Grapeshot Among the Pines
"Somehow they found out we were in the woods east of town. They took two cannon up the pike to where the Toll House now stands and fired several rounds of grapeshot among the pines." John Starnes Memoir
The road passing before you is the Old Northwestern Turnpike (US 50 today). On September 23rd, 1861 a large force under General B.F. Kelley pursued Confederate forces to near this point. Using artillery pieces of the 4th Ohio Volunteer Infantry they fired at Confederate Forces of the 77th Virginia Militia, hidden in the pine thickets can be seen on the hills beyond the campus of the West Virginia Schools for the Deaf and the Blind.
Like Napoleon in 1795 Paris when he ordered his troops to give the royalists “a whiff of grape,” the Federal Troop’s goal was to disrupt and disperse the enemy. There is little doubt that the experience of grapeshot left an indelible mark on the memory of John Starnes.
Grapeshot was a highly versatile artillery round designed to make a cannon much like a large shotgun. While the effective range of the smaller projectiles was limited, the close range effects were physically and psychologically horrific.
Marker is on Main Street (U.S. 50), on the right when traveling east.
Courtesy hmdb.org
