Banks's Camp

Banks's Camp. Lull between the Storms. , When Union Gen. Nathaniel P. Banks marched east into Rappahannock County through Chester Gap in July 1862, he and his 16,000 men were still reeling from recent defeats in the Shenandoah Valley. There, although Banks's command had bested Confederate Gen. Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson at the First Battle of Kernstown in March, the tide had turned against the Federals. Jackson routed Banks's forces at Front Royal and Winchester in May and then defeated two other Union armies at Cross Keys and Port Republic, Banks reoccupied the northern end of the Valley in June after Jackson departed for Richmond and the battles there.

Now, in July, Banks's force had been designated the 2nd Corps of Gen. John Pope's newly formed Union Army of Virginia. Banks and his men enjoyed a month-long respite from fighting while camped here. The nearby hills and the rolling open fields on the opposite side of present-day U.S. Route 211 afforded expansive views of the surrounding countryside and anchored defensive positions. The camp eventually stretched several miles eastward with lookout posts as far as Rock Mills, four miles to the south. Illness struck the men, as was usual in the large camps, and 500 cases of typhoid fever resulted in many deaths, particularly among Banks's New York and Pennsylvania troops.

On August 7, Banks and his corps marched to the Hazel River south of Woodville in the vanguard of Pope's army. Two days later, Banks again met defeat at Jackson's hands at the Battle of Cedar Mountain in Culpeper County.

Nathaniel Prentice Banks was born into poverty in Waltham, Massachusetts, in 1816. He worked in a cotton factory as a youth, gaining the nickname "Bobbin Boy Banks." A former factory worker, Mary T. Palmer, married him in 1847. Banks apprenticed as a mechanic, edited newspapers, read law, and was admitted to the bar at age 23. He quickly became well known as a public speaker with a distinctive voice that carried well in large crowds. Elected to the Massachusetts House of Representative in 1848, he served as a speaker from 1581 until he was elected in 1853 to the U.S. House of Representatives, where he became speaker in 1856. At first a Democrat, Banks was reelected as a Know-Nothing Party candidate in 1854, but soon joined the newly forming Republican Party. In 1856, he coordinated the Republican nomination of John C. Frémont for the presidency. Banks was elected governor of Massachusetts in 1858, and tried and failed to gain the Republican presidential nomination in 1860. President Abraham Lincoln appointed Banks a major general in 1861. His military career was less successful than his political career, notably his defeats at the hands of Stonewall Jackson and his leadership of the ill-fated Red River Campaign in 1864. Appointed commander of the Army of the Gulf, headquartered in New Orleans (1862-1864), Banks and his wife entertained lavishly to build new support for Lincoln's Louisiana reconstruction pans. Banks left the army in 1865 and was reelected to Congress (1865-1877; 1888-1890), where he helped secure the purchase of Alaska from Russia in 1867. He died in Waltham in 1894.