In September 1864, after Union Gen. William T. Sherman defeated Confederate Gen. John Bell Hood at Atlanta, Hood led the Army of Tennessee northwest against Sherman's supply lines and then moved north into Tennessee rather than contest Sherman's March to the Sea. Gen. John M. Schofield, detached from Sherman's army, delayed Hood at Columbia and Spring Hill before falling back to Franklin, where the bloodbath of November 30 crippled the Confederates, though they continued to the outskirts of Nashville and Union Gen. George H. Thomas's strong defenses until Thomas crushed Hood's army on December 15-16. On November 26, 1864, Schofield's army prepared a temporary defense at Columbia as Hood's Army of Tennessee approached the town on the Duck River, Hood's first objective in his plan to recapture Nashville and Middle Tennessee. Schofield won the race to Columbia and created a burn line south of town along present-day Campbell Blvd. to clear fields of fire by destroying structures and large trees, and Elm Springs anchored the eastern end of that line. As Confederate troops neared, Union soldiers broke into the house, gathered small combustibles into the closet under the stairs, lit a broom from the fireplace, shoved it beneath the stairs, and fled through the front door just as Confederate Gen. Frank C. Armstrong's cavalrymen rode into the back yard. Warned by the growing fire, some of Armstrong's men extinguished the flames while others rounded the house, found the fleeing Federals crossing the front lawn, and brought them down with a few well-placed shots, stopping the burning at this end of the field. Hood then pressed on toward Nashville and suffered devastating casualties at the Battle of Franklin on November 30. Afterward, the house sheltered convalescing Confederate officers, including Gen. John C. Brown, who later served as governor of Tennessee. Confederate Maj. Abram M. Looney of the 1st Tennessee Infantry owned Elm Springs, built about 1837, during the war.