Morrisville is a small town located near Raleigh, North Carolina. It was the site of a battle on April 13, 1865, between Union forces under General Hugh Kilpatrick and Confederate forces under General Joe Wheeler. As a result of that battle, General Kilpatrick came into possession of a letter from Confederate General Joseph E. Johnston. On April 14, 1865, a courier from Kilpatrick delivered that letter to the Union General William T. Sherman. The contents of the letter led Sherman to believe that a Confederate surrender might be imminent.

Works Consulted: Barrett, John G., The Civil War in North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1963; Vickers, James, Chapel Hill: An Illustrated History, Chapel Hill, NC: Barclay Publishers, 1985.