Military
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The Mountain Grove community grew up around William Gatewood’s plantation in the early 19th century. During the Civil War, Brig. Gen. William W. Averell’s Federal cavalry attacked from newly created West Virginia late in 1863 and fought with Confederate cavalry in the river valleys and mountain passes of western Bath County. One skirmish occurred while Gen. Robert E. Lee’s family vacationed just a few miles east at Warm Springs. Averell sought to halt mining in the caves near Mountain Grove that provided the Confederates with saltpeter, then needed desperately for gunpowder manufacture. He failed, and soon military activity moved to eastern Virginia.
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Virginia · United States
