- Title
- North Carolina historical review [1961 : January]
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-
- Date
- January 1961
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-
- Place
- ["North Carolina, United States"]
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North Carolina historical review [1961 : January]
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THE SIGNIFICANCE OF STONEMAN’S LAST RAID
By Ina W. Van Noppen *
Introduction
The State of North Carolina has erected a marker in each
of the towns and villages where Stoneman’s Cavalry camped,
fed, or skirmished during his last raid. Millions of tourists
pass at least one of these markers every summer. People in
the Piedmont and Mountain sections of the State grow up
seeing the markers and knowing nothing of the nature of the
raid mentioned thereon. General Stoneman is scarcely re¬
ferred to in accounts of the military phases of the war, in the
most widely used textbook on the Civil War; in more speci¬
alized works of several volumes, a mere sentence or a foot¬
note is deemed sufficient to sum up this officer’s career. A
historical imperative is an account of Stoneman’s Last Raid
in perspective. It is called Stoneman’s last raid because he
first made an abortive raid in Georgia in which he was inglor-
iously captured by home guards. Later he led a successful
raid against the saltworks in Virginia. His enduring fame in
the North and ignominy in the South will, however, rest upon
his last raid. This was a splendidly conceived, ably executed
attack upon the war potential and the civilian population of
the South as well as upon its military resources. It was one
of the early examples of total war. Stoneman’s raid not only
did incalculable military damage, but it destroyed the war¬
making capacity of a whole region. Most significantly as
Stoneman and his raiders passed through eastern Tennessee,
western North Carolina, and the North Carolina and Vir¬
ginia Piedmont we obtain revealing glimpses of how the war
had been felt and interpreted by the people of these regions
who were its innocent victims.
* Dr. Ina W. Van Noppen is a Professor of History, Appalachian State
Teachers College, Boone.
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