During the Civil War, Macon County experienced internal strife like many other parts of Tennessee. In the spring of 1863, a Confederate partisan band established itself in this part of the county, harassing Federal units and threatening local Unionists. On May 2, 1863, this rural hamlet saw a serious firefight between Union cavalry and infantry and Confederate irregulars when guerrillas hidden in the brush of Goose Creek ambushed Companies D and E of the 11th Kentucky Infantry and Company I of the 8th Kentucky Cavalry. Confederate fire killed only a Federal cavalryman’s horse, while Union troopers killed one guerrilla, captured another, and took five Confederate horses. The guerrillas fled toward Hartsville with Federal forces in pursuit, and the fighting continued for about ten miles. Two more Confederates were killed and ten captured. Union soldiers suffered no casualties, though they lost eight horses, two shot out from under them and six that died from exhaustion and sore feet. Colonel S. Pallance Love, commander of the 11th Kentucky Infantry, regarded his opponents as little more than citizens banded together for plunder and robbery, and on May 6 he reported that the whole country was infested with the thieving party, which had nearly devastated the area and stolen nearly all the good horses from the citizens.