In July of 1861, General Felix Zollicoffer assumed command of Confederate troops in Bristol, Tennessee. His task was to organize regiments plagued by confusion and to prevent a Union invasion of east Tennessee.
That same month in Kentucky, Colonel Theophilous Garrard, grandson of the former governor, was given command of a Union regiment that existed only on paper. He set up a recruiting station near his home town of Manchester. By the end of August, he had enlisted nearly a thousand men.
On the 9th of September, Confederate General Zollicoffer ordered his troops to move into Kentucky...
