After engaging Union forces in Columbia on the afternoon of July 3, Gen. John Hunt Morgan’s command continued north on the Columbia-Lebanon Pike, passed the abandoned Union Camp Gilbert just beyond town, and drove toward Cane Valley with 2,400 raiders. Many of the raiders had left their horses in Columbia and taken fresh mounts without their owners’ consent, while also seizing supplies, whiskey, and money because they had no supply train; farmers and shopkeepers saw their storehouses emptied, and Lt. Col. Robert Alston, Morgan’s chief of staff, condemned such conduct and said some men had joined the army simply for plunder. Morgan and most of his men were Kentuckians who knew sympathetic secessionists willing to provide campsites, and that night they camped in fields near the Cane Valley home of Morgan’s friends, the Bridgewaters, while Morgan slept in the house attended by his servant, Old Box. In Cane Valley, Morgan asked Lt. Richard Archibald “Dick Archie” Webster of Taylor County to help lead the men toward Lebanon. Although scouts reported about 400 Union soldiers fortifying the Green River at Tebbs Bend, Morgan remained unconcerned because his troops outnumbered them and had a battery of artillery. At 3:00 a.m. the next morning, the Confederates moved toward the Green River bridge.