Confederate Invasion

Confederate Invasion. Five Years Later …. , In June 1864, Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee sent Gen. Jubal A. Early's corps from the Richmond battlefield to the Shenandoah Valley to counter Union Gen. David Hunter's army. After driving Hunter into West Virginia, Early invaded Maryland to attack Washington, D.C., draw Union troops from Richmond, and release Confederate prisoners held at Point Lookout. On July 9, Early ordered Gen. Bradley T. Johnson's cavalry brigade eastward to free the prisoners. The next day, Johnson sent Maj. Harry Gilmer's regiment to raid the Baltimore area. Union Gen. Lew Wallace delayed Early at the Battle of Monocacy on July 9. Federal reinforcements soon strengthened the capital's defenses. Early attacked there near Fort Stevens on July 11-12 and then withdrew to the Shenandoah Valley with the Federals in pursuit. He stopped them at Cool Spring on July 17-18. Despite failing to take Washington or free prisoners, Early succeeded in diverting Federal resources., After abandoning his attempt to capture Harpers Ferry, Confederate Gen. Jubal A. Early and his army crossed the Potomac River a few miles north of here at Blackford's (Boteler's) Ford near Shepherdstown and spread out through the Maryland countryside. On July 6-8, 1864, the Confederates passed by this spot. Gen. John C. Breckenridge's troops were the first to arrive here. Breckinridge, a former vice president of the United States, had contended against Abraham Lincoln in 1860 for the presidency of the United States., Five years earlier, John Brown had come here to launch his invasion of the South and start a war against slavery. In July 1864, however, a Southern army led by slaveholders marched by here on route to attack Washington. Brown had predicted civil war after his scheme failed at Harpers Ferry. The man who captured Brown, Robert E. Lee, later severed his allegiance to the United States and became the most famous of Confederate generals. Early's invasion of Maryland was Lee's desperate effort to divert Federal attention from the Confederate capital at Richmond to the U.S. capital 65 miles southeast of here., [Captions:] , "It is our policy to draw the attention of the enemy to his own territory." , , Gen. Robert E. Lee, Long-range guns at nearby Maryland Heights shelled Early's men near here , From Dennis E. Frye, Harpers Ferry Under Fire (2012), U.S. Marines under Robert E. Lee storm the engine house at Harpers Ferry to capture John Brown on October 16, 1859. Lee subsequently sent Marines here to the Kennedy Farm to gather additional evidence concerning Brown's plot.