From Legends of Loudoun, Harrison Williams, pub. Garrett and Massie, 1938:
The repercussions of John Brown's insane raid on the nearby Harper's Ferry arsenal on the 16th October, 1859, were particularly severe in Loudoun. The madness of it all profoundly shocked the the community and seemed to strike at the foundations of existing society, law and order. Yet a dogged adherence to that Union, which Virginia had been so instrumental in building, persisted....
When it came to appear inevitable that war would break out, the Virginia Legislature of 1861 decided, probably wisely, that the matter of secession was so sensitive, and the consequences so monumental, that they referred the issue to the people of Virginia in the form of a statewide convention, which voted in favor of secession provided that a referendum of the state's voters supported the decision.
Here's how the vote went in Loudoun County:
| Precincts Aldie Goresville Gum Spring Hillsboro Leesburg Lovettsville Middleburg Mt. Gilead Powells Shop Purcellville Snickersville Union Waterford Waters Whaleys Total | For Secession 54 117 135 84 400 46 115 102 62 82 114 150 31 26 108 1626 | Against 5 19 5 38 22 325 0 19 0 31 3 0 220 39 0 726 |
If you look at at that table and compare it to a map of Loudoun, one thing immediately becomes clear: Just like the newly severed nation, Loudoun had a pro-Secessionist South and a pro-Union North. Compare Leesburg and Lovettsville; they're within eight miles of each other. (The town of Union didn't want no Union at all!) The north, the border area, of Loudoun had been settled in the early and mid-Eighteenth Century by two groups: Quakers in Waterford and Pennsylvania Dutch in Lovettsville. Neither of these peoples had much truck with slavery (although some of them did in fact own slaves), and secession held little appeal for them.
In the beginning stages of the war, a fallen-away Quaker, a miller named Samuel C. Means, in order to combat increasing Confederate harrassment of his business and indeed all the pro-Union farms and businesses in the Waterford and Lovettsville area, raised a company called the Loudoun Rangers and accepted a Federal commission to protect Northern Loudoun from a base in Point of Rocks, Maryland, just across the Potomac.
A further glance at that table above shows another inescapable fact: Although 325 men in Lovettsville had voted against secession, 46 didn't. These people had to continue to live among their neighbors, despite whatever they felt about the war. Many of those who voted for secession joined Confederate units such as the 35th Virginia, also known as "White's Comanches." Richard Crouch puts his finger on the nub of the matter:
There was a curious parallel between the Loudoun Rangers and their archenemies, Lt. Col. Elijah V. "Lige" White's 35th Battalion, Virginia Cavalry, also known as "White's Comanches." The first two companies were raised in exactly the same area of Loudoun County, and the same surnames appear in both the blue and the gray ranks. As the two groups clashed again and again, their special brand of warfare took on the nature of local family feuds.
The relationship between the two bands was especially antagonistic. Soldiers knew individual members of the opposing unit, exactly where they lived, their sweethearts and other loved ones. Like the Loudoun Rangers, the 35th Virginia had been raised for the specific purpose of "ranging in the border counties."...
Nowhere more than in the border areas was that whole "brother against brother" business true. Crouch again:
When General Robert E. Lee's army moved north as part of the Antietam campaign, White's Comanches were suddenly back in force in Loudoun County. The Rangers were sleeping in the Waterford Baptist Church when they were attacked by White's men after midnight on August 27, 1862. Surrounded, the Rangers defended their position in the brick church until almost every man was wounded and ammunition was running low. When they surrendered, it was to relatives and to boys with whom they had gone to school. One of White's men, William Snoots, loudly insisted on the right to kill his prisoner, and it took several of his fellow Confederates to force him to accept the rules of civilized warfare. The prisoner was Loudoun Ranger Charles Snoots, his brother.
Into this cauldron of rage, of internecine butchery, of bloodsoaked and desperate men, all of whom knew where each others' wives and girlfriends lived...
...enter John Mobberly.
Next stop on the Mobberly Trail: testing the patience of the Lovettsville farmer
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