Greenbrier River was a Civil War engagement fought in West Virginia, 1861. The outcome was inconclusive.
During the night of October 2-3, Brig. Gen. Joseph Reynolds with two brigades advanced from Cheat Mountain to reconnoiter the Confederate position at Camp Bartow on the Greenbrier River. Reynolds drove in the Confederate pickets and opened fire with his artillery. After sporadic fighting and an abortive attempt to turn his enemy's right flank, Reynolds withdrew to Cheat Mountain.
On October 3, 1861, Union and Confederate forces clashed in Pocahontas County, Virginia, in territory that would later become West Virginia, in an engagement known both as the Battle of Greenbrier River and the Battle of Camp Bartow. This clash formed part of the Western Virginia Campaign fought during the American Civil War.
Confederate forces set up Camp Bartow within the Cheat Mountain Area during the middle of September 1861. Familiarity with the terrain gave the Southern soldiers an edge, though illness had thinned their ranks considerably. According to Colonel William Taliaferro, his command had shrunk to just a third of its original size.
On the Union side, Brigadier General Joseph Reynolds held command over the forces stationed at Cheat Mountain and Tygart's Valley. His men's morale had risen after successfully turning back General William W. Loring's troops. Convinced he could crush the Confederates and open the mountain to a fast passage into Virginia, Reynolds pressed forward with confidence. Rain fell without pause for two full days, and the bitter cold cost both sides soldiers.
At midnight on October 2, 1861, Reynolds' men set out, reaching Greenbrier by dawn, some four miles shy of the Confederate encampment.
By 8 a.m. the Confederate guards had abandoned their positions, allowing Union forces to push into the camp itself. As firing broke out, the Confederates struggled to get their weapons functioning properly, and the overwhelming Union firepower drove them into open ground while they scrambled to make repairs.
Hearing the sound of gunfire, Colonel John Brown Baldwin, commanding the 52nd Virginia Infantry, rushed his entire command from camp to reinforce the beleaguered Confederates. Though they arrived believing the fight was already lost, the sight of these fresh troops prompted the Union side to keep up its assault, extending the clash roughly five more hours. Eventually Reynolds called for a withdrawal back to Cheat Mountain, bringing the engagement to a close.
When the fighting died down, commanders on both sides recognized the toll had been fairly light. Each side nonetheless tried to paint itself as the stronger force, inflating the other's casualties while claiming its own losses stood near 300 men. The true numbers, once tallied, told a different story: Union forces counted eight dead and thirty-five injured, while Confederate ranks suffered six killed, thirty-three wounded, and thirteen unaccounted for. In the end, Greenbrier River settled nothing, ending without a clear victor on either side.
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