West Virginia and the Civil War Symposium, pt. 4

all right I guess we'll go ahead and move along a little bit here everybody does have tickets correct all right we're gonna draw right after mr. Lowry is done speaking I imagine most of us in here know Terry he was a staff historian for a number of years fortunately he retired and I was able to slip into his position however I can't fill his shoes he is a musician and an author in addition to being a historian and I can't do either of those he has a number of books and articles to his credit the most recent is on sale over here and for those of you who haven't read it or purchased it yet by one afterward I'm sure he'll be happy to sign it for you he's going to be explaining the importance of the whole Kanawha Valley in the let's see what 18 61 and 62 Terry for both north and south join me in welcoming mr. Terry Lowry I'm old school why hope no idea how to do PowerPoint anyways thanks for coming out and I say before I start let's give a big hand of the guy who put this together Chuck right here all right that's the end of my presentation thank you for coming out no seriously I worked I worked for uh yeah at least a few weeks you know putting this together I was pretty confident with it but now came out today and now I found out that under turned everything around on me not going to tell you about my trip to Woodstock but to briefly cover that which I'm sure you'd really don't care about but yes I actually did go to the real Woodstock and as I used to tell people I left Saturday afternoon and during the cause of all the rain the crowd and the mess couldn't hear it the band couldn't get near the stage you know when you saw the movie the documentary it was pretty well glorified so as I used to tell everybody the movie was much better than the real thing no that's my lasting impression of Woodstock I didn't even get to stay Sunday and Monday morning to hear Jimi Hendrix but I did get to hear him later in Charleston so or actually before anyways and we'll talk today as briefly as possible about not just two years the war but they the whole war in the Kanawha Valley yes Chuck you messed that up and to tell about the whole war in the Kanawha Valley in less than an hour that would be an accomplishment in itself because the Kanawha Valley saw a lot of activity that people aren't aware and I still get people coming up all the time today you know say after I did the new book there was actually a civil war battle in Charleston and that's common it's I didn't know it for years so but when I heard about it and looked into a little deeper uh story needs to be told that's usually why will write the Civil War book that's usually one that nobody it hadn't been told and needs to be told that's what got me started with my first book on the bat scary Creek when I started that hardly anybody never heard of the scary Greek much less some battle at security Creek and now I get requests all the time and the books out of prints I can't do much about it well I think Steve may have some anyways the Kanawha Valley in the Civil War you're talking about oh the Kanawha Valley about approximately 90 miles from the headwaters to the mouth let me see if I can work this I remember Chuck's instruction here yeah I guess I got it back to school yeah but you just hold it I'll show you when to do it you know I'm turning 70 next month you know I'm too old to learn these things anyways here's a map basically the Kanawha Valley you know Kanawha River canal valley forms of the headwaters where the new number golly rivers merged to form the Kanawha River round canal falls all the way down into the mouth of Kanawha River Point Pleasant that's the contested area and even though the Confederate authorities didn't actually make this plea or a phrase at least not that we know of until the second year of the war their war call or war cry was defending the Kanawha Valley at all costs now why was the Kanawha Valley so important to them well not only important to the Confederacy is important to the Union Army as well for a number of reasons the main one was though the Salt Works in the Kanawha Valley even though salt was on the decline and Cole was kind of coming more into the picture salt was still quite prominent and salt was necessary for the preservation of meat and armies on the move usually had me or had cattle with them or something that's how they preserved their meat so if you wanted to take an army on the move you need a dassault not only for that but for other things as well and the salt works like for instance at Malden were very desired if you look later here's some of the artifacts I brought there's a little cup dish from one of the military camps and the lunch on the bottom was inscribed from Camp poh what was very near the molten-salt works and it's a salt dish that was made there by I'm assuming a soldier during the war at the camp so that was one of the main reasons the other reason being it was a direct communications and invasion route for either army you get in the Kanawha Valley and invade Richmond and if you're in the Union Army from Ohio and invade Richmond taking basically the old canal chambers and Kanawha River Turnpike which would be Route 60 today or you do it in Reverse if you're in Richmond you can invade the north up and end Ojai using the Kanawha Valley unfortunately for both armies what they didn't take into consideration of time I guess they didn't have topographical maps like we do today as much now they had an apparent apparently not as well because when these soldiers would later get into the mountain it's like between Gauley Bridge and Lewisburg like golly mountainsoul mountain what looked good on paper didn't turn out to be so good in reality when you're trying to fight and that kind of terrain and move big armies over big mountains so another reason was the mountain man in West Virginia or western Virginia was highly sought after by both armies so recruitment was important especially being Virginia and the south at least considered itself at the time because so many were well-trained or well schooled and riding horses shooting guns and so forth but what authorities didn't take into consideration was but they dealt with it is most West Virginia soldiers were not very well disciplined and they didn't like discipline so they were often hard to work with but they could fight and that was an important thing so there was some of your main reasons in the agricultural natural resources Kanawha Valley was loaded with those so crops to feed the men to feed the animals that traveled with the troops so there's some of your main reasons for the kunal being so important and when the war broke out this still being part of Virginia there were very many Virginia militia companies in the Kanawha Valley and of course being Virginia they all were pretty much slanted towards the south so just by nature or whatever you want to call it Kanawha Valley at the beginning of the war was occupied mostly by the Confederates or the Virginia militia so Chuck okay some of you might know this guy Chuck the runs running ahead of me said I really don't do this but somebody who may recognize this guy whose name was George S Patton now you've heard of the George S Patton in World War two his famous cold blood and guts patent well this is his grandfather same name same and he was from Richmond Virginia but in late 1850s he was a lawyer and he came to Charleston to practice law and helped to form a militia company called the Kanawha riflemen here in Charleston there's a monument to him right down here on Canal Boulevard in ruffler Park and a lot of them would not survive the war including happen but he was a VMI graduate very disciplined trained his men well so that was one of the better militia companies that would eventually become part of the Confederate Army in the Kanawha Valley all right Chuck and I forgot to tell in that last picture you might have saw a little cut there between his face and then looked like a painted on uniform that's because that picture came from the National Archives from the Patton family and as was often the case during the war when a soldier was killed before they'd ever had their picture taken with a uniform on the family or somebody else would paint a uniform on the civilian picture and that's where through the years the pain is cracked and so forth causing that we do have copies of this original picture and if Billy Joe Payton's here I'm not sure but at the Glenwood estate in their archives they have the original of him in his civilian the same picture but he's in a civilian outfit okay back to those and you may have heard that ZZ Top's coming to the Clay Center soon that's what I always think of when I see this guy but this is a Albert Gallatin Jenkins from Campbell County and he was a prominent for organizing eventually a cavalry regiments from West Virginia and he was also prominent in recruiting it just like Patton and he'd be involved in some of the early battles just like Patton here in the Kanawha Valley as well and both Patton and Jenkins neither one would survive the war I'm not gonna go into all the details on particular individuals cause many of you probably heard of them and there have been books written on many of them and I've only got so much time left and I don't want to tell anymore Woodstock stories anyways next another local character you probably seen this picture maybe John McCausland he was originally from San Luis but moved to West Virginia early and down in Mason County and went to the Buffalo Academy he died outbreak of the war he was part of the Rockbridge artillery but competitive authorities thought he'd do better here and helping into their recruitment effort so they sent him here to help Patton and Jenkins and other people to recruit more Confederate soldiers for Virginia and he's the one you always hear him called Tiger John McCausland but I found out later that no where no time during the war was he ever called Tiger that was the name that was given to him after the war apparently because I can't find any reference during the war that he's ever called Tiger John but he was called the unreconstructed rebel because they said he never surrendered and to his dying day and he lived on 1928 I believe and he became a general in the Confederate Army but a few years ago I did see on eBay a document for sale and I said it was the the surrender document signed by John McCausland so but it was more than I can afford so I don't was a real thing or not but maybe he actually didn't surrender I don't know but he helped us to a recruit as well and he recruited down in Putnam County mainly and he went to he attended the Buffalo Academy of Buffalo and the story goes that the Buffalo Academy which still stands that when the war broke out if you want to sign up in the Union Army Flor there you went too for that if you want to sign up on the other side you went to the other floor and I'm not buying that story at all well it's it that's the story that goes around and for all those who maybe want to go on this tour tomorrow you talk there and then Steve about that in a little bit my flow CAD amis one of the sites will sit go to ok another guy they sent here I guess they weren't satisfied with the first three so they got Christopher Q Tompkins had a long military history been in a Florida Seminole or the Mexican War and whatever he really wasn't from this area per se it's more from Richmond he was heavily involved in business and he had a summer home on gully mountain called golly mount where the old Hawks Nest Country Club used to that golf course and he was mainly involved in coming over here he was getting involved in the coal industry as well but because of his long military history they thought he would be one of the main guys to get over here and help out and so he came and he was very very skilled alright now for those who recognize this character you had to have somebody in charge of all of them so who did they pick they picked this guy general Henry a wise annex governor of Virginia and he was kind of a logical choice cause during his time as governor he'd shown a little favoritism towards the western Virginia as opposed to Eastern Virginia so they thought the people here would like him for that and so to give him credit considering in that day and age he was considered an old man he'd been sick and he got out of a sickbed and came here to command so but once he got here he was so suspicious of everybody they said before long he had almost everybody in Kanawha Valley in jail was traders or other her because he didn't trust anybody but he didn't get their army together brought his unwise legion with him got all these other groups which became the 22nd Virginia infantry the 36th Virginia infantry and ain't Virginia cavalry he set up a camp on the little Paige farm her estate in the little Paige house and still here over on the west side it's an old stone mansion I believe it's used for a business now I'm not sure what the business is again it's on the tour tomorrow too and so that they said he was something like erratic impulsive and unpredictable so they're high hopes of him being a great commander wasn't that didn't turn out that great but he did his best okay and there is an old picture of the little Paige stone mansion it looked probably in early nineteen hundred's okay now the Union side in 1861 this first campaign lasted from July to April 61 General Jacob D Cox Aloha not a lot of military training but a good good man so he was sent here because McClellan was busy with all these actions up in the North around rich mountain and so forth so Cox got the job of the Kanawha Valley clear the Kanawha Valley take the Kanawha Valley so he gathered together an army of mostly Ohio soldiers not entirely of high Kentucky Union soldiers develop the plan a three-pronged plan to come up the Kanawha River from Point Pleasant put some soldiers on a boat put some soldiers on both sides of the river and send another detail by way of the guy not mud river in another detail by way of Ripley have a three pronged movement coming into Charleston driver-wise out of the Kanawha Valley and so the Union Army would take possession it was a good plan okay and they were destined to meet at some point and one of those points would be first the barbers will actually just between me and Joe Geiger we know the real date the battle took place but you know yep talk to Joe about that and I'm not going to the bettors in July of 1861 and and Jenkins was in that fight but scary Creek in Putnam County at the mouth of scary Creek this is the old scary Creek Bridge not the one that was there during the war probably one they built right after the war looks like some of today's bridges in fact that some July 17th 1861 the Union Army of general Cox which was put under the command of Colonel John Lowe of the 12th Ohio infantry and the Confederate Army under the command of guessed new Patton met one on each side of the creek and had one of the first battles not be first but one of the first battles of the Civil War and obviously the baptism of fire almost all the soldiers involved I mean they call it a kind of a comedy of errors that went back and forth one person take the field and they get scared thinking reinforcements we're coming to the side so they had run off the field and the other one come over and take the field and go back and forth and of course there was a lot of fighting going on too and in the fight Patton was seriously wounded and captured Colonel Jesse Norton of the 21st Ohio I was wounded in captured and the lieutenant well to the canal artillery Confederate battery had his head blown off by a cannonball and he's buried up here in Spring Hill Cemetery on his grave markers has died in the defenses he's a native state July 17 1861 but eventually when Patton got wounded and Jenkins took over command on field and eventually Confederates took possession of the field and claimed the Confederate victories of the Confederates held on to this territory briefly while general Cox's main army remained around the area of polka or Raymond City biding their time and waiting on more men including these ones coming around brother the direction and by that time general wise who was still up at the little page he knew his best iguodala Kanawha Valley you know better run be able to fight another day so he was smart in that effect and he said let's just retreat back to Lewisburg and so the Confederate Army began to retreat I believe on July 24th and during the retreat the 22nd Virginia which was camped around where the old drive-in theater used to be down in st. Albans Camp Tompkins they called it boarded a boat called the Julia Moffitt steamboat and at about the mouth of Davis Creek down south Charleston a Union artillery battery caught up with them across the river and started shooting at them so the 22nd Virginia had to ram the boat on the other side of the river and then it varies this is what happened in whether a cannonball set it on fire or where they set it on fire themselves but they jumped off and ran off and joined the retreat and they say at least was 1930's maybe early 1940s during low water before you had all the dam system on the interstate and the dredging you could still see the remains of this boat sticking out in the river low water okay and there's the marker put a scary Creek by the Daughters of the Confederacy I cannot believe the early 1920s it's been moved from its original location across the creek to where it actually should be now okay and here's a don't call it a ticket a receipt from the Julia Moffatt the ship that went down telling you about that the 22nd Virginia was on I knew how to swim and skin dive and I thought the boat was still there I would go down and look for it because it probably have all that guns and weapons and everything else the 22nd Virginia had but I doubt us still there after all this time okay this is Colonel Jessie s Norton 221st oh hi who was also wounded and captured there and I'm just showing you him because he'll come up here again in a minute okay and wise took his army on out of the valley they escaped and went all the way over the mountains from gulley bridge to Lewisburg and by the time we got to lose Burgin weren't very many men and wise asked around to his officers were where's all your men it turned out when they left Charleston he furloughed most of them that the officers furloughed most cuz they wanted to go home say goodbye to their families so Weiss was missing a lot of men when he got to Lewisburg but eventually they came back most of them but my favorite quote out of that campaign was in Lewisburg according to a member of the 60th Virginia infantry I don't remember the exact words but something affected generalize it speaking on what about you retreat from the Kanawha Valley is it was not a retreat it was a retrograde movement soldier said well I don't know anything about retrogrades all I know is I did some time tall walking and that basically ended the first Kanawha Valley campaign that did not end up for 1861 though because his actions took place moved into the mountainous area between Gauley Bridge and Lewisburg for the rest of the year and you had fights that way even before I get to that once Cox took possession the Kanawha Valley of course they start setting up military camps one being camp piata where the DuPont plant is now and he had camp Norton after that Jesse Norton I showed you which was Charleston and then you had this one when this picture just turned up this year it was discovered the Kentucky Historical Society no it's hard to see but it's camp inyart named after an officer of the second Kentucky infantry which was in the Battle of barboursville and it was at the mouth of witcher's Creek this was a rare discovery this year when this turned up because there are no no one at least at this time pictures or photographs of camp Fiat Camp Norton any of these other camps but suddenly a picture turned up of campeón and y'all drawn by a soldier so that was at the mouth of witchers Creek but as I said action took into the mountains okay and who did they send from Richmond the work with wise not his best buddy that was for sure another ex governor Virginia General John B Floyd and these two ex-governors hated each other with a passion and they were supposed to work together and defeat Cox no I mean come on and I've heard one of the best presentations of this feud between these two by a hundred lesser if he ever gets it again go hear it because it was an ongoing thing and general Cox would even say later something the fact if I had had as much trouble now to either fluid or wise you know basically he just said they just made it so easy for me cuz they were always fighting amongst each other I think I said they each had their idea but the idea and why it's still part of the Kanawha Valley campaign is the whole concept was retake the Kanawha Valley gain back what was lost when wives retreated of course my staff there's an insult to cause Floyd said what I'm gonna take family back I don't care about you so didn't work out he delay okay federal commander they brought down from North General William s Rosecrans you know he had to plan the deal these people in the mountains area here and and ended up okay at you know where Summersville where a carnufex Ferry battlefield is the armies clashed at carnufex Ferry September 10th 1861 and of course that's a State Battlefield Park now and one of the soldiers in the Union Army at that battle was this man Colonel Rutherford behaves of the 23rd Ohio infantry he would later become president in the United States and that was a hard-fought battle a lot of casualties for a small battle and another man that was in that fight in the same regiment 223 infantry was lieutenant William McKinley who also would become prison the United States one day yeah so and as it turned out Floyd managed to hold off Florida was in command the carnufex very wise would not support him he went over to Hawkes and this and said I'll protect your rear flank and I'm gonna stay here and Floyd kept calling for reinforcements but why I was very slow and hasn't let this send him anything but there were some troops that were carnufex very Confederate troops they were so green when they got there that they said we don't have guns so fluid or somebody their commanding I was then throw rocks it's the enemy so that's what they did I don't know if he did any damage but but so we'd managed to hold off a much bigger well-trained army for the day but Floyd also realized during the day Rosecrans had figured out always weak points and he knew if he stayed another day Kranz would take the field so he treated it at night got his whole army out of there and across the Gauley River and mill the night without the Union Army even no and even though they could almost hear each other in fact one soldier did go up to rosecrans and say I think I heard that really you know I think I hear him retreating you know rosecrans reportedly said not that's just the sound of the Gallagher River you know the rapids and stuff so Floyd got away to fight another day unfortunately for him he got a reputation for that like and eventually he got moved to Fort Donelson Tennessee and you know what happened there he wasn't too popular after what happened there okay then it moved on to the Confederate Army when they retreated from carnufex Ferry retreated back to Lewisburg and Sol Mountain near raynelle Floyd went the metal Bluff or Lewisburg and wise went to a more advanced position called camp defiance on Sewell Mountain these guys were still arguing amongst each other before Floyd got sent away and so they had to call this guy down from the north where he'd been up fighting McClellan and so forth general robert e lee to try to come down and get these guys to work together or do something with them and he couldn't found out when they got here that wasn't gonna work either and but what he's known for two things when he was here during the Sol Mountain campaign which was late in 1861 like I said each army was holding a different mountaintop they could literally almost throw rocks like I said it each other just like carnufex but the terrain was so bad and the weather was so bad neither army could actually mount an attack on the other making better weather or something but the two things leaves knowing Ford during this time this is where he first started growing his beard once all mountain and west virginia and it's the first place he saw his horse traveler he didn't get him within but that's where he saw him and then he got him later so what ended this campaign is suddenly a rainstorm started and it flooded the Kanawha Valley the worst and it's ever been flooded ever and the water went clear from here clear back the hills back here up to the second floors of some houses in Charleston there's not been a flood like that sense and there were some houses at one time in Charleston you could go see the high-water marks on the lady down in Putnam County showed me one of those at one point so this rain kept on and kept wanting us washed out the supply lines Union Army couldn't get their supplies from Valley bridge Confederate Army couldn't get their supplies from metal Bluff or Lewisburg because the roads were so muddy and sloppy and everything was bogged down you'd walk on the road and sink to your knees in mud and just went on for about a week or so family when the weather started to clear a little bit leave put together a plan to attack but by that time rosecrans had decided to poison army out and go back to Charleston and so when Lee got up the next morning him to mount his attack there was no Union Army to attack so that was the great battle that never was because both armies were pretty massive at that time and if they had got into a fight that could have been something but Tim McKinney wrote a really good book on that's all Mountain campaign so you get a chance to pick up a copy of that okay here's a guy you just saw earlier about the Battle of Lewisburg Hef sometimes I call him Heath who knows and of course he was in charge after battle is where this is this he will come into play early in 62 because after the soil Mountain campaign Lee and all those people left the lease impt wise down to I think James Island or somewhere down south you kept playing here told Floyd you can keep the West Virginia troops and try to take the Kanawha Valley on your own but we're out of here so Floyd took what he had which wasn't a lot got up on the heights of cotton Hill which is a right across the river from Conley bridge and for about a week fired artillery on Gauley Bridge didn't do much damage this Union soldier said they just dodged the shells it's like a shooting gallery they didn't do any real damage and when the weather got better there they went over and drove them all cotton Hill and the Confederate Army went down to Dublin Virginia for the winter so that ended 1861 with Kanawha Valley 1862 F involved in battle Lewisburg because the objective was changed now the troops in the Kanawha Valley been told to go south and struck the Virginia and Tennessee Railroad the big connecting factor for the Confederacy between east and west of the southern states go down to destroy it you can't move troops and supplies and I don't think Richard mentioned that huh but I read a lot of sad stories and again who knows about battle Lewisburg and a lot of his men in stories after the war said the reason he lost a battle in Lewisburg was that he was drunk on the day of the battle I don't recall Richard mention on that or maybe I just missed it but he was basically replaced replaced by General William wing okay and there's William wing Laurie this is more one of the lesser-known photographs of him and in the Mexican War he was willing to try and take Mexico City and had an arm amputated I've told this story before how you know why he's having his arm amputated they considered the wound a Badge of Courage did not take anything than the moon and why the surgeons were cutting off his arm and sit there and joked with them and and had a good old time why his Army's been cut off he thought this was just great and I didn't know till I told that story one day at a lecture and Rick wolf told me that he'd been told that they took lowerings arm and buried it in the ground and pointed had the arm pointing like that to Mexico City like I'm gonna take Mexico City which they did so I don't harm still buried there or not do you know Rick yeah he became in charge now is his job to take the canal Valley for the salt and the other things I mentioned okay his opponent Colonel Joseph Andrew Jackson light burned up them ways from Pennsylvania but he moved here early in the Lewis County and real religious man he probably really didn't want a fight but yeah a little military experience not much he's a recruiting officer but he was a good man but when Cox took most of the troops in the Kanawha Valley to the Maryland campaign Antietam and South Mountain he left a smaller group here under light burned to protect the Kanawha Valley so light burn actually was given a almost impossible task to defend a large territory of horrible terrain against a possible invading army and it became more than just possible but he did his best okay and prior to luring invading the Kanawha Valley general Jenkins who would talk about earlier made a Calvary raid called the trans-allegheny raid from clear down there you know around Union in Monroe County up went across the mountains now all across and they had clashed it's all along the way places like Weston and Spencer and Ravenswood you name it nothing made you but some flash isn't some casualties and of course that the town of Spencer the Union officer gave up without a fight surrender yourself command once Jenkins said he had him surrounded which he didn't fit the whole story in itself too and Jenkins came down and got in around the area of Putnam County which made it clear alluring I can get an army in the rear of car or light burn and I can attack from the front no problem so next so obviously where it's going to be a clash where the first clash come with Loring's main army as he was moving up towards the Kanawha Valley on what was now the Denton the Giles and kunal Turnpike southern Turnpike turns off cotton he'll go south and that's where you maybe read in the paper lately about the bridge it can all Falls it's falling apart they would clash at Fayetteville and that was a really bloody fight and and it was a year to the day or whatever you saved from the Battle of carnufex Ferry and the worst regiment has suffered the worst here was the 34th Ohio Zouaves which were formed by Colonel Piatt that camp fiat was named after up here but Colonel cyber who was in command of the 37th of high held off Loring's entire basically entire but again likewise a year before with the Confederates he knew he had to get out of there and so he did and so began to retreat out of the Kanawha Valley and so they retreated from Fayetteville down the Gauley Bridge had some fighting there went down to Montgomery's Ferry which is not Montgomery West Virginia but it's up in that neck of the woods had a fight there got down near Camp beyod had a little fight there then they got the Charleston September 13th 1862 right where you sitting basically of course there was no Culture Center here then was the Union line stretcher here waiting on Loring commanding that Union line was Colonel Samuel Gilbert of the 44th oh hi and if that name rings a bell that's because you're state capital was built by his son Cass Gilbert so the Battle of Charleston started under his father and the forty-fourth oh hi you know it was the running battle between here and Elk River they had fights all along the way an elk river on the opposite side Loring I mean like burned made a stand and it was brief of light burn pretty much or he decided to leave and he set all the government buildings on fire in Charleston but it made such a big blaze and a few buildings caught on fire that shouldn't have that all the citizens of Charleston the ones who decided to stay and watch the battle going up here on the hill Spring Hill Cemetery and watching it it made such a big black smoke and everything they thought the whole town burned down so the next day or so in the Ohio papers the headline was like burn burns down the entire town of Charleston you know it's far from true it's only something like ten buildings or something but they made us stay in here pretty balanced and but it's pretty unorganized the fourth West Virginia some of them got cut off and had to take a back way which was good because just so happened to be they were from that area if they knew back woods trails that they could get out of here they didn't have to follow the main army but supply army training one of the longest ever you know went from here and then went down to where the little page house is then turned north to Ripley which fooled the Confederate Army as they thought they'd go downriver straight and then they went to rippling Ravenswood crossed the river and then came down that side of the river down to Gallup please Point Pleasant so they got out safely but not after losing a lot of men and that was a battle of Charlestown I'm not going to any more details on that either talked about that so much already besides I want you to buy the book and learn you know okay and just as that other one was a sketch reportedly by a soldier who we don't know an actual participant eyewitness drew the Fayetteville sketch supposedly this one - that's the Battle of Charleston there's you see those piers that's the bridge that went across the Elk River and those were there four years after the war although like burns army destroyed the rest of the bridge before they retreated that's what kept Loring from pursuing him and you see always dark stuff while we're here behind the hill that's actually the black smoke from the town and we just talked about and I'd seen this picture for years but I always seemed third fourth fifth and copies of it never had seen an original and usually someone was cut off luckily my friend hunter here that's put the Mansfield show came up to me a couple years ago it said guess what I found he found an original and I said I guess that's gonna cost me my entire bank account to get that from you he said no sale to you for what I got it and I said oh let's go finally worse but it wasn't so he can look past the way and which was great because that's first time we've seen an actual copy of it which I now have but anyway moving on while they were here some of the bands and officers and so forth had their pictures taken in Charleston this is a band of the 34th Ohio Piazza Zouaves in Charleston usually you'd see a picture like this of the 23rd Ohio which is very common but just in recent years this one of the 34th ohai showed up and they're all named on the paper you can't see it here but they're all named on the bottom and just like the one on the 23rd but the building behind them is one of the buildings that was burned you can actually see the damage on it during the Battle of Charleston I guess this was like picture day for your yearbook or something because every time you see a picture like this of a band or something they're all posing in the same spot I think it's the same day was just pictured you for do your book or something anyways that's 34th Ohio being in Charleston okay now here's something that plays into something else after the Battle of Charleston then there was another campaign to retake Charleston when Cox came back from the Antietam campaign Maryland campaign and eventually retook it without much in the way of combat a little but not a whole lot so Lori only held the Kanawha Valley for a little over a month but he accomplished his purpose there were various reasons for him he left because he was ordered to leave and it was a real controversial thing and they replaced him with General John Eccles John Eccles moved it back to Charleston but as ordered and set up camp all around the Glenwood estate over on the west side which is still here and which is on the tour tomorrow and judges George Summers who owned the Glenwood home after the war Echols would be a lawyer living in Staunton or Staunton Virginia and every pronounce it if you live there you don't and he was involved in some case where he needed a character witness to somebody say yeah he's a good guy so he wrote George Somers and said you know met you during the war was at your house yeah could you write me up a nice you know recommendation or whatever in judge Road bags you're crazier than hell you when you were here you burned all my rail fences you ate all my food you took all my cattle and livestock I said you left my state in ruins I said it would be a cold day in hell for our give you a recommendation so and there's a letter to that effect I might have emphasized a little bit at the Glenwood archives but but anyways once the Cox retook Charleston that would be the last time the Confederates made any serious threat on Charleston now they'd still make guerrilla raids and so forth see what the remainder of the war but nothing full scale but in 1863 you know they were still prepared so Hayes the McKinley and the members of the 23rd of hi to make sure things didn't happen again like they did in a battle of Charleston and also as he said just to kill time they built a earthen fortification up on Florida Hill up here which is still there there's part of them if you haven't seen it you really need to go see it one of the best-preserved simple reports you're gonna see it's owned by the city but it's really kind of hard to get there but once you're there it's not that bad but mine was fort scammin after a while the officers of 23rd so it never saw any activity in the war other than on the fourth of July they fired the cannons off and then reportedly one day some of the soldiers artillery man there I got got drunk and they decided to fire some cannonballs over at the little Paige house because that's where general Weis was in 61 not talking to one of the little Paige ancestors and they still had a cannon ball said this came out of the yard with a little Paige house okay now somebody was asking earlier about the two ladies supposedly who were shot as Confederate spies and buried up on a carriage trail going up to sunrise and I've looked into this a whole lot and this is what I can tell you nobody knows their names nobody even knows I've ever actually happened for certain yes there were two bodies excavated there at that spot and they were female and there was a soldier who was in the second West Virginia cab where he's dying days and the Delirium said oh yeah I remember that those are you know two Confederate women fast they were executed but there is nothing in documentation to back that up that's not to say it didn't happen but the people who were in charge in Charleston during all this time were very meticulous record keepers people like scammin and others I don't know preciseness and there's nothing in any of the reports I mentioned this at all so excuse people use now ease wheels the drumhead court-martial so it wasn't written down well anybody that either but I'm not saying it happen I'm not saying it did well I'm saying they dug up some people I'm just saying the story they're telling I'm not saying it right but were you there I did he give you a proof so like I said I'm not saying yes or no and you believe the Gazette I thought that was fake news nah no we're not going to hear like hunter said we're not going there anyways moving on the old notice this also during 1863 had a good little fight at Huracan bridge down in Putnam County and fuels here today with his book he's just released on this battle so if you get a chance by those Phil that's not writer and historian he's also like me a musician but he keeps telling me he's he's he's retired but I know as a musician he's just like okay another thing to be on the tour and Stevie tell you more about this is Winfield in 1864 Winfield Thurman's partisan Rangers made a raid on a detachment of the seventh West Virginia cavalry at Winfield and in that fight Thurman was killed and his body fell into the hands of the Union soldiers who won the skirmish your fight and this is the hog House which set nearby it's been moved a little bit from its original location and again you have one of these questionable stories that you know there's stories about the burial Thurman's body that are all post-war they're not wartime stories or although there is one soldier who talks about carrying his coffin and burying it but he doesn't specify exactly where but people kind of narrowed it down to one's area and said that's where he's buried now remember Winfield was occupied by soldiers both of Army's different times through the whole war and their soldiers are known to drop a lot of stuff they had some program a while back where some people got together and dug up what they thought was Thurman's grave and said that's Thurman and they buried him in a little plot off the side of his house it might be Thurman I don't know but I asked what what is your proof and they said well there were buttons you know every soldier not every but most soldiers had buttons I mean what's that prove but you know I can't say again I can't say it was it wasn't it's I wasn't there it's just like we were talking about their menu I wasn't there so anyway that's on the tour - that's in 1864 and there's your Buffalo Academy at Buffalo where McCausland went to school and it's still there that's an early picture of it and there's a church off to the side you can't see it all there but it's earlier than the Academy and it's still there - and still in use Academy is not in use but and the soldiers drilled all around this Academy particularly Union soldiers and I believe Stephen tell you more about in I can but pretty sure the 7th West Virginia cavalry known as a Virginia infantry at the time drilled around it and camped around so and there's the famous Red House at what Citadel Lenore red house alone but it's the Eleanor that's there today this is where in 18th February of 64 General EP scammin was captured by Confederate cavalry Raiders and taken of course the wings were not on the house at the time obviously it's a private residence today a doctor had her for a while today but it's still there in great shape still in use but it's privately owned so if you want to take a tour of the inside I guess you'd have to check and see who owns and see what they say but that's the Red House where general Scanlon was captured and then they put him on a you know I don't know how they got email here but anyways they got him out and supposedly this goes along with the prior speaker I was told through the years that in the basement of this house there's a bricked up wall in the basement and it was the entrance to a tunnel which led from this back to the Kanawha River and it was a tunnel used for the Underground Railroad of course how many stories you've heard of the Underground Railroad which are true and how many of you heard that are not true I don't know but and I've never been in it so I don't know for such a thing in there I've heard a lot of people mention that so if you happen to get inside the house see if you can check it out okay and there is the 8 West Virginia infantry later the 7th West Virginia cavalry Steve's favorite unit if you want to think about him drilling in the Buffalo area and this was a postcard kind of issued after the war but the picture was taken during the war and it was colorized well after the war as a souvenir and then make it sound like it's the West Virginia 7th West Virginia infantry which was nowhere in this area at the time but the way it's written at the top kind of gives that impression but it's not it's the 7th West Virginia cavalry or 8th West Virginia infantry okay and this you may have heard of the Battle of Buffalo or the battle atkinson's gate in 60 actually this goes back a little 62 back to the kunal campaign and this is when Cox was retaking the Kanawha Valley and a farm back at some farm just below Buffalo of course they had a gate on the farm and the 91st though hi I was coming up from Point Pleasant and got into a fight there with Jenkins cavalry and the fight started right at the gate Atkinson's gate so they called the battle Ekans gate and it was a running fight between there and actual a buffalo the 91st know how I won the fight but anticipated reinforcements didn't show up so they left to turn the back over ok this is a midnight scene of the soldiers camped in Charleston no that's just a real brief overview of things that happened in Charleston I mean there's so many sad stories I can I could go on til tomorrow but I don't you know I don't think you want to do that but I will say a couple of things that I always found really interesting happened in Charleston is you always hear about you know the famous Gatling gun when I was researching about the Kanawha campaign about old Charleston I found out there were some Confederate soldiers when they were occupying the area Loring's army they were camped on the old camp campgrounds because they had taken possession and some of the soldiers who were like called engineers or whatever mechanics I guess biding their time actually built a rapid-fire gun similar to a Gatling gun before the Gatling gun was ever made and their last name was wood and they were from Fayette County and they showed it to their commanding officer because I said just as great he said you know perfected a little bit but yeah I think just to work well but before they able to do that the Union Army came and drove him off so that his officer said throw it in the river we can't take it with us cuz let's go slow us down throw it in the Kanawha River because we got to retreat they threw down in Kanawha River and for years after that people looked into Kanawha River including family members trying to find that you know it turned out later they went these same soldiers went to double in Virginia and worked on it more and mr. Gatling who had not yet invented a gun came down here and saw it and said I'd like to go into business with you guys on this if you decided and they said yeah I guess I got to go to France first but when I get back you know well he went to France but when he came back those soldiers were gone and it was forgotten but suddenly a few years later mr. Gatling invented a Gatling gun it was almost like this same gun in the Kanawha Valley so again did they actually I mean there's 100% record they've worked on it there's no doubt about that so it's just one of the many stories and that I always find interesting the human interest stories like colonel gilbert who started the Battle of Chosin right here and whose son was the architect of the State Capitol here colonel Gilbert his man the 44th Ohio hated Charleston and call Valley with passion they didn't like it here at all they complained all through their letters and reports especially Colonel Gilbert saying I want to go somewhere where I can get famous cuz I'm not gonna get famous in the backwoods they hated West Virginia yeah didn't work out for him but there's all kinds of human interest stories like that and you find out more and more as you go I'm still finding out things those I'll look at something a diary or something I haven't seen before and suddenly there's a story about Charleston I hadn't seen when I was researching the book I'd seen one soldier's hand-drawn map with the Battle of Charleston been around for a while yeah I wrote out to California and said do you have anything on this because they had something else relating to Charleston he said well he got this soldiers letter he was in whatever regiment I said but there's no Maps or pictures or anything but if you want it we'll send the copy so they sent it to me opens up and looking at it that's pretty good he's talking about the Battle of Charleston in the narrative so I was holding it like this I'm a girlfriend Patti I think it's here I'm sitting right across from me and she goes what's that map on the back ma'am cuz I already looked at the back I didn't see it turn it over and sure enough there was a soldier the one who wrote the letter and draw a map for the Battle of Charleston which of course I put in the book now who would have thought that would have been out there in San Francisco or some here and some archive but you just never know what you'll turn up anyways that's basicly canola Valley and kind of a large nut shield but for the whole war it's best I can do I'm sad you got to hear about Woodstock - so any questions I do that what's gonna come up yes like a hunter said that he knew the reparations was coming up I knew that was coming up I don't know if you know Tim McKinnon Civil War historian from Fayette County I mean haven't been good friends for years number of years ago and I was working writing for the whispers and you hillbilly newspaper at the time call him on the Civil War in West Virginia and of course we'd heard this story just like everybody had for years you know the famous Confederate cannon on cotton hill we researched that thing we we went in person of course we took metal detectors and we went without metal detectors we did this we did that then we started looking at documents and things the troops who were there and we started looking into the men who started this the soldiers who first mentioned it and he didn't add up just didn't that up because I was supposed to be a brass Confederate cannon that they threw in the crevasse because they afraid of following the enemy hands well first of all a brass Confederate cannon would be a great desire Confederate Army it's not one they'd really want to leave behind and besides the Confederate Army that supposedly food in the crevice Loring's army they won the fight they took Charleston so cotton Hill was waving to the rear of their lines so why didn't they go back and get it and then we looked into the guy who actually started a story and it was an old New York newspaper it was a soldier thanks Virginia cavalry after the war he talked about it he was there and everything and he mentioned that but when they interviewed him there are also two other guys who was with him the war definitely finished they told the interviewer he said he's full of it that never happened you know so and there was all kinds of things that conflicted we looked Loring's artillery reports and he was very meticulous and stuff like that there was nothing mentioned about a cannon the loss during that campaign you know he was all accounted for so we came away thinking there's really not a cannon on cotton hill it's just the bigs but a nice one a fun one you know just like ghost stories or whatever you make like let superintendent up a true mountain told me I don't believe in ghost stories but they they bring in the tourists so Tim and I concluded probably it never happened but again we won't commit ourselves to say it definitely didn't happen because the day we do that he goes up there and finds it [Laughter] and thought of the head might be good [Music] yeah it's just like Melton had the famous lost cannon story the cannon was thrown on a swamp on droop Mountain color was broke down during the fight so they threw it in a swampy area and left it and that's where suppose he'll be today except a few years ago and and you you guys are Rick and you Smothers sure you know this I believe it's Marshall County at the courthouse right on the courthouse lawn they have the cannon from drupe mountain on display it was not lost to the swamp it says right on it you know taken by Colonel more than 2800 high which would be right you know so I guess I'm the mythbuster for the day I don't know anything about that really probably somebody here at the archive staff might know Joe or somebody play ask them last I heard they weren't doing I don't think the state turned over under ship back to somebody else [Music] at this point and it's all boarded up lands there's nobody right so don't plan on a tour of green bottoms although they were doing some archaeological studies everybody's they quit doing that too didn't there all the money okay well are you a relic hunter no I'm kidding yes and no it's highly developed altered most of the battlefield actually the land is basically the same but it's been built on there's even a rock and roll Club down there you know where bands play now and but there are spots here and there if you look around there's one little spot you can see the actual road men up at the hill and the Confederate side where lieutenant Welch was killed with artillery last time I was there now who knows but last time I was there you could you could see that and you can still see spots of woods and thing it's just little groupings you know but the Simms house and things where the Union troops are at basically that's all gone when I was writing the book on it was always still that remains of it we're still there back till well was still there almost stepped in it and went down in it because it was covered but so yes you know I just kind of figured when the railroads here they marry they did they took out a lot but there was still when I was writing the scary Creek book there was still a lot has not been built on yet because at that time I did take my metal detector back in the early 1980s and I did find not a great quantity of stuff but I did find some stuff but where I was looking at at that time there's just houses and things on it now or whatever but I will say this Patti and I my girlfriend we went down there about a week ago right there to intersection the tazed Road and County Road River Road was a restaurant that used to be there just reopens looks like an old train car or bus or something called the red red line or something excellent food try it out it's not simple it's not Civil War vintage but anything else yes it is last I heard it's owned by direct descendant and he has been fixing it up but the word is onyx Tevan with a tour group to mark and tell you more about that but he asked him if he's gone just make it a place to live or open it up to public to tour and he said a place to live it's not gonna be a where you can go and tour so but at least he's fixing it up because it was getting bad shape anything else well thank you and if you got your tickets and chucks right here what we'll do is well you get your number called come up here and you can take your pick [Applause]

Channel: wvarchivesandhistory

Views: 959

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: Terry Lowry, Civil War

Id: n-3GBjTuVvw

Length: 72min 5sec (4325 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 26 2019