" In 60's, Town Misses Being Burned To Ground By Margin Of One
Day" By James Robinson Daniels (Published in The Franklin Press,
June 16, 1955) If General Lee had surrendered one day later,
Federal troops would have burned Franklin to the ground in 1865.
A town in ashes might never have recovered. Or it might have
been rebuilt on a different site. Certainly our community would
be the poorer without the time-mellowed homes that date from
"Before The War". All this is speculation. The grim fact is that
Col George W Kirk marched his Union regiment from Asheville to
Macon County in the twilight of the Confederacy. He was intent
on arson because: "I have heard that Franklin is the hottest
hole in Rebeldom." Kirk planned to make it even hotter. The day
before his mounted infantry reached here, however, a courier
brought him word of the surrender at Appomattox. Kirk kept on.
Those Secesh needed a lesson, anyway. Detouring widely, Kirk's
troops entered Franklin by every possible road. They converged
on the Courthouse,