Summary:
Confederate General Henry R. Jackson writes to Major Michael Harman in October,
1861, to request that a regiment remain in Staunton to guard against a Union
advance in western Virginia.
Maj. HARMAN:
GREENBRIER,
October 20, 1861.
MAJ.:
I have good reason to fear that a body of the enemy are making their way, by the direction of the Seneca route, towards Monterey. They may do us vast injury, unless we can meet them. They are plundering and devastating the country as they come.
Is it possible, I would ask, that the Fifty-eighth Virginia Regt., or any portion of it, will consent, under such circumstances, to remain in Staunton? I am lost in astonishment when I realize it. We are here in the immediate presence of a largely superior force. I cannot spare a man to go back, and yet this command, which could have rendered us so much service, and which I designed for this very duty, and which, had it moved, might have prevented, by its mere presence, this foray of the enemy, lingers in Staunton.
Scarcely a day passes that we are not skirmishing with the enemy here, and our presence here is absolutely necessary at this time to the protection of both lines. For our country's sake, induce this regiment to move, and to move quickly.
I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant,
H. R. JACKSON,
Brig.-Gen., &c.
Bibliographic Information : Letter Reproduced from The War of The Rebellion: Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series 1, Volume 5, Serial No. 5, Pages 912, Broadfoot Publishing Company, Wilmington, NC, 1997.
