On 26 Nov. 1861, a 120-man detachment of Col. Robert Ransom Jr.'s 1st North Carolina Cavalry attacked 94 men of the 3rd Pennsylvania Cavalry under Capt. Charles Bell. Ransom's men took Bell's detachment from the rear as the Pennsylvanians headed north on Lawyers Road out of Vienna. The panicked Union troops suffered significant losses in the two-mile long engagement, with one killed, six wounded, and 26 taken prisoner. Regarding his cavalry, recently appointed Confederate Brig. Gen. J.E.B. Stuart reported: "The result of this our first engagement with the enemy's cavalry is, I doubt not, highly satisfactory to the General-In-Chief."
