Catching Up on Civil War 150 — Battle of Cheat Mountain

Battle of Cheat Mountain took place September 12-15 1861. The location Pocahontas County, West Virginia. This battle took place east of where Carnifex Ferry. It also saw the first action of Robert E. Lee in the Civil War.

A little about the battle:

Gen. Robert E. Lee directed his first offensive of the war against Brig. Gen. Joseph Reynolds’s entrenchments on the summit of Cheat Mountain and in the Tygart Valley. After their victory at First Manassas the Confederates could spare troops for the secondary theater, although they were ill-equipped and poorly disciplined. Lee’s objective was to regain control of as much of the state as possible, not only to claim it for the Confederacy but to disrupt the impending referendum on statehood. It would be a black eye for the Lincoln Administration if they had to cancel the vote, scheduled for late October.

Here's a little about the reenactments that took place for the battle:

This year marks the 150th anniversary of the Civil War, and re-enactors from across the region will descend upon Chase Farm Park on Great Road this weekend, Sept. 16-18, to re-create the Battle of Cheat Mountain in "A Call to Arms."

The park will come to life with hundreds of re-enactors as they set up camp for the weekend, and thousands of spectators are expected to come experience the power of living history.

The re-enactors, or living historians, will invite visitors to step back in time to September 1861, shortly after the start of what would be four long years of the bloodiest conflict in our nation's history. Their goal is to portray as accurately as possible what it was like at that time. As one of the first events to officially be endorsed by the Rhode Island Civil War Sesquicentennial Commemoration Commission, "A Call to Arms" is considered to be one of the most elaborate re-enactments being undertaken in this area in 2011.