The few thousand people who lived in the little rail-hub city of Chattanooga in 1863 became terribly anxious that September, as Confederate soldiers withdrew from Chattanooga, moving southward toward Chickamauga, Ga.
Union soldiers occupied Chattanooga and followed the Confederates southward.
But on Sept. 18, the U.S. soldiers in blue encountered the gray-clad Confederates along Chickamauga Creek.
They exchanged fire, beginning the terrible Battle of Chickamauga in the War Between the States.
On Sept. 19, heavy fighting involved large bodies of Union and Confederate soldiers, with terrible casualties being suffered by both sides.
During the night, among the tall trees, mockingbirds eerily sang, their songs punctuated by the moans of pain from the soldiers on both sides who had been wounded in the day’s bloody fighting.
A train from Virginia brought Confederate reinforcements under Gen. James Longstreet to Catoosa Station.
Then, on Sunday morning, at the time when church bells called worshipers to prayer in Chattanooga, the climax came in the Battle of Chickamauga.
A gap appeared in Union lines, and Confederate troops charged through!
They forced a wild retreat of Union forces — back into Chattanooga.
On Sept. 20, 1863, Confederates won the Battle of Chickamauga. But the decisive Battle of Chattanooga was yet to be fought, in November 1863.