Today in the hotly-contested border state of Kentucky, a Confederate cavalry force led by Maj. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest, captures Paducah, Kentucky with little resistance. The raid is an effort to capture Union supplies; Paducah is a considerable prize. Meanwhile, the Union garrison, having retreated upon learning of the rebels’ approach, is garrisoned in the…
Although white Baptists of the Confederacy revile U.S. President Abraham Lincoln as (variously) the “black president,” an infidel, heretic, barbarian and an evil abolitionist (among other disparaging labels), and some Baptists of the North lament the President’s seeming lack of interest in religion, Lincoln maintains an open door in regards to ministers of the Gospel.…
Trickery is ever afoot in the border states as Confederate and Union partisans vie for control of disputed territory. One of many Baptist families caught up in the conflict on a local level is the Smith family. Obediah, a native Kentuckian, is a Baptist pastor of the Missionary Baptist persuasion. A pioneering family of Missouri,…