Plumb House

The Plumb House was built between 1802 and 1806 on what was then the western edge of Waynesboro. Although fighting did not reach this place until late in the Civil War, the community felt the war’s effects early; Henry Plumb, who lived here, was mortally wounded at the First Battle of Manassas and died in July 1861. Early in Stonewall Jackson’s famous Valley Campaign of 1862, his army passed through Waynesboro by train on its way to the Battle of McDowell. Confederate successes that year left Waynesboro and the Upper Shenandoah Valley largely untouched until 1864, when skirmishes occurred here on June 10 after the Battle of Piedmont and on September 28 after the Battle of Fisher’s Hill. On March 2, 1865, the Confederate defense of the Valley collapsed around the Plumb House as the remnants of Gen. Jubal Early’s Army of the Shenandoah formed a line along the hill east of the house, along modern Pine Avenue. Union cavalry attacked from the west, drove the Confederates to the South River, and captured most of them, effectively ending the war in the Valley. After the victory at Waynesboro, Federal forces marched through Albemarle County to the James River at Scottsville, destroyed part of the canal and other buildings there, and then, under Gen. Philip Sheridan, continued to the Petersburg area to rejoin the command of Gen. U.S. Grant. Jed Hotchkiss, Stonewall Jackson’s map maker, recalled a terrible panic and stampede in which the army was captured or scattered and all seemed lost.

Waynesboro, Virginia · United States