The Battle of Summit Point, also known as Flowing Springs or Cameron's Depot, was an inconclusive battle of the American Civil War fought on August 21, 1864, near Summit Point, West Virginia.
The battle was part of Union Maj. Gen. Philip Sheridan's Shenandoah Valley Campaign, which took place between August and December 1864. While Sheridan concentrated his army near Charles Town, Confederate Lt. Gen. Jubal A. Early and Maj. Gen. Richard H. Anderson attacked the Union forces with converging columns on August 21. Anderson struck north against the Union cavalry at Summit Point. The Union forces fought effective delaying actions, withdrawing to near Halltown on the following day. The battle resulted in approximately 1,000 casualties.
The Civil War Trust (a division of the American Battlefield Trust) and its partners have acquired and preserved 455 acres (1.84 km2) of the battlefield.
The Battle at Summit Point Severe Fighting Our Losses The Retrograde Movement New York Times, August 21, 1864.
The American Civil War (1861–1865) was the deadliest conflict in American history, killing an estimated 620,000 to 750,000 soldiers and an unknown number of civilians. The Confederate States of America, formed by eleven seceding Southern states, faced the Union in four years of warfare across 23 states and territories. Major engagements included First and Second Bull Run, Antietam (the bloodiest single day in American history, September 17, 1862), Chancellorsville, Gettysburg (July 1–3, 1863), Vicksburg (surrendered July 4, 1863), and Sherman's March through Georgia and the Carolinas (1864–1865). President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, transforming the war's stated purpose to include the abolition of slavery and enabling the enlistment of approximately 180,000 Black men in the United States Colored Troops. Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865. The war resolved the question of secession and ended American slavery, though Reconstruction would face sustained resistance in its attempt to secure civil rights for formerly enslaved people.
This page covers Summit Point — Engagement (August 21 1864). A full Aubrey report for the area pulls together this battle alongside historic sites, land records, and everything else the record holds within a few miles:
Every location is different. Not every section appears for every place, only what the historical record actually holds turns up in a report.
Content adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Wikipedia source.
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