For four days in June 1864, Union troops commanded by General David Hunter occupied Lexington, Virginia. The 18,000 strong Union forces entered the town on the afternoon of June 11. General John McCausland’s (a Virginia Military Institute [VMI] graduate and former faculty member) Confederate troops were greatly outnumbered and were soon forced to retreat.

The VMI Corps of Cadets, having only recently returned to VMI after their participation in the Battle of New Market on May 15, were also ordered to retreat. The Corps camped near the top of the Blue Ridge Mountains, about two miles from Balcony Falls (Virgina), on the night of the June 11.

There were no civilian or military casualties during this occupation; however, VMI was both the site of a state arsenal and a military training school, so it was a legitimate military target. On June 12, Hunter ordered the burning of VMI. The barracks and two faculty residences were extensively damaged, as were the library and laboratory equipment. The troops also removed the Institute's statue of George Washington, which was taken to Wheeling, West Virginia as a trophy of war and was not returned until 1866. The Union forces left on June 14, marching over the mountains to Lynchburg, Virginia.

Primary Resources

The Archives has several Confederate primary resources related to Hunter’s Raid including:

• Superintendent Francis H. Smith letter, June 17, 1864
• VMI Annual Report, 1864
• VMI Surgeon Robert L, Madison's report, July 1864
• Fannie Wilson eyewitness account
• Captain Achilles J. Tynes letter, June 13, 1864

The Archives has several Union primary resources related to Hunter’s Raid including:

• General David Hunter operations reports
• J. O. Humphreys Civil War diary
• William G. Watson Civil War memoirs
• Letter from Sidney Marlin to Sarah Marlin, June 14, 1864

Secondary Resources

Secondary resources about Hunter’s Raid include:

• Allan, Elizabeth Preston. The Life and Letters of Margaret Junkin Preston. Boston, New York: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1903. https://archive.org/details/lifeandlettersm00harrgoog.
• Miller, Edward A., Jr. “David Hunter: The General Who Burned VMI.” VMI Alumni Review 73, no. 4 (1997): 2-7. 
• Miller, Edward A., Jr. Lincoln's Abolitionist General: The Biography of David Hunter. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1997.
• Turner, Charles W. “General David Hunter’s Sack of Lexington, Virginia, June 10-14, 1864: An Account by Rose Page Pendleton.” The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography 83, no. 2 (1975): 173-183.