Appalachian History Series
Bull’s Gap sits where the railroad and the road squeeze through Bays Mountain between Greene and Hawkins counties. In the fall of 1864 the gap again became the key to East Tennessee. Across three days, November 11 to 13, Major General John C. Breckinridge pressed a smaller Federal force under Alvan C. Gillem, roughly 2,500 effectives, with about 3,000 Confederates on the field. The result was a Confederate success at the gap, a rout at Russellville on November 14, and hard marching toward Strawberry Plains outside Knoxville. Casualties for the short campaign cluster around four hundred total, heavier on the Union side, a sharp cost for a brief fight that civilians and veterans remembered long after.
Why Bull’s Gap mattered
The East Tennessee and Virginia Railroad ran directly through the defile. The rails, the low surrounding knobs, and the road net made the position easy to fortify and hard to turn. Control of the gap meant control of movement between Greeneville, Morristown, and Knoxville, which is why both armies returned to it in 1863 and 1864. Contemporary fortification traces and later railroad town growth help explain why the landscape dictated tactics here.
The three days, November 11 to 13
November 11
Breckinridge opened with pressure across the line, artillery probing and cavalry feeling for a flank. Federal guns, posted to command the railroad and approaches, checked a general push, so the day ended as heavy skirmishing rather than a full assault.
November 12
The fighting began at daylight along several points. Ground changed hands in places, but the main Federal position still held by evening. Inside the gap, ammunition and rations ran low, a fact that weighed on Gillem as Confederate movements continued to test his flanks.
November 13
Fire slackened, then flared again through the day. After dark, concerned that his position could be turned and short on supplies, Gillem pulled out toward Russellville on the railroad to the west. Breckinridge pushed quickly after him with cavalry in the lead. By night’s end the Confederates had forced the evacuation of the gap and opened the road for pursuit.
“Turned Bull’s Gap,” pursuit, and the “stampede”
On November 14 the pursuers struck near Russellville, captured guns, wagons, and prisoners, and kept the Federals moving toward Strawberry Plains. Union newspapers printed Gillem’s terse admission of a reverse, while Richmond papers carried Robert E. Lee’s message to the War Department summarizing Breckinridge’s success. Veterans of the 13th Tennessee Cavalry, U.S.A., titled their chapter on these days “Bull’s Gap Stampede,” a phrase that captured the speed of the retreat and the confusion once the column broke. Their account is rich in road names, hours, and the human detail of men and teamsters trying to save trains by lantern light.
What the Official Records preserve
For the battle days themselves, begin with Series I, Volume 39. Part I holds formal reports, Parts II and III carry the telegraphs that framed decisions inside and around the gap, with the names that matter most here, Gillem, Breckinridge, and Vaughn. For the pursuit and immediate aftermath, turn to Series I, Volume 45, which covers November 14 to January 22, including Russellville and Strawberry Plains dispatches. Read together, these volumes let you reconstruct the tempo of contact, the shortages that pressed Gillem’s hand, and the momentum Breckinridge gained once the Federals gave up the position.
Where it sits on the maps
The atlas that accompanies the Official Records plots Bulls Gap on East Tennessee theater plates, placing the defile in the web of rails and roads that shaped late war operations. Cross-checking those plates against modern terrain makes the tactical choices on November 11 to 13 easier to see.
What remains on the ground
Bull’s Gap retains historic fabric because the rails and town grew directly out of the pass. National Register filings document Civil War earthworks and the later railroad community. Walkers who know what to look for can still read the folds and lines that made the gap a prize in 1864.
Why it matters
Bull’s Gap did not change the endgame in the West, but it shows how small armies, rails, and mountain passes could still shape campaigns late in 1864. Breckinridge’s win stiffened Confederate control for a moment. Winter, bad roads, and larger movements soon pulled both sides elsewhere. For East Tennesseans who had endured conscription, raids, and reprisals for years, the three days at the gap and the rush through Russellville were another hard chapter in a long war.
Sources and further reading
The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series I, Vol. 39, Parts I to III, and Series I, Vol. 45, Part I, reports and correspondence on East Tennessee operations, November 1864 to January 1865.
Atlas to Accompany the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, plates locating Bulls Gap in the East Tennessee rail network.
Samuel W. Scott and Samuel P. Angel, History of the Thirteenth Regiment, Tennessee Volunteer Cavalry, U.S.A.Nashville, 1903, chapter “Bull’s Gap Stampede.”
Period newspapers, November 1864, including Richmond and New York press printings of Gillem’s telegram and Lee’s dispatch summarizing Breckinridge’s success at Russellville and along the railroad.
National Register of Historic Places, Bulls Gap Fortification, NRIS 98001211.
National Register of Historic Places, Bulls Gap Historic District nomination.
National Park Service, Civil War battle detail for Bull’s Gap, TN033, concise summary of commanders, casualties, and result.
Tennessee Civil War Preservation Association, Bull’s Gap battlefield brief.
Northeast Tennessee Civil War, day-by-day recap with collated period dispatches.