Brig. Gen. Felix Zollicoffer's Confederates had moved from Tennessee to push from the Cumberland Gap into central Kentucky in an effort to gain control of that important border state. On September 14, 1861, ten days after his 5,400-man force left their base, Zollicoffer occupied the Cumberland Gap and took a position at the Cumberland Ford (near present-day Pineville, Kentucky) to counter Unionist activity in the area, where Union supporters had been organizing and training recruits from Kentucky and east Tennessee at Camp Andrew Johnson near Barbourville, Kentucky.