On the night of July 9, 1863, Morgan’s cavalrymen camped in fields near Palmyra after an afternoon of looting in Corydon and reaching the area by early evening on two parallel roads. The site lay about 25 miles from their first night’s camp at Frakes’ Mill. While the soldiers cooked and ate supper, telegraph expert Lieutenant George “Lightning” Ellsworth tapped into the line to Salem and Seymour and learned that General Edward H. Hobson’s four thousand pursuing Union cavalry would soon be ferrying across the Ohio River from Kentucky. Early the next morning, General Morgan split his command into three groups, with one heading straight north for Salem, one moving southeast toward Greenville, and the third going northwest toward Fredericksburg.