Monday, June 29, 2009

Site of the Greenback Raid (Oct. 14, 1864)


The railroad cut in the photo is the location of Confederate partisan ranger Col. John S. Mosby’s famous attack on the train carrying a payroll for Phil Sheridan’s Army of the Shenandoah. It is located between Duffields Station to the east and Kearnysville in the west in Jefferson County, W. Va. I visited the spot a few years ago with Don Hakenson of the Stuart-Mosby Historical Society, who knows Mosby’s Confederacy as well as anyone. The county gives the site as where Wiltshire Road intersects the railway, but Don guided us to a location near Warm Springs Road, and the photo is taken looking west from there.

It was here, in the deep cut, on the night of October 14, 1864, that Mosby and 84 of his partisan rangers (43d Battalion, Virginia Cavalry) ambushed, derailed, and destroyed the express train on the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad. After taking the payroll and several prisoners, the raiders burned the train and returned to Loudoun County, Va.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.