Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: September 7, 2025
As a result of these two practices, Union combat reports throughout the war consistently credited Mosby with from three to five times his actual strength. In time, the entire economy of Mosby's Confederacy came to be geared to Mosby's operations, just as the inhabitants of seventeenth century Tortugas or Port Royal depended for their livelihood on the loot of the buccaneers.
Wyndham and Stoughton had found Mosby an annoying nuisance; their successors were finding him a serious menace. This attitude was not confined to the local level, but extended all the way to the top echelons. The word passed down, "Get Mosby!" and it was understood that the officer responsible for his elimination would find his military career made for him.
Condition of the Country Favorable for their Depredations. Our Picket Lines too Light. Attacks on Pickets at Herndon Station, Cub Run, and Frying-Pan Church. Miss Laura Ratcliffe, Mosby's Informant. Mosby at Fairfax Court House. Capture of General Stoughton. Fight at Chantilly. Mosby lauded by His Chiefs. Mosby beaten at Warrenton Junction.
Mosby, taking a command of five companies of cavalry and two mountain howitzers, numbering two hundred and fifty men, passed at night across the Blue Ridge, and fording the Shenandoah, halted a few miles below Berryville. Riding out to the turnpike, he discovered in his immediate front two large trains parked for the night one going toward the army loaded, the other returning empty.
Whatever Stuart might have had in mind in leaving him behind "to look after the loyal Confederate people," John Mosby had no intention of posting himself in Laura Ratcliffe's front yard as a guard of honor. He had a theory of guerrilla warfare which he wanted to test.
So, on Sunday, March 8, Mosby led thirty-nine men through the gap at Aldie, the largest force that had followed him to date. It was the sort of a foul night that he liked for raiding, with a drizzling rain falling upon melting snow.
There was nothing artificial or upstart about their beauty, but the venerableness of dignity. The Mosby place had been noted for its walnuts. "Tell 'em," Claybrook had said, "I'll give 'em a nickle a foot for those trees right there on the ground. That is, if they are hard up," he had added as if seeking to justify himself. She remembered the incident now with regret, a sort of complacent regret.
A lane ran down the slope of the hill between two such fences, and at the southern end of the slope another fence separated the meadows from a belt of woods, beyond which was the road from Dranesville, along which Flint's column was advancing. It was a nasty spot for Mosby.
Cole's Marylanders turned and gave chase, and Mosby led them toward the rendezvous with Jimmy Edmonds and the re-enforcements. Everybody arrived together, Mosby's party, the pursuers, and the re-enforcements, and a running fight ensued, with Cole's men running ahead.
Mosby reserved the right to select all of his officers, who were invariably chosen from those who had already demonstrated their fitness for this particular service. It has been said of a great military hero that the surest proof of his genius was his skill in finding out genius in others, and his promptness in calling it into action.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking