Rebels at the Gate: Lee and McClellan on the Front Line of a Nation Divided (11 page)

The Philippi covered bridge was a boon to transportation and a community landmark. Astonished youngsters who watched it take form later played around the veiled interior. Spying herds of cattle driven along the road to market, they would race inside the span, clamber up the broad wooden arches, and perch triumphantly while bawling animals crowded through below.
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But in the spring of 1861, there was a feeling of greater excitement. Young men who had once frolicked inside the Monarch now joined Confederate soldiers gathering in its shadow at Philippi. A “Palmetto” flag, raised in sympathy to South Carolina's departure from the Union, had flown over the courthouse since January. Philippi was proud of its reputation as “the strongest secession town in Western Virginia.”
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Taking Philippi as his headquarters, Colonel George Porterfield appealed for Confederate recruits. His broadsides pledged to shield the people from “invasion by foreign forces,” called on them to “Strike for your State! Strike for your liberties! Rally! Rally at once in defense of your mother!” But the colonel's pleas drew limited numbers—a ragtag gaggle of volunteers. Many of the recruits were mere boys. One company, the “Upshur Grays,” had just four members older than twenty-three years of age; their captain, John Higginbotham, was only eighteen.
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These young Confederates sorely lacked the tools of war. Most carried old flintlock or converted muskets; a few had no weapons at all. There was little ammunition, about five cartridges per man. Unable to equip two volunteer horse companies, Colonel Porterfield reluctantly sent them home. “The exaggerated idea went forth that an army was in our midst,” declared one Confederate at Philippi.
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An ordnance officer was detailed to scavenge for gunpowder. Lead pipe was pulled up and melted into bullets. The volunteers rolled homemade cartridges and cleaned rusty muskets. As wild-flowers bloomed and spring foliage filled the hillsides, a force of about six hundred infantry and one hundred seventy-five horse soldiers gathered at Philippi.
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The Confederates had few tents. Most lodged in the courthouse and dwellings around town. Meals were often taken with the citizens. “Philippi was a pandemonium,” recalled one soldier. “No order, our drill foolishness. The whole thing a holiday, full of disorder, uproar, speeches and intense excitement.” This sad state of affairs did not inspire confidence in Colonel Porterfield's ability to command. One soldier described him as “a polished Virginia gentleman, but as ignorant of war as a mule is of the Ten Commandments.”
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Porterfield's officers routinely took “French leave,” coming and going as they pleased. Captain Daniel Stofer, a corpulent Pocahontas County attorney, was known for speechmaking. One fine evening, Stofer led his “Pocahontas Rescues” onto the courthouse lawn and began to regale the crowd. Nattily dressed in a black, long-tailed coat, he was plum-faced and jovial: “Many a cup of good cheer had evidently been tendered him by patriotic hands.” In a booming voice, “Count” Stofer promised to thrash any Unionists who might be foolish enough to appear. “Gentlemen,” he exclaimed, “I could take a peach tree switch and whip all of Lincoln's 75,000 Yankees if they invade Virginia.”
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A peach tree switch was needed, for on the evening of June 1, trains bearing more than two thousand Indiana volunteers rolled into Grafton, less than a day's march from Philippi. At their head was Union General Thomas A. Morris, a stolid man, grave in countenance and demeanor. Morris was an able soldier, West Point class of 1834, modest and steady. Like McClellan, he had been a railroad president, called back as a brigadier general of Indiana volunteers. For most of his five decades, Morris had been an avid hunter. Now as the ranking officer in Western Virginia, he prepared to track down the Rebels.
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Morris arrived to find Colonel Kelley readying an attack on Philippi. Taking Kelley into a council of war, he embellished the plan as a two-pronged movement—adding the newly arrived regiments to entrap Porterfield's command. He also added the fickle element of timing.

On June 2, Colonel Kelley led two Federal columns against the enemy. Each consisted of about fifteen hundred men, traveling south on opposite banks of the Tygart Valley River. Kelley's column boarded an eastbound train at Grafton around 9 A.M., reportedly bound for Harpers Ferry. Just six miles out at Thornton, however, Kelley's First Virginia, the Ninth Indiana, and six companies of the Sixteenth Ohio Infantry left that train and marched for Philippi, twenty-two miles south on “a road but little traveled.”
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Colonel Ebenezer Dumont, sallow, dyspeptic, and rather eccentric, led the second column. Dumont's piping voice gave him a whimsical air, but he was a capable former Indiana legislator and Mexican War veteran. His march on the Beverly-Fairmont Road to Philippi would be just twelve miles, under cover of night. At 8:30 that evening, Dumont's Seventh Indiana Infantry took a train six miles west, left the cars at Webster, and joined five companies of the Fourteenth Ohio Infantry, six companies of the Sixth Indiana Infantry, and two guns of the First Ohio Light Artillery for the assault.

Dumont's orders were to engage the Rebels at dawn—just as Kelley cut off their southern retreat on the Beverly-Fairmont
Road. The two Federal columns were to arrive in Philippi at precisely 4 A.M. on June 3. If all went according to plan, Porterfield's Confederates wouldn't have a prayer.
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The Federals began their first march of the war. Drizzling rain soon turned into a downpour. The night was pitch black. Soldiers traced their progress by the steady flashes of lightning. The raging storm turned narrow country roads into slippery quagmires. Troops slogged over hill and vale, bent against the pounding rain.

An eerie red light glowed at the head of Colonel Dumont's column, emanating from a large ruby lantern carried by Lieutenant Benjamin Ricketts to guide the men. Ricketts had protested the order—that light would signal the enemy! He “didn't want a record in history as the first man killed.” But the Confederates in Philippi already knew that something was astir.
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Two young Fairmont lasses, Abbie Kerr and Mollie McLeod, had counted the number of soldier-filled railroad cars passing their town. Estimating that five thousand Federal troops were bound for Grafton, the beguiling pair rode at dawn on June 2 to warn Porterfield's Confederates. Their arrival sparked a sensation in Philippi. Citizens scurried about, piled belongings into wagons, and rode away in droves. Colonel Porterfield ordered his men to “be ready to move on a moment's notice.” He then called a council of war.
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Rain slammed against the windows at headquarters as Confederate officers expressed their desire to fall back. But Colonel Porterfield urged delay. He spoke of the thirty-mile march to Beverly through that withering storm—a punishing ordeal that would break down green troops and ruin meager supplies. It seemed best to wait out the tempest. No army would be out on such a night.

Colonel Porterfield chose to await the dawn. To avoid surprise, his cavalry would scout the approaches to Philippi. An officer of the day would post sentinels around the town. In the carnival atmosphere there, guard duty had been neglected in the past—the colonel himself had found sentinels asleep at their posts.

It so happened that Captain Stofer was officer of the day as Federal troops converged on Philippi. Unfortunately for the Confederates, Stofer must have been hard at the bottle. Around 9 P.M., a sentinel observed him weaving about, stammering, and highly animated. Nothing more was seen of him that night.
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Meanwhile, the sentinels kept watch in a drenching rain. Their ammunition, stuffed into wet coat pockets in lieu of cartridge boxes, was soon rendered useless. The rain poured down with a vengeance. As midnight approached, the sodden sentinels and cavalrymen left their posts for dry beds. “Hell,” exclaimed one Confederate as he took shelter, “any army marching tonight must be made up of a set of damned fools!”
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Out in raven darkness on the Beverly-Fairmont Road, Colonel Ebenezer Dumont scowled at his watch. The mud-spattered Federal column trailing him was behind schedule, nearly five miles from Philippi, with little more than an hour to make up the distance. Colonel Dumont gave orders to quicken the pace. Weary soldiers fainted and collapsed by the roadside.

Dumont had one comfort: leading his column was Frederick W. Lander, a man hungry for adventure. Lander was a thirty-nine-year-old Massachusetts native, robust, flamboyant, and absolutely fearless. His looks and temperament were that of a grizzly bear. Lander was a renowned transcontinental explorer. Among his many adventures was the Pacific Railroad Survey of 1853. When a young lieutenant named George McClellan declined to cross the snow-blanketed Cascade Mountains, Lander had forged ahead on his own. He later married British actress Jean Davenport, the Shirley Temple of her day.

Lander was a romantic poet—as happy lecturing on the fine arts as he was to duel with Bowie knives. When war came, his offer to serve McClellan “in any capacity, at any time, and for any duty” without rank or pay, was gladly accepted. Lander became a
volunteer
aide-de-camp
, holding only the honorary title of “Colonel” as he charged through the darkness toward Philippi.
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Colonel Kelley could have used Lander on his own march. Kelley's route was far longer than Dumont's, and despite leaving hours ahead, he too was behind schedule. Kelley's guide, a woodsman named Jacob Baker, led the column astray at a narrow crossroads east of Philippi. As Baker followed the right fork, Kelley—sensing treachery—ordered Colonel Robert Milroy's Ninth Indiana Infantry to take the left fork—one that presumably would come out on the Beverly-Fairmont Road south of Philippi, square across the Confederate line of escape.
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Meanwhile, Colonel Dumont's column was fast closing on Philippi. Less than two miles from town, the First Ohio Light Artillery wheeled to the front. Lander guided them to the crest of Talbott Hill, an eminence overlooking the sleepy village. Dense fog obscured the town as two bronze six-pounders were unlimbered and rolled into position. Now Lander waited for dawn, for Kelley's arrival, and for a shot signaling the artillery to open fire. Lander disliked waiting; it went against his very nature. He began to pace behind the guns, taunted by a row of white tents visible through the mist below.
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Ironically, a woman fired the first shot. As Colonel Dumont's infantry marched by a house on the way to Lander, their clatter awoke an elderly secessionist, Mrs. Thomas Humphreys. Mrs. Humphreys eyed the shiny brass “U.S.” buckles on their belts with great concern, for she had a son in Colonel Porterfield's army. Quickly saddling a horse, she placed her twelve-year-old boy Oliver aboard and sent him off to warn the Confederates. Dumont's men promptly pulled the youth from his mount. Mrs. Humphreys rushed from the house, throwing rocks and sticks until the soldiers released her child. She lifted Oliver back into the saddle, but they snatched him off again. Mrs. Humphreys drew a pistol from her bosom and fired.

That harmless shot caught Colonel Lander's attention. Still pacing along the brow of Talbott Hill, he impatiently watched the
break of dawn. The rain had eased. A veil of fog lifted from the valley below. The town of Philippi was now visible—the courthouse, the meandering river, the sturdy Monarch, and that beckoning row of tents. Where was Kelley? The hour to attack was past. Movement could be seen on the streets—the Rebels were beginning to stir.