Washburn's Quarters August 21, 1864

Cadwallader Washburn, who fled his quarters here in his nightshirt for Fort Pickering, had a long career before and after Memphis. He served in Congress from Wisconsin, as a Union major general, as governor from 1872 to 1874, and in 1877 formed the Washburn-Crosby Company, the predecessor of General Mills. His brothers were Israel Washburn Jr. and Elihu Washburne. The Washburn Observatory at the University of Wisconsin was funded during his governorship. He died in 1882 in Eureka Springs, Arkansas.

What the plaque says

Washburn's Quarters August 21, 1864 Maj. Gen. C.C. Washburn, Federal commander in Memphis, lived in a house which stood here at the time of Gen. Forrest's dawn raid. He escaped capture by decamping through the back door in his night clothes. His uniform and sword seized by raiders under Lt. Col. Jesse Forrest, were returned next day under flag of truce.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Beale Street — steps away
  The street that became the center of Black Memphis after the Civil War, home to Church's Park, W. C. Handy, Ida B. Wells and the blues, now a National Historic Landmark district.
• National Civil Rights Museum — 0.7 mi
  The Lorraine Motel, where Martin Luther King Jr. was killed on April 4, 1968, kept as a museum of the civil rights movement from the nineteenth century to today.
• Sun Studio — 0.7 mi
  The small Union Avenue room where Sam Phillips recorded Rocket 88, Howlin' Wolf, Elvis Presley and the Million Dollar Quartet, now a National Historic Landmark.
• 1866 Memphis Massacre Marker at Army Park — 0.7 mi
  A privately funded NAACP marker in a small downtown park, placed in 2016, that names the May 1866 attack on Black South Memphis as a massacre.

More markers nearby

• Marion Scudder Griffin 1879-1957 — steps away
• WDIA: The Goodwill Station — steps away
• Rufus Thomas, Jr. — 0.2 mi
• Nat D. Williams — 0.2 mi