Battle of Mossy Creek

Federal cavalry had ridden out from Strawberry Plains to pressure Longstreet's winter quarters, and on December 29 General Martin's Confederates struck the line east of Mossy Creek. For a time a Southern victory looked sure. Then Colonel Archibald Campbell ordered one cavalry regiment to charge Frank Armstrong's flank, and a hasty summons brought Colonel LaGrange's men into the fight. Captain Eli Lilly's Indiana battery, the future drug-company founder's, had held the center until it ran low on ammunition and fell back.

What the plaque says

Battle of Mossy Creek December 29, 1863 Federal cavalry under Gen. S.D. Sturgis established a line just east of Mossy Creek. At 9:00 a.m., Confederate Gen. W.T. Martin assembled 2000 dismounted cavalry and eight cannons at Talbott's Railroad Station, three miles east. They advanced along the railroad driving the Federal outposts. After seven hours of severe fighting, Sturgis' Cavalry, with seven cannons and reinforcements by an infantry brigade from the 23rd Corps, repulsed the Confederates. By 4:00 p.m. the fight ended near where it began. It is estimated that the U.S. loss was 109 while the Confederate loss was 400.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Beck Cultural Exchange Center — 26 mi
  Knoxville's Black history museum and archive, opened in 1975 in the 1912 Dandridge Avenue house the community bought for $22,500.
• Blount Mansion — 27 mi
  The 1792 frame house of William Blount, governor of the Southwest Territory, Knoxville's only National Historic Landmark, where the people he enslaved are named.

More markers nearby

• Carson-Newman College — 1.3 mi
• "Little Lord Fauntleroy" — 4.4 mi
• David Crockett and Polly Finley — 4.9 mi
• Panther Springs — 7.1 mi