infantry, divided into two brigades, was
led by Brig. Gen. Jeremiah Sullivan, while
Sigel’s chief of staff, Maj. Gen. Julius Sta-
hel, had charge of the cavalry.
As word of Sigel’s advance reached Rich-
mond, Breckinridge took steps to check-
mate the Union move into the valley. The
man charged with the defense was Brig.
Gen. John D. Imboden. A native of
Staunton, Imboden had intimate knowl-
edge of his domain. He had served as a
captain of artillery under Stonewall Jack-
son in 1861 and later recruited and raised
a cavalry battalion. His most notable
achievement came at Gettysburg, where he
successfully covered the Confederate
retreat and secured, against daunting odds,
the army’s vital crossing point over a rain-
swollen Potomac River at Williamsport.
Shortly afterward, Imboden was named
district commander in the valley, with
1,500 troopers under his control, including
the 18th, 23rd, and 62nd Virginia
Mounted Infantry, as well as a battery of
artillery. They were tasked with observing,
harassing, and slowing down Sigel’s
advance, buying time for Breckinridge to
assemble his forces.
Imboden sent two companies of the 23rd
Virginia Cavalry, under Major Fielding
Calmese, to operate on the road betweenRomney and Winchester. Union scouts
detected the activity, and portions of the 6th
and 7th West Virginia Cavalry, as well as
14th Pennsylvania Cavalry, rode out in pur-
suit. The blue-clad horsemen tirelessly gave
chase but failed to come to grips with the
Confederates. No sooner had the Federals
called off the pursuit than fresh Confeder-
ate cavalry appeared on the scene. “In a lit-
tle while,” wrote a resident of Winchester,
“the Yankees came back and went down
the Martinsburg road.” In a few moments,
they were followed by Calmese, leading his
men triumphantly through the streets.
When the news of the running victory
reached Breckinridge and Lee, it was
viewed as a favorable portent of things to
come. A soldier in the 51st Virginia wrote
home, “My opinion is that right here in
this country will be the next fighting in the
spring.” He was right. Before the month
was out, Imboden was calling for local
companies of reserves and militia to bol-
ster his ranks. Rockingham and Augusta
Counties, in the central part of the valley,
contributed six companies of reservists
made up of boys too young and men too
old to join the army.
Imboden also reached out to Francis
Smith, superintendent of the Virginia Mili-
tary Institute at Lexington, raising the pos-sibility that the youthful cadets might be
pressed into service. When the war began,
the cadets had gone to Richmond to act as
drillmasters for the thousands of raw
recruits joining the army. In May 1862, they
had marched with Jackson to the Battle of
McDowell but did not see action there.
Now, two years later, they were itching to
get into the fight. The feeling was best
summed up by a 19-year-old cadet who
wrote his mother: “I think you had just as
well give your consent at once to my resign-
ing and entering the Army. I want to have
some of the glory of the year ‘64 attached
to my name.” Smith offered the cadets to
Robert E. Lee, but Lee expressed the droll
hope that the boys would remain in school,
thus avoiding the necessity of what Presi-
dent Jefferson Davis had termed “grinding
the seed corn of the nation.”
Sigel, satisfied that he had completed his
preliminary assignment, moved his head-
quarters from Cumberland to Martinsburg
and made final preparations for the trip
southward up the valley. Two days later,
Sigel’s force entered Winchester and imme-
diately abandoned any further idea ofWikipediaThe 34th Massachusetts Infantry, photographed in
camp near Washington, D.C., found itself in the thick
of the fighting at New Market before driving from
the battlefield.CWQ-Sum16 New Market_Layout 1 4/20/16 4:18 PM Page 77