Windsor's Crossroads

Windsor's Crossroads. Stoneman's Raiders Pass By. (Preface): , On March 24, 1865, Union Gen. George Stoneman led 6,000 cavalrymen from Tennessee into southwestern Virginia and western North Carolina to disrupt the Confederate supply line by destroying sections of the Virginia and Tennessee Railroad, the North Carolina Railroad, and the Piedmont Railroad. He struck at Boone on March 28, headed into Virginia on April 2, and returned to North Carolina a week later. Stoneman's Raid ended at Asheville on April 26, the day that Confederate Gen. Joseph E. Johnston surrendered to Union Gen. William T. Sherman near Durham. , ---- , Early in April, a detachment of Union Gen. George Stoneman's cavalry rode south from Jonesville to Hamptonville and passed through Windsor's Crossroads here. Alfred "Teen" Blackburn, then a slave, later recalled that the Union cavalrymen rode "three abreast" on the "narrow dirt road that runs a few feet in front of my house." He reported that the Federals burned "everything along the way," including the Buck Shoals Mill, located about two miles north of here. Local resident, Colvin J. Cowles wrote to his son on April 6 that Stoneman's men, after burning the mill, continued into Iredell County to burn the Eagle Mill. En route, they passed through Windsor's Crossroads., More than twenty Confederate veterans are buried in the Flat Rock Baptist Church cemetery, about four miles northeast of here. The church was founded in 1783 as Petty's Meetinghouse. Among those buried there are Yadkin County natives Capt. James West, killed in 1863 in the skirmish at Bond Schoolhouse, and Robert Duvall (1819-1863), who served as a lieutenant in in the U.S. Navy until 1859, and then as captain of a small Confederate steamer, the Beaufort. Duvall and Beaufort engaged USS Albatross on July 21, 1861, off the North Carolina coast near Cape Hatteras. Duvall claimed victory in this, among the earliest all-naval battles of the Civil War., Major funding for this project was provided by the North Carolina Department of Transportation Enhancement Program of the Federal transportation Efficiency Act for the 21st Century , ---- , (Sidebar 1): , John A. Hampton, the grandson on Hamptonville founder Henry Hampton, began practicing law in Wilkesboro in 1858. When war came, he volunteered in the Wilkes Valley Guards, which became part of the 1st Regiment North Carolina Infantry. He resigned because of bad health in September 1863, but later served as an officer in Yadkin County's 74th Regiment North Carolina Militia. He is buried in Flat Rock Church cemetery. , ---- , (Sidebar 2): , In January 1862, 18-year-old Alfred "Teen" Blackburn accompanied his [so-called] master, Pvt. John Augustus Blackburn, to Camp Mangum, a Confederate mustering ground. Pvt. Blackburn served in Co. F, 21st North Carolina Infantry, and Alfred Blackburn was his bodyguard, cook, and all-round helper (for which he later received a pension of $26.26 per month). His brother Wiley Blackburn was a body servant in Company B, 38th North Carolina Infantry. After the war, Alfred Blackburn worked as a mail carrier for sixty years, first on the route from Hamptonville to Jonesville and then from Hamptonville to Statesville. He died in 1951, believed to be the last surviving participant in the war in the state. He is buried at nearby Pleasant Hill Baptist Church in Iredell County.