Confederate Brig. Gen. J. E. B. Stuart and his 1,200 cavalrymen rode past this spot on the morning of 12 June 1862 heading west on a mission to gather intelligence about Union Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan's Army of the Potomac. Stuart hoped to deceive Union forces into thinking that he was joining Confederate Maj. Gen. Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson in the Shenandoah Valley, but his true objective was northeastern Hanover County, in the rear of the Union army, about a dozen miles east of here. The westward feint and the narrow, tree-lined country roads allowed Stuart to conceal the true nature of his expedition.
