CHAPTER VI.

The Campaign in Western Virginia.-General Wise's Command.-Political Influences in Western Virginia.-The Affair of Scary Creek.-General Wise's Retreat to Lewisburg.-General Floyd's Brigade.-The Affair at Cross Lanes.-Movements on the Gauley. The Affair of Carnifax Ferry.-Disagreement between Generals Floyd and Wise.-The Tyrees.-A Patriotic Woman.-Movements in Northwestern Virginia.-General Lee.-The Enemy intrenched on Cheat Mountain.-General Rosecrans.-Failure of General Lee's Plan of Attack.-He removes to the Kanawha Region. The Opportunity of a Decisive Battle lost.-Retreat of Rosecrans.-General H. R. Jackson's Affair on the Greenbrier.-The Approach of Winter.-The Campaign in Western Virginia abandoned.-The Affair on the Alleghany.-General Floyd at Cotton Hill.-His masterly Retreat.-Review of the Campaign in Western Virginia.— Some of its Incidents.-Its Failure and unfortunate Results.-Other Movements in Virginia.-The Potomac Line.-The BATTLE OF LEESBURG.-Overweening Confidence of the South.

We must return here to the narrative of the campaign in Virginia. The campaign in the western portion of the State was scarcely more than a series of local adventures, compared with other events of the war. It was a failure from the beginning-owing to the improvidence of the government, the want of troops, the hostile character of the country itself, and a singular military policy, to which we shall have occasion hereafter to refer.

General Wise, of Virginia, was appointed a brigadier-general without an army. He rallied around him at Richmond a number of devoted friends, and explained to them his views and purposes. Cordially favoring his plans, they went into the country, and called upon the people to rally to the standard of General Wise, and enable him to prevent the approach of the enemy into the Kanawha Valley.

About the first of June, General Wise left Richmond for the western portion of the State, accompanied by a portion of his staff. At Lewisburg, he was joined by several companies raised and organized in that region. From this point, he proceeded to Charleston, in the Kanawha Valley, where he undertook, with his rare and characteristic enthusiasm, to rally the people to the support of the State. A number of them joined his command; but the masses continued apathetic, owing to a

number of adverse influences, prominent among which was the political position of George W. Summers, the most influential politician of Western Virginia, the leader of the "Union" men in the State Convention, and a prominent delegate to the Peace Conference at Washington.

This person threw the weight of his great influence in opposition to the uprising of the people. He advised them to a strict neutrality between the public enemy and the supporters of the Confederate government. Notwithstanding all the appeals made to his patriotism, he maintained an attitude of indifference, and, by reason of the high estimation in which he was generally held by the community in which he lived, as a wise and sagacious man, he succeeded in neutralizing the greater portion of Kanawha and the adjoining counties.

Despite, however, the obstacles in his way, General Wise succeeded in raising a brigade of two thousand five hundred infantry, seven hundred cavalry, and three battalions of artillery. Of this force, western Virginia furnished about threefifths and the east about two-fifths. On his arrival at Charleston, General Wise found C. G. Tompkins in command of a number of companies, chiefly from Kanawha and the adjacent counties. These forces, combined with those of the Wise Legion, amounted to about four thousand men.

General Wise, anxious to give an assurance of support, tothe strong Southern sentiment reported to exist in Gilmer and Calhoun, sent an expedition into those counties to repress the excesses of the Union men. In the mean time, the enemy had landed considerable forces at Parkersburg and Point Pleasant on the Ohio river, and had military possession of the neighboring country. His superior facilities for raising troops in the populous States of Ohio and Indiana, and his ample means of transportation by railroad through those States, and by the navigation of the Ohio and Kanawha rivers, enabled him, in a short space of time, to concentrate a large force, with adequate supplies and munitions of war, in the lower part of the Kanawha Valley.

About the middle of July, the enemy advanced up the river into the county of Putnam, and, on the 17th, Captain Patton (afterwards Colonel Patton), with a small force, met and repulsed three regiments of the enemy at Scary Creek, in Put

nam county, taking prisoners Cols. Norton and Villiers of the Ohio troops, and Cols. Woodroof and Neff of the Kentucky troops. The enemy retired, and our forces remained in possession of the field. On the evening of the day of the action, General Wise sent down two regiments under Colonels Tompkins and McCausland to reinforce the troops at Scary. Upon arriving at the opposite side of the river, they found that the enemy had fallen back to his main forces under the command of General Cox.

Being unprepared to hold the position, not having the adequate supplies of men and munitions of war, the Confederates fell back in the direction of Charleston. Capt. Patton had been dangerously wounded in the action, and could not be removed from the place. Col. Norton, one of the Federal officers captured, was also wounded. He and Capt. Patton were placed in the same house, Col. Norton entering into an arrangement by which Capt. Patton was to be released by the enemy in exchange for himself. Gen. Cox, on his arrival, repudiated the understanding. He, however, released Capt. Patton on parole as soon as he had partially recovered from his wound.

After the action of Scary, the enemy's forces, which had been largely increased, steadily advanced up the valley both by land and water. Gen. Wise, however, was ready to offer battle to the enemy, and was confident of his ability to repulse him. But just about this time the news of the disaster to Gen. Garnett's command at Rich Mountain reached the Kanawha Valley, and put a new aspect upon military operations in that section. The consequences of this disaster exposed the little army of Gen. Wise to imminent peril. He was in danger of being cut off in the rear by several roads from the north west, striking the Kanawha road at various points between Lewisburg and Gauley Bridge. Under these circumstances, Gen. Wise determined to fall back with his entire force to Lewisburg, a distance of one hundred miles. This he did in good order, destroying the bridges behind him, and reaching Lewisburg about the first of August. Remaining in that vicinity some ten days, laboriously engaged in organizing his brigade, and supplying it, as far as possible, with arms and the essential materials for an active campaign, he announced himself as again prepared to take up the line of advance.

About this time, General Floyd arrived at the Greenbrier White Sulphur Springs with a brigade of three regiments of infantry and a battalion of cavalry. He had been ordered, in the first instance, to proceed with his command to Jackson River, with a view to the relief of the retreating forces of Gen. Garnett; but, on his arrival at the Sweet Springs from Southampton, Virginia, Gen. Floyd's direction was changed by authority to the Kanawha Valley. After consultation between Generals Floyd and Wise in Greenbrier county, the former, who was the ranking officer, resumed his march westward, the latter following in a few days.

Gen. Floyd commenced to skirmish with the enemy's pickets at Tyree's, on the west side of the Sewell Mountain, driving them back to their command, five miles distant, with a loss of four killed and seven wounded. Upon his approach, the army retreated from Locust Lane to Hamilton's, near Hawk's Nest, Floyd's command advancing and occupying the camp of the Federals the next night. The Wise Legion also came up and occupied the same ground. The two commands then advanced to Dogwood Gap, where the road from Summersville intersects the turnpike from Lewisburg to Charleston. There two pieces of artillery were posted to keep open the line, and prevent a flanking movement from Cox's command via Carnifax Ferry, where there was reported to be a Federal force of several thousand. The main command then moved down to Pickett's Mills, near Hamilton's, within a few miles of the enemy's camp. At this point, information was obtained that the rear of the Confederates was threatened by Matthews' and Tyler's commands, which had occupied Carnifax Ferry (on the Gauley river), and Cross Lanes, a few miles distant therefrom. Gen. Floyd at once ordered his brigade to strike tents, and at halfpast one o'clock in the morning he took up the line of march, with the view of engaging the forces of his assailants, whose object was to cut off his trains and fall upon his rear.

Gen. Wise's command was left at Pickett's Mills to hold the turnpike, and prevent a flank movement from Hawk's Nest, where the main body of Cox's forces were stationed on New River, seven miles east of Gauley Bridge.

Floyd's brigade proceeded by a rapid march, and reached Carnifax Ferry about noon of the same day. On his arrival

there, he learned that the enemy had drawn in his commands at Cross Lanes and Carnifax Ferry, in anticipation of an attack at Hawk's Nest. Gen. Floyd proceeded at once to raise the boats which the enemy had sunk in the river at the ferry, and to construct other boats for crossing the river immediately, so as to occupy the strong positions which the enemy had held on the opposite side of the Gauley. In the short space of twentyfour hours, he had constructed a small batteau to carry some ten men, and had raised a ferry-boat capable of carrying fifty men and transporting his wagons, and had succeeded in ferrying over all of his infantry and two pieces of artillery. He then undertook to transport his cavalry, when an accident occurred which caused the loss of the ferry-boat and four men. The boat capsized and was drawn over the rapids. By this accident, Gen. Floyd's command was severed, most of his cavalry and four pieces of artillery being left on the eastern side of the stream, while his infantry and a small portion of his cavalry had reached the opposite shore. The stream had been so swollen by recent rains as to render ferrying extremely hazardous. Gen. Floyd, from the western side, ordered the quarter-master across the river to build boats on the other side, and to convey a message to Gen. Wise informing him of the condition of the command.

In twenty-four hours, a boat was built and launched from the west side of the river, and the remainder of the artillery and cavalry and such wagons as were needful were passed over. In the mean time, Gen. Floyd was engaged in strengthening his position. His scouts were thrown out in the direction of Gauley Bridge, by way of the Summersville and Gauley turnpike, and they reported the advance of the enemy in considerable strength from Gauley, in the direction of Cross Lanes. The next evening, the enemy had advanced to Cross Lanes, within two miles of Floyd's camp. The Federal officers had heard of the casualty at the ferry, and their “Union” friends in the neighboring country had reported to them that but two hundred of the infantry and cavalry had succeeded in crossing over.

Col. Tyler, who commanded the Federals, was confident of the capture of the whole force on the western side of the river. He was sadly disappointed. Gen. Floyd had drawn up his