Throughout the Civil War, the Cumberland Valley Railroad transported Union supplies and soldiers to and from battlefields south of Pennsylvania. Although Cumberland Valley residents saw much railroad and Union troop activity in the war’s early years, Confederate forces did not enter the valley until June 1863. Confederate General Richard Stoddert Ewell’s infantry pushed north as far as Oyster Point, present-day 31st Street in Camp Hill, where they skirmished with state militia. Though Ewell’s troops were well positioned to assault Harrisburg, General Robert E. Lee ordered them back to support the rest of the Army of Northern Virginia as fighting developed around Gettysburg. Ewell’s troops briefly occupied Carlisle on June 27–28, and on July 1 Confederate cavalry under General J.E.B. Stuart shelled the town and set fire to the gas works and the Carlisle Barracks before heading south to rejoin the main Confederate army at Gettysburg. As Confederate troops moved southwest, they tore up sections of Cumberland Valley Railroad track, damaged railroad maintenance shops and equipment at Chambersburg, and destroyed the bridge at Scotland. Within a week, crews repaired the line, and it continued operating for the rest of the war as a key Union logistics route.