Confederate Assembly

Confederate Assembly. Waiting at McKenzie's Station. Shortly after the Battle of Shiloh on April 6-7, 1862, information reached the Confederate army near Corinth in northern Mississippi that a large store of Union supplies worth $3,000,000 was located at Paducah, Kentucky. On April 29, Confederate Gen. P.G.T. Beauregard ordered Col. Thomas Claiborne, 6th Tennessee Cavalry, to attack the Union garrison at Paducah. Claiborne and his regiment marched from Trenton and reached the railroad junction at McKenzie's Station on May 3. Learning that Confederate Col. William H. Jackson, 7th Tennessee Cavalry, was en route to McKenzie's Station, Claiborne decided to wait here for him and his regiment. They arrived the next day., The two regiments joined forces on the Harris farm (now the Holland Farm) north of McKenzie and then moved north toward the Paris road. Confederate forces occasionally bivouacked on the Harris farm (the Harrises were Southern sympathizers), as did Gen. Nathan B. Forrest en route to Parker's Crossroads in December 1862. Cavalry horses were likely watered at the two old ponds near the roadbed., As the Tennessee regiments marched north, they surprised a Union patrol from Fort Heiman on May 5 at Lockridge Mill on the Obion River in Weakley County. Union Maj. Carl Schaeffer de Boernstein was mortally wounded, about 20 other Federals were killed, and 60 to 70 were captured. Claiborne reported that "the loss on our side was not one; a few scratches were received." The clash alerted other Federal units, however, and the Confederates called off the Paducah raid and withdrew to Trenton., (captions) , Col. Thomas Claiborne, from Confederate Veteran Magazine (1893) , Ge. William H. Jackson Courtesy Belle Mead Plantation , Maj. Carl Schaeffer de Boernstein Courtesy University of Tennessee