Mount Joy

Mount Joy. Industrial Connections. On May 26, 1864, Union Gen, David Hunter marched south from Cedar Creek near Winchester to drive out Confederate forces, lay waste to the Shenandoah Valley, and destroy transportation facilities at Lynchburg. His raid was part of Gen. Ulysses S. Grant’s strategy to attack Confederates simultaneously throughout Virginia. After defeating Gen. William E. “Grumble” Jones at Piedmont on June 5, Hunter marched to Lexington, burned Virginia Military Institute, and headed to Lynchburg. There, on June 17-18, Gen. Jubal A. Early repulsed Hunter and pursued him to West Virginia. Early then turned north in July to threaten Washington., One of Gen. David Hunter’s objectives was to destroy iron furnaces near Buchanan, Eagle Rock, Fincastle, and Cloverdale. These sites produced pig iron and iron bars that were transported down the James River and Kanawha Canal to Richmond and Joseph R. Anderson’s Tredegar Iron Works, which transformed the raw materials into cannons and munitions., Because Anderson’s brother, Confederate congressman Col. John T. Anderson, owned Mount Joy, Hunter ordered it destroyed on June 15, but an officer burned only the barn and outbuildings. Looking back from the foot of the mountain, Hunter realized that the house had been spared and dispatched a troop of cavalrymen to carry out his orders. The Andersons were allowed one hour to remove their belongings before the mansion was burned. They may have hidden livestock behind the house on Staple Hill. In 1906, the present house here was built on part of the foundation., Ellen Glasgow, Pulitzer Prize-winning Virginia novelist, later featured Mount Joy in The Battle Ground. During the war, her mother, sent to Buchanan for safety, stayed with the Andersons during Hunter’s raid. She observed the seemingly endless blue line of cavalry, infantry, artillery, and wagons passing by here.