the earlier stages of the war, there was much more civility and a respect toward the rules of war and non-combatants. By 1864 and into 1865, the brutality of guerrilla war seemingly touched every corner of the state and affected everyone from civilian Unionists, returning Union veterans, United States Colored Troops, Freemen, and sometimes, even Confederate sympathizers. Exactly how were the stages of irregular warfare different in Kentucky, and what brought about the drastic changes?”
That’s what I’ll be discussing with Derrick today. Welcome, Derrick, it’s nice to have you join us.
Derrick Lindow: Thanks for having me.
Steve Phan: Before we discuss your book and the presentation at the park, tell our listeners more about The Western Theater in the Civil War website.
4:35 Derrick Lindow: Glad to. So, I guess back in 2020, back when Covid was going on and we had nothing else to do but be on the internet, Darryl Smith and I, we decided that there needed to be something just for the Western Theater. And so we… we made the website, uh, it’s westerntheatercivilwar.com, and we’ve, uh, nearing 300 blog posts on there. We do events, try to do one or two a year. Lately, Perryville has been our annual event. We do a symposium there every year that lasts three days. And, uh, it’s tours for certain brigades or certain topics and, uhm, you know, all over the battlefield and that’s been our main one that we’ve been going lately. But we’ve…every now and then we’ll add some other little events in there, and our goal is just to bring more attention to the Western Theater and, really, just the amazing stories that happened out here and how important this area of the war was to the conclusion of everything.
Steve Phan: And I’ve seen your popularity with this website and the work you’re doing with the programs grow pretty rapidly over the past couple years. So, what’s that been like for you and Darryl?
5:35 Derrick Lindow: Uh, sometimes it’s like another job. Honestly, it’s, uh, uhm… you know, last… this last past year was probably the least amount that we were able to put into it because I was moving and we were building a house, and then school started back up and kids doing things. And so it kind of took a dip, but it’s jumping back up there now. We’ve, uh, found the time to be able to hit hard again and, uh, start putting more stuff out there. We’re always looking for writers, so if somebody has a Western Theater topic and, uh, you’ve done some good research, then, you know, we’d be happy to take a look at that.
Steve Phan: And I must confess in a very positive way that whenever I’m doing some sort of reading or writing about the Western Theater, especially Civil War Kentucky, I generally send a message to Derrick and Darryl and be like, “Is this right? Am I accurate?” So I obviously appreciate, uh, your support of Camp Nelson and the work that we’re doing here as well.
And I think this is a great transition to my next thought about this. From my perspective as Civil War historian, Kentucky has existed on the periphery of Civil War era scholarship and public interest and focus. But that appears to be changing with the preservation of sites like Camp Nelson and Mill Springs, together with other Civil War sites across the state, and the publication of new scholarship, including your new book, We Shall Conquer or Die. Uh, what are your thoughts on this growing, perhaps, attention to the scholarship and preservation happening in Kentucky?
Derrick Lindow: I think it’s amazing. Uh, just the more that we can bring to these sites, and to the stories of the people that fought there or lived there, uh, I think it’s exactly what we need. Uhm, especially in Kentucky, because, you know, a lot of these sites are just…a lot of them are just roadside signs, historical markers. Uh, but I think as we research more, as we get more stories out there and, uh, find more information, then maybe one day we can start getting even more sites. And that will help the others that we already have. And, uh, that people’s interests will really start to pique and that, you know, realize just how important Kentucky was during the war. It wasn’t just a one and done with Perryville and then Kentucky’s done with the war. I mean it was…there was a whole lot of things going on. And, you know, Camp Nelson is one of the perfect examples of that, so…
7:41 Steve Phan: And that really, I think, lends well to the topic of your work, especially with We Shall Conquer or Die. What was your inspiration for writing that?
Derrick Lindow: It started with a…it was almost just like a passionate project. Uh, it took place–one of the main events took place in Owensboro and, uh, you know, as a kid growing up and just being obsessed with Civil War history, I always wanted to know what exactly happened there. We didn’t really have internet growing up, but once we got it, I started googling–if that was even a word back then in the early 2000s, I don’t know– but I was trying to look up anything I could on it and there was absolutely nothing. There really wasn’t a whole lot written about it either. And so, several years ago, I decided that I was…if no one else was gonna do it, I’ll do it. And so I started researching and, uh, started finding a lot of interesting stories and bits of information and realized after a few months of research that this is not gonna just be a little pamphlet from our local library–which was what I originally planned for it to be. And, you know, there’s a whole lot of material here and it’s connected to so many other events. And this could be something book length, and that’s what it turned into.
Steve Phan: For those listening for the first time or maybe this is the first time they’ve heard about your book, give them, uh, maybe just an overview of the work that you did there. 9:00 Derrick Lindow: Yeah, so what I’m focusing on is, uh, partisan warfare, which is oftentimes mixed up with guerrilla warfare, but the book is careful to, I guess, explain the differences between that. And it follows the partisan activities of one Confederate regiment–the 10th Kentucky Partisan Rangers–and… because they were the ones that were really doing all the partisan activity in western Kentucky, in that part of 1862. So it follows them and how they are, uh, just wreaking havoc behind Union lines. And the book looks into, you know, how does this unit organize? How does it arm itself? How does it supply itself? How does it function?
And then how does the Union Army figure out how to defeat them? Uh, because they struggle with that. And it’s almost like they’re learning by doing. And so the more mistakes they make, they actually are learning, and they stop making a lot of those mistakes. And eventually, they’re able to figure out and they push Johnson and his 10th KY Partisan Rangers out of the state.
Steve Phan: So Derrick, when we talk about Civil War Kentucky in 1862, obviously we’ve got Munfordville, we’ve got…I guess you would start with Mill Springs and then Munfordville. And then we’ve got Richmond and the capture of Frankfort by the Confederate Army. We’ve got, of course, culminating in the biggest battle in the state in Perryville. What is… what’s happening in western Kentucky in 1862?
10:18 Derrick Lindow: Yeah, there’s a… there’s a lot of questions. Uh, people asking, you know, how…how safe am I? Uh, because sometimes it’s getting to the point where, can I trust my neighbors? Because, you know, in town there are, in most cities, there are some divided loyalties, very strongly divided loyalties. And you have some people that are taking advantage of this war to settle personal scores, you know, just because you had a problem with somebody before the war, and now you have an opportunity to get at them. Uh, people were taking advantage of that.
But there is very few Union Army, uh, regiments or units operating in that part of the state. Uhm, they’ve all been really pulled south and so it left it open, almost just…almost like a vacuum. And so the Confederate Army recognizes that that’s a prime area to do some recruiting and to, uh, really start to, hopefully, mess up the plans of the Union Army and inhibit their ability to do things where the main armies are actually marching and fighting, so they take advantage of that.
Steve Phan: So if our listeners were to visit western Kentucky, are there Civil War sites for them to see and experience?
Derrick Lindow: Uh, there’s a few. Uhm, so the sites that are, uhm, I guess, they have to do with the book… So in Owensboro there is a, uh, I call it the battlefield when I talk about going there, it’s really just a field, uhm, and an elementary school. Where part of the battle was fought, they built an elementary school there, but there’s still a huge field in the front yard and, uhm, you know, I guess halfway preserved in a way. And then across the road from there, a very busy road, there is another really big hill, it’s just a cornfield and I guess you could say that’s… that is preserved, it’s just farmed every year and owned by some kind of farming corporation, so…. I would love to figure out what remains there and, uh, see if there’s any secrets that we don’t know about.
But that’s something that people can visit. There is a historical marker there. There is a little stone monument that the UDC put up back in the 1930s. Uh, they actually own that little…there’s a little bitty spot of land where they placed that and they actually own that. But then there’s some other spots, uh, where there’s… Sacramento in McLean County that was Forrest’s first battle, uhm, in 1861, and that’s…there’s a reenactment there every year. And so they’ve…the city there bought, or the county bought, a large portion of land down there and they use that as the battlefield and part of the fight was there.
But any of these other little fights and skirmishes, there’s… there’s not like a… you’re not gonna find a visitor center or you might not even find even a lot of information on it, except for just the historical marker itself. Uh, there’s not really, you know… there’s not any Civil War trail signs, uhm, in Kentucky. Maybe one day we can get some out there.
Steve Phan: That would be wonderful.
Derrick Lindow: It would and I mean, I think that would really help people understand just how much was happening right in their backyard. Because when people look at this map of the Civil War and they look at the battles, nothing is close to where we are in western Kentucky. But when you start researching, there’s a whole lot of things that were going on.
13:19 Steve Phan: And obviously for people to learn more, reading the blog posts, right, from the website.
Derrick Lindow: Oh yeah, yeah. Because we try to get all of those small stories, uh, you know, at the company level or the regimental level. Uhm, you know, what were these people–and we forget about that sometimes, they’re people with lives and experiences–you know, what were they going through? What were they thinking? And a lot of the times, what…how did they handle these situations? Especially things like guerrillas.
Steve Phan: So We Shall Conquer or Die focuses on partisan warfare in western Kentucky in 1862.
Derrick Lindow: Mhmm.
Steve Phan: Your presentation at the park today expanded on this topic to include the impact of irregular warfare, including guerrilla warfare, on all Kentuckians later in the Civil War, including U.S. Colored Troops, freedom seekers, civilian Unionists. And I thought it came fully connected, Derrick, when we talked about Owensboro, where you’re from. And, you know, a lot of your work was focused on that as well. But also that there was a large U.S.C.T. recruitment station there as well.
Derrick Lindow: Yep, yep. Steve Phan: So share with our listeners the work that you presented on today.
14:20 Derrick Lindow: Yeah, so what I was talking about was, you know, how did irregular war–and when I say irregular, I mean partisan rangers, I mean raiders, guerrillas, your bushwhackers, and just really your outlaws–like all of that is kind of thrown into the irregular box, I guess you could say. Uh, but they’re different types of irregular warfare. And so what I was showing was, you know, in 1862 it was partisan war, where you had partisan rangers and they, uhm, they were official Confederate soldiers. They swore oaths to the Confederate Army, they enrolled, uhm, they organized into regiments and companies and officers that had commissions, so they were regular army units. But they just operated behind Union lines.
But the people at the time, and even today, they didn’t understand that they were actual, legitimate soldiers, and so they just called them guerrillas. And, even, you know, Morgan is called a guerrilla when, you know, he wasn’t a guerrilla. And so we… we kinda were looking at just how that changed. Because the partisan war was…was not so brutal as the guerrilla war that takes off in ‘64. And so, uhm, how that comes about is, you know, the state pretty much gets drained of most of the Union soldiers that were, uhm…that were stationed there. And with the thousands of men they had in Kentucky, it really kept…I guess you can say it kept the peace.
Uhm, but as those troops are being pulled out for all these other assignments and these other campaigns that are going on, Kentucky’s left with just a few regiments to garrison the entire state and then your local home guard. And, uhm, that just allows these guerrillas to just thrive, these small bands. Uh, some of these men had been former Confederate soldiers, but then like, for example after the… Morgan’s defeat at Cynthiana, that command just gets scattered and so a lot of these men turn into guerrillas. They don’t go back to the army. They don’t really make any effort to. And, uh, they decide they’re going to have their own little small bands and they are going to start doing a lot of bad things.
Uh, some of those are… some of the things they do are military in nature. They’ll burn a bridge that the army, Union Army, might use to transport supplies. But then they’re doing other things, like they’re stealing, they’re murdering. They’re targeting certain people and Unionists, uh, Union veterans. Union veterans, a lot of them are re-enlisting at the end of the war because it’s the only safe place for them to be, because if they go home there’s a really good chance that five or six, seven guerrillas show up and something bad would happen. So, uhm you know, those men are being targeted.
And then, of course, you know, the African…the African Americans that are joining up for these U.S.C.T. regiments, where this is… that’s something that really shows an explosion in this guerrilla violence. Where the more that the recruitment takes place, the more the violence that you start to see and especially in the newspapers and in the official records.
Steve Phan: Can you share more of those accounts? I thought it was really powerful that you were sharing, like, the accounts of specific soldiers or communities, uh, especially where you see the growing number of African Americans enlisting in the U.S. military and the reaction, right.
Derrick Lindow: Yeah.
Steve Phan: Talk about that, Derrick.
17:19 Derrick Lindow: Yeah, so one example is, uh, Color Corporal, uh, Weir, uh… He was from Muhlenberg County, uh, Kentucky. Uh, it’s… it’s… there’s one county between Muhlenberg County and Daviess County, where Owensboro is. And Owensboro is one of these recruitment centers. And so he got permission of his owner to enlist, and he does and becomes, you know, the Color Corporal. And there’s a great image of him holding the flag. And he enlists in Owensboro and, uhm, he…in the 108th U.S. Colored Infantry. And, uh, there’s an account that’s in the newspaper where, uh, a company of the regiment is sent out to… it doesn’t really say what they’re out there doing. But they go out to a certain part of the county, and as they’re returning to Owensboro, they are passing through a little area called Yelvington, and Yelvington is also on the Ohio River, uhm, right across from Spencer County, where Abraham Lincoln grew up, uhm, which…
Steve Phan: In Indiana, correct?
Derrick Lindow: Yeah. So it’s, you know… these very pro-secessionist areas just miles away from, you know, President Lincoln grew up. And he… did he know some of these people? I don’t know. Uhm, but as they’re going through Yelvington, you know, this place is called the, uh, the Charleston of Daviess County, uh, just because of this pro-Confederate attitude that they have. And so as this company is marching through it, the newspapers said that there was a skirmish with some guerrillas and civilians that were there in Yelvington. So the violence that takes place is not just with the guerrillas, you have sometimes just regular civilians. They’re going to take an opportunity to shoot at…at a… someone in the U.S.C.T. regiment because they hate seeing the fact that, uh, you know, these men who, a lot of them are former slaves, are now, uhm, helping free other slaves. And that is something that is just infuriating so many of these people.
Steve Phan: And how was the U.S. military, the state government, going to respond to this? Uh, we shared with visitors at the park today that Lincoln will issue, uh, orders to declare Kentucky under martial law in July of 1864. But from Lincoln all the way down to Governor Thomas Bramlette to General Burbridge to General Palmer, right, these commanders of Kentucky, how is the U.S. military responding to this rise of guerrilla warfare?
19:34 Derrick Lindow: Pretty harshly. Uhm, and… there’s, you know, some orders put out that if there is some sort of guerrilla depredation that takes place, any known rebel sympathizer, I think within like 5 miles radius, is going to be removed from their home. And there’s another order that comes out where if a Union man is killed by a guerrilla or any Union citizen is killed by a guerrilla, then 4, uhm, Confederate prisoners, probably guerrillas, are going to be executed near the place where the original, uhm, crime took place. Uh, so they are responding pretty harshly.
And, uhm, that sort of… the revenge violence, I guess you could say, is something that is difficult for a lot of people to swallow because there’s a lot of accusations made, uhm, that certain people are guerrillas. And… were they really guerrillas? You know, they deny that they were. Uhm, and so the fact that you have people being shot, people are losing their property, especially in a Union state that was loyal. And a lot of these people may have originally been Unionists because they thought staying in the Union was the best way to preserve slavery.
And the support they start to have for the Union really starts to go away with, uhm… They’re mad at the guerrillas. They’re mad at the Union response. They’re mad at the recruitment of African Americans. Uhm, they’re just upset about being treated like they’re one of the Confederate states, uh, that rebelled. And, uhm, you know, they’re just… there’s a lot of angry sentiment towards…towards the state government, U.S. government, just everybody in general.
Steve Phan: So we see guerrilla warfare. We see retaliation by the U.S. military. I mean… so what is the landscape looking like in 1864 and 1865? It seems, from everything that’s been shared by historians, the work that you’re doing, it was chaotic, wasn’t it?
Derrick Lindow: Yeah, uhm, I’ve heard that it turned into anarchy. That’s how some people have explained it. Yeah, it’s just… it’s chaos. You know, there are some counties that are completely under the control of guerrillas, uh, where they have a 3 or 4 county area where it is completely under their control. Where there is no U.S. authority there at all. You know, declaring your loyalty is… can be a dangerous thing, whichever side it is that you’re loyal to. Going by yourself anywhere is dangerous because these guerrillas, they don’t… they don’t care about the war sometimes. Sometimes they just… they just want to rob and steal and murder. And, uhm, which a lot of them take advantage of the chaos of the war to do these things. They really just turn into outlaws that you would see in a Western movie almost. Uhm, so… but yeah it’s a very violent time. And you can find these incidences of violence all over the state. Like it’s not just in one spot, it is… it’s everywhere.
Steve Phan: Can you share just a couple examples of this violent…these incidences that would, I guess in a way, for our listeners, kind of personify how chaotic and deadly this was?
Derrick Lindow: Yep. So, uhm, I opened, uhm, today with a story about an Illinois soldier who is recovering from smallpox in Louisville, in one of the hospitals, and he was carrying a report to another hospital. And on the way he was captured by some guerrillas and, supposedly, you know, according to the newspapers, it was Sue Mundy, uhm, Marcellus Jerome Clark is his real name, and they forced… they took his horse, uhm, they took most of his belongings, and they forced him to walk along the road several miles. And then, uhm, in late afternoon, they shot him 5 times and stabbed him twice and left his body in a ravine for the locals to find. And, uh, the only way they found out who he was was because of his letters that were still on him. And some of those letters had been pierced by the bullets that killed him.
And, uhm… and so I read a letter by the chaplain that is informing this man’s wife, you know, what’s happened to him. It’s ordinarily… earlier in the war, if a Union soldier had fallen to the hands of Confederates, most of the time I feel like it would’ve just been a prisoner or they, a lot of times… they would parole these guys, where they have to go home, can’t fight until they’re properly exchanged. But at this point in time, it’s… they just murdered him. And, uh, you see a lot of stories like that too.
And then even on the Union side, uhm, if they capture some quote, unquote “guerrillas.” Uh, there was one regiment, the 17th KY Cavalry, where a lot of those men were in the regiment because they couldn’t go home because of the danger. And one newspaper account says that these men were, uhm, very careless with their weapons when guerrillas were near, meaning that they shoot a lot of these guerrillas. And there’s a story with the same regiment where some guerrillas try to escape, those men were all killed. Did they really try to escape?
Steve Phan: Right, right.
24:00 Derrick Lindow: And then there’s stories of these other guerrillas doing things in southern Indiana and southern Illinois. And one newspaper says just capture these guys and hand them over to the 17th KY because they know what to do with these men, implying that they’re going to…
Steve Phan: Yeah, they’re not just going to a military tribunal, right?
Derrick Lindow: Right.
Steve Phan: They’re going to take care of them outside of court.
Derrick Lindow: Yep.
Steve Phan: I thought it was fascinating… we talk so much about language, right, Derrick? And I love your spectrum of, you know, how we…how you were trying to determine combatants, right? And we see that in primary source records, from newspaper accounts to letters to the U.S. Army itself describing these men as guerrillas, bushwhackers, bandits. I know you came across that word quite often.
But the life and experience of these guerrillas, either U.S. or Confederate, or Union or Confederate, or something in the middle, they weren’t… they didn’t have a long life expectancy, right?
Derrick Lindow: No, no.
Steve Phan: So we’ve got some pretty big names. You mentioned Sue Mundy, uhm, talk about what happens to some of these guerrillas, you know…
Derrick Lindow: Yep.
Steve Phan: … in the final stages of the Civil War. I think you mentioned Quantrill. Some of these people were executed months after the end of the Civil War, right?
Derrick Lindow: Yeah, yeah. So most of these… the famous leaders of these guerrilla bands, most of them, they meet, uh… they have an early death. A lot of these guys are in their early 20s, like, you know, Clark–Sue Mundy–he’s, I think, like 20…20 years old. Uhm, I mean that’s really young to be doing these sort of things and leading your own band and being this famous for it. Uhm, and then, uh, one of his, uh, men that was with him all the time–who was actually in command of this little band, was it Clark or was it this guy named Magruder? Uhm, Magruder and Clark are captured at the same time and Magruder is wounded. And they’re taken to Louisville and Mun… Clark is executed within just a couple days, he’s hanged.
And then Magruder, they bring him back to health and then they execute him, uhm, in October, 1865. And, uhm, so it’s… in somebody like Quantrill, you know, he’s shot and, uh, he’s paralyzed from the chest down. Uh, he’s captured by a Union guerrilla who is a guerrilla hunter, uhm, for the Union Army, and who’s also a pretty bad guy it seems. He brings him to Louisville in a cart and, uh, within…not very much long after that, you know, Quantrill’s dead. And so most of these men, they find untimely deaths. Even, uh, Terrell, the man that shoots and captures Quantrill, he dies. It’s after the war, but it's within just a couple years and it’s a violent death, too. So it’s… violence just seems to follow a lot of these men.
Steve Phan: I think it was critically important at the end of your program that we talked about what was next. I think with growing scholarship and we see what really happens on the ground for formerly enslaved people, for veterans, for civilians, that Appomattox may have signaled the end of major hostilities for just a couple armies, that the conflict goes on.
Derrick Lindow: Mhm.
Steve Phan: Right? So what happens in Kentucky in the months and even years after the end of the Civil War? Because we see a proliferation of violence, right?
27:05 Derrick Lindow: Mhm. Oh yeah, yeah. So like the war may have ended, the armies might have surrendered, but a lot of these guerrillas, they have no intention of really stopping. And the only way they do stop is when they’re killed. So you see a lot of these men die in 1865, in the spring ‘65. Uhm, it’s… it just seems like that’s when the Union Army is pulling some forces back because they’re not needed in these other places as much and it’s a lot easier to capture them. So yeah, that continues. But the ones that survive, you really see them… it’s almost like the war… the war that they are waging against, uhm, African Americans–especially the ones that are joining and trying to get freedom–that war continues.
And you see that in, especially in the other lecture that was before mine, you know, talking about all of these depredations that were happening to them in the 1860s, after the war was over and, uhm, how the law was still against them. And you have all these raids and, uh, acts of violence against these free people, and a lot of those people that were committing those were former guerrillas. It’s like the war just didn’t stop for them in that sense.
Steve Phan: And I think that was really compelling to understand and it, really, lends, uhm, a lot of substance to what happens to a lot of people who freed themselves at Camp Nelson that formed these communities after the Civil War. We’ve got accounts of a lot of U.S.C.T. veterans and their families who tried to make it work in Kentucky into the 1870s, but the proliferation of violence, that… I guess in a way, that it continues after the Civil War. But remember, as we talked about, Kentucky’s not under Reconstruction because it was never…
Derrick Lindow: Right.
Steve Phan: …a Confederate state, right? Uhm, which inspired thousands of black Kentuckians to leave the state in the 1870s, including, uh, the so-called Exodusters who ended up in Kansas in the late 1870s. So in conclusion, what’s next for you and your work, Derrick? You working on… I assume you’re working on, uhm, some more scholarship…
Derrick Lindow: Yep.
Steve Phan: …some more research? That never ends of course.
Derrick Lindow: Uh, it never does. It’s… I found so many rabbit holes that I start going down and…. But yeah, I need to just get myself to focus on one thing because there’s so many things I want to just research and get into and write about, and, uh, I’ve gotta just… I’m making myself right now focus on, uhm, really the war that was taking place in Kentucky in ‘61 to ‘62. As the two armies are just staring at each other in Kentucky, I want to know what all was going on during that time because you hear about Mill Springs, you hear about some of the other skirmishes that happened. But otherwise it’s always portrayed as a time where nothing’s happening, really, until the fall of Fort Henry and Fort Donelson and then the armies really start to move.
But what I’ve been finding is there is constant movement between the sides, constant skirmishes, constant fighting. And it’s… it’s really fascinating to me, you know, how many men were moving through certain areas, uh, areas that you would think of, you know, the war never touched. But in reality, I mean, like little small town Calhoun, Kentucky, on the Green River, you know, Crittenden’s entire division was encamped there for the winter. And they were constantly going out on patrols and they were constantly looking for Confederate cavalry and, uh, rounding up supposed rebels. You know, things that you would think of in ‘64 or ‘65, they were doing that to an extent then too, but it’s… it’s a really, uh, for me just fascinating.
So I’m hoping to shed some more light on that and, uhm, just kind of bring that time period to life, because as far as I know, I haven’t found a book just on that time period. It’s mentioned in so many others, but I wanted to just focus on that and, you know, what was it like for the men during that time as they’re learning how to be soldiers and learning how to fight?
Steve Phan: These are the men that are going to be fighting in some of the biggest battles that take place in the Western Theater, right?
Derrick Lindow: Yep.
Steve Phan: And these are some big names. You men… I assume that’s Thomas Crittenden?
Derrick Lindow: Yeah, mhm.
Steve Phan: And, you know, we know him from Stones River and Chickamauga, of course, and George Thomas is in Kentucky, right?
Derrick Lindow: Yeah.
Steve Phan: Robert Anderson, Felix Zollicoffer, these are some really big names.
Derrick Lindow: Yep.
Steve Phan: So we… can you again mention the name of the website so people can learn more about the Western Theater?
Derrick Lindow: Yeah, sure. So it’s westerntheatercivilwar.com.
Steve Phan: And we had… of course, had you sign your book at our park today. We’ve got multiple copies. So if you’re in the area and you want to read Derrick’s book, come out to the park and you can purchase one. For those that can’t visit, where can they find your book?
Derrick Lindow: Uh, you can find it at Savas Beatie. That’s, uh, their website… that’s kind of like the preferred angle. Uhm…
Steve Phan: So, uhm, can you spell out the name of the website, the Savas Beatie?
Derrick Lindow: Sure. Uh, savasbeatie.com.
Steve Phan: Any final thoughts, my friend? I’ve enjoyed this conversation with you.
Derrick Lindow: I just love being here. I love coming to Camp Nelson. This is my second time being here. And, uhm, I wish the weather was a little better, so I could go explore a little more, but, uh, definitely looking forward to coming back out here. And I just encourage anybody to come visit this place, you know, even if you don’t have much of an interest in the Civil War–which I imagine if you’re listening to this, you probably do. But if you’ve never made it out here, come visit the place. Uhm, you’re… you’re gonna learn a lot and you’re gonna be amazed at the things that happened here.
Steve Phan: Thanks, Derrick. I really appreciate your time. And as we were just talking about, the Western Theater, Civil War Kentucky, there’s just so much to see and experience all around us, from National Park sites, county, state. Everything from Perryville to Lincoln’s birthday to even the birthplace of Jefferson Davis, right? Of course.
Derrick Lindow: Right. Yep.
Steve Phan: And obviously Camp Nelson National Monument. And so I wanted to again thank my friend, historian Derrick Lindow, who joined us today. And that’s a fitting conclusion to our second episode of the park podcast, Echoes of Camp Nelson: Uncovering the Stories of the Civil War Era, at Camp Nelson National Monument. Again I want to thank my friend Derrick for joining us. Uh, to hear previous interviews, please check out the park website at www.nps.gov/cane. Click on the “Learn About the Park” tab and go to photos and multimedia and you’ll see all of our podcast episodes there. You can also find our schedule of events on the calendar, including the 160th Anniversary of Camp Nelson special events that will be coming this year. Thank you for joining us. Cheers to another year of monumental moments at Camp Nelson. Take care.
Join Ranger Steve as he speaks with Derrick Lindow about irregular warfare in Kentucky during the Civil War.