Gallery-Newspaper Articles

Interesting article from the Cleveland "Morning Leader", June 4, 1861, detailing secession sentiment in the Kanawha Valley following the Union invasion of May 26.Cleveland Morning Leader, June 4, 1861"South Western Virginia"...A gentleman of the highest respectability and intelligence was in the city yesterday, having been compelled for the sake of peace and safety to leave the region of the Great Kanawha, for his known Union sentiments and Yankee proclivities. He has lived at Charleston, the county seat of Kanawha county, which town is situated at the junction of Elk and Kanawha rivers, about sixty miles from the mouth of the latter at Mr. Pleasant, and about one hundred miles south east from Wheeling...The situation of affairs there at this time is peculiar. The county gave 1400 for Union the other day, and yet the Unionists are daily in danger of insult, and even personal injury. Outside of the town people, the greater part of the population are "poor whites", whose only ambition and interest is to be a good shot, to be able to drink down a pint of raw whiskey, and to have enough "hog and hominy" to eat. They are an impressionable class, who will follow any energetic leader, whichever side he may be on. The trouble now is that the Union men who have ability to lead the cause are now discouraged-or rather intimidated-by the influence surrounding them. There were at the time of the President's Proclamation, two good companies of militia in Charleston. These have both been mustered into State service, although a part of their members were Union men. The advance of the Ohio troops at Wheeling has exasperated the secessionists, and by means of the four hundred State troops now collected at Charleston, they keep the Union men under. One great dead weight upon all expression of approval of the course of the government is the State pride of which we have before spoken, and which disposes the possessor of the feeling to resent any real or fancied insult to the State. The common people, who are not well informed enough to know the plan of the administration, or to understand it if they did, are easily moved by this feeling, and under the influence of their leaders, are bitterly hostile to the presence of any foreign troops. This disaffection is by no means lessened by the fact that the blockade upon their ports upon the Ohio stops all provisions, &c, except whiskey, of which an unlimited amount is received and imbibed. And while under the influence of such stimulants, the secessionists are but too ready to enforce the State law making it treason to speak against the action of the Richmond Convention or the Legislature.

The prospect before the Union men here is very dark. They know that the Administration could do no less than it has done, and yet they fear the results in their section. They are not safe either in their property or lives, and anxiously await the development of the hour."

"Justice to West Virginia", Richmond Enquirer, January 13, 1863. Article written by a group of West Virginia military and political leadersexplaining the complicated issue of western Virginia, its loyalty to Virginia and the sacrifices and commitments made by its people.