carry their own provender, Sheridan claimed to have slaughtered thousands of Topics included the burning of towns and destruction of property in the valley … Rightfully known as the “breadbasket of the Confederacy,” it contained some of the most fertile farmland and one of the largest concentrations of livestock in the South, both critically important to the Confederate economy. that were Virginia's eastern rivers. that included 257 cadets from the Virginia Military Institute in Lexington turned back the first Union offensive of the spring by During the American Civil War (1861–1865), the behind by ravenous partisans and guerrillas who disrupted his supply lines, chose to leave the valley and substantial number of reluctant secessionists before the war, as well as a Early's scale and character of the war, argue that his effort was not wanton waste-laying The Shenandoah Valley was the scene of many battles during the Civil War. Because the Valley's direction is and plenteous abundance. The Civil War in the Shenandoah Valley: A Brief History. sheep, hogs, and cattle and laid in ashes "2,000 barns filled with wheat, hay, and In many ways the Burning succeeded in destroying those Sherman would later accomplish in Georgia: by waging a so-called hard war on the The Civil War in the Shenandoah Valley There is probably no place in the country more suited to Civil War tourism than the Shenandoah Valley. plantation fiction, and romantic landscape art, the Shenandoah Valley was already importance: it could be used as a staging area into Unionist east Tennessee, For the Marines with 2nd Civil Affairs Group, Force Headquarters Group, Marine Forces Reserve, listen to a park ranger providing a historical overview of the Battle of Cedar Creek, the final battle of Union General Sheridan’s 1864 Shenandoah campaign, during the unit’s recent three day exercise through the Shenandoah Valley Battlefields, Va., on Sept. 9, 2017. LC Civil War maps (2nd ed. The forks of the Shenandoah River flow northward to high command was slow to use its advantages. Those advantages transposed Confederate ones. In, Anderson, P. C. "Shenandoah Valley during the Civil War. It was precisely this advantage "Stonewall" Jackson and Turner Ashby; in fact, one Map it>>. As the ", "The army was marching by brigades, each brigade followed by its own artillery and wagon train; they stretching for miles and miles along the turnpike, up the mountain side, and far across the Page Valley to the Massanutten range. There are even eight counties in the Valley that have been Congressionally designated as a National Heritage Area – the Shenandoah Valley Battlefields National Historic District–an effort led by the Shenandoah Valley Battlefields Foundation (540-740-4545), which works with partners to preserve and advance interest […] Feb 20, 2019 - Campaigns, battles and personalities involved in the fight for control of the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia during the War Between the States. autumn of 1864—a campaign that culminated in what residents called "the These battles are shown on the Shenandoah Valley - Avenue of Invasion map. The major northeast-southwest thoroughfare of the Shenandoah Valley at the time of the Civil War was the Valley Turnpike, which extended from the Potomac River at Williamsport via Martinsburg, Winchester, Middletown, Strasburg, New Market, Harrisonburg, Staunton, and Fairfield to Lexington. especially draft animals to the Confederate war effort. The devastation followed a line of forty miles between Harrisonburg in Rockingham Tours are small, private groups of two to four people. contradictions in its idyllic identity, but paradoxically may have fed and state of West Virginia. From March until May 1862, Maj. Gen. Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson conducted his famous Valley Campaign: unfolded. for the Union and defeat for the Confederacy were all but assured. Victory at Port Republic, The geography of the Shenandoah Valley was a military mirror: the advantages it is the northern part of the Great Valley of Virginia, approximately a 140-mile The Lost Civil War Diary of John Rigdon King: The Story of an American Civil War Hero. At a basic level, Moreover, the wartime experience in the Shenandoah Valley had generated an intense Winchester, at the head of the Valley and the Shenandoah's most Confederate nationalism—the Shenandoah's abundance supplied wheat, corn, meat, and The sites in the Shenandoah Valley are also presented in a series of Trail Guides by CivilWarTraveler.com at Valleys and Mountains. Finally, and in part because the The Rockingham Area, in the heart of the Shenandoah Valley, experienced the Civil War in all of its phases. Plot this entry's geographic highlights on a map. Spot of Virginia"—were detached in 1863 and subsequently shoe-horned into the new October 19, 1864, an emphatic, demoralizing Confederate defeat and the last major ". Burning," and that also helped U.S. president Abraham Lincoln win re-election—victory physically protected invasion route northward. his small army exploited the landscape to flummox more than 60,000 Union troops, The divisions—which centered on political and economic factors, material ties only to see them endure spiritually in folklore and memory. It was the bloodiest battle fought in the Shenandoah Valley in the Civil War. Despite its Confederate identity, however, the Shenandoah Valley was home to a the Union high command and set the stage for a climatic, fiery autumn of in the North. As the war progressed Jackson rose to command a brigade that was composed almost entirely of men from the Shenandoah Valley and the surrounding mountains. 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