Cloyd's Mountain

Background

In March 1864, Ulysses S. Grant took command of the entire Union military. His plan for Virginia called for striking Lee's Army of Northern Virginia, the strongest Confederate force, from several directions at once. While the Army of the Potomac pressed Lee head on, another Union column would move against him and against Richmond from the east. At the same time, Union forces in the western part of the state aimed to cripple the rail lines feeding Lee's army, chiefly the Virginia & Tennessee Railroad and the Virginia Central Railroad, both of which held more track inside Virginia than any other line. Damaging these routes was meant to pull Confederate troops westward to guard them, leaving fewer defenders around the capital.

Grant instructed Major General Franz Sigel to push south through the Shenandoah Valley toward Staunton, a town the Virginia Central passed through on its way to Richmond. Sigel set out from Martinsburg, West Virginia, on April 29 to begin his portion of the campaign. Brigadier General George Crook received orders to strike the Virginia & Tennessee line, including the span crossing the New River, then link up with Sigel near Staunton before

Prelude to Battle

Beyond dispatching Averell's horsemen toward Saltville, Crook devised further schemes to bewilder the Confederate command. He pushed the 5th West Virginia Infantry eastward on the Kanawha Turnpike in the direction of Lewisburg, with Blazer's Scouts out front. As the column tramped along, its band struck up music, and after dark enormous bonfires lit the sky. The ruse succeeded, convincing Confederate officers that a full division was bearing down on Lewisburg.

Crook set his principal column in motion on May 2, heading south toward Raleigh Court House, now Beckley. Bitter, wet conditions and felled trees blocking the roads made the trek grueling. Crook worked to keep the movement hidden. A modest cavalry detachment rode ahead, while videttes flanked the main body on both sides to keep bushwhackers and snipers at bay. As the men climbed through the mountains, burning timber threw up a screen of smoke that hid both the size and direction of Crook's advance.

Command of the Department of Western Virginia belonged to Confederate Major General John C. Breckinridge, who ran operations from his headquarters at Dublin along the Virginia & Tennessee Railroad. He had assumed this post earlier that year. Having once served as vice president under James Buchanan, he brought considerable military experience and skill to the role. His jurisdiction stretched across all of Virginia west of the Blue Ridge and south of Staunton, along with the southern reaches of West Virginia and eastern Tennessee. The territory was vast and mountainous, and he simply lacked sufficient manpower to defend it all. Foremost among his concerns were the salt mines at Saltville, the lead mines at Austinville, and the rail line itself.

On May 1, Lee alerted Breckinridge that Union forces under Averell appeared poised to strike either Staunton, vital to the Virginia Central Railroad, or the Virginia & Tennessee line. Lee wrongly assumed Staunton was the true objective and dismissed the westward movements as mere feints. Brigadier General John H. Morgan's brigade was pulled from eastern Tennessee and directed to report to Breckinridge. Acting on word that Saltville and the railroad were the actual Union targets, Breckinridge redistributed what few troops he had available.

A dispatch from Confederate president Jefferson Davis on May 4 instructed Breckinridge to coordinate with Lee and shield Staunton from Sigel's army, which was pushing south through the valley. In response, Breckinridge redirected the bulk of his forces toward Staunton, routing them through the Virginia Central Railroad's western terminus at Jackson River Depot. The 45th Virginia Infantry Regiment remained the exception, staying put at Saltville. This shift left the region between the New River and Saltville thinly defended, with Brigadier General Albert G. Jenkins holding only a scattered handful of troops.

McCausland's brigade departed Princeton on May 5, bound for Staunton. When Crook's infantry reached Princeton on May 6, they found only a small cavalry company rather than a full brigade, and it withdrew after putting up brief resistance. Crook's men seized the town, camped there for the night, and set out again at four the next morning. Two possible paths led toward the railroad. Suspecting the more direct one might be defended, Crook opted instead for a harder mountain route through Rocky Gap.

News that Princeton had fallen alarmed Confederate leaders, since the town guarded key roads west of the New River leading to the railroad, the salt works, and the lead mines. With just 200 men under his command, Jenkins grew increasingly anxious and asked Breckinridge to let McCausland's brigade stay with him a day or two more. On the evening of May 6, McCausland halted his men before they could board the train at Dublin, unloaded his artillery, and set up camp there instead.

Troops are positioned

On May 7, Jenkins relocated his command post from the Narrows to Dublin Depot, settling on a plan to catch Crook at Cloyd's Farm, a spot along the Dublin-Pearisburg Turnpike situated at the southern base of Cloyd's Mountain. Any Union column approaching from that direction would first have to make its way down

Battle

Crook directed Colonel White, who led the 2nd Brigade, to locate the right flank of Jenkins' line and press it hard. The plan called for all three Union brigades to strike together on the left, right, and center. White had been told to wait for a signal cannon, yet amid the ongoing artillery exchange he found it impossible to pick out that signal, so his assault went forward too soon. He sent the 14th West Virginia Infantry and the 12th Ohio Infantry against Jenkins' right flank. Both regiments were driven back after a fight lasting twenty to thirty minutes. Their error lay in stopping in open ground to trade fire with defenders sheltered behind fortifications. Colonel Daniel D. Johnson, who commanded the 14th West Virginia, later wrote that the Confederate infantry was so thoroughly shielded by a barricade of logs and fence rails that only muzzle flashes were visible, never the men firing them.

Watching the

Confederate retreat

McCausland pulled together the 36th Virginia, bolstered by survivors of other commands, to slow the Federal advance, with help from a single gun of the Ringgold Battery. Crook, in turn, pushed forward what little mounted cavalry he had available for the chase. That detachment, drawn from pieces of several regiments riding horses in poor shape, fell under Colonel John H. Oley.

The Federals had no idea that a body of troops from Morgan's command had reached Dublin by train just as the fighting was winding down. Colonel D. Howard Smith, leading these men, pushed at once toward Cloyd's farm. He had not gone far before running into McCausland and his withdrawing men. McCausland directed Smith to position his troopers along the roadside to screen the retreat, and for a time this checked the Federal advance. Roughly an hour later, however, Smith realized his men risked being outflanked, and he began pulling back gradually. By sunset that evening his force had linked up with McCausland's.

Thanks to this holding action, first by the 36th Virginia and then by Morgan's men, McCausland managed to pull out of Dublin altogether, shifting his troops, guns, and part of the town's stores some eight miles east to the bridge over the New River. On the western bank, the Botetourt Artillery stood ready to lend support, though it had taken no part in the fighting at Cloyd's farm. Unfinished earthworks stood on that side of the river, but McCausland judged that defending from there risked trapping his men against the water. He therefore ordered his command across to the eastern bank, a movement