| FEDERAL TROOPS FORAGING. |
On December 20th Gen. E. O. C. Ord, commanding a brigade, moved westward along the chain-bridge road, toward Dranesville, for the purpose of making a reconnoissance and gathering forage. Near Dranesville, when returning, he was attacked by a Confederate force consisting of five regiments of infantry and one of cavalry, with a battery. The attack came from the south and struck his right flank. Changing front so as to face the enemy, he found advantageous ground for receiving battle, and placed his artillery so as to enfilade the Centreville road on which the enemy's battery was posted. Leaving his cavalry in the shelter of a wooded hill, he got his infantry well in hand and moved steadily forward on the enemy. His guns were handled with skill, and soon exploded a Confederate caisson and drove off the battery. Then he made a bayonet charge, before which the Confederate infantry fled, leaving on the field their dead and wounded, and a large quantity of equipments. His loss was seven killed and sixty wounded. The Confederate loss was about a hundred.
That portion of Virginia west of the Alleghanies (now West Virginia) never was essentially a slaveholding region. The number of slaves held there was very small, as it always must be in a mountainous country; and the interests of the people, with their iron mines, their coal mines, and their forests of valuable timber, and their streams flowing into the Ohio, were allied much more closely with those of the free States than with those of the tide-water portion of their own State. When, therefore, at the beginning of the war, before the people of Virginia had voted on the question of adopting or rejecting the ordinance of secession as passed by their convention, troops from the cotton States were poured into that State to secure it for the Confederacy, they found no such welcome west of the mountains as east of them; and the task of driving them out from the valleys of the Kanawha and the Monongahela was easy in comparison with the work that lay before the National armies on the Potomac and the James. Major-Gen. George B. McClellan, then in his thirty-fifth year, crossed the Ohio with a small army in May, and won several victories that for the time cleared West Virginia of Confederate troops, gained him a vote of thanks in Congress, and made for him a sudden reputation, which resulted in his being called to the head of the army after the disaster at Bull Run. Some of the battles in West Virginia, including Philippi, Cheat River, and Rich Mountain, have already been described. An account of other minor engagements in that State is given in this chapter.
There were several small actions at Romney, in Virginia, the most considerable of which took place on October 26th. General Kelly, with twenty-five hundred men, marched on that place from the west, while Col. Thomas Johns, with seven hundred, approached it from the north. Five miles from Romney, Kelly drove in the Confederate outposts, and nearer the town he met the enemy drawn up in a commanding position, with a rifled twelve-pounder on a hill. They also had intrenchments commanding the bridge. After some artillery firing, Kelly's cavalry forded the river, while his infantry charged across the bridge, whereupon the Confederates retreated precipitately toward Winchester. Kelly captured four hundred prisoners, two hundred horses, three wagon-loads of new rifles, and a large lot of camp equipage. The losses in killed and wounded were small. In this action a Captain Butterfield, of an Ohio regiment, was mounted on an old team horse, which became unmanageable and persisted in getting in front of the field gun that had just been brought up. This embarrassed the gunners, who were ready and anxious to make a telling shot, and finally the captain shouted: "Never mind the old horse, boys. Blaze away!" The shot was then made, which drove off a Confederate battery; and a few minutes later, when the charge was ordered, the old horse, with his tail scorched, wheeled into line and participated in it.
At the same time when General McClellan was operating against the Confederate forces in the northern part of West Virginia, Gen. Jacob D. Cox commanded an expedition that marched from Guyandotte into the valley of the Great Kanawha. His first action was at Barboursville, which he captured. At Scarytown, on the river, a detachment of his Ohio troops, commanded by Colonel Lowe, was defeated by a Confederate force under Captain Patton, and lost nearly sixty men. Cox then marched on Charleston, which was held by a force under General Wise. But Wise retreated, crossed Gauley River and burned the bridge, and continued his flight to Lewisburg. Here he was superseded by General Floyd, who brought reinforcements. Floyd attacked the Seventh Ohio Regiment at Cross Lanes, and defeated it, inflicting a loss of about two hundred men. He then advanced to Carnifex Ferry, endeavoring to flank Cox's force, when General Rosecrans, with ten thousand men, came down from the northern part of the State. Floyd had a strong position on Gauley River, and Rosecrans sent forward a force to reconnoitre. The commander of this, General Benham, pushed it too boldly, and it developed into an engagement (September 10th), wherein he lost about two hundred men, including Colonel Lowe and other valuable officers. Rosecrans made preparations for giving battle in earnest next day; but in the night Floyd retreated, leaving a large portion of his baggage, and took a position thirty miles distant. Soon afterward General Lee arrived with another force and took command of all the Confederate troops, numbering now about twenty thousand, and then in turn Rosecrans retreated. On the way, Lee had made a reconnoissance of a position held by General Reynolds at Cheat Mountain (September 12th), and in the consequent skirmishing he lost about a hundred men, including Col. John A. Washington, of his staff, who was killed. Reynolds's loss was about the same, but Lee found his position too strong to be taken. Early in November, Lee was called to Eastern Virginia, and Rosecrans then planned an attack on Floyd; but it miscarried through failure of the flank movement, which was intrusted to General Benham. But Benham pursued the enemy for fifty miles, defeated the rear guard of cavalry, and killed its leader. On December 12th, General Milroy, who had succeeded General Reynolds, advanced against the Confederates at Buffalo Mountain; but his attack was badly managed, and failed. He was then attacked, in turn, but the enemy had no better success. Three or four hundred men were disabled in these engagements. On the last day of the year Milroy sent eight hundred men of the Twenty-fifth Ohio Regiment, under Major Webster, against a Confederate camp at Huntersville. They drove away the Confederates, burned six buildings filled with provisions, and returned without loss.
Through the natural impulses of a large majority of her people, and their material interests, aided by these military operations, small as they were in detail, West Virginia was by this time secured to the Union, and would probably have remained in it even if the war had terminated otherwise.
There never was any serious danger that Kentucky would secede, though her governor refused troops to the National Government and pretended to assume a position of neutrality. Such a position being essentially impossible, such of the young men of that State as believed in the institution of slavery went largely into the Confederate army, while a greater number entered the National service and were among its best soldiers. The Confederate Government was very loath to give up Kentucky, admitted a delegation of Kentucky secessionists to seats in its Congress, and made several attempts to invade the State and occupy it by armed force. The more important actions that were fought there are narrated elsewhere. A few of the minor ones must be mentioned here.
To protect the loyal mountaineers in the eastern part of the State, a fortified camp, called Camp Wild Cat, was established on the road leading to Cumberland Gap. It was at the top of a high cliff, overlooking the road, and was commanded by a heavily-wooded hill a few hundred yards distant. The force there was commanded by Gen. Albin Schoepff. A force of over seven thousand Confederates, commanded by General Zollicoffer, marched upon this camp and attacked it on the same day that the battle of Ball's Bluff was fought, October 21st. The camp had been held by but one Kentucky regiment; but on the approach of the enemy it was reinforced by the Fourteenth and Seventeenth Ohio, the Thirty-third Indiana, and Stannard's battery. After a fight with a battalion of Kentucky cavalry, the Confederate infantry charged up the hill and were met by a withering fire, which drove them back. They advanced again, getting within a few yards of the log breastwork, placed their caps on their bayonets and shouted that they were Union men. This gave them a chance to fire a volley at close range; but it was answered so immediately and so effectively that they broke and fled down the hill. Then the artillery was brought into play and hastened their flight, besides thwarting an attack that had been made by a detachment on the flank. In the afternoon the attempt was repeated, by two detachments directed simultaneously against the flanks of the position; but it was defeated in much the same way that the morning attack had been. Zollicoffer then drew off his forces, and that night their campfires could be seen far down the valley. The National loss was about thirty men, that of the Confederates was estimated at nearly three hundred.
Two days later there were sharp actions at West Liberty and Hodgesville. A regiment of infantry and a company of cavalry, with one gun, marched thirty-five miles between half-past two and half-past nine P.M., in constant rain, making several fords, one of which, across the Licking, was waist deep. The object was to drive the Confederates out of West Liberty and take possession of the town. In this they were successful, with but one man wounded. The Confederates lost twenty, and half a dozen Union men who had been held as prisoners were released. The greatest benefit resulting from the action was the confidence that it gave to the Unionists in that region. One correspondent wrote: "The people had been taught that the Union soldiers would be guilty of most awful atrocities. Several women made their appearance on Thursday, trembling with cold and fear, and said that they had remained in the woods all night after the fight. The poor creatures had been told that the Abolition troops rejoiced to kill Southern babies, and were in the habit of carrying little children about on their bayonets in the towns which they took; and this was actually believed." A detachment of the Sixth Indiana Regiment made a sudden attack on a Confederate camp near Hodgesville, and after a short, sharp fight drove off the enemy, killing or wounding eight of them, and captured many horses and wagons and a large quantity of powder.