More Confederate diversity – the Bunker brothers

    Several years ago, I wrote a post about the way the Confederate army was racially integrated. Actually, I’ve written on that subject a couple of times, talking about the lives of free men of color like the Townsend brothers in the 26^th North Carolina and the Cozzens brothers in the 37^th North Carolina. These men volunteered to serve, and, according to the 1860s, they were not white. You can check out those posts here and here.

   Along those same lines is the service of Christopher Wren Bunker. However, Bunker’s father was not Black, but was born in Thailand, as was his uncle. The two brothers are better known as Chang and Eng Bunker, the famous Siamese Twins.

   The brothers were born in the fishing village of Mekong, Siam, now Thailand, in 1811. They were conjoined at birth, and in August 1829, came to the United States. Due to their being conjoined, they were seen as oddities and picked up jobs with Hunter and Coffin and later with P.T. Barnum, traveling around the United States. They decided to settle in the states, became naturalized citizens, broke with Barnum, adopted “Bunker” as a surname, and set out on their own. For a time in the late 1830’s, they quit touring and settled in the Traphill section of Wilkes County, North Carolina.  Eng and Chang met two sisters, Adelaide and Sarah Yates, whom they married in 1843. Eng and Sarah had ten children, while Chang and Adelaide had twelve children. They relocated to Surry County, North Carolina.[1]

   One of those sons was Christopher Wren Bunker, born to Chang and Adelaide in 1845. On April 1, 1863, in Wythe County, Virginia, Bunker enlisted in Company I, 37^th Battalion Virginia Cavalry. He was mustered in as a private. Bunker was captured at Moorefield, Virginia, on August 7, 1864, and sent to Camp Chase, Ohio, arriving on August 24, 1864. A descriptive list described Bunker as having a dark complexion, brown eyes, and black hair, five foot eight, and twenty years of age. On March 4, 1865, Bunker was transferred to City Point, Virginia, where he was paroled.[2] 

Christopher W. Bunker (findagrave)

   But wait, there is another Bunker in the 37^th Battalion Virginia Cavalry. Stephen D. Bunker, son of Eng and Laura Bunker, also served. According to his widow’s pension record, Stephen D. Bunker enlisted in July 1864. There is no clear record in the 37^th Battalion for Stephen, but there are a couple of pages for a D.C. Bunker who was absent wounded in 1864.[3]

   What about the 37^th Battalion Virginia Infantry? They were originally known as Dunn’s Partisan Rangers, organized in August 1862. Lt. Col. Ambrose C. Dunn was the first commander. The battalion saw duty during the Jones-Imboden Raid, the battle of White Sulphur Springs, the Siege of Knoxville, and the Valley Campaigns of 1864, including the battle of Moorefield and third battle of Winchester. The battalion disbanded in mid-1865.

   Chang and Eng Bunker passed away in 1874 and are buried at White Plains Baptist Church Cemetery in Surry County, North Carolina. Christopher Wren Bunker passed in 1932 and is buried at the Antioch Baptist Church Cemetery in Surry County.  Stephen D. Bunker passed in 1920 and is also buried at White Plains Baptist Church in Surry County.

   While there is probably not another story quite like that of Chang and Eng Bunker and their sons Christoper and Stephen, there are undoubtedly many other documented cases of diversity in the ranks of Confederate regiments.

 

 

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[1] Daniel Traywick, “Eng and Change Bunker,” Dictionary of North Carolina Biography, 1: 269-70.

[2] CMSR, RG109, M324.

[3] CMSR, RG109, M324.

Marking Lee’s Headquarters of Appomattox

A wooden board mark's Lee HQ

   Recently, I acquired a postcard of Robert E. Lee’s last headquarters at Appomattox. In the turn- of-the-century style, a board nailed to a tree marks the spot of Lee’s camp site. The post card is postmarked 1906, about two decades before the National Park Service acquired the property.

   Lee’s headquarters was about a mile east of Appomattox Court House. He spent the night of April 8, 1865, sans tent, sleeping under the stars with Longstreet, Fitz Lee, and John B. Gordon. Lee met with Grant the following day at the McLean House, surrendering the Army of Northern Virginia. The headquarters’ wagon arrived, and Lee’s tent was pitched. It was at this site that Lee’s headquarters’ flag was cut up, and where, in a wagon, General Order #9 was drafted, copied, and sent to the surviving corps and division commanders.

   There are not many descriptions of the camp compound. One came from Maj. Gen. Thomas F. McCory (US), who had known Lee during the war with Mexico. McCory recalled in 1888 that it was a challenge, but

“so favorable an opportunity may never again he presented, and would make the effort, so that we could have it to say that we spoke with the great Confederate General. The way to Lee’s headquarters we did not know, but we rode along the great rode leading through the Confederate camps, and as we advanced made inquerry, and for some time received but little satisfaction, but at length met an officer who very courteously said that Lee’s headquarters would be found ‘right out that road.’ Following the direction some distance in a wood we soon found ourselves in the midst of headquarters tents. On the right of the road we saw one of our Major-Generals, an old army officer, sitting beneath a tent-fly waiting for an interview with Lee. A little further on we noticed an officer in full uniform of the Confederate color standing before a fire in front of his tent, and I at once said to my companion that it was General Lee, whom I immediately recognized, although I had not seen him for nearly twenty years. It was suggested that we ride a little aside, hitch up our horses, and go right up to the General and not attempt a formal approach in the red tape style, or we might fail in our purpose.”[1]

   McCoy detailed his conversation with Lee, yet provided no other descriptions of the camp. One Tar Heel recalled that on the night of April 9, the regimental band of the 4^th North Carolina Infantry visited Lee’s headquarters, serenading him. The entire regiment was present, and “Gen. Lee came out of his tent, gave his hand to all and bid them farewell.”[2]

   There was a movement to start marking various spots connected to historical events related to the war. For some places, like Gettysburg, that movement started in 1864 with the Gettysburg Battlefield Memorial Association. For the most part, it was not until the late 1800s that the movement picked up traction. Veterans were visiting the fields where they had fought, some attempting to mark prominent positions with painted boards, often nailed to trees.

  Joseph W. Kirkley and Calvin D. Cowles visited Appomattox in 1892. Both Kirkley and Cowles worked on commission producing the Official Records and are the authors of the atlas that accompanied the volumes. What they discovered was that the Grand Army of the Potomac, a veterans’ organization for Federal soldiers, had purchased much of the property. The idea was that summer homes could be constructed for “members who desired to revisit leisurely the scene of the surrender.” The venture, however, had failed.[3] A new courthouse was being constructed down the road at Appomattox Station, and the McLean house had been disassembled for shipment to Washington, D.C. for display. “It became at once apparent that Appomattox was being robbed of its most interesting architectural feature, and the commissioners at once regretted that steps had not been taken to prevent this act of vandalism, and measures taken to have the McLean house made some sort of memorial hall in perpetuity.”

 

  Kirkley and Cowles could find only one man, George Peers, who had lived in the area during the eventful days of April 1865. Peers had been the clerk of court since 1860. Kirkley and Cowles filed their report, and there was some movement to mark the important positions. This included support from former Confederate general John B. Gordon.

   Plans were made to produce several iron signs, much like those at Chickamauga. One sign denoted where Confederate artillery fired their last shot on the morning on April 9, 1865; another the apple tree that Lee and Grant met under on the morning of April 10; and yet another denoted the site of Lee’s final headquarters. These were apparently all in place by 1893.[4]

   But to the postcards, which still have the wooden sign image. These were apparently printed prior to 1893. Maybe they were made to support the failed Grand Army of the Republic enterprise.

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[1] The Free Lance-Star, June 5, 1888.

[2] The Charlotte Observer, March 17, 1895.

[3] The Times-Picayune, November 24, 1893.

[4] The Times-Picayune, November 24, 1893.

What Happened to the Food Sent to Amelia Court House?

   It is a fairly well known story about the war. In 1865, Robert E. Lee asked that rations for his army be sent to Amelia Court House. After being forced from the trenches protecting Richmond and Petersburg, Lee found not rations awaiting him, but ammunition.

   Writing in 1875, just ten years after the events, George C. Eggleston recalled an interesting turn of events concerning those provisions. Born in Indiana, Eggleston was living in Amelia County when the war began and joined Lamkin’s Battery on May 9, 1861, serving as a first sergeant and then as sergeant major. At the battle of Pocotaligo, South Carolina, in October 1862, Eggleston was wounded by “concussion of shell.”[1] Lamkin’s Battery, Virginia Light Artillery, saw service in the Department of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, until returning to Virginia in October 1863. The rest of their service was connected to the Army of Northern Virginia.

Marker in Amelia (HMdg.org)

   Eggleston accompanied his battery on at least part of the retreat toward Appomattox Court House, although it appears he was not present for the surrender, coming in for his parole at Burkeville on April 21, 1865. Eggleston had a great deal to say about food and rations in a chapter entitled “Red Tape” in his 1875 memoir. Concerning the waiting train of provisions at Amelia Court House, Eggleston wrote:

   When the evacuation of Richmond was begun, a train load of provisions was sent by General Lee’s order from one of the interior depots to Amelia Court House, for the use of the retreating army, which was without food and must march to that point before it could receive a supply. But the president and his followers were in haste to leave the capital and needed the train, wherefore it was not allowed to remain long enough to be unloaded, but was hurried on to Richmond, where its cargo was thrown out to facilitate the flight of the president and his personal followers, while the starving army was left to suffer in an utterly exhausted country, with no source of supply anywhere within its reach.”[2]

   While Lee had been warning those in Richmond that his ability to defend the entrenchments was nearing its end, the breakthrough on April 2, 1865, caught many by surprise. J.H. Averill wrote after the war that he was serving as trainmaster for the Richmond and Danville Railroad at the time. His first telegraph note on April 2 was to hold all trains at Danville. Averill asked for clarification but got no response. He believed that raiders might have cut the line between Burkeville and the Staunton River. The next message over the wire was: “Come to Richmond with all engines and empty passenger and box-cars you can pick up. Bring no freight or passengers.” Averill readied the four engineers and whatever rolling stock he could find. Asking for further instructions, he was told “Too late. Richmond is being evacuated. We will all leave this P.M. Arrange for all track room possible in Danville.” Averill also wrote that in Danville “were large government storehouses…all filled to the ceiling, as well as many loaded cars, awaiting shipment.”[3] It is interesting to note that the telegram told Averill to bring “all engines and empty passenger and box-cars you can pick up.” Since the rations would have been in between Danville and Amelia, they certainly would have fallen under the “all you can pick up” order.

   There appears to be an even older version of this story. Writing in 1866, James D. McCabe, Jr., wrote that the “the trains which had been sent from Danville [to Lee at Appomattox] had been ordered to Richmond to help carry off government property, and that, through inexcusable blundering of the Richmond authorities, the cars had been sent on to the Capital without unloading at the stores at Amelia Courthouse.”[4]

   Lee went as far as to say in his final report to Davis in April 1865 that “Not finding the supplies ordered to be placed there [Amelia] twenty-four hours were lost.” The same was repeated on April 4, when Lee sent his appeal to “the Citizens of Amelia County, Va.” The army had arrived at Amelia Court House “expecting to find plenty of provisions, which had been ordered to be placed here by the railroad several days since…”[5]

   These reports obviously rankled Jefferson Davis in the postwar years. In July 1873, Isaac M. St. John, who had replaced the inept Lucius Northrop as commissary general in the last months of the war, wrote Davis on the resources of the Confederacy. St. John could recall or find “No calls by letter or requisition from the General Commanding [Lee], or from any other source, official or unofficial, had been received, either by the Commissary General or the Assistant Commissary General; nor…was any communication transmitted through the Department channels to the Bureau of Substance—for the collection of supplies at Amelia Courthouse. Had any such requisition or communication been received at the Bureau as late as the morning of April 1^st, it could have been met from the Richmond reserve.”[6]

   Eggleston certainly remembered seeing the discarded rations or hearing this story, as did McCabe. Based upon his appeal to the farmers in Amelia County, and his final report to Davis, Lee expected rations to be waiting for his army in Amelia Court House when he arrived on April 4. Would the rations and the lost twenty-hours have made a difference in Lee’s ability to outpace the Federal army? Maybe the    war might have lasted a little longer.

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[1] George C. Eggleton, CMSR, Roll 0318, M324, RG109. NA.

[2] Eggleston, A Rebel’s Recollections, 228.

[3] SHSP, 25:267-9. Originally in the Nashville Banner.

[4] quoted in Freeman, R.E. Lee, 4:509.

[5] Confederate Veteran, 7:233.

[6] SHSP 3:101-2.

Robert E. Lee, Jefferson Davis, and biographer Frank Alfriend

   Recently, on one of the online auction sites, a letter from Robert E. Lee to Jefferson Davis was listed. Lee, writing on April 2, 1868, thanks Davis for a copy of Frank H. Alfriend’s The Life of Jefferson Davis. Born in Richmond in January 1841, Alfriend was a graduate of William and Mary College and taught school in Richmond during at least part of the war.[1] By early 1863, he was writing for the Southern Literary Messenger, publishing a piece entitled “The Great Danger of the Confederacy.”[2] In December 1863, it was announced that Alfriend was now the editor of the publication.[3]

Lee to Davis letter on eBay in 2026.

   Alfriend continued writing after the war, becoming a contributor to the Raleigh-based Field and Fireside.[4] Some of his pieces were biographical in nature, such as a piece on Italian revolutionary Garibaldi.[5] All the while, Alfriend was working on a biography of Jefferson Davis. The Biblical Recorder reported in January 1868 that Alfriend, “an attractive writer,” was working on as biography of Jefferson Davis. “The time for that book has not yet arrived, but we feel sure that Mr. Alfriend will execute the work in a manner fully equal to the expectations of his numerous admirers.”[6]

   Alfriend’s book was not the first. Alfred Taylor Bledso released Is Davis a Traitor, or was Secession a Constitutional Right Previous to 1861 in 1866.

   Alfriend reached out to Davis on July 22, 1867, about the biography. Davis confessed that he had “always been very reluctant to give an account of my own deeds.” Sketches that had been released to date were “very defective and often erroneous.” Davis then writes about his time in the U.S. Senate, the Missouri Compromise, working with President Buchanan, and the Crittenden Compromise. Concerning treason, with which Davis was being charged, he wrote “The first congress of the Confederation defined treason, and there was unmistakably declared the doctrine to which the founders of the Union steadily adhered, the paramount allegiance of the citizen to his state. The departure from that creed has been the source of all our ills.” Davis confessed that he had “no books to which to refer and write from memory entirely.”[7] Davis wrote in 1888 that he had only this one “conversation” with Alfriend prior to the publication of the biography.[8]

   The Life of Jefferson Davis was released by the National Publishing Company in March 1868. It was not widely available, and readers needed to subscribe to obtain a copy. The Cincinnati Commercial considered it possibly the best book on the life of Davis, but noted Alfriend’s confession that he was writing from a Southern viewpoint. Despite this bias, the Ohio newspaper believed Alfriend’s work “will excite a lively interest and have a permanent historic value. . . All in all, this volume is the most valuable contribution yet made to the history of the war by any Southern author.”[9] While some praised Alfriend’s biography, it did not meet the approval of everyone. In the December 1868 issue of D.H. Hill’s The Land We Love came a scathing review. “We regard this book as a great misfortune to Mr. Davis,” wrote the editor. “This is much of real value in this book, and it is to be regretted that Mr. Frank H. Alfriend did not confine himself to matters he understood. His military criticisms are not worth a button.”[10]

   Obviously, Davis either asked Alfriend to send a copy of the book to Lee, or Alfriend took it upon himself to send a copy to Lee. On April 2, Lee wrote to Davis: “I am very much obliged to you for the copy of your “Life of Jefferson Davis” which you have kindly sent me. I will take pleasure in its perusal.” Did Davis actually mail the book to Lee? Probably not. Writing to Alfriend in April 1871, Davis confessed that he had “not seen your biography of myself and have failed in my efforts to get a copy.”[11]

   Alfriend continued to work for various newspapers, including the Wilmington Star, the Louisville Courier-Journal, and the Atlanta Constitution. While in Atlanta, he befriended John B. Gordon. When Gordon went to Washington, D.C., as a senator, he got Alfriend a job as an assistant librarian. Alfriend was working on a revised biography on Davis when he died on May 3, 1887. He is buried in Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond.[12]

      While this letter has recently come to light, does Lee’s copy of The Life of Jefferson Davis survive?

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[1] Richmond Dispatch, August 26, 1862, September 24, 1863, September 12, 1864.

[2] Staunton Spectator, February 3, 1863.

[3] Richmond Dispatch, December 30, 1863.

[4] Field and Fireside, January 6, 1866.

[5] The Field and Fireside, July 28, 1866.

[6] The Biblical Recorder, January 22, 1868.

[7] The Papers of Jefferson Davis, 12:239-43.

[8] Ibid, 12:244n20.

[9] quoted in the Clarion-Ledger, March 7, 1868.

[10] Book Notes. The Land We Love (December 1868): 179-181.

[11] The Papers of Jefferson Davis, 13:20-21.

[12] The Papers of Jefferson Davis, 12:243.

Robert E. Lee’s Railroad Gun

   The War brought some emerging technology to the forefront, innovations like repeating rifles and ironclad ships. The railroad was used to funnel troops and supplies, and then the wounded from battlefields to hospitals in cities. One of the new technologies was the use of armored railroad cars bearing large cannons.

(Library of Congress)

   Rumors filtered into Army of Northern Virginia command in early June 1862 that the Federal army was building a mobile battery to operate on the railroad. Due to their close proximity to Richmond, Lee believed that the only way that the enemy could get large cannons close to the Confederate capital was to use the York River Railroad.[1] On June 5, Robert E. Lee, who just three days prior had been assigned command of the principal Confederate army in Virginia, wrote Maj. W.H. Stevens, his chief engineer, concerning the vulnerability of the railroad. If the Federals constructed “a railroad battery, probably plated with iron,” they could “sweep the country.” While a fixed battery could be constructed, Lee wanted Stevens to explore the idea of their own “railroad battery…plated and protected with a heavy gun.”[2]

   That same day Lee wrote to Col. J. Gorgas, chief of the Ordnance Department: “Is there a possibility of constructing an iron-plated battery mounting a heavy gun, on trucks, the whole covered with iron, to move along the York River Railroad?” Lee asked. He told Gorgas to inquire with the Navy Department. Lee also mentioned using mortars on the railroad as well.[3]

   A third note went out from Lee that day to Capt. George Minor, Chief of Ordnance and Hydrography. “I am very anxious to have a railroad battery,” Lee wrote, mentioning he had written Gorgas and Confederate naval Lt. John M. Brooke on the subject. “Till something better could be accomplished I proposed a Dahlgren or Columbiad, on a ship’s carriage, on a railroad flat, with one of your navy iron aprons adjusted to it to protect gun and men. “If I could get it in position by daylight to-morrow I could astonish our neighbors.”[4]

   Lee did not get his cannon until June 24. The design was one by Brooke, who also designed both cannons and armament for the CSS Virginia. Minor reported that a rifled and banded 32-pounder had been mounted on a railcar, and supplied with 200 rounds of ammunition, including 15-inch solid bolts, all under the command of Lt. R.D. Minor, C.S. Navy.[5]

   The cannon was used at least once during the Seven Days campaign, during the battle of Savage Station. Private Robert K. Sneden, 40^th New York, wrote that during a lull in the battle, “a shrill locomotive whistle was heard… soon appeared coming down the tracks toward us a nondescript car, which was roofed over at sides with railroad iron set at an angle, and from which in front projected a heavy gun… While all eyes were directed toward it, [its] big gun opened fire suddenly, and everyone looked for some place of shelter.” The “heavy gun,” according to Shenen, fired several shots before being withdrawn half a mile back up the tracks where it continued firing till dark. Also noted was that the Confederates had placed cotton bales on the cars, with infantrymen behind them, to protect the gun. As the gun withdrew, the Federals commenced to tear up the York River Railroad, preventing the gun from advancing any closer.[6]

   Following the action at Savage Station, the armored battery disappears for a couple of years, probably stored at the rail yard in Richmond. There is a rumor that the gun saw action at Drewry’s Bluff in June 1864. The cannon was obviously captured at the end of the war, maybe in Petersburg. An armored railroad battery was photographed at the end of the war. Some historians believe that the imaged  cannon is Lee’s Railroad Gun.[7]

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[1] OR 11, pt. 3, 573.

[2] OR 11, pt. 3, 574.

[3] OR 11, pt. 3, 574.

[4] OR 11, pt. 3, 576.

[5] OR 11, pt. 3, 615.

[6] Bryan and Lankford, Eye of the Storm,76-77.

[7] see also David H. Schneider, “Lee’s Armored Car.” Civil War Times, February 2011.

Petersburg Confederate Mines

 

Confederate countermine at Fort Mahone (LOC)

   The battle of the Crater is a fairly well-known event during the war. Federal general Ambrose Burnside came up with the idea to dig a mine shaft from the Federal works at Petersburg, under a Confederate position at Pegram’s salient. The distance was 511 feet. Coal miners from the 48^th Pennsylvania Infantry were in charge of the mining operation. They packed the chamber under the Confederate salient with 8,000 pounds of black powder. At 4:40 am on July 30, an explosion blasted a hole 170 feet long and 30 feet deep within the Confederate line. The ensuing battle as Federal soldiers rushed in was a nightmare; many of them were caught in the crater left by the explosion.

   But this was not the only mine dug during the war. Confederate forces attempted to dig their own mines along the Petersburg front. One mine shaft stretched from Gracie’s Salient toward Federal lines at Hare House. Powder – 450 pounds – arrived on the evening of July 31 and all was ready to light the fuse the next day. However, with a truce in place to bury the dead from the failed Federal attempt, the attack was delayed. When the fuse was lit later that day, it was discovered to be defective. Over the next few days, the mineshaft was lengthened and double the amount of powder added. When the powder exploded on August 5, it was discovered that the Confederates were 40 yards short of the main Federal lines. There was no grand Confederate charge into the non-existent breach.[1]

   There were at least eight Confederate counter mines dug along the Petersburg front. These were underground listening posts, attempting to find Federal mining efforts. The counter mines were located at Elliott’s Salient, north of the James River, and City Point Road, Jerusalem Plank Road, Squirrel Level Road, Cooke’s Salient, Colquitt’s Salient, Pegram’s Salient, and somewhere between Pegram’s Salient and Jerusalem Plank Road.[2]

   Much of the early work on counter mines fell to Company F, 1^st Regiment Engineering Troops, under Capt. Hugh T. Douglas. They went into camp near Blandford Church. Tools were sent and in some places fabricated for the tedious jobs.[3] Details from brigades in the area assisted the engineers. Much of the work of transporting planking and ventilation machinery had to be done at night, as the lines were exposed to enemy fire. After the failure of the mine explosion on August 5, Douglas was arrested and allowed to resign from the army, finishing the war as a contract engineer.[4]

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[1] Hess, In the Trenches, 118-19.

[2] Hess, In the Trenches, 48, 111.

[3] Jackson, First Regiment Engineer Troops, 61-62.

[4] Hess, In the Trenches, 118-19.

Robert E. Lee and John S. Mosby

Col. John S. Mosby

            “The Marble Man” and the “Gray Ghost.” If we mention those two names, Robert E. Lee and John S. Mosby come to mind. Lee commanded the Army of Northern Virginia. Mosby was a colonel, charged with disrupting Federal operations behind the lines in Northern Virginia. While Mosby might not have been a “trusted” lieutenant like Jackson or Longstreet, he still communicated frequently with the commanding general. (Note: “The Marble Man” and the “Gray Ghost” were names applied much later.)

            Mosby was much younger than Lee. He was born in Powhatan County, Virginia, in 1833. Small in stature and frequently bullied, Mosby shot one of those bullies. Convicted of the crime and expelled from the University of Virginia, Mosby wound up studying law under the prosecting attorney while incarcerated. Mosby was later pardoned by the Virginia governor and was admitted to the bar. He and his family were living in Bristol when the war began.

            Lee was born in 1807 at Stratford Hall, the son of a Revolutionary War hero and former governor of Virginia. Lee grew up in Alexandria, graduated from West Point, and served as an engineer in the United States army. He was three times brevetted for his role in the Mexican-American War. In the early days of the secession crisis, Lee was serving with a cavalry regiment in Texas.

            At the beginning of the war, Mosby enlisted as a private in the Washington Mounted Rifles, under Grumble Jones. While members of the 1^st Virginia Cavalry, the men of the Washington Mounted Rifles were not seriously engaged at First Manassas. In early 1862, Private Mosby was promoted to adjutant of the regiment, with the rank of first lieutenant. Mosby slipped off on his first scout in March 1862, reporting back to Stuart that there was no serious pursuit of the Confederate army as it pulled back from the Manassas area to the Rappahannock River. When Fitzhugh Lee replaced Jones, Mosby resigned. Stuart kept Mosby as a scout. It was Mosby who scouted the Federal position that led to Stuart’s famed ride around McClellan in June 1862. Lee made mention of Mosby in a general report of the operation. Mosby continued under Stuart’s command during the Seven Days battles. After this campaign Mosby came up with the idea of a partisan ranger command that could harass Federal supply columns. While on his way to consult with Jackson at Gordonsville, Mosby was captured. Upon being paroled and released, Mosby made his way to Lee’s headquarters, explaining to Lee what he had seen at Hampton Roads. This was probably the first meeting between Lee and Mosby. The date: August 5, 1862.

            Mosby served on Stuart’s staff the next few months, serving as a scout. It was at the end of December 1862, while Stuart was scouting in Loudoun County, that Mosby received permission to remain behind with nine men. On January 10, they made their first raid, capturing a picket post near Herndon, Virginia. By January 22, when they reported back to Stuart, they had captured twenty horses and men. Mosby asked for a few more men, and Stuart granted his request. It was the beginning of Mosby’s Rangers and the 43^rd Battalion, Virginia Cavalry.

            Lee and Mosby communicated often over the next couple of years. It was Lee who wrote General Samuel Cooper of Mosby’s capture of Brig. Gen. Edwin Stoughton in March 1863.[1] Lee recommended that same month that Mosby needed to be promoted, and the rank of captain came a couple of days later, along with orders to recruit his command.[2] With Mosby operating so close to the Washington, D.C. defenses, Lee frequent wrote to his superiors with details of his raids and the information gathered.

            Mosby continued to raid Federal wagons trains north of the Rappahannock as Lee began moving the army north, the start of the Gettysburg campaign. It was Mosby who suggested Stuart ride once again around the Federal army, and Mosby who scouted that army with two men, trying to decern its intentions.

            In August 1863, Lee wrote Stuart about Mosby: “I fear he exercises but little control over his men…his attention has been more directed toward the capture of wagons than military damages to the enemy.”  Lee wanted Mosby to attack railroads, trying to force Meade to pull troops away from the army to guard the vital supply lines.[3]  

            Lee again mentioned Mosby in December 1863, writing that he had destroyed a wagon train at Brandy Station, capturing 112 mules.[4] In April 1864, Lee wrote Cooper that he was attempting to “have Col. Mosby’s battalion mustered into regular service. If this cannot be done I recommended that this battalion be retained as partisans for the present.”[5] For much of April, Mosby continued to funnel information to Lee regarding troop movements.

            When Jubal Early commenced his campaign through the Shenandoah Valley in June, July, and August 1864, Mosby joined in, attacking Federal positions at Point of Rocks, Mount Zion Church, the Snicker’s Gap War, Berryville Wagon Train Raid, Gold’s Farm, and others.

            Mosby paid Lee a visit at the latter’s headquarters near Petersburg on December 6, 1864. At Edge Hill, they had a meal together – a leg of mutton, which Lee joked about as being stolen since it was a rarity.[6] Mosby visited Lee’s headquarters again on February 2, 1865.[7] This appears to be the last time the two met during the war.

            Lee of course surrendered at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865. In Loudoun County, Mosby received word of the surrender on April 15, asking for a ceasefire so he could verify the validity of the news. This was granted. Word was sent to Lee, now back in Richmond. What should the rangers do? Lee’s response? He thought they should go home. Mosby disbanded the 43^rd Battalion on April 21, 1865, in Salem. Mosby and a few others rode south, trying to link up with the Army of Tennessee. When they learned that Johnston had also surrendered, they returned, and Mosby, confirming that he would not be arrested, likewise surrendered on June 17.

 

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[1] Knight, Arlington, 247.

[2] Knight, Arlington, 250.

[3] OR 29, pt. 2, 652-3.

[4] Dowdey and Manarin, Wartime Papers, 630.

[5] Dowdey and Manarin, Wartime Papers, 689.

[6] Mitchel, Mosby Letters, 125.

[7] Knight, Arlington, 470.