Milroy's Camp

Milroy's Camp. Woodville. , Woodville's location about a day's march from Culpeper Court House encouraged both Union and Confederate forces to camp here frequently. They established many camps in the fields and hills around the town, and both sides in the conflict used the sites multiple times., The longest camp of the war in Woodville took place in July 1862, when Union Gen. Robert H. Milroy's Independent Brigade occupied it for a month. Milroy made his headquarters at Clover Hill (now Eldon Farms) a mile north. He participated in a mock battle here on July 31 with part of the Army of Virginia camped at Sperryville, five miles north. Milroy was a fierce Unionist, a staunch abolitionist, and a hater of West Point graduates, for whom he expressed boundless contempt. He rounded up more than 100 white residents and required them to take the oath of allegiance to the United States. He also reported that a large number of slaves fled to freedom at his camp; he hired many as wagoners, cooks, pioneers, and general laborers, "to do, in short, all the drudgery that would otherwise have to be done by the soldiers." A year later, his attitudes regarding Southern civilians, slaves, and professional soldiers intensified, leaving him with few supporters. His defeat at the Second Battle of Winchester effectively sidelined him for the remainder of the war. In a bit of irony, his defeat came at the hand of Confederate Gen. Richard S. Ewell, who had marched his men past this location en route to the northern Shenandoah Valley.,

"I am now camped in a beautiful rolling, hilly mountainous country. Large farms, mostly of clover and timothy, cattle being the chief business. Rich old farmers and large flocks of slaves. … All the [white] people are hot secessionists. … All the young men are in the rebel army and [those] at home are of course very bitter … and scowl upon us with black … looks." , Gen. Robert H. Milroy to Mary Milroy, July 14, 1862