Anyone interested in this region’s Civil War-era history knows November was a pivotal time during the winter of 1863-1864.
The Union Army had retreated to Chattanooga following its resounding defeat at Chickamauga in September and was besieged by Confederate forces who occupied the heights of Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge.
On Thanksgiving Day, 1863, those blue-coated troops swarmed the slopes of Missionary Ridge, breaking the siege and forcing rebel soldiers to withdraw southward.
To commemorate those military actions the National Park Service is hosting a series of guided walking and driving tours of key elements that marked the end of the Chattanooga Campaign and the beginning of the end for the Confederacy.
It was at Ringgold Gap that about 4,100 Confederates under the command of Maj. Gen. Patrick Cleburne stood firm, allowing the main force of Gen. Braxton Bragg’s routed rebel army to escape to Dalton.