Hood & Schofield, November 24, 1864

For five days Columbia was a contest of nerves more than a battle. Schofield marched his army from Pulaski and dug in just hours ahead of the Confederates, then spent November 24 to 29 under skirmishing and artillery fire. On the 28th Thomas told him to prepare to fall back to Franklin, where he expected A. J. Smith's corps to join him, and an 800-wagon train went ahead. Schofield himself left on the afternoon of the 29th, and Jacob Cox's rear guard followed up the Franklin Pike, the last troops gone by 10 that night.

What the plaque says

Hood & Schofield November 24, 1864 Arriving at Columbia ahead of the Confederates, Schofield entrenched around the town. Hood, arriving Nov. 26, demonstrated against his position, with Lee's corps and most of his artillery, while the rest of the Army of Tennessee crossed Duck River at Davis' Ford, 3 mi. E., intending to cut Schofield off at Spring Hill, 12 mi. N.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• James K. Polk Home and Museum — 1.8 mi
  The 1816 brick house in Columbia where Polk practiced law and campaigned for the legislature, now a museum that also tells of the people the Polk family enslaved.
• The Mink Slide and East 8th Street — 2.0 mi
  Columbia's Black business and church district south of the courthouse square, where on the night of February 25, 1946 a white mob gathered and Black veterans stood guard.
• Gordon House and Ferry Site — 13 mi
  A brick house of 1818 beside the Duck River at milepost 407.7 of the Natchez Trace Parkway, where a Chickasaw partner and a Tennessee captain ran a ferry and an inn.
• Henry Horton State Park — 21 mi
  A Duck River park on Governor Henry Horton's former farm in Marshall County, with a mill ruin from 1845, kayak floats and the grave of a governor the House declined to impeach.

More markers nearby

• Columbia Military Academy — 1.0 mi
• Freedmen's Savings Bank and Trust Company — 2.0 mi
• The Reverend Edmund Kelly — 2.1 mi
• Hood's Maneuver — 2.3 mi