In fact, the people of Kentucky seemed to have a very curious set of attitudes. Although many of them openly applauded Southern victories and were not averse to waving the Stars and Bars, they did not seem to have any really deep convictions about ultimate Southern victory. If Bragg came to Kentucky expecting to be welcomed with open arms and showered with recruits, he was to be sadly disappointed.

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Still, Bragg had outmarched Buell and had the chance to bring him to battle, or else get across his lines of communications with Louisville. Circumstances were quick to erase this advantage. When Buell arrived at Bowling Green, he threw his men into the same entrenchments the Confederates had dug the year before. Unwilling to attack what he felt was a strong position, Bragg looked to continue moving north of Buell, staying between him and Louisville.

While Bragg was pondering his options, a small advance body of troops had been scavenging in the area of Munfordville. Running across what they thought was only a small detachment of Union soldiers, the Confederates attacked and were repulsed with humiliating loss. The action was not critically important, but Bragg was unnerved to find that his army had suffered any kind of reverse. Coupled with the fact that Munfordville lay near the intersection of the Green River and the Louisville and Nashville Railroad, Bragg began sending the whole Southern army in the direction of the tiny hamlet.

By the 15th of September, most of Bragg’s army was in front of Munfordville. Upon his arrival, Bragg saw that this was not a small unit, but some 4,000 men behind well-built defenses. Rather than making an immediate frontal assault, he continued to bring up more units until, by the next day, he had the entire position surrounded.

Had Bragg struck immediately, he might well have put Buell in a very awkward position and forced him to fight on ground favorable to the Confederates. Instead, he allowed himself to be talked into an extremely foolish compromise by one of his subordinates, Maj. Gen. Simon Bolivar Buckner. It seemed that Munfordville was Buckner’s home town–he was loath to see it bombarded. Buckner suggested that he be allowed to parley with the garrison and convince them of the hopelessness of their position. Bragg grudgingly acquiesced.

The Union commander at Munfordville, Colonel John T. Wilder, had no military experience, but the successful Indiana industrialist knew how to make deal. Coming to the Confederate camp, he asked Buckner for a tour of the attacking forces, counted the cannons he was up against, and decided to surrender. Even then, Wilder continued to haggle over the exact details of the surrender and, after everything was settled, turned up several hours late for the ceremony. All told, Wilder and his 4,000 men managed to stop the advance of the whole Rebel army for three days.

Having already wasted so much time, Bragg made matters worse by ordering a day of thanksgiving set aside for the army to celebrate its victory. It was a classic fault of Bragg’s generalship–thinking his opponent would obligingly sit still for him. Instead, while Bragg was celebrating his victory, Buell was marching hard to get around Munfordville and put his forces between the Rebels and Louisville.

While Bragg was diddling away his opportunities around Munfordville, the other two prongs of the Confederate attack were not doing well, either. After his initial smashing entry into Kentucky, Smith seemed to lose his grip on exactly what he intended to accomplish. He had driven into the Lexington area and his cavalry had raided as far north as the Ohio River, but then, unaccountably, he lost his vigor.

Instead of keeping his force together as a solid group and marching toward Louisville or Cincinnati, or else reuniting with Bragg’s army, Smith began to disperse in an attempt to occupy as much territory as possible. If it was an attempt to drum up support for the Confederate invasion, it was a failure. The people of Kentucky were not trying to break their shackles–they were self-imposed.

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