Re-Opening the Tennessee River

After Chickamauga, Confederate control of Lookout Mountain and Lookout Valley closed the Tennessee River line of supplies. Rosecrans planned to reopen it by moving Hooker’s force from Bridgeport into Lookout Valley while Gen. W. F. Smith cooperated from Chattanooga by seizing Brown’s Ferry on the Tennessee River. At 3 A.M. Oct. 27, 1863, fifty boats carrying 1500 men of Hazen’s Brigade started from Chattanooga, floated undiscovered past Confederate pickets, landed at Brown’s Ferry about 5 o’clock, seized the gorge, and with assistance from Turchin’s Brigade on the opposite shore occupied the crests above and below the ferry after a short engagement. Hooker, with the 11th Corps and Geary’s Division of the 12th, marched from Bridgeport on the morning of the 27th, and the head of the column reached Brown’s Ferry at 5 P.M. on the 28th. Geary’s Division, six regiments, halted for the night at the junction of the Kelly’s Ferry Road, where Geary was unsuccessfully attacked at midnight by Jenkin’s Brigade of Longstreet’s troops, which withdrew at 3 A.M. because the 11th Corps was advancing to Geary’s assistance. Lookout Valley thereafter remained in Union possession, and the river supply line was open via Brown’s Ferry and the short wagon haul to Chattanooga.

Chattanooga, Tennessee · United States