Morgan, John Hunt (1825-1864)

US soldier. When the Civil War broke out, he sided with the Confederacy; made a captain, he was assigned a cavalry scouting unit; bold and energetic, he led three daring penetrations from 1862 to 1863, disrupting Union communications in Tennessee and Kentucky and tying down large enemy forces with his relatively small units. Captured during a fourth raid, into Indiana and Ohio in July 1863, Morgan escaped from a federal penitentiary in November and resumed his raiding career. Federal forces surprised and killed Morgan in Greenville, Tennessee, the following year. Previously he had fought as a volunteer in the Mexican War and, as a businessman in Lexington, Kentucky, he supported a militia group. Morgan was born in Huntsville, Alabama.