Regarding the following:

>>>>>The Camp Robinson, Ohio River boats and other Union presence in Kentucky have long been the Confederate claim that the Union was first to violate Kentucky neutrality. But weren't there at least as many examples of Confederate presence in Kentucky? And surely, the occupation of two West Kentucky towns by armed forces with belligerent intent is not comparable to a recruiting camp or seizing boats on the Ohio. No less an authority than John Y. Simon concluded the South was first to seriously violate Kentucky's neutrality.>>>>>

These are historians that do not wish to see that the Federals did it first and well before Columbus was taken by Polk. I am especially sure that the chief editor of the Grant Papers would not see it as any other way than how you state it above yet it completely ignores the fact that the Federals did it first. At the start, both sides established training camps outside of the state. I live 5 miles from Camp Boone and Camp Burnett where KY troops came to Tennessee to form and train. The Federals had camps near Cincinnati and Louisville (Jeffersonville, IN) and indeed honored their part of not violating the KY neutrality.

All of this changed after the June Congressional elections when the pro-Union Congressional candidates swept the elections save one district which was western KY and with HC Burnett winning there. This was not helped by the general boycott of those elections by pro-south voters which also happened in the state elections of August, 1861. I think that election emboldened the pro-Union forces of the state to establish Camp Dick Robinson.

But the establishment of a fully armed training camp within the KY borders by either side was a clear cut violation of the declared neutrality that both sides stated they would honor. There was no such comparable Confederate post. There is a significant difference between bodies of pro-South guys getting together to head to Tennessee and even pro-Union guys getting together to head to Indiana or Ohio to go to training camp and going to an established camp in Kentucky. A BIG difference!

Please show me the fully armed training camp established in KY by the pro-South forces before the taking to Hickman and Columbus like what the Federals did for Camp Dick Robinson. There is none. The pro-South men all came to Tennessee for training camps.

The Federals sent bodies of troops into KY from Cairo quite a bit to capture these bodies of men who were getting together to head south and go to training camps. I do not know of any comparable act by the pro-South forces of the state - arresting Unionists before they could go to Ohio or Indiana.

Add in the Union gunboat sailing right into Paducah's "harbor" to take a steamer back to Cairo because of it being suspected of holding supplies for the south and you have more than clear cut evidence of the Union consistently, and first, violating Kentucky neutrality. Hands down the most egregious component of that was Camp Dick Robinson. When Nelson replied to Magoffin he wondered why the governor would care so much about Kentuckians forming to defend their state but he fully neglected to tell him about the two Union regiments from Tennessee that were also forming at the time. In other words Nelson covered things up. Magoffin's reaction should have been to allow the Confederates to do the same thing and go tit for tat. But the Confederate western strategy for the time was to build their defenses along the Mississippi River and not worry about Middle TN since KY formed a nice shield to the north. TN Gov. Isham Harris certainly did not want to violate KY's neutrality and was shocked when it happened.

Greg Biggs