Berkeley Hotel
Railroad Raids Survivor
This is one of the last surviving antebellum buildings in the area. It was constructed shortly after the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad reached Martinsburg in 1842. The adjacent railroad yards twice were Confederate Gen. Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson’s target.
The possession of Martinsburg, a strategic railroad center, was hotly contested during the early years of the war. On May 24, 1861, Gen. Joseph E. Johnson ordered Jackson to destroy the rolling stock here. Beginning in June, over the next the ten months more than 400 cars and 40 locomotives were taken, damaged, or destroyed. The Confederates also stripped the round-house complex of its stationary equipment, tools and 40-foot turntable but did not destroy the buildings. A few of the locomotives were disassembled, and 40-horse teams dragged them up the turnpikes to Strasburg. Several were transported in pieces to Richmond, reassembled, and returned to use.
In September-October 1862, after the Battle of Antietam (Sharpsburg), Maryland, Jackson’s retreating column occupied Martinsburg. The Confederates destroyed almost 38 miles of track and burned the round-house, shops, warehouses, ticket and telegraph offices, company hotel, and other facilities. The privately owned Berkeley Hotel was spared.
The B&O bought the building in 1866, expanded it, and used it as the station, eating house, telegraph office, and hotel. In 1877 the trainmen and enginemen here struck to protest wage cuts, starting the “Great Strike of 1877” nationwide. Railroad and military officials suppressed the strike here, using this building as headquarters.
Marker is on East Race Street.
Courtesy hmdb.org
