"Sheridan’s Swoop Up The Valley"

1864 Campaign

On September 26, 1864, The Courier-Journal in Louisville, Kentucky printed this summary of Union General Philip Sheridan's Campaign in the Shenandoah Valley. This campaign with numerous Union victories influenced the elections in northern states.

Monday, September 26, 1864.

Sheridan has changed the Shenandoah “Valley of Humiliation” into a theatre of glorious triumphs. It has been so often the scene of disaster under political Generals that these brilliant victories come upon the nation refreshingly and cheeringly. He has annihilated the old veteran corps of Stonewall Jackson, and sent Early in full retreat, broken and disorganized, toward Richmond, leaving the highroads encumbered with his dead and wounded and his fainting stragglers. He has opened the way to Staunton to Lynchburg, where he will cut Lee off from his only sources of supplies, which have been sent to the beleaguered rebel capital from the rich and fertile counties of southwestern Virginia. As a co-operating movement with Grant’s investment of Petersburg and Richmond, the value of Sheridan’s success cannot fail to be appreciated by all who follow the history of the war, and it must be of the utmost importance to carrying out of the plans of the Lieutenant-General, which look to the capture or annihilation of Lee’s army, the possession of Richmond, and the crushing out of the military power of rebellion. The Shenandoah valley has always been regarded as “the back door to Washington,” and so long as the rebels commanded it, the national capital was never safe from menace. Lee had sent the very last man he could spare to Early – the very flower of the Confederate army – and, if it is not utterly destroyed, it will be because the rebels are fleeter in retreat than Sheridan can be in pursuit. On Monday the first attack was made on the Opequan creek, between Darkeville and Bunker Hill, and the rebels were driven beyond Winchester, and on Tuesday, at 3 P.M., Sheridan followed them up to Strasburg; on Wednesday the rebels made a stand at fisher’s Mountain, beyond Strasburg, the key to the upper Shenandoah valley, from whence they were dislodged on Thursday, with the loss of sixteen guns many prisoners, though darkness saved the rest, and Sheridan continued the pursuit in the direction of Woodstock, which is Early’s principal depot for stores. Nothing could have been more complete than the success of this brilliant series of manoeuvres, and we have not yet heard the last of Sheridan’s swoop up the valley.