In the final days of the Civil War, the last reviews of the Confederate army under Gen. Joseph E. Johnston’s command took place at the Stevens House at Mitchener Station on April 4 and April 7, 1865. The entire army, the remnants of the Army of Tennessee, paraded on April 4, and only Gen. William J. Hardee’s Corps marched on April 7, watched by Johnston and numerous dignitaries, including North Carolina Governor Zebulon B. Vance, Raleigh Daily Confederate editor Duncan Kirkland McRae, and several women from Raleigh. Hardee gave a reception afterward, and the party then went to Gen. Robert F. Hoke’s headquarters, where Vance urged the North Carolina Junior Reserves to “fight till Hell freezes over!” Afterward, the governor and his entourage rode to the nearby Stevens farmhouse, where a cotillion was held in their honor before they returned to Raleigh. Few believed the end was so near, but this proved to be the final review of the Confederate army. Mitchener Station, named for the prosperous local Mitchener family, stood at the intersection of the North Carolina Railroad and the old Louisburg-Smithfield Stage Road in present-day Selma. In 1856, the North Carolina Railroad linked Smithfield to Raleigh and Goldsboro, and Confederate soldiers from Kinston and Raleigh arrived at the station in March 1865 and took part in the Battle of Bentonville.