War buffs marking Morgan's Raid path

By Kevin Kidder
Dispatch Staff Reporter
April 17, 1999

Four states plundered by John Hunt Morgan's raiders are hoping to recoup some of their losses almost 140 year later by promoting his route as a destination for tourists.

At sites around Meigs County in southeastern Ohio, new bronze historic markers show the path the Confederate general and his troops took during a foray into northern territory.

Civil War buffs and state officials hope the rest of Morgan's path across Ohio, from the Indiana border near Cincinnati and north toward Canton, will gain new markers and visibility as part of a four-state John Hunt Morgan Heritage Trail.

"It's a wonderful idea. It'll definitely draw tourists in the state,'' said Margaret Parker, president of the Meigs County Historical Society in Pomeroy, about 100 miles southeast of Columbus. The county along the Ohio River was involved in a watershed battle involving Morgan on nearby Buffington Island.

Morgan and his 2,400 Confederate soldiers pushed through Tennessee, Kentucky, Indiana and Ohio in 1862-63, stealing livestock, silverware and other valuables before he was captured by Union troops in northeast Ohio's Columbiana County. His 26-day ride in 1863 came to be known as Morgan's Raid.

Already, Dr. G. Michael Pratt, the director of Heidelberg College's Center for Historic and Military Archeology in Tiffin, Ohio, has received a $40,000 matching grant from the American Battlefield Protection Program to "try and tie down where things happened.''

"We're hoping to be able to give an idea of exactly what happened where, instead of giving a 5- or 6-square-mile area and saying, there was a battle here,'' Pratt said.

In addition to mapping skirmishes and conducting an archeological survey of the Buffington Island battlefield this spring, the grant would help organize grass-roots support for the heritage trail concept at public meetings, he said.

"It'll provide a vehicle to get people talking about it. . . . These efforts have to be coordinated,'' Pratt said.

It has already happened in Meigs County. The county historical society raised $11,000 and received a matching grant of $10,000 from the Ohio Travel and Tourism of fice. The money helped place new markers and signs across the county.

Parker said the society installed two new markers in April, and five more are planned for this year.

Neighboring states also are working on the heritage trail.

In Kentucky, the West Kentucky Corp., a nonprofit economic-development agency, is leading efforts to establish the Morgan heritage trail. Indiana last month received a $116,000 federal grant to help pay for signs and other designations of the trail.

Ohio historical groups also are excited about the idea.

"I first followed the raid when I was a high-school student 30 years ago. I can remember looking for the confederate graves,'' said Amos Loveday, state historic preservation officer for the Ohio Historical Society.

Loveday said the long-term goal is to have the Morgan's Raid route declared a "heritage corridor'' by the National Park Service, although currently the project is being worked on at the state level.

Last year, Rt. 68 in western Ohio was designated as Simon Kenton Memorial Highway from Kenton, in Hardin County, south to the Ohio River to honor the frontiersman and attempt to lure history-minded tourists.

Franco Ruffini, deputy state historic preservation officer with the Ohio Historical Society, said the new heritage trail would help replace about 15 markers installed in about 1915.

"It's a piece of Ohio history. It's good for Ohio children to know that the Civil War wasn't fought entirely in the South,'' Ruffini said.

Buffington Island is the site of Ohio's only Civil War battlefield. That site has been threatened by the proposed mining of gravel on the island, though the mining company is still waiting for the Army Corps of Engineers to issue a permit for a loading dock.

Brian Newbacher, a spokesman for the Ohio Bicentennial Commission, said the commission established a special advisory council on Civil War history in Ohio to highlight the state's involvement in the war.

It plans a re-enactment of Morgan's plunderous push through Ohio in the state's bicentennial year 2003, he said, and the commission supports the idea of a heritage trail for John Hunt Morgan.

"It'll do well. There are a lot of Civil War buffs in the state,'' he said.

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