Robert E. Lee’s Railroad Gun

   The War brought some emerging technology to the forefront, innovations like repeating rifles and ironclad ships. The railroad was used to funnel troops and supplies, and then the wounded from battlefields to hospitals in cities. One of the new technologies was the use of armored railroad cars bearing large cannons.

(Library of Congress)

   Rumors filtered into Army of Northern Virginia command in early June 1862 that the Federal army was building a mobile battery to operate on the railroad. Due to their close proximity to Richmond, Lee believed that the only way that the enemy could get large cannons close to the Confederate capital was to use the York River Railroad.[1] On June 5, Robert E. Lee, who just three days prior had been assigned command of the principal Confederate army in Virginia, wrote Maj. W.H. Stevens, his chief engineer, concerning the vulnerability of the railroad. If the Federals constructed “a railroad battery, probably plated with iron,” they could “sweep the country.” While a fixed battery could be constructed, Lee wanted Stevens to explore the idea of their own “railroad battery…plated and protected with a heavy gun.”[2]

   That same day Lee wrote to Col. J. Gorgas, chief of the Ordnance Department: “Is there a possibility of constructing an iron-plated battery mounting a heavy gun, on trucks, the whole covered with iron, to move along the York River Railroad?” Lee asked. He told Gorgas to inquire with the Navy Department. Lee also mentioned using mortars on the railroad as well.[3]

   A third note went out from Lee that day to Capt. George Minor, Chief of Ordnance and Hydrography. “I am very anxious to have a railroad battery,” Lee wrote, mentioning he had written Gorgas and Confederate naval Lt. John M. Brooke on the subject. “Till something better could be accomplished I proposed a Dahlgren or Columbiad, on a ship’s carriage, on a railroad flat, with one of your navy iron aprons adjusted to it to protect gun and men. “If I could get it in position by daylight to-morrow I could astonish our neighbors.”[4]

   Lee did not get his cannon until June 24. The design was one by Brooke, who also designed both cannons and armament for the CSS Virginia. Minor reported that a rifled and banded 32-pounder had been mounted on a railcar, and supplied with 200 rounds of ammunition, including 15-inch solid bolts, all under the command of Lt. R.D. Minor, C.S. Navy.[5]

   The cannon was used at least once during the Seven Days campaign, during the battle of Savage Station. Private Robert K. Sneden, 40^th New York, wrote that during a lull in the battle, “a shrill locomotive whistle was heard… soon appeared coming down the tracks toward us a nondescript car, which was roofed over at sides with railroad iron set at an angle, and from which in front projected a heavy gun… While all eyes were directed toward it, [its] big gun opened fire suddenly, and everyone looked for some place of shelter.” The “heavy gun,” according to Shenen, fired several shots before being withdrawn half a mile back up the tracks where it continued firing till dark. Also noted was that the Confederates had placed cotton bales on the cars, with infantrymen behind them, to protect the gun. As the gun withdrew, the Federals commenced to tear up the York River Railroad, preventing the gun from advancing any closer.[6]

   Following the action at Savage Station, the armored battery disappears for a couple of years, probably stored at the rail yard in Richmond. There is a rumor that the gun saw action at Drewry’s Bluff in June 1864. The cannon was obviously captured at the end of the war, maybe in Petersburg. An armored railroad battery was photographed at the end of the war. Some historians believe that the imaged  cannon is Lee’s Railroad Gun.[7]

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[1] OR 11, pt. 3, 573.

[2] OR 11, pt. 3, 574.

[3] OR 11, pt. 3, 574.

[4] OR 11, pt. 3, 576.

[5] OR 11, pt. 3, 615.

[6] Bryan and Lankford, Eye of the Storm,76-77.

[7] see also David H. Schneider, “Lee’s Armored Car.” Civil War Times, February 2011.

Petersburg Confederate Mines

 

Confederate countermine at Fort Mahone (LOC)

   The battle of the Crater is a fairly well-known event during the war. Federal general Ambrose Burnside came up with the idea to dig a mine shaft from the Federal works at Petersburg, under a Confederate position at Pegram’s salient. The distance was 511 feet. Coal miners from the 48^th Pennsylvania Infantry were in charge of the mining operation. They packed the chamber under the Confederate salient with 8,000 pounds of black powder. At 4:40 am on July 30, an explosion blasted a hole 170 feet long and 30 feet deep within the Confederate line. The ensuing battle as Federal soldiers rushed in was a nightmare; many of them were caught in the crater left by the explosion.

   But this was not the only mine dug during the war. Confederate forces attempted to dig their own mines along the Petersburg front. One mine shaft stretched from Gracie’s Salient toward Federal lines at Hare House. Powder – 450 pounds – arrived on the evening of July 31 and all was ready to light the fuse the next day. However, with a truce in place to bury the dead from the failed Federal attempt, the attack was delayed. When the fuse was lit later that day, it was discovered to be defective. Over the next few days, the mineshaft was lengthened and double the amount of powder added. When the powder exploded on August 5, it was discovered that the Confederates were 40 yards short of the main Federal lines. There was no grand Confederate charge into the non-existent breach.[1]

   There were at least eight Confederate counter mines dug along the Petersburg front. These were underground listening posts, attempting to find Federal mining efforts. The counter mines were located at Elliott’s Salient, north of the James River, and City Point Road, Jerusalem Plank Road, Squirrel Level Road, Cooke’s Salient, Colquitt’s Salient, Pegram’s Salient, and somewhere between Pegram’s Salient and Jerusalem Plank Road.[2]

   Much of the early work on counter mines fell to Company F, 1^st Regiment Engineering Troops, under Capt. Hugh T. Douglas. They went into camp near Blandford Church. Tools were sent and in some places fabricated for the tedious jobs.[3] Details from brigades in the area assisted the engineers. Much of the work of transporting planking and ventilation machinery had to be done at night, as the lines were exposed to enemy fire. After the failure of the mine explosion on August 5, Douglas was arrested and allowed to resign from the army, finishing the war as a contract engineer.[4]

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[1] Hess, In the Trenches, 118-19.

[2] Hess, In the Trenches, 48, 111.

[3] Jackson, First Regiment Engineer Troops, 61-62.

[4] Hess, In the Trenches, 118-19.

Robert E. Lee and John S. Mosby

Col. John S. Mosby

            “The Marble Man” and the “Gray Ghost.” If we mention those two names, Robert E. Lee and John S. Mosby come to mind. Lee commanded the Army of Northern Virginia. Mosby was a colonel, charged with disrupting Federal operations behind the lines in Northern Virginia. While Mosby might not have been a “trusted” lieutenant like Jackson or Longstreet, he still communicated frequently with the commanding general. (Note: “The Marble Man” and the “Gray Ghost” were names applied much later.)

            Mosby was much younger than Lee. He was born in Powhatan County, Virginia, in 1833. Small in stature and frequently bullied, Mosby shot one of those bullies. Convicted of the crime and expelled from the University of Virginia, Mosby wound up studying law under the prosecting attorney while incarcerated. Mosby was later pardoned by the Virginia governor and was admitted to the bar. He and his family were living in Bristol when the war began.

            Lee was born in 1807 at Stratford Hall, the son of a Revolutionary War hero and former governor of Virginia. Lee grew up in Alexandria, graduated from West Point, and served as an engineer in the United States army. He was three times brevetted for his role in the Mexican-American War. In the early days of the secession crisis, Lee was serving with a cavalry regiment in Texas.

            At the beginning of the war, Mosby enlisted as a private in the Washington Mounted Rifles, under Grumble Jones. While members of the 1^st Virginia Cavalry, the men of the Washington Mounted Rifles were not seriously engaged at First Manassas. In early 1862, Private Mosby was promoted to adjutant of the regiment, with the rank of first lieutenant. Mosby slipped off on his first scout in March 1862, reporting back to Stuart that there was no serious pursuit of the Confederate army as it pulled back from the Manassas area to the Rappahannock River. When Fitzhugh Lee replaced Jones, Mosby resigned. Stuart kept Mosby as a scout. It was Mosby who scouted the Federal position that led to Stuart’s famed ride around McClellan in June 1862. Lee made mention of Mosby in a general report of the operation. Mosby continued under Stuart’s command during the Seven Days battles. After this campaign Mosby came up with the idea of a partisan ranger command that could harass Federal supply columns. While on his way to consult with Jackson at Gordonsville, Mosby was captured. Upon being paroled and released, Mosby made his way to Lee’s headquarters, explaining to Lee what he had seen at Hampton Roads. This was probably the first meeting between Lee and Mosby. The date: August 5, 1862.

            Mosby served on Stuart’s staff the next few months, serving as a scout. It was at the end of December 1862, while Stuart was scouting in Loudoun County, that Mosby received permission to remain behind with nine men. On January 10, they made their first raid, capturing a picket post near Herndon, Virginia. By January 22, when they reported back to Stuart, they had captured twenty horses and men. Mosby asked for a few more men, and Stuart granted his request. It was the beginning of Mosby’s Rangers and the 43^rd Battalion, Virginia Cavalry.

            Lee and Mosby communicated often over the next couple of years. It was Lee who wrote General Samuel Cooper of Mosby’s capture of Brig. Gen. Edwin Stoughton in March 1863.[1] Lee recommended that same month that Mosby needed to be promoted, and the rank of captain came a couple of days later, along with orders to recruit his command.[2] With Mosby operating so close to the Washington, D.C. defenses, Lee frequent wrote to his superiors with details of his raids and the information gathered.

            Mosby continued to raid Federal wagons trains north of the Rappahannock as Lee began moving the army north, the start of the Gettysburg campaign. It was Mosby who suggested Stuart ride once again around the Federal army, and Mosby who scouted that army with two men, trying to decern its intentions.

            In August 1863, Lee wrote Stuart about Mosby: “I fear he exercises but little control over his men…his attention has been more directed toward the capture of wagons than military damages to the enemy.”  Lee wanted Mosby to attack railroads, trying to force Meade to pull troops away from the army to guard the vital supply lines.[3]  

            Lee again mentioned Mosby in December 1863, writing that he had destroyed a wagon train at Brandy Station, capturing 112 mules.[4] In April 1864, Lee wrote Cooper that he was attempting to “have Col. Mosby’s battalion mustered into regular service. If this cannot be done I recommended that this battalion be retained as partisans for the present.”[5] For much of April, Mosby continued to funnel information to Lee regarding troop movements.

            When Jubal Early commenced his campaign through the Shenandoah Valley in June, July, and August 1864, Mosby joined in, attacking Federal positions at Point of Rocks, Mount Zion Church, the Snicker’s Gap War, Berryville Wagon Train Raid, Gold’s Farm, and others.

            Mosby paid Lee a visit at the latter’s headquarters near Petersburg on December 6, 1864. At Edge Hill, they had a meal together – a leg of mutton, which Lee joked about as being stolen since it was a rarity.[6] Mosby visited Lee’s headquarters again on February 2, 1865.[7] This appears to be the last time the two met during the war.

            Lee of course surrendered at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865. In Loudoun County, Mosby received word of the surrender on April 15, asking for a ceasefire so he could verify the validity of the news. This was granted. Word was sent to Lee, now back in Richmond. What should the rangers do? Lee’s response? He thought they should go home. Mosby disbanded the 43^rd Battalion on April 21, 1865, in Salem. Mosby and a few others rode south, trying to link up with the Army of Tennessee. When they learned that Johnston had also surrendered, they returned, and Mosby, confirming that he would not be arrested, likewise surrendered on June 17.

 

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[1] Knight, Arlington, 247.

[2] Knight, Arlington, 250.

[3] OR 29, pt. 2, 652-3.

[4] Dowdey and Manarin, Wartime Papers, 630.

[5] Dowdey and Manarin, Wartime Papers, 689.

[6] Mitchel, Mosby Letters, 125.

[7] Knight, Arlington, 470.

A deserter from the 48th Alabama writes the regiment’s history

No sooner had the last shot of the war ended than there was a push to write a history of the conflict. Edward A. Pollard, a newspaper editor from Richmond, released The Lost Cause in 1866. While often considered a “pro-Confederate” volume, Pollard’s text was very critical of both Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee. Another newspaper editor, but in New York, Horace Greeley released volume 1 of The American Conflict in 1864. The second volume was released in 1866. An abolitionist, Greeley incorporated his own partisan views about the cause of the war, much like Pollard did with his work.

John D. Taylor (findagrave)

As time went on, the men who had fought the war began to pen their own accounts. In the north, veterans’ organizations would appoint one of their members as the regimental historian. This person would then gather materials and correspond with other veterans to write a regimental history. The South was less organized. It was not until 1885 that the United Confederate Veterans began to push for histories written by former Confederates. Over the next couple of decades, a trickle of books appeared.

We are not sure what prompted John Dykes Taylor to pick up his pen and draft a history of his regiment, the 48^th Alabama Infantry, before his death in 1888. This short survey was not published until 1902 in the Montgomery Advertiser, and later in pamphlet form by both the Confederate Publishing Company and Morningside. These later editions have a forward by William Stanley Hoole and additional notes by William C. Oates (of the 15^th Alabama fame.)

Taylor was born in Habersham, Georgia, in 1830. As a young man he moved to Jackson, Alabama, to study law and was admitted to the bar in Marshall County, Alabama, in 1857. Taylor must not have found the practice of law to his liking, as in 1860 he was working for a wholesaler in Nashville, Tennessee.[1]

Taylor did not answer the call to enlist until March 1862 when he joined Company E, 48^th Alabama as a private. He was present through all of the muster rolls through October 1864, often listed as the ordnance sergeant for his company. On August 27, 1864, his company commander actually wrote to Richmond, asking that Taylor be officially promoted to ordnance sergeant, a position he had unofficially held. The War Department agreed. It is unclear if Taylor ever received word of the promotion. In November 1864, Taylor was granted a furlough for 30 days. We assume he returned home. And he never returned. The major of the regiment wrote to the secretary of War on February 18, 1865, asking that Taylor be dropped from the rolls of the regiment. “He has not been heard from since [leaving on his furlough], and from all the information that I have, I do not think he intends to return to the Regiment,” Major J.W. Wiggonton wrote.[2]

Taylor survived the war, married twice, and lived in Guntersville, working as a wholesaler and commission merchant, along with being a notary public and justice of the peace. He died on May 9, 1888.[3]

The 48^th Alabama was mustered into service in Auburn, Alabama, in May 1862. It was composed of men from Blount, Calhoun, Cherokee, DeKalb, and Marshall Counties. The regiment was sent east, becoming a part of Brig. Gen. William B. Taliaferro’s brigade, fighting at Cedar Mountain, Second Manassas, Sharpsburg, and Fredericksburg. Later the regiment was transferred to Brig. Gen. Evander M. Law’s Alabama brigade, Hood’s Division, Longstreet’s Corps, and fought at Gettysburg, Chickamauga, Lookout Mountain, and then back east, through the Overland Campaign, Petersburg Campaign, and Appomattox Campaign. At Appomattox, the regiment surrendered 122 men.[4]

The detail that Taylor provides is good, just not deep or in great detail. For example, in writing about Chickamauga, he sums up the action of the brigade with: “Throughout the two days of terrific fighting Law’s Alabamians won new laurels and received the compliments of [illegible].[5]

But why Taylor? He ends his narrative toward the end of October 1864, about the time he heads home on his furlough. Never throughout the text does he criticize his commanders; he is not disgruntled by the outcome of the war. What were the underlaying issues that caused him to pen this short account of the regiment he served in? Are there any other cases of a soldier, who deserted toward the end of the war, who later penned a history of his regiment?

The 48^th Alabama does have a modern regimental history, written by Joshua Glenn Price and released in 2017.  

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[1] Taylor, History of the 48^th Alabama Volunteer Infantry Regiment, 6-7.

[2] J.D. Taylor, CMSR, RG109, Roll0437, National Archives.

[3] Taylor, History of the 48^th Alabama Volunteer Infantry Regiment, 8.

[4] Taylor, History of the 48^th Alabama Volunteer Infantry Regiment, 14-20.

[5] Taylor, History of the 48^th Alabama Volunteer Infantry Regiment, 21.

New project - on Robert E. Lee!

 Robert E. Lee is one of the most written-about subjects in American history. There are scores of books, hundreds of articles, a few documentaries, and other forms of media. So why add another book to the stack? That is a question I have been asking a lot over the past few weeks.

In 2024, Savas Beatie published a book on U.S. Grant – Unconditional Surrender: Ulysses S. Grant in the Civil War. The co-authors are Curt Fields and Chris Mackowski. Chris is the editor-in-chief and co-founder of Emerging Civil War. I’m not so sure how long I have known Chris, but he interviewed me in 2019 when the American Battlefield Trust’s Teacher’s Institute was in Raleigh. I was at the annual teacher’s meeting talking about North Carolina and the end of the War. Curt is undoubtedly the premier U.S. Grant interpreter in the United States. We’ve met in person a couple of times and follow one another’s work online. The book is a part of the Emerging Civil War series. It is a quick introduction to the life, especially the war-years, of U.S. Grant.

If we have a book on Grant, why not a book on Robert E. Lee? I pitched that idea to Chris, and he thought it was a good idea. I then pitched that book idea to Thomas Jessee, someone I first met 40 years ago in the reenacting community. Thomas is undoubtedly the best Robert E. Lee interpreter in the United States. Curt and Thomas are often at Appomattox Court House each year during the surrender commemoration events. At times, they also appear on stage together portraying their respective historical characters in programs based on decades of careful research, study, and respect for the past. These events are truly historical performances in their own right, and I encourage you to check them out.  Seeing these two gentlemen in action is the closest thing to jumping in a time machine and meeting the originals. I am honored that Tom agreed to join me on the project.

Curt Fields and Thomas Jessee at Appomattox

Chris and Ted Savas at Savas Beatie Publishing both said yes. Of course, I’ve worked with Savas Beatie on other projects, including General Lee’s Immortals, my history of the Branch-Lane Brigade, and Feeding Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia, plus an upcoming book on the April 1864 battle of Plymouth. (You can order signed copies of those books here.)

Over my thirty years of writing, I have spent a great deal of time with the Army of Northern Virginia – books on the 37^th North Carolina, the 39^th Battalion Virginia Cavalry, the Branch-Lane Brigade, the battle of Hanover Court House, and most recently, the book on food and the army. (This does not include many articles and blog posts.) You would think that writing about Lee would be a natural progression, and in some ways, it is. The most challenging part is that the books in this series are relatively short. And, I don’t want this to be a history of the Army of Northern Virginia. This is a look at Lee. In many cases, the descriptions of battles are just slightly expanded summaries. What is important is Lee’s personal role and how he felt about that battle. For example, he wrote that the battle of Chancellorsville, perhaps his greatest victory, was not worth the cost.

This project is due in March 2026. It is exciting to be working with such a great publishing team and with the incomparable Thomas Jessee.  We just started the first of December 2025, and it will hopefully be released in 2027.

Longstreet's other plan

Lt. Gen. James Longstreet

A lot of ink has been spilt over the decades on Gen. James Longstreet and the Gettysburg campaign. Believing that they were just fighting defensive battles, Longstreet was opposed to the attacks on July 2 and 3. He wanted to find a defensive position and let the Federals attack them. Frequently lost in the discussion is the fact that Longstreet did not even really want to be on this campaign.

Following Chancellorsville, Confederate Army of Northern Virginia commander Robert E. Lee sought to once again invade the North. He had many reasons, including a dwindling supply of foodstuffs and wanting to pull the enemy army out of Virginia. A Confederate victory on Northern soil might just galvanize the beginning peace party in the North to press for an end to the war. Elsewhere in the Confederacy, the primary Confederate army of the western theater was locked in a siege at Vicksburg, Mississippi. There were some who believed that a portion of the Army of Northern Virginia should be detached and sent to help defeat the Federal forces.

Longstreet was one of those who wanted to ship a portion of the Virginia army west. Writing in the Philadelphia Weekly Times in 1897, Longstreet recalled visiting the Secretary of War James Seddon as he passed through Richmond following his assignment in the Suffolk area. Seddon asked Longstreet his views on the matter of sending part of the ANV west. “I replied that there was a better plan, in my judgement, for relieving Vicksburg than by direct assault upon Grant. I proposed that the army then concentrating at Jackson, Mississippi, be moved swiftly to Tullahoma, where General Bragg was located with a fine army, confronting an army of about equal strength under General Rosecrans, and that at the same time two divisions of my corps be hurried forward to the same point. The simultaneous arrival of these reinforcements would give us a grand army at Tullahoma. With this army General Johnston might speedily crush Rosecrans, and that he should then turn his force towards the north, and with his splendid army march through Tennessee and Kentucky, and threaten the invasion of Ohio.”

When Longstreet met with Lee, “I laid it before him with the freedom justified by our close personal and official relations. . . . We discussed it over and over, and I discovered that his main objection to it was that it would, if adopted, force him to divide his army. He left no room to doubt, however, that he believed the idea of an offensive campaign was not only important, but necessary.”[1]

Longstreet brings up the same argument in 1896 when he pens his autobiography, From Manassas to Appomattox.[2]

Why not reinforce Pemberton in Vicksburg? “Grant seems to be a fighting man, and seems to be determined to fight. Pemberton seems not to be a fighting man. . . the fewer troops he has the better,” Longstreet wrote Wigfall on May 13, 1863.[3]

Historians are mixed on Longstreet’s motivation. Freeman speculates that “It is impossible to say how far his ambition influenced his proposal or to what extent his plan stirred his ambition. Perhaps he dreamed of supplanting Bragg and of winning the decisive victory.”[4] Piston found Longstreet’s proposal “strategically sound,” but questioned his motives. Did Longstreet wish to replace Bragg? Johnston out-ranked Bragg. Maybe Longstreet still preferred serving under Joseph E. Johnston. Piston goes on to agree with Jones and Connelly who wrote that Longstreet was a part of the “western concentration bloc.” This group of men feared that the industries in East Tennessee, Georgia, and Alabama were susceptible to Federal attacks and Bragg should be reinforced by portions of Lee’s army. Longstreet actually wrote Texas Senator Louis T. Wigfall about such a proposal in February 1863 concerning this concentration of troops.[5] Wert argues that Longstreet was not a member of that “western concentration bloc.” He bases this assertion on the letter that Longstreet wrote Wigfall on May 13, 1863. Longstreet told the senator that if a forward movement was ordered, “we can spare nothing from this army to re-enforce in the West.” Instead, the Army of Northern Virginia should be reinforced. “If we could cross the Potomac with one hundred & fifty thousand men, I think we could demand Lincoln to declare his purpose. . . . When I agreed with the Secy & yourself about sending troops west I was under the impression that we would be obliged to remain on the defensive here. But the prospect of an advance changes the aspect of affairs to us entirely.”[6]

Would the proposal of a combination of men and commanders in central Tennessee have reaped the benefits that Longstreet proposed? Maybe. The plan of Lee moving north certainly did not work to the best advantage of the Confederates.

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[1] The Annals of War written by Leading Participants North and South, 416-17.

[2] 330-31.

[3] Wert, General James Longstreet, 245.

[4] Freeman, R.E. Lee, 3:20.

[5] Piston, Lee’s Tarnished Lieutenant, 42, 44.

[6] Wert, General James Longstreet, 244-45.

A 9th Virginia Cavalry Trooper Saved by Robert E. Lee

    Recently, while reading through Charlie Knight’s From Arlington to Appomattox, Robert E. Lee’s Civil War Day by Day, I came across a line about John William Irvine (sometimes Irwin). Born in Stafford County, Virginia, in 1846, Irvine enlisted in what became Company A, 9^th Virginia Cavalry, on June 4, 1861. His occupation was listed as a student. He re-enlisted for two additional years, collecting a $50 bounty. On November 15, 1862, Irvine was captured.

   Seldom does the capture of an individual soldier call for a response from Army of Northern Virginia commander Robert E. Lee. Irvine’s capture did. Captured behind Federal lines, he was suspected of being a spy. He was quickly transported to the Old Capitol Prison in Washington, D.C. Lee wrote to Federal commander Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside on December 19, 1862.

   Irvine was tried on December 21, 1862. His charge: “Being found and arrested within the lines of the Army of the Potomac.” Irvine was found in civilian clothes and was behind Federal lines “during a time when important movements of that army [Army of the Potomac] were being made.” The military court found him guilty. The punishment: “hung by the neck until he be dead.”[1]

   Word got to Lee, and after he spoke to Col. Beale, 9^th Virginia Cavalry, and Brig. Gen. William H.F. Lee, a letter was sent through the lines. Irvine was not a spy. Instead, he was given permission to go back to Stafford County to procure a fresh horse. “This is a permission commonly given in similar cases and at the time it was not known that the place Private Irwin wished to proceed was within the lines of your army.”[2] Burnside stepped in, and Irvine was ordered to be held as a common prisoner.[3]

   Irvine was sent to Old Capitol Prison in Washington, D.C., where he was released on May 13, 1863. He was captured again just a few short weeks later, on June 30, 1863, in Hanover, Pennsylvania. This time, he was sent to Point Lookout until exchanged on April 30, 1864. Irvine appears on the last company roll dated October 6, 1864.[4] Irvine survived the war, passing away in April 1875 in Monroe County, Missouri.

  

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[1] John W. Irvine (Irwin), CMSR, Roll 0093, M324, RG109.

[2] OR, Series 2, Vol. 5, 98.

[3] OR, Series 2, Vol. 5, 104.

[4] Krick, 9^th Virginia Cavalry, 81.