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The decisive Union victory at the Battle of Mill Springs, Kentucky, on January 19, 1862, led to the total collapse of the eastern sector of the Confederate defensive line established to defend the Upper South and hopefully secure Kentucky’s allegiance to the Southern cause. Considered the first significant Union victory in the western theater of the Civil War, Mill Springs was soon followed by Federal capture of Forts Henry and Donelson, in northwestern Tennessee, coupled with the surrender of an entire Confederate army. This succession of victories, which permitted Union forces to carry the war deeper into Tennessee, reenergized Northern war interests and led directly to the capture of Nashville in Middle Tennessee, setting in motion the sequence of movements resulting in the titanic battle won by Union forces at Shiloh, on April 6-7, in southwestern Tennessee. Kentucky’s importance to the Union cause during the war was demonstrated in many ways, its strategic value expressed pointedly by President Abraham Lincoln, who early on in the conflict stated, “I hope to have God on my side, but I must have Kentucky.” Although soon overshadowed by subsequent events and an ever increasingly bloodier conflict, the initial and decisive defeat suffered by the Confederacy at Mill Springs, materially aided United States forces to seize the initiative in the West and retain control of Kentucky throughout the war.
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Last updated: May 1, 2020