For most of the Civil War, Cedar Bluff knew the conflict mainly through news from elsewhere, but in late September 1864 the war reached the town directly when Union General Stephen Burbridge arrived from Kentucky with a regiment of more than 5000 men on the way to seize the nearby Saltville saltworks, one of the South's two remaining saltworks and a vital Confederate resource for preserving meat and making gunpowder. Warned by scouts in the hills, Confederate Lt. Col. Edwin Trimble prepared to stop the advance with 400 young men at the narrow pass through Cedar Bluff, where they blocked the road, cut large trees into the river, and dug into the hillside. When Burbridge's troops arrived, fighting broke out as townspeople tried to protect their homes and belongings; the postmaster removed postal supplies and mail to a nearby cliff and watched soldiers invade his home, other soldiers broke into homes in the community, and at the McGuire home a young girl hid beneath the dining table while the front door was damaged by rifles and swords. The Confederate blockade delayed Burbridge for nearly a day, giving reinforcements time to reach and defend the saltworks. The number of dead is unknown, but after the battle a resident found a Union soldier killed by a sniper's bullet on a hilltop, gathered his belongings, and mailed them to his family in Kentucky, who returned after the war to take his body home.