A Unique Hell in Southwestern Virginia: Confederate Guerrillas and the Defense of the Virginia and Tennessee Railroad Nicholas A. Nowland Thesis submitted to the faculty of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts In History Paul D. Quigley, Chair A. Roger Ekirch Daniel B. Thorp 22 August, 2016 Blacksburg, Virginia Keywords: Civil War; Southwestern Virginia; Guerrillas; Partisan Rangers; Bushwhackers; Home Guards; Guerrilla Warfare Copyright 2016 by Nicholas A. Nowland ii A Unique Hell in Southwestern Virginia: Confederate Guerrillas and the Defense of the Virginia and Tennessee Railroad Nicholas A. Nowland ABSTRACT During the United States Civil War, southwestern Virginia was mired in a bloody guerrilla conflict that involved Confederate irregular combatants defending the region from invading or raiding Union Army forces. Simmering for the entirety of the war, this conflict revolved around the Virginia and Tennessee Railroad (V&T), a critical railway that ran through southwestern Virginia and connected the southwestern Confederacy with Richmond and the rest of Virginia. As the war progressed, this railway moved increasingly large amounts of foodstuffs and minerals vital to the Confederate war effort, and by the later stages of the war it was the most important railway in the South. Union Army commanders in West Virginia recognized the incredible importance of the V&T to the Confederacy, and launched a multitude of major and minor invasions and raids into southwestern Virginia with the intent of crippling the railroad. Confederate partisan rangers, bushwhackers, and home guards played separate roles in weakening, distracting, and hampering Union Army operations in southwestern Virginia, thereby helping to defend the V&T from attacks. Their actions played a crucial role in ensuring the survival of the railroad until nearly the end of the war, and thus Confederate guerrillas had a strategic effect on the course of the war in southwestern Virginia. iii A Unique Hell in Southwestern Virginia: Confederate Guerrillas and the Defense of the Virginia and Tennessee Railroad Nicholas A. Nowland GENERAL AUDIENCE ABSTRACT During the United States Civil War, Confederate guerrillas in southwestern Virginia played a critical role in the defense of the Virginia and Tennessee Railroad (V&T) in southwestern Virginia. The V&T ran from Bristol, Tennessee to Lynchburg, Virginia, and connected the fertile fields and mines of southwestern Virginia and the southwestern Confederacy with the rest of Virginia. The railroad proved to be one of the most critical transportation assets in the entire Confederacy, and thus it attracted the attention of Union armies in West Virginia who consistently tried to attack and cripple the railroad throughout the course of the war. Confederate guerrillas weakened, distracted, and hampered Union Army operations in southwestern Virginia, thereby helping to defend the V&T from assaults and enabling the railroad to survive until almost the very end of the conflict. iv Acknowledgements I would like to thank my thesis committee members for supporting me during this project and providing me critiques and guidance during their valuable summers. Furthermore, I extend my deepest thanks to Dr. Paul Quigley for serving as my academic advisor and thesis committee chair, and for providing me with constant guidance, critiques, and encouragement as I explored and wrote about Civil War guerrilla warfare. I am also grateful to all the faculty and staff in the History Department who helped me earn my master’s degree in one year, for it was only with their generous aid that I was able to make my compressed schedule work. The History Department and my fellow graduate students immediately made me feel at home at Virginia Tech, and for that I will always be thankful. I am additionally indebted to the library and archival staff at Virginia Tech’s Special Collections and the Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library at the University of Virginia. Finally, I would like to thank my family for their constant love, support, and prayers during this project, and the United States Air Force Academy History Department for sponsoring me to come to Virginia Tech’s Graduate School. v Table of Contents Acknowledgements ........................................................................................................... iv Introduction .........................................................................................................................1 Chapter 1-The Virginia & Tennessee Railroad: A Confederate Strategic Asset and Pull Factor for the Union Army ...............................................................................................21 Chapter II-The Forgotten Defenders: Confederate Guerrillas in Southwestern Virginia .40 Chapter III-A Never-Ending Battle: Guerrilla Warfare from the Union Army’s Perspective ........................................................................................................................81 Conclusion .......................................................................................................................115 Bibliography ....................................................................................................................118 vi The views expressed in this thesis are those of the author and do not reflect the official policy or position of the United States Air Force, Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government. 1 Introduction Driving through southwestern Virginia is a particularly delightful experience for motorists cruising down the region’s roads and highways. The area’s curving and climbing roads reward motorists with sweeping vistas of lush valley floors, thickly wooded mountain slopes, and hazy distant mountain ranges that seductively invite drivers to turn off onto a dirt road and search for a secluded corner of the Appalachian Mountains. However, the beautiful and peaceful landscape of southwestern Virginia masks a violent Civil War history as important as that of the oft-studied eastern areas of the state. Although Civil War historians have explored most every battle and skirmish that occurred during the bloody conflict, few scholars have written about the Civil War in southwestern Virginia. This is understandable, since no sixty-thousand man armies tramped through this region, engaging in titanic battles that continue to capture the imagination of readers today. Put simply, the Civil War in northern and eastern Virginia outshined the conflict in southwestern Virginia, stealing historians’ and popular audiences’ attentions. However, the mountains and valley of southwestern Virginia contained a brutal conflict that proved critical to the survival of Virginia during the Civil War. This was because an absolutely crucial railroad running from Bristol, Tennessee to Lynchburg, Virginia defined the conflict in the area.1 Named the Virginia and Tennessee Railroad (V&T), this railway proved to be one of the most important transportation assets in the entire Confederacy for two reasons. First, it connected Virginia with the southwestern Confederacy. Although the V&T ended at Bristol, other railroads continued from there 1 W.W. Blackford, “Map & profile of the Virginia & Tennessee Rail Road,” map, Library of Congress, 1856. 2 farther into Tennessee, linking states like Alabama and Missouri to Virginia.2 Second, the V&T also connected the productive fields, pastures, and mines of southwestern Virginia with Confederate forces and civilian populations throughout Virginia and the Upper South. Southwestern foodstuffs, livestock, and horses helped keep Confederate forces fed and fighting. The region’s productive salt, lead, niter, and coal mines also supplied critical raw materials to factories that kept Confederate armies supplied with ammunition, weapons, and salted rations. These mines depended on the V&T to move their products to customers and factories throughout the South. Southwestern Virginia’s mineral and agricultural wealth meant that the region rivaled the famous Shenandoah Valley, the “Breadbasket of the Confederacy,” in importance. As the war progressed, the Confederacy became increasingly dependent on the V&T, and southwestern Virginia’s mines. Advancing Union armies captured mines throughout the South, leaving southwestern Virginia as one of the largest producers of lead, salt, and niter in the entire Confederacy. The V&T became an indispensable support element of the Confederate war effort, even as the railroad’s materials and operators became increasingly worn-out. It is telling that President Abraham Lincoln himself once called the railroad the “gut of the Confederacy.”3 However, the ever increasing strategic importance of the V&T to the Confederacy acted as a “pull factor” for Union troops in southern West Virginia, drawing their attention and efforts to southwestern Virginia. Starting as early as 1861, Union commanders in West Virginia sought to push south and destroy the railroad. Although Confederate defenders stymied Union commanders’ early plans to invade deep into 2 Kenneth Noe, Southwest Virginia’s Railroad: Modernization and the Sectional Crisis (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1994), 111. 3 Ibid., 112. 3 southwestern Virginia, by 1863, Union officers were launching raids into the region with the goal of tearing-up the V&T’s tracks, burning its depots and bridges, and severing this productive region from the rest of the Confederacy.