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Day's Gap
Also known as: Sand Mountain
April 30, 1863
Cullman County, AL
Campaign:
Streight's Raid in Alabama and Georgia (1863)
Col. Abel Streight, USA
Brig. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest, CSA
Streight had a composite brigade of mounted infantry from 5 regiments;
Forrest was chasing him with a brigade of three cavalry regiments.
Casualties were light, Union losses about 25, Confederate under 75.
Union Col. Abel D. Streight led a provisional brigade on a raid to cut the
Western & Atlantic Railroad that supplied Gen. Braxton Bragg's Confederate
army in Middle Tennessee. From Nashville, Tennessee, Streight's command traveled
to Eastport, Mississippi, and then proceeded east to Tuscumbia, Alabama, in
conjunction with another Union force commanded by Brig. Gen. Grenville Dodge. On
April 26, 1863, Streight's men left Tuscumbia and marched southeast, their
initial movements screened by Dodge's troops.
On April 30, Confederate Brig. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest's brigade caught
up with Streight's expedition and attacked its rearguard at Day's Gap on Sand
Mountain. The Federals repulsed this attack and continued their march to avoid
further delay and envelopment. Thus began a running series of skirmishes and
engagements at Crooked Creek (April 30), Hog Mountain (April 30), Blountsville
(May 1), Black Creek/Gadsden (May 2), and Blount's Plantation (May 2). Forrest
finally surrounded the exhausted Union soldiers near Rome, Georgia, where he
forced their surrender on May 3.
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