A REBEL ACCOUNT
IN CAMP, JACKSON’S DIVISION
VALLEY OF THE SHENANDOAH, MAY 27,
1862
•
We got to Front Royal, where we met the First
Maryland regiment, and after a fight and a charge,
we captured every man of them save fifteen. Our cavalry
then dashed ahead and took two hundred more
prisoners, to a little town between Front Royal and
Strasburg, on the railroad. In all we
took nine hundred prisoners at Front Royal,
including one colonel, one lieutenant colonel, one
major, two pieces of cannon; horses, arms, etc, in
abundance, and $300,000 worth of quartermaster and
commissary stores, also, two locomotives and three
passenger and fifty tonnage cars.
•
These facts are reliable, and you may rest
assured thereof, as I will write you nothing but
what I know to be true. We slept on
the bare ground that night, and the next morning,
very early, were off at a tangent for somewhere on
the Winchester road.
On our way to Middletown, the road was often
crowded with prisoners, wagons, and horses, which
our cavalry had captured, and were conveying to the
rear.
When last heard from we had fifteen hundred
prisoners at Front Royal. Banks, who
was at Strasburgh when he heard of our doings, cut
stick and broke for Winchester in hot haste; but we
cut his force in twain at Middletown, sending
Taylor’s brigade (Ewell’s division) after the
Strasburgh wing, who captured many of them and
demoralized the rest, and we hurried on swiftly
after Banks down the valley.
--Lynchburg Republican
Excerpt from: The
Rebellion Record, A Diary of American Events
Edited by Frank Moore
