Page News & Courier
Heritage and Heraldry
Jackson’s first efforts at burning the bridges of Page
County
Article of November 22, 2001
Nearly a month after the battle of Kernstown, Gen.
Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson’s command was situated
near Harrisonburg and was enroute to join Gen. Richard
S. Ewell’s division in the Elk Run Valley near
Conrad’s Store (present day Elkton). To better secure
this haven for reorganization, on April 19, 1862
Jackson dispatched his mapmaker, Jedediah Hotchkiss,
to burn the White House, Columbia and Red Bridges that
crossed the South Fork of the Shenandoah River in Page
County.
From the outset Hotchkiss’ chore was plagued with
problems. In addition to a heavy rain, a number of
the 150 cavalrymen that Hotchkiss had joined for the
assignment at Shenandoah Iron Works were under the
influence of “apple-jack.” Among these men were
Captain George Frederick Sheetz’s Hampshire Riflemen
of Co. F, 7th Va. Cavalry and Captain Macon Jordan’s
or Page County’s own Massanutten Rangers of Co. D.
Jordan had been one of Hotchkiss’ students from Mossy
Creek Academy in Augusta County.
After finding the men in a foundry, Hotchkiss recorded
making “a short halt for refreshments at Mr. Henry
Forrer’s” shortly thereafter.
As the mission continued ten miles to Red Bridge,
Lieutenant Mantaur’s squadron (not identified in the
roster of the 7th Va. Cavalry) was ordered, along with
Hotchkiss’ aid, S. Howell Brown, to remove the
planking and prepare to set fire to the stringers.
Hotchkiss continued on for six miles with Jordan’s and
Sheetz’s companies, likely along the River Road,
toward Honeyville, near Columbia Bridge. Sending a
scout ahead to reconnoiter, there was no immediate
evidence of Federals found at Columbia. Hearing this,
and about a mile from the bridge, Hotchkiss allowed
the men to feed their horses and “get out of the
deluge of rain.”
In the meantime, Hotchkiss went ahead and ordered
Sheetz and 50 men (another account lists only three
men) back to Columbia Bridge to burn it.
Additionally, he ordered 1st Lieutenant John Henry
Lionberger, of Jordan’s company, to proceed with a
squadron of sober men from Jordan’s company to the
White House Bridge near Luray and destroy that as
well.
At Columbia, Sheetz and his men “had put hay in the
mouth of it and set it on fire, when a column of the
enemy appeared and fired a volley and their dragoons
charged.” At once, Hotchkiss ordered the men to their
horses and told Jordan to front his men. Hotchkiss
then went forward to reconnoiter. Instead of
attending to his men, Jordan followed. When the
Federal cavalry came charging up and firing, Jordan’s
men “broke at once, except some 3 or 4, and a perfect
stampede of them took place, the enemy pursuing for 3
miles, every attempt to rally was unavailing, some
actually throwing away their guns, many their coats,
blankets &c, &c.”
The Federals continued to pursue Hotchkiss and the
remaining men for three miles, capturing only a few of
the Confederates. Hotchkiss made it to Red Bridge and
S. Howell Brown saw to its burning.
Meanwhile, at White House Bridge, Lionberger’s
squadron met a similar fate. As the Federals pressed
the squadron, Private Charles C. Wheat was killed,
earning the fate of the first killed in military
action in Page County. A boulder, erected sometime
after the war, stands on the South side of Rt. 211 (on
top of the hill near the Hamburg intersection) to mark
the spot of his death. He was buried in the
Wheat-Forrer-Kendrick Cemetery in Luray.
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