THE WAR YEARS: 1861–1865

As events in the winter of 1860 and the spring of 1861 carried the nation into the crisis of civil war, Fairfax County aligned itself with Richmond rather than Washington. Thus, at the State's convention on secession in May 1861, the Fairfax County delegation voted to ratify the secession ordinance.[83] The consequences of this action were prompt in coming and far-reaching in their effects, for with the commencement of military operations in Northern Virginia it became impossible to carry on the normal processes of county government.

Fairfax Court House (the Town of Providence) was outside the ring of fortifications which were built on the Virginia side of the Potomac to protect the National Capital. Inside this line, stretching in a great arc from Alexandria, through the vicinity of The Falls Church, to Chain Bridge, Union Army commanders exercised military authority and administered justice through provost courts.[84] Outside this area the authority of the General Assembly of Virginia nominally remained in effect, and the justices of the courts and the sheriffs of the county continued to hold their positions under the laws of the seceded state.

Serious difficulties in the transaction of public business soon appeared throughout Fairfax County, where patrolling and skirmishing outside the ring of permanent fortified positions were daily occurrences. This was recognized in an ordinance adopted by the Secession Convention providing that when the court of any county failed to meet for the transaction of business or the public was prevented from attending the court "by reason of the public enemy", the court of the adjoining county where such obstructions did not exist had jurisdiction of all matters referrable to the court or the clerk of the court where normal business had ceased.[85]

As Virginia armed, troops of the Confederacy placed themselves in positions to repel invaders, and in May 1861, a company of the Warrenton Rifles established a camp at Fairfax Court House. On the morning of June 1, 1861, a body of Union cavalry rode through the town, and in the confused exchange of fire which followed, a Captain of the Rifles, John Quincy Marr, became the first officer casualty of the war.[86]A month later, the tide of Union forces under McDowell swept past the courthouse on the way to its rendezvous at Bull Run, and back again to the safety of the fortified positions along the Potomac. In the wake of their victory at Bull Run, troops of the Confederacy established an outpost at Fairfax Court House to watch for signs that the Union Army might resume the offensive by moving against the Confederate earthworks near Centreville.

This outpost did not see any fighting for the time being, but it provided the site for what later was regarded as one of the decisive moments of the war. In September 1861, General Beauregard had established his headquarters at Fairfax Court House, and urgently pressed the newly-formed government of Confederate President Jefferson Davis for reinforcements with which to sweep into Pennsylvania and Maryland and, hopefully, to carry the Federal capital itself. A meeting was arranged at Beauregard's headquarters in which Davis, Generals Beauregard and J. J. Johnston, and certain of their trusted staff officers considered this plan. Their decision was to adopt a defensive posture and protect the borders of Virginia rather than take the offensive and invade the North. As events turned out, this decision had consequences of the greatest effect, for it was not until Lee marched out of the Valley on the road to Gettysburg in 1863 that there was another opportunity for the Confederacy to carry the war to the soil of the northern states.[87]

In the spring of 1862, the Confederate army retired from Fairfax Court House, and soon after that its line of fortifications at Centreville—the most extensive system of field fortifications in military history up to that time—was abandoned. As the Union armies took the initiative in their repeated efforts to reach Richmond, the crossroads at Fairfax Court House had key importance in the communication and supply systems of these forces.

From 1862 to the end of the war, Union troops remained in control of the crossroads and the courthouse. Contemporary photographs of the building show it being used as a lookout point and station for patrols. Other descriptions indicate that the courthouse was loopholed,[88] the furnishings were removed, and the interior generally was gutted so that only the walls and roof remained.[89] For all practical purposes, the courthouse and its related buildings were, in the years 1863 and 1864, a military outpost and minor headquarters in the Union army's system to protect its supply and communications lines from the irregular troops who kept hostilities constantly smoldering in Northern Virginia. Throughout the western part of Fairfax County, and in Loudoun, Fauquier and Prince William Counties, lived many who gave the appearance of innocent farmers during the daylight hours, but who changed into Confederate uniforms at night and on weekends to ride against isolated outposts or supply points of the Union army or destroy vulnerable bridges and communications centers.

The operations of these guerilla bands kept thousands of Union troops pinned down on rear area security guard duty, and preoccupied the forces assigned to Fairfax Court House. The difficulty of their task under the circumstances that prevailed in Northern Virginia was dramatized in the famous Confederate raid on Fairfax Court House by men under the command of Col. John S. Mosby when, on the night of March 8, 1863, the Confederate commander with about 30 men captured and carried off 33 prisoners, including Union Brigadier General Edwin H. Stoughton, and a large number of horses and quantity of supplies. Throughout 1863, 1864 and the spring of 1865 hardly a night went by without some cries of alarm and shots being fired because of the activities of the Confederate irregulars. Yet they took a substantial toll from the wealth and welfare of the very people they claimed to represent, for the Union troops soon learned more efficiency in their rear area operations, and increased the restrictions on movement of civilian traffic. The transaction of personal business in normal ways became virtually impossible. The historian, Bruce Catton, has assessed the activities of the guerilla bands as follows:

During the years when normal business at the courthouse was suspended and the county officials who held authority from the General Assembly were dispersed, some of the county's records were removed from the courthouse for safekeeping, and some were not.[91] In either case they were subject to the risks of loss and damage. Some were carried off and in later years have been brought to light as the descendents of Union and Confederate soldiers have found them in places where they had been put for safekeeping.The jail building ceased to be used for its original purpose, and, during the latter months of the war, the jail of Alexandria County (now Arlington County) was utilized for Fairfax County's prisoners.[92]

The effort to provide a legitimate successor to the secession government in Richmond started in the Wheeling Conventions of May and June 1861, from which came the Unionist government of Francis H. Pierpont.[93] The admission of West Virginia to the Union in December 1862[94] left Governor Pierpont in control of only those parts of Northern Virginia, the Shenandoah Valley, and Chesapeake Bay that were occupied by Federal troops. Within this area, the Pierpont administration collected taxes and attempted to supply the essential services of civilian government. Closer touch with these problems was possible after June 1863, when Governor Pierpont moved his government to Alexandria.

On January 19, 1863, a new County Court for Fairfax County was convened pursuant to a proclamation by Governor Pierpont which directed that the place for the court's sessions should be changed from Fairfax Court House to the Village of West End[95] near Alexandria. Here, in January 1863, the Court met in a structure known as Bruin's Building. The minutes of this and other sessions which followed recite many of the same problems and disputes that always had occupied the time of county courts—dockets of minor criminal and civil cases, petitions to higher levels of government, determination of minor civil disputes, issuances of permits and licenses, and appointment of public officials.[96]

Certain items in the minutes of this January 19, 1863 meeting documented the strains created by the wartime conditions: a petition to the Secretary of War prayed that the "Bruin Building" in the Village of West End be placed at the court's disposal; the Deputy Commissioner of Revenue was directed to discharge the duties of the Commissioner until the latter, currently a prisoner in Richmond, could return to his duties; payments were approved for wagonowners who had hauled books, papers and records to the courthouse from various points in Fairfax and nearby counties. One item of particular interest stated:

After the cessation of fighting in April 1865, Governor Pierpont moved his government from Alexandria to Richmond. However, without the presidential support which Lincoln had provided during his lifetime, the Pierpont administration found it increasingly difficult to carry on effective government as the years immediately after the war saw numerous plans for reconstruction competing for favor. The situation was further complicated by the fact that in February 1864 the Pierpont administration had sponsored a constitutional convention which had adopted a new constitution for Virginia, and that this constitution had nominally gone into effect in Alexandria and Fairfax counties.[98] A complex legal problem regarding the succession of governmental authority thus was added to the formidable task of reconstructing Fairfax County's economy and physical facilities.

This task was made difficult because many of the records of the County had been scattered or destroyed during the fighting. Records were searched out and retrieved whenever their places of safekeeping were known, a process requiring years of effort. Some record books were never found. The accounts of how the wills of George and Martha Washington were recovered are frequently cited to illustrate the difficulties of reassembling Fairfax County's records.

When, in the fall of 1861, Beauregard's Confederate troops withdrew from Fairfax County, the will of George Washington was secretly removed from the courthouse by the court clerk, Alfred Moss, and taken to Richmond. Here it was placed for safekeeping with the Secretary of the Commonwealth of Virginia. Following the cessation of hostilities, it was returned to Fairfax County.[99]

Martha Washington's will was not removed from the courthouse to Richmond, but remained there during the time Union troops occupied the building as a patrol point. As might be expected, cabinets were broken open and papers scattered. One day, late in 1862, a troop of soldiers from New England was in the building and engaged in shoveling out the debris from the floor. A Union lieutenant named Thompson grew curious about these papers and interrupted the work long enough to examine some of them. He picked up the will of Martha Washington and, recognizing it, took it with him. Following the war, the will next was heard of in 1903 in England where a descendant of Lt. Thompson sold it to J. P. Morgan. The sale was reported to the Commonwealth Attorney of Fairfax County who wrote Mr. Morgan seeking the return of the will, but no answer was ever received. After Mr. Morgan's death, the County sought to obtain the will from his son. Negotiations were unsuccessful until court action was begun by the County. Finally, one day before the matter was to be argued before the United States Supreme Court, the will was returned.[100]

NOTES FOR CHAPTER IV