Federal Raid at Blountsville

Right through this area, in the spring of eighteen sixty-three, ran one of the most dramatic chases of the Civil War in Alabama. Union Colonel Abel Streight had pushed a mounted raid deep into the state, aiming to wreck the railroads feeding the Confederate Army of Tennessee. On his heels came the relentless Confederate cavalry of Nathan Bedford Forrest.

On the first of May, Forrest's troopers caught up with Streight's rear guard near Blountsville. The pressure forced Streight to abandon and set fire to some of his supply wagons, loaded with provisions and captured goods, to keep them out of enemy hands. Forrest's men arrived just behind. The running fight pressed on across Sand Mountain and beyond, until Streight finally surrendered his whole force days later, outbluffed by a smaller Confederate command.