Downtown Civil War

Tennessee was an ideological battleground before the outbreak of the Civil War. When it came to the question of secession, the state was split regionally—strong pro-Union sentiment of mountainous East Tennessee clashed with fervent support for secession by agricultural West Tennessee, which was far more reliant on enslaved labor. The ultimate decision, then, came right here in Middle Tennessee. In February of 1861, Middle Tennessee voted fifty-one percent against secession. Not until the attack on Fort Sumter and President Lincoln’s call for volunteers, would this pro-Union sentiment give way to support of secession. When another referendum came on June 8, the vote in Middle Tennessee had swung to eighty-eight percent in favor of secession. This made Tennessee the last state to secede from the Union, and it would later be the first state to be readmitted in 1866.

During the war, some of the war’s fiercest and deadliest fighting occurred in Tennessee. In this region, much of the fighting took place south—towards Franklin. In 1862, Nashville surrendered to the Union army and would remain occupied for the rest of the war. Though Nashville remained a pro-Confederate city, significant pockets of Union support also lived here. In fact, more Tennesseans fought for the Union than every other Confederate state combined. Nashville’s geographic position and important transportation routes by river and rail made the city a strategic bastion. Join us as we tell the story of Nashville during the Civil War as well as the city’s role in a state with divided loyalties.

Hi, I am Jim Hoobler, and I will be your guide on this tour. I am the Senior Curator of Art and Architecture at the Tennessee State Museum. I’m a board member of the Metropolitan Historical Commission, and I’m the author of Cities Under the Gun: Images of Occupied Nashville and Chattanooga. Begin the tour at Ft. Nashborough standing by the river on the south end.