Two West Virginias

"There was no denying the fact that West Virginia was largely the

creation of the Northern Panhandle and of counties along the

Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, which had supplied her officers and

funds for her public institutions."

Charles H. Ambler, "A History of West Virginia", 1933, pg. 357

It is unfortunate that Mr. Ambler didn't keep this sentiment in mind when he wrote of West Virginia in the Civil War, as most of his histories only concern the successes of the Wheeling government and the 16 counties of the northern panhandle and the B&O. The 32 other counties of West Virginia and their stories are largely ignored, except as obstructions on the high road to statehood. To illustrate the general truth of Mr. Ambler's remarks, this map might be helpful. The counties of Jefferson and Berkeley are missing from the map as they were not part of the state until the latter part of 1863.

Not only did the counties in yellow give the major portion of votes against secession on May 23, 1861, they also provided 70% of the votes in favor of Statehood on Oct 24, 1861.

In contrast, the total votes of the counties in blue on the Ordinance of Secession of May 23 actually shows a modest majority in favor of secession, 15,892 to 14,485. And in the Oct. 24 vote on statehood, only 5,187 votes were cast in the blue counties in favor, 14% of the electorate, not deducting the votes cast by Ohio soldiers.

It should also be remembered that while the secession vote was a generally hard-line vote, the anti-secession vote was not, and with the invasion of western Virginia much of it turned to support of Richmond. In counties such as Cabell, Wayne, Kanawha, Putnam and others, where the anti-secession vote was about 4-1 against, the recruitment of Confederate soldiers was about half the available men. (1)

The vote numbers I used come from Richard O. Curry's "A House Divided", Univ. of Pittsburgh Press, 1964.

(1)The soldier numbers come from James Carter Linger's "Confederate Military Units of West Virginia", as well as "The Civil War in Wayne County" by Jack L. Dickinson and "Torn Apart: How Cabell Countians Fought the Civil War" by Carrie Eldridge.

On August 23, 1861, the New York Times published an article wired from Clarksburg "From Our Own Correspondent", whom I believe to be newspaper editor James E. Wharton of Parkersburg, in which he writes- "I remark, however, that it is difficult to comprehend the reluctance of many of the Union Virginians to wage war against their rebel enemies, who evince for them the consideration which highwaymen display towards gentlemen. Many have been driven from their homes, and their property appropriated for rebel use, without so much as 'thank you', or Confederate scrip-equally worthless-being proferred in compensation. But propose arms to them, to assist in compelling restitution, and they disgust you with timid excuses. But there are gallant spirits, who joyfully accept loyal service-thus redeeming the people from the reproach of an indifference which patriotic soldiery are apt to construe into disloyalty. Indeed, the practical lukewarmness of so many able-bodied men, and their professed zeal for the Union, are almost inexplicably inconsistent. If one were to attempt an explanation of the subject, I do not perceive how he could avoid a conclusion not flattering to the courage of men who seem so desirous that the National cause shall prevail, and yet do so little to promote it. While the war appears to be degenerating into mere bush-fighting-a description of warfare for which mountaineers are peculiarly fitted-it is aggravating to the Army that the Western Virginians do not appropriate this part of operations to themselves."

One year later, on August 22, 1862, the Adjutant-General of the Restored Government of Virginia in Wheeling, Henry I. Samuels, wrote to Gov. Pierpoint about the prospects for raising more Union troops in West Virginia. This document gives us an idea of the actual state of things in west Virginia.

    "The Counties West of the Allegheny Mountains, from which men are to be raised, by volunteering or draft, are Hancock, Brooke, Ohio, Marshall, Wetzel, Tyler, Doddridge, Harrison, Marion, Monongalia, Taylor, Preston, Barbour, Upshur, Lewis, Pleasants, Wood, Ritchie, Jackson, Mason, Putnam and Kanawha. Some volunteers may be obtained outside of these limits, but to enforce a draft would be impractible. In fact, in several of the Counties I have named, a draft would be an operation of extreme difficulty, and attended with great delay, as the condition of things has been such that the loyal State Government has not yet succeeded in effecting a regular organization of Militia within those Counties.

    These twenty two Counties had, at the time the United States Census of 1860 was taken, a white population of 203,119. We may fairly estimate that one fifth of this population were Secessionists. The vote on the Secession Ordinance, in May last 1861, was about in that proportion. Many of the young men have since joined the rebel forces, and many have withdrawn to the Confederate States. The frequent inroads made, or threatened by guerrillas and maurauders, have driven many Union people into other states." (Ambler, Charles, Francis H. Pierpont: Union War Governor of Virginia and father of West Virginia, Univ. of North Caroline, 1937, pg. 419, note 36)

    Mr. Samuels makes here the same error historians make and that is presuming that an anti-secession vote is actually a "pro-Union" vote, or a vote for the Union above loyalty to Virginia. To demonstrate this, it is notable that he did not include the counties of Wayne and Cabell, which lie across the river from Ohio. These counties voted 3-1 and 4-1, respectively, against secession, but were in a state of anarchy, if not actual rebellion. If those votes had been seriously "pro-Union", Unionists would have easily quelled any rebel disturbances by their overwhelming numbers. Soldier numbers from these counties show that about half went to the Confederacy.

    What is most remarkable about Mr. Samuels statement is that it was issued 10 months after the vote for statehood. If conditions were this bad after such a length of time and the efforts of 20,000 Union soldiers, what were the conditions when they held the statehood vote? Mr. Samuels writes this letter 4 months after the public vote on the state constitution. That state constitution called for a new state of 50 counties, and yet they could barely count on 22 in which to recruit Union soldiers. Most of the 28 counties not named by Samuels had voted in favor of secession from the United States. In six of the counties he does name, about half of Marion, Lewis, Pleasants, Jackson and Harrison were secessionist, and Barbour had voted for the Ordinance of Secession. The fiction of West Virginia's "secession" from Virginia is very clearly revealed here. West Virginia did not "Secede from Secession".

    There are nuances in the supposed Unionism in West Virginia which historians have failed to address. First, of course, is conditional Unionism, second is the participation of West Virginians in the secession referendum, and finally, the fact that West Virginians were occupants in a state that had formally left the Union. Kentuckians did not have to deal either with a secession referendum or the actual secession of their state from the Union.

In "Creating a Confederate Kentucky, The Lost Cause and Civil War Memory in a Border State"( UNC Press, 2010, pg 116), Ann Elizabeth Marshall stated-

"In the Big Sandy Valley counties of Floyd, Johnson, Lawrence and Pike, which bordered what would become West Virginia, three times as many men enlisted in the Union army as in the Confederate."

Sharing that Big Sandy Valley on the Kentucky border are the West Virginia counties of Wayne, Logan, Wyoming and McDowell. The last three counties voted to secede from the Union along with the rest of Virginia, and of course gave the majority of its soldiers to the Confederacy. Wayne voted three to one against the ordinance. But when the war came, half of the soldiers in Wayne were Confederate. (Jack Dickinson, Wayne County in the Civil War, pg. 164). This is a map of the area from the 1861 slave map produced by the Federal government. The West Virginia counties had a few more slaves than the Kentucky counties, but not that much more to account for the differing loyalties in a region that shared more common qualities than differences.

When Gen. McClellan sent Orlando Poe on a fact finding mission through eastern Kentucky and western Virginia, he reported to McClellan that while the inhabitants of eastern Kentucky are eminently loyal, "the Western Virginians from the Kentucky line to Parkersburg are rotten, but loyal above the latter point." Mr. Poe's observations, though not quite accurate since Mason County was very Unionist, reveal many west Virginian's great attachment to Virginia over the Union.

By the end of 1861 the southern West Virginia counties along the Ohio River and the Big Sandy had become so uncontrollable that the Restored Government in Wheeling appealed to Abraham Lincoln on Dec. 3, 1861, to create a special department called The Department of the Big Sandy. Gov. Pierpoint's adjutant-general, H.J. Samuels, wrote-

"That the Virginians will lose their sectional prejudices when mingling with their Kentucky neighbors, and carry home to them that they are fighting their friends and associates and those allied to them by similar habits and feelings. That we can erect the civil government of West Virginia, when it is impossible to do so under existing state of things."

Gov. Pierpoint, Samuels, and Mr. Ralph Lute of Ohio wrote to Lincoln, saying-

"That part of the territory of Virginia watered by the Guyandotte and the Sandy Rivers is in a state of perfect anarchy, no one claiming to hold a civil office and a perfect terrorism paralyzes every effort to restore law and order in that region; and such will be the state of the country as long as the rebel chiefs (Jenkins and Clarkson) are permitted to remain in that region and make their periodic raids through the same at pleasure. The people are divided in sentiment, but would flock to that power that would inspire confidence that they would be protected. The people of Kentucky, on the waters of the Sandy, Little Sandy, and Tygarts Creek are mostly loyal, and have raised two entire regiments of men, now ready for service; and the people, in their manners, customs, habits, feelings, and prejudices much like the people in the region of Virginia referred to, and the same similarity in the geographical features of the country exists."

Pierpoint, Samuels and Mr. Lute appealed in vain. Cols. Albert Jenkins and John Clarkson had coordinated a raid on Union-held Guyandotte, in Cabell County, in November. Their men were not east Virginians, but were raised in the counties of Cabell, Wayne, Putnam, Boone, Logan and some from Mason. They were not bandits, but local men fighting for their homes and the state of Virginia. And worse was yet to come for Gov. Pierpoint, for men such as Jenkins and Clarkson were re-enforced by men like "Rebel Bill" Smith and Col. Vincent A. Witcher. Bill Smith even carried his raids beyond Appomattox. In late 1864 Witcher had almost an entirely new regiment raised in southern West Virginia.