George Estes, Co A, 14th MS writes about the expected battle

The 14th MS was part of Adams’s Brigade, Loring’s Division

“Our division was in the right of the Pike and on the top of a high ridge from where we could see all the movements of the enemy. The blue coats were busy fixing for us. We could see them by the thousands, shoveling dirt, cutting brush and bushes and making all kind of traps for us to march against. I was very much in hopes they would run again, but they kept on digging and seemed to be burying themselves behind their breastworks. I kept feeling more and more anxious about the kind of reception they were going to give us. We lay in full view of them till nearly sundown. Oh! What a day of suspense, and mortal fear. I could hardly content myself with standing or sitting for I fully realized the fact that many of us who were now alive and full of fond anticipation would in a very short time ‘be laid low by the shells and shots of a relentless foe,’ and my anticipations were fully realized.”
-The Civil War Years Revealed Through Letters, Diaries & Memoirs. Warwick, p. 189.

Estes survived the battle. Ten of Estes’s fellow 14th MS are buried at McGavock.

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50th Ohio soldier writes of Franklin battle, mentions dead and wounded.

Columbia Tenn
Dec 28th 1864

Dear Sister,

I received a long letter from you today. I reply not because there is anything of importance transpiring just at present, but because when the most happens is the time I am entirely unable to write. Since I was last at Columbia we have had some stirring times. Hood drove us back to Nashville. We had a very severe battle at Franklin during which our Regiment lost in killed wounded & captured some thing over half its men. After that we were in the big fight at Nashville & our company lost its Commanding Officer, a fine man who was shot through the breast & had an arm broken by a musket ball. But the success atoned for all the loss & more. Hood has halted at Columbia again. The rest of the Army has gone down after Hood. How long we shall remain here idle I know not but presume we shall have plenty to do. Sherman has taken Savannah & Hardee has escaped with his 15,000 men & will probably reinforce Hood which will give him a chance to show us considerable fight. But we shall conquer in the end. The right will triumph in the end. Charleston will be taken next and all important Sea ports. Christmas is over & I thought often of the fine times you were having at home. We had rather hard times living on hard tack & sow belly. It is quite cold to night, I have just had an argument on Slavery with the Captain who is for allowing the slaveholders credit for honesty on account of early education and I am not. I would just as — take a horse or hoe from one of these men as not. But I must stop writing. Having passed safely through the Battle of Franklin I expect good times for a while. Let me know if any thing new happening and you hear from Thomas.
Goodbye.
Your Bro. A.M.Weston

Asa M. Weston enlisted on 8/11/62 as Sergeant in Company K, 50th Ohio Infantry. He survived the Civil War.

The fiercest fighting during the battle of Franklin (November 30, 1864) centered around the home of Fountain Branch Carter (see above), looking East. Hundreds of wounded and dead could be seen from the porch after the battle. Many of those – Confederate soldiers – would eventually be interred at McGavock cemetery close by.

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The McGavock Cemetery Book

George Cuppett, who led the re-burial project from April to June 1866, recorded the names and identities of about 1,500 Confederate dead. He kept them the book pictured below. The book was passed on to the care of Carrie McGavock, which she kept diligently.

Here the book is opened to the Mississippi section of boys killed at Franklin.

Photos provided for and courtesy of the Carnton Foundation.

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