Timeline of West Virginia: Civil War and Statehood
Undated
November 1861

We conversed on Saturday with a gentleman just from Weston, Lewis county, who gives a sad account of affairs in the upper end of Lewis, and in the adjoining counties of Gilmer, Wirt, Webster and Braxton. Within less than a week there have been no less than five Union men shot by roving guerrilla bands within fifteen or twenty miles of Weston. The first was Wm. Brake, of Jacksonville. Then Owen Mulvey. His body was brought into Weston Thursday. The murderers stole four horses from Mulvey's premises after killing him. The others killed, were a Mr. Blair, and another whose name our informant could not recall. Porter Arnold, brother of J. G. Arnold member of the Legislature from Lewis, was shot through the side, and the wound is thought to be mortal. All these men beside Mr. Brake, were killed in the same night. They lived within a scope of about four miles in the upper edge of Lewis county. Arnold was a secessionist last spring, and ran away to the rebel army. He subsequently returned and made professions of loyalty.

In Gilmer, Calhoun and the adjoining counties, our informant says the most ferocious terrorism is universal. Bands of rebel guerrillas range the country from Webster county to Jackson, and commit the most barbarous outrages on the loyal portion of the people, burning their buildings, carrying off their property of every description, and killing the men.

At Glenville, the county seat of Gilmer, where many Union families reside, these gangs have been in the habit of making descents for forage and plunder. They finally located in town, and took full possession of everything. Hearing of this state of things, a force of citizens numbering some 75, under the lead of Henry H. Withers, a member of the late Convention from Gilmer, marched upon the place from Troy, in the same county. They reached the place on last Sunday, (yesterday week,) and routed the scoundrels from their quarters, killing their leader, named Ferrell, and his son. Withers held the town a day or two, but fears for the safety of his position induced him to abandon it. When our informant left Weston, Withers was there. He reported that the rebels had congregated some five or six hundred strong in Gilmer, and that he had consequently been obliged to withdraw his small force. Very likely this statement of the strength of the rebels should be taken with several grains of allowance.

The Union families are fleeing from this God-forsaken, lawless country as best they can, taking with them what little effects have been spared from the general ruin. The history of such times in such a region will make a sad chapter in the great book that will one day be written about the war.

Timeline of West Virginia: Civil War and Statehood: Undated: November 1861