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Come to find out, Meherrin Station Virginia is the site of a historical marker which commemorates two Civil War-related events. Federal cavalry units were in the area during the Wilson–Kautz Raid in late June 1864. The raid’s mission was to destroy Confederate railroad track and bridges as the Richmond–Petersburg campaign began. As The Siege of Petersburg explains the raid had only limited success from a Union point of view. The Federal cavalry suffered substantial casualties given that it failed to accomplish one of its main objectives – destroying the Staunton River Bridge on the Richmond & Dansville Railroad. Quite a bit of track was torn up and Confederate supplies ran low for awhile, but in about nine weeks the tracks were repaired. That would explain the second event mentioned on the historical marker – as Richmond was burning and the Confederate government was fleeing, Jefferson Davis and associates passed through Meherrin Station on the Richmond & Dansville as they made their way all the way to Dansville, where they temporarily set up the government.
wrecking rebel railroads
rough raid route
You can read all of Harper’s Weekly at the Internet Archive, including pages 288, 320, and 336. Hal Jespersen’s map of the Wilson-Kautz raid is licensed under Creative Commons, Map by Hal Jespersen, www.posix.com/CW. From the Library of Congress: rail disruption; vacated Davis house; burnt districts map; the Danville Address.
the house that Jeff left
what got burnt
Montgomery, Richmond, … Danville
