1861 Civil War - Philippi WV....

THE NEW YORK TIMES from New York, NY and dated June 5, 1861. 

* Philippa West Virginia WV - Harper's Ferry WV and more 

* Original Civil War era complete issue on cotton & rag paper  

* The War Against Slavery, Abraham Lincoln's War, the 2nd War For Independence

This 8 page newspaper is in nice condition due to the use of cotton and rag paper during this very historic time in U.S. history. This issue is loaded with advertisements and Civil War reports throughout from the day it was first reported which includes the following headlines: "The Seccession Rebellion" "Official Account of the Battle at Philippi" "Complete Rout of Two Thousand Rebels" "An Advance of the Federal Troops Towards Manassas Gap" "Rumored Withdrawl of the Insurgents from Harper's Ferry" and much more. SEE PHOTOS. A nice piece of history from this famous newspaper.

 

source: wikipedia: The principal advance was by 1,600 men under Brig. Gen. Benjamin Franklin Kelley, which pushed toward the town of Grafton and occupied it on May 30. The other advance, of 1,400 men under Brig. Gen. Ebenezer Dumont, took Webster, several miles to the west. On June 2, the two forces departed by train to converge on Philippi Kelley from the south and Dumont from the north to execute a double envelopment of the 800 recruits commanded by ConfederateColonelGeorge A. Porterfield. Both columns arrived at Philippi before dawn on June 3.

Morris planned a predawn assault that would be signaled by a pistol shot. The untrained Confederate troops had failed to establish picket lines to provide perimeter security, choosing instead to escape the cold rain that fell at morning and stay inside their tents. A Confederate sympathizer, Mrs. Thomas Humphreys, saw the approaching Union troops and sent her young son on horseback to warn the Confederates. While Mrs. Humphreys watched, a Union outpost captured the boy and she fired her pistol at the Union soldiers. Although she missed, her shots started the attack prematurely.

The Union forces began firing their artillery, which awakened the sleeping Confederates. After firing a few shots at the advancing Union troops, the Southerners broke lines and began running frantically to the south, some still in their bed clothes, which caused journalists to refer to the battle as the "Races at Philippi". Dumont's troops entered the town from the north, but Kelley's arrived late and were unable to block the Confederate escape. Kelley himself was shot while chasing some of the retreating Confederates. There were two significant Confederate casualties, one of whom was a VMI cadet, Fauntleroy Daingerfield. Both were treated with battlefield amputations, believed to be the first such operations of the war. The remaining Confederate troops retreated to Huttonsville.