War Comes to Savannah

On March 8, 1862, Savannah's pro-Union citizens greeted the 40th Illinois Infantry, the vanguard of a 40,000-man Union invasion force, as the troops came off the steamer Golden Gate, formed ranks, and marched up into town. Within a week, a Union flotilla of more than 80 steamboats crowded the banks of the Tennessee above and below Savannah, and Federal troops occupied the town for the next three months. Union Major General Ulysses S. Grant established his headquarters at the home of William Harrell Cherry. After the Battle of Shiloh, wounded Union soldiers flooded the town; hundreds died and many were buried in the local cemetery before being moved after the war to the National Cemetery at Shiloh overlooking Pittsburgh Landing.

Savannah, Tennessee · United States