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It was 1:30 P.M. and the temperature was
reaching eighty degrees when General Jackson and General
Richard S. Ewell with their staffs stopped in this
vicinity to prepare their men for battle.
With a company of the Sixth Virginia Cavalry, "Wise
Troop," in advance, Colonel Bradley T. Johnson's First
Maryland (CSA) deployed into line of battle, the Louisiana
Brigade filed in behind them. This would include the
colorful battalion of Major Chatham Roberdeau Wheat,
"Wheat's Tigers." The Sixth Louisiana was positioned in
immediate support. The Seventh, Eighth, and the Ninth
Louisiana regiments were ordered to the open fields to the
west of Gooney Manor Road. |
Belle Boyd ca.1890 wearing specially
designed (Belle’s design) brooch of Southern Cross of
Honor. Picture from the Book
Belle Boy in Camp and Prison.
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front of the columns, one-half miles south of town,
Jackson and Ewell surveyed the ground leading into Front
Royal. It was from this ridge that Henry Kyd Douglas
captured the attention of G. Campbell Brown, a member of
Ewell's staff. Brown focused his gaze on "a woman running
like mad down from the on our right...gesticulating wildly
to us. "Douglas, at Ewell's behest, rode down the hill to
meet "the romantic maiden" with a "tall, supple, graceful
figure" who called his name. Momentarily startled at
being recognized by the woman, Douglas' astonishment
evaporated when he saw the " well-known Belle Boyd whom
[he] had known from her earliest girlhood."
Winded and gasping Belle Boyd told her friend to advise
Jackson that the Federal forces inside Front Royal were
minimal: "Go back quick and tell him that the Yankee Force
is very small, one regiment of Maryland infantry...Tell
him I know, for I went through the camps and got it out of
an officer." "Tell him charge right down and he will catch
them all."...Four Valiant Years pg
147.
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Henry Kyd Douglas
“Stonewall” Jackson’s Staff
Acquaintance of Belle Boyd
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It is Kyd Douglas who recognizes the young woman running
across the fields as Belle Boyd. Kyd Douglas had made
Belle’s acquaintance in Martinsburg, Virginia previously.
“She was just the girl to dare to do this thing.” . . .Four Valiant Years, pg 147
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Belle Boyd Sign
Click here to read the sign |
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Next Stop 3 Prospect Hill
Cemetery
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