Aug. 4-6, 1861 - Dawn Ambush on the Potomac; Albemarle & Chesapeake Canal opens to military vessels

Aug. 4-6, 1861

Dawn Ambush on the Potomac

Lovettsville, VA (Loudon County)

28th New York Infantry (Loudoun County Unionist Samuel Means)

vs.

Capt. William W. Mead's Loudoun Cavalry (Co. K, 6th Virginia Cavalry)

https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=223884

First Clash On Loudoun Soil

Dawn Ambush on the Potomac River Frontier

You are standing within the foundation of a shed used for a bunkhouse early in the war. In the spring and summer of 1861, twenty-one men of Capt. William W. Mead's Loudoun Cavalry (Co. K, 6th Virginia Cavalry) were posted here. The lane behind you which goes to McKimmey's Landing, then led to the Point of Rocks toll bridge over the Potomac River. Mead's men partly burned the bridge on June 9 on orders of Col. Thomas J. (later "Stonewall") Jackson, then kept their eyes on the Union troops on the Maryland side of the river.

On the evening of August 4, Loudoun County Unionist Samuel Means of Waterford guided sixty men of the 28th New York Infantry across the Potomac from Maryland below Berlin (present-day Brunswick). On reaching the Lovettsville Road, they turned east toward this outpost.

At dawn, Sgt. Boyd Barrett and Pvt. Cumberland George Orrison emerged from the shed to feed their horses. Barrett shouted, "There are the Yankees!" as the Federals charged across the field behind you. Barrett and Orrison dashed for the cover of Furnace Mountain just across the road to your right; however, Orrison was killed, and Barrett was wounded. He and thirteen others escaped, but the Federals captured six men, twenty horses, and two civilians at the bridge tollhouse.

The next day, the New Yorkers burned the tollhouse and bridge remains as Orrison was buried at nearby New Valley Church. The minister there intoned, "Every soldier that gives his life in this cause will go straight to heaven. George Orrison is in heaven today." The heaven-bound Orrison was the first man killed in Loudoun County in the war.

(Sidebar)

With crucial roadways, twelve fords, and four ferries across the Potomac River, Loudoun County was "the highway of the armies" during the war. Confederate Col. John S. Mosby's Partisan Rangers crossed here at McKimmey's Landing on July 4, 1864, during Confederate Gen. Jubal A. Early's campaign on Washington. Mosby's men cut telegraph wires and looted the Point of Rocks village in what became known as the Calico Raid. You can walk down to the water and see that the river is shallow here.

"Federals charged across the field behind you"

*    *    *

You know what else was happening in August of 1861? This whole other thing way down in North Carolina. And this is a convenient blog spot to discuss it, despite its importance at various at moments later in the war.

Aug. 1861

Albemarle & Chesapeake Canal opens to military vessels 

Coinjock, North Carolina, in Currituck County

https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=276264

Albemarle & Chesapeake Canal

Supply Route for Blue and Gray

Beginning in the 1820s, "canal fever" swept the country and Americans built dozens of canals to improve transportation. Some, such as the Albemarle & Chesapeake Canal that was completed in 1859, are still in use today. As constructed, this canal consisted of two "cuts," the 8.5-mile-long Virginia section between the Elizabeth and North Landing Rivers, and this 5.5-mile-long North Carolina cut that joined Currituck Sound with the North River. The completed canal allowed vessels to move from Norfolk all the way to the Albemarle and Pamlico Sounds.

Confederate ships transported supplies on the canal to build Forts Hatteras and Clark on the Outer Banks. Between August 1861 and January 1862 more than 200 military vessels passed through the canal. After the February 1862 Battle of Elizabeth City, the Confederates scuttled ships to block the North Carolina cut. The Federals, ironically, had the same idea to stall Confederate traffic. They sent five vessels to the North River towing ships to be sunk "to obstruct the Chesapeake and Albemarle Canal," only to find that the Confederates had already begun the tasks. After the Union occupation of Norfolk in May 1862, southeastern Virginia and northeastern North Carolina were largely in Federal hands, and the canal was reopened to Union patrol and supply vessels.

On February 9, 1864, U.S. Congressman George W. Julian (Indiana), a member on the Joint Committee on Conduct of the War, was on his way to Roanoke Island aboard the mail boat Fawn to investigate reports of sutlers price-gouging the soldiers to whom they sold goods. Confederates attacked the vessel near here, killed or wounded 7 people, and captured 29 passengers including Julian. They burned Fawn and soon released Julian, who continued to Roanoke Island.

At dusk on May 16, 1863, 30 Confederate partisans jumped from the nearby Coinjock bridge here onto the side-wheel steamer Arrow and captured the crew, then steered the vessel alongside the steamer Emily and captured it. The partisans continued flying the Stars and Stripes as they steamed past a Union gunboat up Albemarle Sound and the Chowan and Blackwater Rivers to Franklin, Va. The exploit made headlines in the North Carolina newspapers.

Elizabeth City and indiantown will have to wait, but I did enjoy visiting the Currituck County Courthouse [Summer 2025].