Valley campaigns of 1864

• 1. Introduction

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  The Valley campaigns of 1864 unfolded across the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia from May to October, involving a succession of Union and Confederate commanders whose fortunes rose and fell in dramatic reversals. The valley was not a sideshow. It was a critical artery supplying Confederate forces, a corridor that could threaten Washington itself, and a stage where the fate of a presidential election would partly be decided. How did a single stretch of Virginia become so consequential? And how did a Union general named Philip Sheridan ultimately tip the balance in a campaign that had stumbled through so many false starts?

• 2. Grant's Grand Design

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  Ulysses S. Grant arrived at the start of 1864 with a new rank, lieutenant general, and a new mandate: command of all Union armies. He chose to base himself with the Army of the Potomac, though Major General George G. Meade retained command of that army. Grant believed, along with Sherman and President Abraham Lincoln, that only the utter defeat of Confederate forces and their economic base would end the war. Scorched earth was not a last resort but a deliberate tool.

  His coordinated strategy struck the Confederacy from multiple directions at once. Major General Franz Sigel would invade the Shenandoah Valley and cut Lee's supply lines. Major General Benjamin Butler would move against Richmond alongside Grant and Meade. Major General William Tecumseh Sherman would push into Georgia and capture Atlanta. Major General Nathaniel P. Banks was assigned to take Mobile, Alabama, an important Gulf Coast port. The Valley was just one spoke in a wheel designed to crush the Confederacy simultaneously on every front.

• 3. Sigel's Failure and Hunter's Fire

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  Sigel marched into the Shenandoah with 10,000 men, bound for the Confederate railroad, hospital, and supply center at Lynchburg, Virginia. On the 15th of May he was intercepted near New Market by a force of roughly 4,000 troops, including cadets from the Virginia Military Institute, under Confederate Major General John C. Breckinridge. Sigel was beaten and fell back to Strasburg. His command passed to Major General David Hunter.

  Hunter proved more aggressive. He defeated William E. "Grumble" Jones at the Battle of Piedmont on June 5-6; Jones died in the fighting and Hunter occupied Staunton. Pressing south to Lexington on June 11, Hunter's forces burned the home of former Virginia Governor John Letcher, shelled and burned the Virginia Military Institute, and seized a statue of George Washington. VMI was forced to move its classes to the Richmond Alms House.

  Hunter joined General William Averell at Buchanan on June 14 and advanced to Liberty by June 15. Confederate Major General Breckinridge responded by sending Brigadier General John D. Imboden's cavalry to reinforce John McCausland, while Breckinridge himself reached Lynchburg on June 16. Confederate Major General Daniel Harvey Hill and Brigadier General Harry T. Hays constructed a defense line in the hills southwest of the city.

• 4. Early Takes the Offensive

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  Confederate General Jubal A. Early arrived in Lynchburg on June 17 at one in the afternoon. Hunter believed his forces were outnumbered and, short on supplies, retreated back through West Virginia. That retreat opened the door to one of the most audacious Confederate moves of the war.

  General Robert E. Lee, alarmed by the Union threat to his supply lines and railroad connections, sent Early's corps to sweep the Valley and, if possible, menace Washington directly. Lee hoped the threat to the capital would force Grant to pull troops away from the siege lines at Petersburg. Early had inherited the same operational territory where Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson had run his celebrated 1862 Valley campaign.

  Early moved quickly. He swept down the Valley unopposed, bypassed Harpers Ferry, crossed the Potomac into Maryland, and on July 9 defeated a smaller Union force under Lew Wallace near Frederick at the Battle of Monocacy. That defeat delayed Early's march enough for Union reinforcements to reach Washington's defenses. Early attacked Fort Stevens, on the northwest perimeter of Washington, on July 11-12, but failed to break through and withdrew back to Virginia. Grant dispatched a corps under Horatio G. Wright and additional troops under George Crook to pursue him.

• 5. Raids, Reprisals, and a Burning Town

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  Early's campaign after Fort Stevens became a series of thrusts and withdrawals across the Virginia-Maryland border. At Rutherford's Farm on July 20, a Union division routed a Confederate division under Stephen Dodson Ramseur. Early pulled his army south to Fisher's Hill near Strasburg.

  Wright, concluding that Early no longer posed a serious threat, began withdrawing his forces back toward Petersburg. Early attacked to delay that withdrawal at Second Kernstown on July 24, routing Union troops through the streets of Winchester. He then pursued north and burned Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, in deliberate retaliation for Hunter's earlier destruction in the Valley.

  At Moorefield on August 7, Confederate cavalry returning from the Chambersburg burning were surprised in the early morning and routed by Union cavalry. The action was small but pointed to a pattern: Early's forces were increasingly stretched, fatigued, and vulnerable to counterattack. Grant, watching from Petersburg, had seen enough of Hunter's failures to find a new commander.

• 6. Sheridan's Calculated Turn

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  Philip Sheridan, the cavalry commander of the Army of the Potomac, was given command of all Union forces in the region and named them the Army of the Shenandoah. His start was deliberately cautious. The presidential election of 1864 loomed, and any major disaster could threaten Lincoln's re-election. Sheridan spent August in careful maneuvering, fighting actions at Guard Hill on August 16, Summit Point on August 21, Smithfield Crossing in late August, and Berryville in early September.

  The intelligence that broke the stalemate came from a Quaker Unionist named Rebecca Wright. She told Sheridan that Early had dispersed his forces to raid the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad and had reduced his infantry and artillery near Winchester, a town that had changed hands 75 times during the war. Sheridan moved immediately. On September 19 he struck Early's camp at Opequon Creek just outside Winchester. The resulting battle, also called the Battle of Opequon, was the largest engagement of all three Valley campaigns. Early sustained ruinous casualties and fell back to Fisher's Hill.

• 7. The Valley Laid Bare

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  At Fisher's Hill on September 21-22, Sheridan launched a flanking attack in the early morning and routed Early's Confederates with moderate losses. Early retreated to Waynesboro, Virginia. The Valley now lay open.

  Sheridan moved south through it with deliberate destructiveness. His army burned crops, barns, mills, and factories to deny the Confederacy the means of feeding and supplying its armies in Virginia. The scorched earth campaign prefigured Sherman's March to the Sea in November. As Sheridan burned the Valley, Sherman's capture of Atlanta had already made Lincoln's re-election appear likely.

  On October 9 at Tom's Brook, Union cavalry routed two Confederate cavalry divisions as Early attempted to shadow Sheridan's movements. Then came Cedar Creek. On October 19, Early launched a surprise dawn attack and smashed two-thirds of Sheridan's army. His hungry, exhausted troops broke ranks to pillage the Union camp. Sheridan, riding from Winchester, rallied his shattered command and launched a devastating counterattack. The Confederates lost everything they had taken that morning. The Cedar Creek victory helped Lincoln win re-election.

• 8. Aftermath

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  With Early neutralized and the Valley's military economy destroyed, Sheridan rejoined Grant at Petersburg. Most of Early's remaining corps also made their way to Petersburg by December, while Early himself stayed in the Valley commanding a skeleton force.

  On the 2nd of March, 1865, Early was defeated at the Battle of Waynesboro. Lee removed him from command immediately afterward. The Confederate government and its people had lost confidence in him. The Valley campaigns that had opened with Sigel's stumble at New Market and wound through months of raids, retreats, and reprisals had ended with Early's reputation in ruins and the Confederacy's most vital supply corridor permanently in Union hands.