The American Civil War

1863 was the third year of the American Civil War. When the year began, the war was still largely unsettled. This was the case in the western theater, where the Union Army of the Cumberland faced the Confederate Army of Tennessee, vying for control of Tennessee and its valuable resources and strategic rail interchanges. In the early months of 1863 the Army of the Cumberland was resting and reorganizing. General William S. Rosecrans, commander of the Army of the Cumberland, resisted pressure from Washington to commence his spring offensive against General Braxton Bragg, commander of the Army of Tennessee. The strategic importance of Tennessee at that point in the war was three-fold. First, many Union loyalists lived in East Tennessee. President Lincoln wanted to liberate the state and bring those citizens back under the umbrella of Union control. Secondly, Confederate rail lines connecting the resources of the western theater to Virginia ran through Tennessee. Those rail lines served as lines of communication and lines of supplying the Confederate armies not only in Tennessee but throughout the Eastern Theater as well. Third, Tennessee was rich in supplies needed to sustain the Confederate war effort. Food items such as pork, corn and mineral resources such as copper and saltpeter, two ingredients of gunpowder, were mined in Tennessee.