Second Winchester Marker: West Fort

I've stopped at the Virginia Farm Market on 522 before but a Civil War Trails marker has been added since I was there in 2004. (See my 2nd Winchester Field Trip pages for photos taken then.)

Excerpts from this sign:

Second Battle of Winchester
Louisiana Tigers Capture West Fort
— Gettysburg Campaign —

In June 1863, Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee marched his infantry from Culpeper County to the Shenandoah Valley to launch his second invasion of the North. First, however, he had to capture Winchester... which Union Gen. Robert H. Milroy and a 9,000 man garrison occupied... After heavy skirmishing on June 12-13, Milroy ordered his command into three fortifications: Fort Milroy, Star Fort, and West Fort.

West Fort, smallest of the three, is on the high ground to your distant front... Confederate Gen. Jubal A. Early, seeing that West Fort was vulnerable to attack from the west, marched three infantry brigades and Lt. Col. Hilary P. Jones’ 20-gun artillery battalion to the ridge on your right...

Four Union guns were knocked out, and Hays' men charged. The Ohioans fought stubbornly but soon abandoned their guns and fled toward Fort Milroy and Star Fort.

See HMDB for the complete text.

Related Book: Plagued By War: Winchester, Virginia During the Civil War by Jonathan Noyalas