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by Kelly Cupp, Winchester Star
Early's army won a battlefield victory at Frederick, Md., on the Monocacy River banks and then marched to the defenses of Washington, D.C. Stymied, Early withdrew to the Valley where he won the Second Battle of Kernstown. He then settled down to guard the Lower Valley while his army enjoyed the bounty from the Valley's agricultural harvests. Early's ability to strike Union forces created newspaper headlines that were worrisome in the North. President Abraham Lincoln became nervous about his chances of reelection in the fall, says Joseph Whitehorne, a retired Army officer and professor at Lord Fairfax Community College. The months of marching and fighting and in May and June in the Shenandoah Valley and the Confederate lunge toward Washington and subsequent victory at Kernstown led to decisive action by Federal authorities in the Shenandoah Valley.
Early had become a thorn in the side of Lincoln and his supreme military commander Gen. Ulysses Grant. “Early was a fox. Early was a good commander,” says Brandon Beck, director of the McCormick Civil War Institute at Shenandoah University. Following his victory July 24 at Kernstown, Early dispatched troops north to destroy part of the Union's crucial supply line of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad at Martinsburg, W.Va. The Second Battle of Kernstown was the final straw on the proverbial camel's back that forced Grant to make a leadership change, Whitehorne said.
Grant recognized that command defects in the Valley and casualty lists from Union losses so near to Washington were hurting Lincoln's re-election bid. He decided to send a friend, Major Gen. Philip H. Sheridan, to the Valley. Grant's plan for Valley domination was two-fold, Whitehorne said. The economic viability of the Valley also had to be decimated to prevent Confederate forces from receiving any type of help. When Sheridan arrived on Aug. 7, he camped outside Harpers Ferry and started a cat-and-mouse game with Early, Beck said. During this time, Union forces poked and prodded to find soft spots in Early's command.” It was like two heavyweights sparring and tapping,” Whitehorne said of the tense time. Finally, Early decided Sheridan didn't pose much threat and sent troops south to help Robert E. Lee's forces defending Richmond. Sheridan discovered Confederate numbers were depleted and decided to take advantage, Beck says. Sheridan believed this was his opening to destroy Early's troops.
Sheridan's move set off a string of events that would decide once and for all who would dominate the Valley. Would Sheridan to complete Grant's plan and destroy the agricultural and military viability of the Valley, or would Early's fox-like cunning derail the Union's plans? Because Lincoln's reelection bid potentially hinged on the success of Sheridan's Valley campaign, would the political pressure be too much for Sheridan? Could Early, with depleted forces remain dominant in the Valley and push Sheridan farther north, while mounting more and deadlier raids on Union troops? As summer faded to fall in 1864, these questions would be answered — first at Winchester and then at the ridgeline of Fisher's Hill, in the rich agricultural land of the Upper Valley, at Tom's Brook, and, finally, at Cedar Creek. |
Confederate forces under Gen. Jubal Early's command enjoyed relative dominance in the Valley in the early summer of 1864. After the engagement at Lynchburg, Federal forces under Gen. David Hunter retreated west into the mountains and left the Valley open to Early.