Battle of Brown's Ferry
The Battle of Brown's Ferry was an engagement of the American Civil War which took place on October 27, 1863 in Hamilton County, Tennessee. During the battle, two Union brigades drove Confederate sharpshooters from the Tennessee River, which allowed supplies to start arriving to the Union army at Chattanooga. Although a minor engagement, the battle proved to have significant results in paving the way for the Union victory at Chattanooga a month later. Background Following the defeat at the Battle of Chickamauga the Union Army of the Cumberland was trapped in Chattanooga, Tennessee, by the Confederate Army of Tennessee under Braxton Bragg. Lacking the strength to capture the city by direct assault, Bragg settled into a siege, intending to starve the Union forces into surrender or retreat. To do so, he sent the brigade of Evander Law to a point on the Tennessee River downstream from Chattanooga, ordering it to fire on any Union wagon train which passed along the opposite shore. Law spread the 4th and 15th Alabama Infantry regiments along a front, keeping the other three regiments of his brigade in reserve. When the Union army began using other routes to supply Chattanooga, Law's corps commander James Longstreet