Qualla: Battle of Columbus (1865) https://qualla.com/battle-of-columbus-1865 en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:13 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/d/j/g/8/battle-of-columbus-1865-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Battle of Columbus (1865) https://qualla.com/battle-of-columbus-1865 Battle of Columbus (1865): Introduction https://qualla.com/battle-of-columbus-1865/ Photo credit Brady National Photographic Art Gallery (Washington, D.C.), Public domain. On the night of April 16, 1865, Union and Confederate soldiers ran side by side through a covered bridge over the Chattahoochee River, neither side able to see the other in the darkness. Confederate General Robert Toombs had two cannon loaded with canister aimed straight into the bridge's mouth, but he held his fire -- his own retreating men were mixed in with the attackers. That bizarre scene, equal parts chaos and restraint, captures the spirit of the Battle of Columbus, Georgia: a fight that shouldn't have happened at all. Robert E. Lee had surrendered a week earlier at Appomattox. Abraham Lincoln had been shot two days before. But word traveled slowly in 1865, and Major General James H. Wilson's 13,000 cavalrymen were still following orders to destroy the South's last great industrial city.

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Image: Brady National Photographic Art Gallery (Washington, D.C.) | Public domain

]]> Tue, 10 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/j/g/8/battle-of-columbus-1865-wp/djg8-battle-of-columbus-1865-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Battle of Columbus (1865): The South's Last Arsenal https://qualla.com/battle-of-columbus-1865/ Photo credit Joshua Beschutzer, CC BY-SA 4.0. Columbus, Georgia mattered because it built things. By April 1865, with Richmond fallen and Selma already destroyed by Wilson's raiders, Columbus was the largest surviving Confederate manufacturing center in the South. Foundries along the Chattahoochee River produced cannon, swor...

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Image: Joshua Beschutzer | CC BY-SA 4.0

]]> Tue, 10 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/j/g/8/battle-of-columbus-1865-wp/djg8-battle-of-columbus-1865-the-souths-last-arsenal.mp3 0:06 2 full Battle of Columbus (1865): A Bridge Too Narrow https://qualla.com/battle-of-columbus-1865/ Photo credit Joshua Beschutzer, CC BY-SA 4.0. Confederate Major General Howell Cobb scraped together 3,500 defenders -- mostly Georgia and Alabama home guard units and civilian volunteers -- and set up his defenses on the Alabama side of the Chattahoochee, in the town of Girard (now Phenix City). His strategy centered on two...

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Image: Joshua Beschutzer | CC BY-SA 4.0

]]> Tue, 10 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/j/g/8/battle-of-columbus-1865-wp/djg8-battle-of-columbus-1865-a-bridge-too-narrow.mp3 0:06 3 full Battle of Columbus (1865): Chaos After Dark https://qualla.com/battle-of-columbus-1865/ Photo credit Joshua Beschutzer, CC BY-SA 4.0. Wilson turned to the upper bridge and did something unexpected: he attacked at night. At 8:00 p.m., he sent General Edward Winslow's brigade of Iowa cavalry charging toward the upper bridge, led by Colonel Frederick Benteen -- the same officer who would later serve under Custer a...

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Image: Joshua Beschutzer | CC BY-SA 4.0

]]> Tue, 10 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/j/g/8/battle-of-columbus-1865-wp/djg8-battle-of-columbus-1865-chaos-after-dark.mp3 0:06 4 full Battle of Columbus (1865): The Morning After the War https://qualla.com/battle-of-columbus-1865/ Photo credit Joshua Beschutzer, CC BY-SA 4.0. Wilson crossed the bridge at 11:00 p.m. -- his horse was shot and later died beneath him -- and established headquarters in the Mott House, the nearest building on the Columbus side. On the morning of April 17, he ordered the systematic destruction of everything that could suppor...

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Image: Joshua Beschutzer | CC BY-SA 4.0

]]> Tue, 10 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/j/g/8/battle-of-columbus-1865-wp/djg8-battle-of-columbus-1865-the-morning-after-the-war.mp3 0:06 5 full Battle of Columbus (1865): The Last Battle Argument https://qualla.com/battle-of-columbus-1865/ Photo credit Joshua Beschutzer, CC BY-SA 4.0. Whether Columbus was the last battle of the Civil War depends on how you define 'battle' and 'war.' The officers who fought there had no doubt. General Upton called it the 'closing conflict of the war.' Wilson himself wrote in 1913 that there were 'no grounds left for doubting th...

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Image: Joshua Beschutzer | CC BY-SA 4.0

]]> Tue, 10 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/j/g/8/battle-of-columbus-1865-wp/djg8-battle-of-columbus-1865-the-last-battle-argument.mp3 0:06 6 full