Cumberland Blood: Champ Ferguson's Civil War

Civil War News

Ask a Civil War buff to name a Confederate guerrilla and you'll probably hear the names of Trans-Mississippi warriors William Clarke Quantrill, William "Bloody Bill" Anderson or Frank and Jesse James. But, as historian and author Thomas Mays correctly notes, Kentucky native Champ Ferguson "needs to be added to this bloody pantheon of America's outlaws."
Ironically, Ferguson was practically a household name at the time of his death in 1865. He faded into obscurity as more famous "western" figures like Quantrill and Anderson took center stage. Now, Thomas Mays has once again brought Ferguson to national attention in his fascinating study of Champ's bloody, brutal and private civil war.
The Cumberland Highlands (specifically the Kentucky-Tennessee border just west of Cumberland Gap) became an area where foraging raids and reprisals against civilians became commonplace during the Civil War. The region split not along the lines of antebellum feuds, but largely due to prewar political and economic alliances.
Some of Ferguson's prewar enemies became his allies and long-time friends became adversaries. Even families were divided - Champ Ferguson, a Democrat and slaveholder, went to war against his brother James, a debt-ridden Whig.
Ferguson actually began his bloody career in this region when he killed a man in an altercation in 1858. Still facing that murder charge when the war began, the pro-Southern Ferguson did not become a guerrilla fighter until he was apprehended by and escaped from a party of Union Home Guards.
He then began targeting Union sympathizers in the region, arguing that he needed to eliminate pro-Northern friends, acquaintances and relatives before they came for him. By the time of his arrest in May 1865, Ferguson was suspected of killing 53 men. After a lengthy trial, he was convicted of most of the charges against him and was sentenced to death. He stoically went to the gallows in October 1865.
Mays does an excellent job of documenting Ferguson's brutal reign of terror. He does his best both to explain Ferguson's motives and place him in a larger regional context. Champ was not a stereotypical guerrilla. He had a habit of attacking non-military "targets of opportunity," which did little to aid the Confederacy, and may in fact helped weaken support for the cause.
His relatively small number of men rarely operated under the authority of a Confederate commander. Ferguson's actions did not keep substantial numbers of Federal troops tied to the area.
He was not averse to killing noncombatants, the unarmed, sick and wounded, white and black. But May argues that Champ was not simply a psychopathic killer - he was rather "a product of the highland frontier culture" that advocated a concept of total war against soldiers and noncombatants.
This study of Champ Ferguson is a shocking read, even if you're well-schooled in the literature of Civil War guerrillas. But once I started, I found myself unable to stop following Champ and his neighbors as they carried on their ruthless killing spree.
If you're tired of hearing about dashing and romantic Civil War figures, or even the famous Missouri partisans, have a look at the well-written and -researched tale of Cumberland Blood.

— Jeff Patrick