That got your attention didn't it! Lol!

No streaking, drive on, drive on.

Springfield, KY – est. 1797, Lincoln Legacy Museum, closed Wednesday's, quick picture of the Lincoln Statue and some nice old buildings.

Perryville, KY – steeped in civil war history, we visited the Perryville Battlefield State Historical site. Great little museum and 30minute film about the battle in October of 1862. The story unfolds with Braxton Bragg's Confederate Army of Mississippi and Don Carlos Buell's Union Army of Ohio.

The museum is very informative and has a great collection of artefacts and uniforms. The cannon or “Six-Pound Smoothbore Field Gun” are always spectacular to look at! The ammunition case beside it was cool and now I know where the meaning of 'shrapnel' came from. The 6pound spherical case shot was invented by one Henry Shrapnel.

The soldiers on both sides suffered greatly as Kentucky experienced drought through this time. Many suffered heat stroke and died of dehydration as well as any injuries received during the battles that ensued.

When you look at the grounds surrounding Perryville, I try to imagine the some 70,000 odd troops that would have been in and around here. Great lines of men fighting each other.

The Bottom House is quite small and still it is hard to fathom hundreds of bodies littering the yard and porch as it was made a makeshift hospital. Many houses during that time were commandeered for such purposes.

Some stats from the brochure.

• 55,396 Union and 16,800 Confederate soldiers.
• 203 cannons located in Perryville, 90 were used in the battle
• At least 21 states were represented in the Battle of Perryville – Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Louisianna, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Mississippi, North Carolina, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania,Tennessee, Texas, Virginia and Wisconsin.
• 1,431 soldiers were killed (890 Union, 532 Confederate)
• 5,618 were wounded (2,966 Union, 2,652 Confederate)
• 669 missing or captured (433 Union, 236 Confederate)

So in fact looking at those figures for total casualties 7,718 (4,298 Union, 3,420 Confederate) that's 1/5th of the Confederate force and only 1/12th of the Union. Like most of the Civil War period Union forces definitely outnumbered the Confederates.

All things considered, that's a huge victory for the Confederates.

Winchester, KY – est. 1792, didn't see much through here as we sort of bypassed the historic downtown, oh well.

Onward through rolling hills and the green trees of Kentucky. Fall is starting to show her signs of change, as reds and yellows creep through the forest.

We have now entered into West Virginia! A new state for us, staying somewhere around Charleston tonight, then a dash to the very northern section of the state to Berkeley Springs tomorrow.

Signing off with a bit of John Denver ……almost heaven, West Virginia….blue ridge mountains…..

Kat xo

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