2nd Kentucky Cavalry was participant
in largest troop surrender of Civil War

Men from the 2nd Kentucky Cavalry were on hand in April 1865 for what has been called the largest troop surrender of the Civil War.

It also is called the event that effectively ended the War Between the States.

The surrender occurred as Confederate Gen. Joseph E. Johnston met Union Gen. William T. Sherman at an unassuming farmhouse near present-day Durham, N.C., where they signed documents to end fighting by Southern armies in the Carolinas, Georgia and Florida. Johnston made his way on horseback from Greensboro, Sherman rode from his headquarters in Raleigh.

Johnston was escorted by 60 soldiers from the 5th South Carolina Cavalry Regiment and Sherman had an escort of 200 men from the 9th and 13th Pennsylvania, and the 8th Indiana in addition to the 2nd Kentucky.

Meetings took place three different times that April at the Bennett Place farmhouse, which is now a state historic site. There’s a statue on the land to commemorate its significance. A parcel of land across from the farmhouse and the statue – originally part of the Bennett farm – is undeveloped and now is on the market. The state has an option on the land that expires in October. To purchase the land, the state needs to raise more than $300,000 by the end of the month.

The land is a crucial, unexplored link to the history of the area, according to John Guss, Bennett Place site manager.

“I don’t think anybody has understood the impact of what Bennett Place means,” Guss said. “This property has the capability of having tremendous archeological significance for research and study. There were more than 250 Confederate and Union soldiers on the ground during the meetings in April, and the soldiers and their horses were spread out all across those grounds. There could be something from a uniform buried in the woods, for example, or other items left behind.”

Bennett Place consists of 30 acres and has a reconstructed farmhouse, kitchen and smokehouse. Living history demonstrations illustrate how the family of James and Nancy Bennett lived on the farm in the 19th century. Civil War re-enactors also give demonstrations in April and actors dramatize the surrender negotiations.