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Grant Takes Paducah
Arriving off Paducah at 8:30 am a small squadron of two wooden gunboats,
the Tyler and the Connestoga, with a few transports land federal troops at
Paducah, Kentucky, forestalling an obviously Confederate move from
Columbus to the strategic Kentucky city at the mouth of the Tennessee.
There was no fighting and no casualties. The only reported incident of the
occupation occured when Captain John T. Duff of the armed steamer Bee
and his crew raised a Union flag on the roof of the St. Francis Hotel. When
challenged by six women, one of whom brandished a pistol, Captain Duff
informed them that if there was any resistance, he had orders to shell the
house "whereon they took the hint and retired, carrying their tails behind
them, but not too late to see their husbands arrested and put under guard."
It was U.S. Grant's first victory and it was bloodless. By seizing Paducah, and
later nearby Smithland at the mouth of the Cumberland, Grant had prevented
Confederate forces from claiming the entire state of Kentucky and planting
their northern line on the Ohio River. The move also foreshadowed the river
campaign of the coming year. Federal Brigadier General C. F. Smith was
assigned to command in western Kentucky as Grant returned to Cairo.
Shortly thereafter, Smithland, KY, just 10 miles further up the Ohio at the
mouth of the Cumberland river, was also occupied by Union troops and Fort
Holt was established on the Kentucky shore across the Ohio River from Cairo.
General Grant would soon realize that stationing a gunboat off each of these
towns would not only provide support for the troops ashore but would allow
the Union to control access to these two important Ohio River tributaries along
which trade with the Confederacy was still being conducted. The Tyler was
given the dubious honor of being the first boat thus stationed at Paducah.
There were skirmishers at Rowell's Run, western Va., and Monticello Bridge,
Mo.
Arriving off Paducah at 8:30 am a small squadron of two wooden gunboats,
the Tyler and the Connestoga, with a few transports land federal troops at
Paducah, Kentucky, forestalling an obviously Confederate move from
Columbus to the strategic Kentucky city at the mouth of the Tennessee.
There was no fighting and no casualties. The only reported incident of the
occupation occured when Captain John T. Duff of the armed steamer Bee
and his crew raised a Union flag on the roof of the St. Francis Hotel. When
challenged by six women, one of whom brandished a pistol, Captain Duff
informed them that if there was any resistance, he had orders to shell the
house "whereon they took the hint and retired, carrying their tails behind
them, but not too late to see their husbands arrested and put under guard."
It was U.S. Grant's first victory and it was bloodless. By seizing Paducah, and
later nearby Smithland at the mouth of the Cumberland, Grant had prevented
Confederate forces from claiming the entire state of Kentucky and planting
their northern line on the Ohio River. The move also foreshadowed the river
campaign of the coming year. Federal Brigadier General C. F. Smith was
assigned to command in western Kentucky as Grant returned to Cairo.
Shortly thereafter, Smithland, KY, just 10 miles further up the Ohio at the
mouth of the Cumberland river, was also occupied by Union troops and Fort
Holt was established on the Kentucky shore across the Ohio River from Cairo.
General Grant would soon realize that stationing a gunboat off each of these
towns would not only provide support for the troops ashore but would allow
the Union to control access to these two important Ohio River tributaries along
which trade with the Confederacy was still being conducted. The Tyler was
given the dubious honor of being the first boat thus stationed at Paducah.
There were skirmishers at Rowell's Run, western Va., and Monticello Bridge,
Mo.