Carter County In The Civil War

Carter County In The Civil War. The Navy Man Joins the Cavalry. Carter County, especially the area around Roan Mountain, suffered from the effects of occupation during the war. Residents were divided in their support of the Union and the Confederacy, and raids were commonplace., Union General Samuel P. Carter was a descendant of Virginia's Carter family, as well as of the founding pioneer family of Carter County. His birthplace in Elizabethton (the Carter Mansion) is the oldest frame house in Tennessee. A U.S. Naval Academy graduate and Mexican War veteran, Carter taught mathematics at the academy before the war. In 1862, President Abraham Lincoln appointed him to organize a regiment of Unionists in East Tennessee. Carter's cavalry raiders destroyed railroad bridges at Blountville, the Holston River, and on the Wautauga Railroad in December 1862 and January 1863. He maneuvered through Moccasin Gap to capture Confederates on the Blountville road, in Union City, and at Carter's Depot., Carter's brothers were also ardent Unionists. James Carter commanded the 2nd Tennessee Volunteers. The Rev. William Blount Carter, a Presbyterian minister, helped lead the Unionist plot to burn bridges in East Tennessee in November 1861. He wrote, "The Union men of eastern Tennessee are longing and praying for the hour when they can break their fetters." He advised Union Gen. George Thomas, "I find our Union people unwavering in their devotion to our Government and anxious to have an opportunity to assist in saving it....They will open the war for you by routing these small bodies of marauding cavalry." The Carter brothers did all they could to support the Union., (captions) , Bridge-burner meeting in East Tennessee. Harper's Weekly, Mar. 29, 1862 , The Rev. William Blount Carter East Tennessee Historical Society , Occupation of Cumberland Gap. Harper's Weekly, Oct. 10, 1863 , "Mountain Region of North Carolina and Tennessee", 1864 Courtesy Library of Congress