Tilghman House: Explore the Civil War in Western Kentucky
The Lloyd Tilghman House and Civil War Museum houses mementos of a Confederate general, but its main focus is the Civil War in Western Kentucky.
The historic Greek Revival home is also known as the Tilghman-Woolfolk House, as Robert Woolfolk built the home in 1852 to rent to Tilghman when he relocated to Paducah. Tilghman, his wife Augusta, seven children and five slaves lived in the 6,000-square-foot home until the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861, when they moved yet again, never to return.
After being in danger of closing several times in recent years, Tilghman House is now on a surer financial footing. The museum highlights Western Kentucky’s most important battle: the 1864 Battle of Paducah in which Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest, who later founded the Ku Klux Klan, raided the city but was repelled by Union troops. you’ll find lots of uniforms, armaments, paintings, photos, maps and more.
The museum explores the Civil War from the vantage of both sides. Naturally, Tilghman and the Confederacy get their due: For example, you’ll find a full collection of Confederate flags. However, you’ll also find uniforms, rosters and artifacts from the Eighth Colored Heavy Artillery.
The museum is open Wednesday through Saturday from noon to 4 p.m. from April to November.
Tilghman was a colonel in the Kentucky militia, and his orders were to safeguard Kentucky’s neutrality in the war. Instead, the slave holder and Southern sympathizer threw his lot with the Confederacy and created the Third Kentucky Regiment. Tilghman was elevated to brigadier general on Oct. 18, 1861.
Trained as an engineer at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y., Tilghman oversaw fortifications at Forts Henry and Fort Donelson in Western Tennessee. Union troops under General Ulysses S. Grant attacked Fort Henry in February 1862, just as the rain-swollen Tennessee River was inundating flood-prone Fort Henry. Tilghman sent his troops 12 miles away to Fort Donelson and surrendered. Fort Donelson fell to the Union Army 10 days later, and Grant captured an entire Confederate army. Some historians cite the capture of Forts Henry and Donelson as the turning point for the Union.
Tilghman, lauded for his courage in surrendering with his men, was held as a prisoner of war in Boston, Mass.
Released in a prisoner exchange on Aug. 15, 1862, Tilghman became a brigade commander in the Confederacy’s Army of the West. On May 16, 1863, a shell fragment hit Tilghman in the chest, killing him during the Battle of Champion Hill, Miss. — part of Grant’s Vicksburg Campaign.
HelloMetro Tip: In 1902, Tilghman’s remains were exhumed from Mississippi and reburied in The Bronx, as his wife and sons had relocated to New York City. Ironically, Tilghman’s buried just 14 miles from Grant, the general who defeated him.
Posted by Ivonne Rovira
