FAQ #3. Did Kentucky actually join the Confederacy?

ANSWER: Yes and No.

Yes and No?? Yes, let me explain.

First, the state legislature of Kentucky -- the House and Senate -- never took action to call a special convention to decide if Kentucky would secede from the Union. Thus, the normal means by which most of the states of the Confederacy (the Confederate States of America) took action to secede from the Union were not accomplished in Kentucky. As you'll read in some of the other FAQ's, Kentucky actually declared itself "neutral" from both the Union and the Confederacy in May 1861. This resulted from the two chambers of the legislature independently approving proclamations of armed neutrality and then Governor Magoffin using those documents to notify both sides that Kentucky would not participate with either one.

With the entrance of Confederate forces onto Kentucky soil in September 1861, the Kentucky legislature took formal action shortly after that to side with the cause of the Union. As a result of that action, many in Kentucky who were in favor of the state seceding from the United States saw that it was not going to happen through the normally accepted means of either a sovereignty convetion being called for or a referendum of the voters of the state.

In November 1861, a Sovereignty Convention was convened in Russellville, Kentucky (Logan County) and the delegates attending declared that they had created a Provisional Government of Kentucky. A governor and state officers of the Provisional Government were selected, the capitol of the government was declared to be Bowling Green and delegates were selected to go to Richmond, Virginia and seek acceptance of Kentucky into the Confederacy on behalf of this Provisional Government.