During the Civil War, the strategically important Valley Turnpike crossed the stream just above the small waterfall here, and two battles were fought nearby. The first occurred on July 2, 1861, half a mile south on the Porterfield Farm, when Federal troops under General Robert Patterson crossed the Potomac River from Maryland and marched south toward Martinsburg. Colonel Thomas J. Jackson, soon to be nicknamed Stonewall, ordered his command northward from the town, fought a brief delaying action on the farm, and then fell back. Because this stream was the last body of water encountered by the Federals before engaging the Confederates, the fight was named for Falling Waters, following the Union convention of naming battles for natural features. The second engagement took place after the Battle of Gettysburg in July 1863, when part of General Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia retreated over a pontoon bridge that crossed the Potomac River approximately 150 feet south of the mouth of this stream. On the morning of July 14, after most of the troops had crossed, Union cavalrymen attacked two infantry divisions still on the Maryland side of the river. This fight, also known as Falling Waters, resulted in the capture of a large number of Confederates and the mortal wounding of Confederate General James J. Pettigrew, whose troops had participated in Pickett’s Charge in Gettysburg. During the war, a gristmill stood here, and the large railroad bridge and embankment were built after the war.
