Confederate General John Hunt Morgan’s daring Civil War raid led to an equally daring escape

Confederate cavalry general John Hunt Morgan terrorized the locals during an 1863 raid over the Ohio River into Indiana and Ohio. Despite carrying out his expedition against the orders of his senior officer, Braxton Bragg, the South was electrified by his audacity. But it was all in vain; Morgan's Raid was crushed in Ohio, and the majority of his troops perished, were captured, or fled as deserters. Along with a number of his officers, Morgan was taken prisoner of war and kept in Columbus' infamous Ohio State Prison.

Morgan and several of his officers cut a hole through the stone walls of their cells and into the prison yard using spoons and a fireplace poker. They abandoned their cells on November 27, 1863, climbed over the prison's outer wall with a blanket rope, and fled into the night. To avoid federal forces in Cincinnati, they boarded a train headed there from Columbus, hopped off before they arrived, and then made their way through the night over fields to the house of a known Confederate sympathizer. They arranged with a boatman to cross the Ohio River into Kentucky from there. They were led to safety in Tennessee by more Confederate sympathizers as they passed through the Union lines.

Morgan was reinstated in charge despite having disobeyed orders and launched his expedition, which cost him a vital cavalry regiment. Since some of his attacks in Kentucky and Tennessee were illegal, Confederate authorities removed him from command in 1864. Up until the time of his death in September 1864 at the hands of Union troops, he assembled a group of outlaws and carried out separate raids. Only a few of inmates managed to successfully escape the Ohio State Penitentiary throughout its 150-year history, including Morgan and his crew.

Born: June 1, 1825Huntsville, Alabama, U.S.
Died: September 4, 1864 (aged 39)Greeneville, Tennessee, U.S.