On Wednesday at 6:30 p.m., the Rowan Rifles Camp 405 Sons of Confederate Veterans will host Chris Hartley, author of “Stoneman’s Raid, 1865.”
After leading a failed raid in the Chancellorsville campaign and later earning the dubious honor of being the highest-ranking Union prisoner of war, Union General George Stoneman was described as “one of the most worthless officers in the service” by Edwin Stanton. The 1865 raid, his last chance at redemption, was a brutal, unnecessary pillaging of a broad swath of six Confederate states after the Civil War was already decided. No other such action has inspired both a classic song, The Band’s “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down,” and a Disney TV movie.
Hartley’s first book was “Stuart’s Tarheels: James B. Gordon and His North Carolina Cavalry.” He was honored by the UDC with the prestigious Jefferson Davis Award for his work on “Stuart’s Tarheels.”
The event will be held in the Stanback Room at Rowan Public Library Headquarters and is free to the public.