Battle of Johnsonville
1864 attack on a Union supply base at Johnsonville during the American Civil War
The Battle of Johnsonville was fought November 4–5, 1864, in Benton and Humphreys counties, Tennessee, during the American Civil War. Confederate cavalry commander Major General Nathan Bedford Forrest culminated a 23-day raid through western Tennessee by attacking the Union supply base at Johnsonville. Forrest's attack destroyed a total of 28 Union boats and barges in the Tennessee River and millions of dollars of supplies, disrupting the logistical operations of Union Major General George H. Thomas in Nashville. As a result, Thomas's army was hampered in its plan to defeat Confederate Lieutenant General John Bell Hood's invasion of Tennessee, known as the Franklin–Nashville campaign. (Thomas eventually succeeded in repulsing Hood.)
Part of the battlefield has been preserved in Johnsonville State Historic Park. Much of the original battleground was submerged by the creation of Kentucky Lake in 1944.
Background
The Union relied on the Tennessee River as a critical route to supply Federal forces in the state. Supplies were offloaded at Johnsonville and shipped by rail to Nashville. In the fall of 1864 the supplies were principally meant for the Army of the Cumberland, commanded by Thomas. Meanwhile, Hood's army was marching through northern Alabama on its way to an invasion of Tennessee.
“Battle of Johnsonville” enters the record as 1864 attack on a Union supply base at Johnsonville during the American Civil War. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Battle, Johnsonville and attack can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Contemporary correspondence, administrative files and participant testimony can test how later narratives organized the event or institution. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q4871346. The Library of Congress control number is sh85070633. Authority coordinates are 36.071, -87.976. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1864 and 1944.
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This entry incorporates text from “Battle of Johnsonville” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.