Such was the situation in Kentucky when on the 15th of November, 1861 Gen. D. C. Buell relieved General Sherman of his command. He had been assigned by orders dated November 9, 1861, to the department of the Ohio, consisting of the States of Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, and that portion of Kentucky east of the Cumberland and Tennessee. General Sherman was relieved at his own request, having by his failure to advance and his extravagant estimate of the troops needed brought down upon himself an avalanche of abuse, including the charge of insanity preferred by the Cincinnati Commercial. He had his inning later. Just-before being relieved he was actively preparing for the defense of Lexington from an attack which he conceived imminent from General Johnston's forces at Bowling Green. An abstract from the consolidated report of General Sherman's force on November 10, 1861, gives an aggregate present and absent of 49,586. （Rebellion Records, Vol. IV, page 349.)
On the 28th of October, 1861, General Johnston moved his headquarters from Nashville to Bowling Green, and assumed immediate command of what was styled the army corps of Central Kentucky. The organization of his forces then was as follows:
