Appalachian History Series – The Battle of Camp Wildcat: Holding the Wilderness Road
On a quiet day at Camp Wildcat the forest feels older than the war that once raged across its ridges. Wind moves through oak and pine, birds call over shallow trenches, and interpretive signs stand where men in blue and gray once fired blindly through drifting smoke. It is a remote place, reached by a narrow gravel road on the London Ranger District of Daniel Boone National Forest, but it preserves one of the earliest hard clashes of the Civil War in Kentucky and the first engagement between regular troops in the Commonwealth.
Kentucky at a crossroads
In the summer and fall of 1861 Kentucky tried to hold to a fragile policy of neutrality while the Union and Confederacy both courted its people and maneuvered along its borders. That stance began to collapse when Confederate Brigadier General Felix K. Zollicoffer crossed Cumberland Gap from East Tennessee, occupied Cumberland Ford near present day Pineville, and threw detachments against Union home guard camps at Barbourville and Laurel Bridge. Those skirmishes showed how quickly the war could leap out of the mountain gaps onto the old roads that led toward central Kentucky and the Bluegrass.
In response, Union Brigadier General George H. Thomas pushed troops into the same corridor. He understood that whoever controlled the Wilderness Road and the crossings of the Rockcastle River controlled one of the most direct invasion routes between East Tennessee and the Bluegrass country. If Zollicoffer’s column could break through the hills north of Cumberland Gap and around London, nothing but scattered home guards and raw regiments would stand between Confederate forces and the interior of Kentucky.
Building Camp Wildcat on the Rockcastle Hills
To block that route, Thomas ordered Colonel Theophilus T. Garrard to establish a camp at the Rockcastle Hills near the junction of the Wilderness Road and the road that tied Lexington and Richmond to Cumberland Gap. Garrard, a Laurel County native commanding the 7th Kentucky Infantry, picked the rough spine of Wildcat Mountain and the surrounding knobs as his defensive ground. The camp that grew up there took its name from the mountain itself and from the steep, broken terrain that seemed to invite ambush.
Garrard soon realized he was trying to hold a crucial gateway with too few men. His Kentucky infantry and local home guards dug rifle pits and cleared fields of fire, but his reports to Thomas warned that he was greatly outnumbered and might have to fall back if help did not reach him. Reinforcements came in the form of a brigade under Brigadier General Albin F. Schoepf, including the 14th and 17th Ohio, the 33rd Indiana, Battery B of the 1st Ohio Light Artillery, and the 1st Kentucky Cavalry fighting dismounted. By the time Zollicoffer began moving again in mid October the Union strength around Camp Wildcat stood at roughly seven thousand, facing an estimated five thousand four hundred Confederates moving north along the road from Cumberland Ford.
A battlefield made of knobs and ridges
The terrain at Camp Wildcat shaped everything that followed. Wildcat Mountain is not a single clean summit but a tangle of high knobs and narrow ridges cut by ravines and hollows. The Wilderness Road climbed across this broken ground, using saddles and benches to find a path north. Archaeologists and forest historians describe the site as high, rough ground that dominates the surrounding approaches. Hoosier Knob, Round Hill, and Infantry Ridge rise above the old roadbed, leaving attacking troops to scramble uphill through timber and rocks into fire from entrenched defenders.
That topography is why Garrard and Schoepf chose the position and why Zollicoffer had to try to break it. Modern surveys by the Kentucky Archaeological Survey and the Forest Service have mapped long entrenchments at Hoosier Knob and other points, as well as campsites where soldiers left behind nails, bottle glass, whiteware, animal bone, percussion caps, and minie balls. The pattern of bullets from pre battle skirmishes and the main engagement still traces the movement of lines across the ridges more than a century and a half later.
October 21, 1861: Hoosier Knob
On the evening of October 20 Union pickets skirmished with Zollicoffer’s advance and fell back with word that a sizable Confederate force was near. At dawn on October 21 Schoepf pushed four companies of the 33rd Indiana about three quarters of a mile east of camp to occupy a bald hill commanding the Wilderness Road. Later known as Hoosier Knob, that summit became the opening stage of the battle.
Confederate skirmishers ran into the Indiana detachment soon after it arrived and withdrew to report the contact. Zollicoffer responded by sending most of two Tennessee regiments up the slope. Before those regiments closed, men from the 1st Kentucky Cavalry and local home guards reinforced the 33rd Indiana on the knob. The hillside was steep and rough, and later accounts from Union and Confederate soldiers alike dwell on how hard it was to climb in formation while under fire, scrambling over logs and rocks as bullets cut branches overhead.
For nearly an hour the Tennessee infantry tried to drive the Federals off Hoosier Knob. Rifle fire cracked through the woods, and the guns of Battery B threw shells over the ridges from positions nearer camp. The Tennesseans could not gain the crest. Finally they broke off and slid back down the slope, leaving the knob in Union hands. One Confederate officer summarized the experience in later recollection as an assault against a natural fortification that was simply too strong to carry.
Fighting along Infantry Ridge and the Wilderness Road
Zollicoffer tried again rather than abandon the effort. He shifted fresh regiments, including the 29th Tennessee and more of the 17th Tennessee, to strike another part of the line. Across the road from Hoosier Knob, Union troops had thrown up works along what later interpreters call the South Rim or Infantry Ridge. This position guarded the road itself and overlooked a saddle that any attacker would have to cross.
Confederate infantry slogged up toward those rifle pits in the early afternoon, only to find that the Federals had solid cover and supporting artillery. Accounts from the Ohio regiments and from the First Kentucky Cavalry describe men firing from behind logs and earthworks while clouds of powder smoke hung in the still air. The Confederates tried to probe for a gap between the 33rd Indiana and the 7th Kentucky, but Garrard and Schoepf shifted companies into the threatened sector before the assault could punch through. As casualties mounted and the line held firm, Zollicoffer realized that his exhausted men could not force the heights without unacceptable losses.
By late afternoon the fighting slacked. After dark the Confederate column quietly withdrew back down the Wilderness Road toward Cumberland Ford. The Union troops remained on the ridges, stiff and sleepless, not entirely sure the enemy had gone until morning confirmed the retreat.
Casualties and early war significance
Compared with the bloodbaths that would follow at Perryville, Chickamauga, and elsewhere, Camp Wildcat was a small battle. Official returns and later compilations such as the CWSAC reports and modern battle summaries usually place Union losses at around twenty five casualties and Confederate losses at roughly fifty three, for a total of about seventy eight. Period newspapers sometimes claimed higher numbers, and the fog of war made exact figures hard to confirm, but all agree that the fighting was sharp in relation to the number of men actually engaged.
What mattered most was not the casualty count but the outcome and the timing. The same month saw Federal reverses at Ball’s Bluff in Virginia and worries about Confederate advances along other fronts. A clear Union victory in Kentucky, even on a rugged hilltop far from the big cities, reassured Northern readers that the government could still defend a loyal but contested border state. For Zollicoffer, the failed assault delayed his push toward central Kentucky and helped set the stage for his later defeat and death at Mill Springs in January 1862.
Voices from the ranks
We know Camp Wildcat not only through official reports but through the words of men who scrambled up and down its slopes. The massive War of the Rebellion volumes preserve the formal dispatches of Schoepf, Garrard, and Zollicoffer, laying out troop movements, casualties, and justifications in the precise language of the nineteenth century army. Compilers such as Frederick Dyer later distilled those records into service summaries that mark Camp Wildcat as an early test for units like the 1st Kentucky Cavalry, the 7th Kentucky Infantry, and the 14th and 17th Ohio.
At the same time, soldier memoirs and regimental histories give the battle its human texture. Eastham Tarrant’s The Wild Riders of the First Kentucky Cavalry recounts how his regiment hurried into position on the ridges and fought on foot among the rocks and trees. Orlando P. Cutter’s Our Battery, a journal of Battery B, 1st Ohio Light Artillery, describes the battery’s march into the hills and the work of hauling guns into position to support the infantry. Together with Ohio and Indiana regimental histories, these accounts linger on details the official reports only hint at: the difficulty of climbing the knobs under fire, the confusion of fighting in dense woods, the exhaustion that followed the long march and sudden engagement.
Northern newspapers repeated dispatches celebrating what they called Kentucky’s first major battle. Headlines announced Zollicoffer’s repulse and emphasized that Union troops had held firm. Those stories, reprinted for years afterward in compilations of Civil War journalism, helped fix Camp Wildcat in public memory even as larger battles eclipsed it in the national narrative.
Archaeology, preservation, and walking the ground today
For much of the twentieth century Camp Wildcat remained relatively remote. That isolation turned out to be a kind of protection. Unlike battlefields on open farmland that were plowed or built over, the steep woods around Wildcat Mountain preserved earthworks, campsites, and artifact scatters. Archaeological surveys have identified entrenchments on Hoosier Knob and other features that match descriptions from soldiers’ letters and the official reports, confirming how the lines lay across the terrain. Excavations have recovered Civil War bullets, percussion caps, and camp debris that help archaeologists and historians map the exact routes of attacks and the locations of skirmish lines.
Today the battlefield is part of Daniel Boone National Forest and is interpreted in partnership with the Camp Wildcat Preservation Foundation and other heritage groups. Visitors reach it by leaving Interstate 75 at Exit 49, following U.S. 25, and turning onto Hazel Patch Road, then climbing a narrow gravel route into the hills. At the top they find a pavilion with interpretive panels, trailheads that lead to Hoosier Knob and Infantry Ridge, cannon displays marking artillery positions, and monuments that honor both Union and Confederate soldiers.
Preservation work has been substantial. Much of the battlefield, around one hundred thirty acres, entered the National Register of Historic Places in 1979, and additional acreage was added in 2006 as archaeologists documented more of the encampment and fighting ground. The American Battlefield Trust and its partners report that more than two hundred sixty acres have been protected, while the Camp Wildcat Preservation Foundation highlights the same figure as a milestone in its campaign.
In Laurel County the local historical society has created exhibits that pair artifacts, interpretive text, and reproductions of Alfred E. Mathews’s 1861 lithograph “The Battle of Wild Cat, Oct. 21st, 1861,” sketched on the spot while he served with an Ohio regiment. That print, preserved today in the Library of Congress and reproduced on modern panels at the battlefield, shows smoke rising over steep ridges and ranks of tiny figures struggling up the slopes, an artist’s confirmation of what the landscape and written sources still tell us.
Why Camp Wildcat still matters
Camp Wildcat can be overlooked beside names like Perryville and Mill Springs, yet it marks a turning point in Kentucky’s Civil War story. It was an early test of the Union’s ability to hold a loyal but divided border state, a check on Confederate ambitions to cut into the Bluegrass by way of the mountains, and a demonstration that control of old roads and passes still mattered in an age of railroads and telegraphs.
For Appalachian history the battle also shows how national conflict played out on very local ground. Laurel County home guards fought on ridges they knew from childhood. Kentucky regiments raised from nearby counties stood beside Ohio and Indiana volunteers who had never seen such country before that autumn. Their footprints, artifacts, and accounts tie a global struggle over Union and slavery to specific hollows, knobs, and creek crossings that people can still walk today.
Standing behind the old trenches at Camp Wildcat, it is possible to sense both the fear of inexperienced soldiers and the determination that held the heights. The forest has grown back and the road has changed, but the ridge lines, the hard climbs, and the view down toward the Rockcastle River remain. They remind visitors that long before the war became a contest of giant armies in open fields, it was already being decided in places like this, where a few thousand men on a rough Kentucky mountain helped fix the fate of a borderland state.
Sources & Further Reading
United States War Department. The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. Series I, Vol. 4. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1881. Digitized edition, Internet Archive. https://archive.org/details/cu31924077699704 Internet Archive
United States Adjutant-General’s Office. Official Army Register of the Volunteer Force of the United States Army for the Years 1861, ’62, ’63, ’64, ’65. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1865–67. Digitized edition, Internet Archive. https://archive.org/details/officialarmyregi00unit_0 Internet Archive
Alfaro, Armando J. The Paper Trail of the Civil War in Kentucky, 1861–1865. Frankfort: Kentucky National Guard History Program, n.d. PDF, Kentucky National Guard History. https://kynghistory.ky.gov/Our-History/History-of-the-Guard/Documents/ThePaperTrailoftheCivilWarinKY18611865%202.pdf KY National Guard History
Dyer, Frederick H. A Compendium of the War of the Rebellion. Des Moines: Dyer Publishing Co., 1908. Digitized edition, Internet Archive and Google Books. https://archive.org
Ohio Roster Commission. Official Roster of the Soldiers of the State of Ohio in the War of the Rebellion, 1861–1865. 12 vols. Akron: Werner Co., 1886–1895. Digitized selections, Internet Archive. https://archive.org
Kentucky Adjutant General’s Office. Report of the Adjutant General of the State of Kentucky, 1861–1865. Frankfort: Kentucky Yeoman Office, 1866–1867. Digitized selections, Internet Archive. https://archive.org
Tarrant, Eastham. The Wild Riders of the First Kentucky Cavalry: A History of the Regiment in the Great War of the Rebellion, 1861–1865. Louisville: R. H. Carothers, 1894. Digitized edition, Internet Archive. https://archive.org Internet Archive
Cutter, Orlando P. Our Battery; or, The Journal of Company B, 1st O.V.A. Cleveland: Nevin’s Book and Job Printing Establishment, 1864. Digitized edition, Project Gutenberg. https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/31887 Project Gutenberg
Hancock, R. R. Hancock’s Diary, or A History of the Second Tennessee Confederate Cavalry, with Sketches of First and Seventh Battalions. Nashville: A. R. Hinks, 1887. Digitized edition, Internet Archive and Google Books. https://archive.org
“Diary of Private Richard R. Hancock.” Transcribed Civil War diary entries, including October 1861 material on Zollicoffer and the Kentucky campaign, in Civil War Notebook blog. https://civilwarnotebook.blogspot.com FlipHTML5
Stephens, Ann S. Pictorial History of the War for the Union: A Complete and Reliable History of the War from Its Commencement to Its Close, Together with a Complete Chronological Analysis of the War. Hartford: Published by Moore, 1863–1867. Digitized edition, Internet Archive. https://archive.org/details/pictorialhist01step Internet Archive
Johnson, Rossiter. Campfire and Battlefield: An Illustrated History of the Campaigns and Conflicts of the Great Civil War. New York: Thompson & Thomas, 1894. Digitized edition, Project Gutenberg. https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/47746 Project Gutenberg
McKnight, Brian D. Contested Borderland: The Civil War in Appalachian Kentucky and Virginia. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2006. Publisher page. https://www.kentuckypress.com Laurel County Historical Society
Brown, Kent Masterson. The Civil War in Kentucky: Battle for the Bluegrass State. Cambridge, MA: Da Capo Press, 2000. Publisher information. https://www.perseusbooksgroup.com American Battlefield Trust
Hafendorfer, Kenneth A. The Battle of Wild Cat Mountain. Louisville, KY: KH Press, 2003. Publisher and ordering information. https://blueandgrayeducation.org Amazon
Fowler, John D. Mountaineers in Gray: The Nineteenth Tennessee Volunteer Infantry Regiment, C.S.A. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 2004. Publisher page. https://utpress.org Appalachianhistorian.org
Daniel, Larry J. Days of Glory: The Army of the Cumberland, 1861–1865. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2004. Publisher page. https://lsupress.org Civil War Notebook
Long, E. B. The Civil War Day by Day: An Almanac, 1861–1865. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1971. Publisher and bibliographic information. https://www.worldcat.org National Park Service
Eicher, David J. The Longest Night: A Military History of the Civil War. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2001. Publisher page. https://www.simonandschuster.com Internet Archive
Hearn, Chester G. The Civil War State by State. Devon: RedBlue Press, 2011. Publisher and bibliographic information. https://www.worldcat.org Spokane Public Library
Klotter, James C., Lowell H. Harrison, James A. Ramage, Charles P. Roland, and Richard Taylor. Kentucky’s Civil War, 1861–1865. Lexington: Back Home in Kentucky, 1971. Publisher and bibliographic information. https://www.worldcat.org Wikipedia
Hart, Addison. “‘That Dark and Bloody Ground’ The Kentucky Campaign of 1861.” American Civil War Scots (online essay). https://www.acwscots.co.uk/Shotguns/darkandbloodyground.htm Acwscots
National Park Service. “Battle Detail – Camp Wildcat.” The Civil War (CWSAC battle code KY002). https://www.nps.gov/civilwar/search-battles-detail.htm?battleCode=ky002 National Park Service
National Park Service, American Battlefield Protection Program. CWSAC Report Update – Kentucky. Washington, DC: National Park Service, 2008. https://npshistory.com/publications/battlefield/cwsac/updates/ky.pdf NPS History
American Battlefield Trust. “Camp Wildcat Battlefield.” Visit information and preservation overview. https://www.battlefields.org/visit/battlefields/camp-wildcat-battlefield American Battlefield Trust
Daniel Boone National Forest. “Camp Wildcat Battlefield.” Site overview and visitor information. https://www.fs.usda.gov
Kentucky Archaeological Survey. “Camp Wildcat.” Site profile and archaeological summary. https://www.kentuckyarchaeologicalsurvey.org Kentucky Archaeology
Camp Wildcat Preservation Foundation. “Camp Wildcat Battlefield” and related interpretive materials. http://www.wildcatbattlefield.org Wikipedia
Laurel County Historical Society. “Battle at Camp Wildcat.” Virtual exhibit. https://www.laurelkyhistory.org/exhibits/campwildcat Laurel County Historical Society
“Camp Wildcat Battlefield.” Clio: Your Guide to History. https://theclio.com/entry/35000 Clio
WKMS. “Kentucky Civil War Dispatch: Battle of Camp Wildcat.” Radio segment and article, 2011. https://www.wkms.org
National Park Service. Update to the Civil War Sites Advisory Commission Report: Technical Volume II, Battle Summaries (includes summary for Camp Wildcat, KY002). https://npshistory.com/publications/battlefield/cwsac/technical-v2.pdf NPS History
Author Note: I first saw the Camp Wildcat battlefield as a kid, riding with my father on the way to football games and looking up at the ridges from the road. Writing this piece now, I still think about those drives every time I walk the trails and read the markers on that same ground.