On occasion we will feature stories of the 16th Kentucky Volunteer Infantry Regiment (U. S. A.) as two full companies (about two hundred men) came from Bracken County. While Bracken men saw service in various other units, these two companies are the “definitive” Civil War organizations from Bracken County.

Reacting to President Lincoln’s call for an additional 500,000 troops after the summer defeats of First Bull Run and Wilson’s Creek. Four companies of the 16th, which would be recruited in Bracken (Companies D & E), Fleming (B & H), Lewis (K), Mason (A, C, G, & I), Whitley (F), would see service under Colonel Charles A. Marshall at Ivy Mountain near Prestonsburg before the regiment would be fully organized. The regiment would suffer seventeen causalities at Ivy, including Company D’s Alfred Dougherty who would be wounded - Dougherty is buried at Johnsville’s Old Pioneer cemetery.

The regiment would complete its formation at Camp Kenton, south of Maysville and near present day Old Washington. Mustering into Federal service on January 27, 1862, the regiment would be assigned rear area duties until being ordered to Glasgow as part of Ambrose Burnside’s campaign into East Tennessee, seeing at at Mossy Creek. On December 27, 1863 the regiment would reenlist, now being able to add “Veteran” to their name. After a month’s furlough, the regiment would camp in Louisville, performing guard duties until April 1864 when it moved to Camp Nelson, through East Tennessee, and join Sherman’s army for the Atlanta Campaign.

To this point of the war the regiment had been fortunate to not have seen heavy action, but during the campaign to take Atlanta that would change. Starting with the battle at Resaca, Georgia in May, the 16th would see fighting at Cartersville, Etowah River, Dallas, Kennesaw Mountain, the crossing of the Chattahoochee, around Atlanta, and Jonesboro. It would then be detailed to central Tennessee to repel Hood’s invasion and the 16th would see its bloodiest and finest fighting at Franklin on November 30th, 1864. Placed in reserve east of the Columbia Pike, when the front line Union regiments broke and routed, allowing the Confederates to occupy their works, the 16th, along with other regiments, counterattacked, driving the Confederates back, retaking the main Union line, losing eighty-three men along the way. The 16th was so proud of their performance at Franklin that for many years their regimental reunion would take place on November 30th.

After Franklin the regiment would head north, then head to Washington, D. C. From there it would be moved by boat to Fort Fisher, North Carolina, It would fight along the Cape Fear River before arriving at Greensburg and then the remaining men would muster out of service on June 1, 1865. The 16th was sent back to Louisville, collected its final pay, and the men returned to their homes.

Across Bracken County today there are at least seventy-one veterans of the 16th located in the various cemeteries that dot the hills and and occupy the hollows. The largest concentrations of 16th Kentucky men can be found at Fairview and Old Brooksville Cemeteries. Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Doniphan, former mayor of Augusta, is buried in Hillside Cemetery.

Now you know a little more about the regiment in which these men served - Bracken County’s Boys in Blue.

Bracken's Boys - Companies D & E, 16th Kentucky Infantry