ABSTRACT
Civil War accounts of life in the Bluegrass state are littered with stories of Federal and Confederate intrusions on the daily activities of "common citizens." These incidents vary in innumerable ways with regard to the measure of physical, psychological, and spiritual damage done. Confederate and Federal troops, as well as the bands of guerrillas which swept back and forth across the state, were responsible for the terror that Kentucky's black and white inhabitants experienced. Federal authorities confiscated several buildings for use as military hospitals. Confederate soldiers, one woman said, "never entered private houses or committed any depredations on private property" in Danville. While many Kentuekians endured negative and frightening experiences, examples of positive encounters between citizens and soldiers do exist. In July 1862, during the Confederate invasion of Kentucky, rumors spread that a twelve-hundred-man force from Morgan's cavalry was bearing down on Danville, raising the worst fears of pro-Union citizens.
