The Snowden Family: Producers of Their Time (Part 2)

Recap 1846-1859

Part 1 - From the December 2023 ACRP Newsletter

In 1846, white Alexandrians voted to leave the District of Columbia and become part of Virginia. Free Black Alexandrians, who were not allowed to vote, did not want to live under the restrictions Virginia applied to non-white people. Edgar Snowden Sr. campaigned for retrocession and then became Alexandria’s first representative in Richmond following the vote.

In 1850, Snowden, a Whig, like most of Alexandria’s leadership, supported Henry Clay’s compromise that strengthened the Fugitive Slave Law and kept slavery as an option in the territories. Snowden implored northern states to stop nagging the South over slavery, arguing that the South didn’t say anything when Northern states made slavery illegal, “The South has stood on the broad platform of the Constitution, and has said to the northern States, “Pursue your own course; but let us alone.” [1]

The Compromise of 1850 bolstered Alexandria’s robust slave market, but the larger issue of whether to enslave people continued to prick the nation’s conscience.

After the long debated plan for Kansas and Nebraska became law in 1854, that allowed settlers to vote for or against slavery, violence engulfed Kansas. Abolitionists and enslavers descended upon the new territory igniting a mini civil war that raged within state boundaries.

The Whig Party fell apart.

The party that had dominated Alexandria’s politics going back to the closing days of Samuel Snowden’s tenure at the paper collapsed under the weighty question of slavery. Former Whigs who were against the spread of slavery joined the Republican Party. Many who held pro-slavery positions became Democrats. Snowden’s distaste for the governing style of former President Jackson, a democrat who increased the powers of the presidency, left him without an obvious choice. As he searched for a place to land, Snowden tried on the nativist American Party and at their 1856 convention announced a second bid for Congress. [2]

Edgar Snowden Jr.

In April 1857, Edgar Snowden Jr., 22, took control of the newspaper to free his father to pursue his run for the district’s congressional seat. The younger Snowden’s writing style was more modern, straightforward and pithy. “Ned,” as he was sometimes called, attended the best schools in Alexandria, and while he was clever, he didn’t enjoy studying. At a young age, he hawked newspapers, took turns as a copy boy, and eventually reported the news. Edgar Jr. excelled as an editor. He was known for plucking random yet precise bits of knowledge, mixing them with his “keen sense of humor,” adding a hint of “pathos” and then applying words to the page for the amusement of the readers. [3]

On May 4, 1857, Edgar Jr. married Clarence Brent, a native to Alexandria and about the same age. Her father, John Heath Brent, was a merchant who moved to Alexandria from Warrenton, Va. with his wife Lucy Page Baylor (related to the Fizhughs by her mother) in 1833. [4]

Both Edgar and Clarence came from families that enslaved people. When they set up their home, they chose to enslave two Black women, Louisa Ford and Ellen Dyson. The women were forced to cook, clean, launder, run errands, and, after July 1859, care for the couple’s children - all without compensation. [5]

Three weeks after celebrating his wedding, Edgar Jr.’s father’s hopes for national office were dashed for a second time. Making matters worse - he lost to the same opponent - the incumbent Democrat Congressman William Smith. In the wake of the electoral loss, Snowden Sr. again headlined the Gazette, but this time, with his son at his side, producing a sagacious and occasionally witty paper.

John Brown

John Brown, an abolitionist attracted to the fight in Kansas, became infamous in the South for brutally murdering a white family in Kansas who were pro-slavery, then killing a Missouri enslaver and liberating 11 people.

In 1859, when white Virginians learned that Brown had come to the Commonwealth and attacked the arsenal at Harpers Ferry, they were indignant and afraid at the same time.

The Alexandria Riflemen jumped aboard the 3 p.m. steamer on Oct. 18 and headed for West Virginia to lend a hand.[6]

For two weeks, Snowden set aside whole columns to describe the “insurrection” and the heroics of Robert E. Lee. He called the violent plot for liberty “wild and wicked” and said Brown and his freedom fighters were “desperadoes and fanatics” “destitute of judgment, discretion, or even common sense.” He blamed the Northern states and the Northern Press for the raid and tried to tie nonviolent leaders of the abolitionist movement to Brown.

Snowden demanded “stern justice” be “meted out to all concerned in bringing about, or acting in, this outrage upon law, this rebellion and treason, this great crime against the laws of the country and the rights of our peaceable citizens.” [7]

On Dec. 2, 1859, John Brown was hanged as a traitor. In reply, Snowden wrote that Brown “richly merited the punishment” he received, for he “had struck at the peace of society, the supremacy of the law, the safety of our institutions, the harmony of the states, and the lives of our citizens.”

In his 1936 memoir, Alexandrian and confederate veteran Edgar Warfield recollected that the attack at Harpers Ferry was the beginning of the Civil War, “From that time the people of the South, anticipating trouble, began organizing military companies through the various sections.” [8]

1860

A Southern Crisis

The question of slavery loomed large as states squared off against one another during the campaign for the Election of 1860. It was in this atmosphere, that Edgar Snowden, Jr. won his first city council race.

The same year, a faction of partyless Whigs offered a third way starting the Constitutional Unionist Party. The party’s ambivalent slogan “the Union as it is, the Constitution as it is” was built on a one-plank platform “to recognize no political principle other than the constitution of the country, the union of the states and the enforcement of the laws.” [9]

The party’s name can be confusing to modern readers who think of Unionists as those who wanted to keep the Union together - a definition that changed after 11 states seceded. Constitutional can also be confusing - it indicated the party was pro-slavery. Historian and Author Heather Cox Richardson explains, “[Abraham] Lincoln dated the founding of the nation from the Declaration of Independence rather than the Constitution, the document enslavers preferred because of that document’s protection of property,” and unfortunately, in 1860, enslaved Black Americans were considered property. The Constitutional Unionists hoped that by not discussing slavery in national politics, the country could stay united.

The Snowdens, who owned and enslaved people, latched onto this last ditch effort to avoid war and threw their support behind presidential hopeful John Bell in a multicandidate race. Due to their split over slavery, Democrats in the North and South each ran a candidate for president. While Republicans, who vowed to leave slavery alone where it existed, but not allow expansion, backed Abraham Lincoln. [10]

On Aug. 15, 1860, with weeks to go before the national election, Edgar Snowden Sr. addressed “the crisis to which the country is now brought,” and tried to convince Democrats to join Whigs under the banner of the Constitutional Union Party.

“There is no reason why, considering the position of parties, the danger of the election of Lincoln, and the fearful results that may, in time, follow the success of a mere sectional faction, Whigs and Democrats should not agree to adopt the platform of this organization, and join the Union party of the country. Upon this platform, and with the Union candidates, we can crush the Disunion Parties, north and south, and defeat the candidates of Black Republicans…Defeat Lincoln now –and it is probable, that the Black Republican party will dissolve.”

During the most consequential election in the nation’s history, Harold Snowden, Edgar. Jr. 's younger brother by three years, joined the editorial team at the Gazette. In September, amidst political upheaval, the masthead announced the new team in bold letters Edgar Snowden & Sons. At just 24, Harold was a graduate of both the University of Virginia and the medical school at Jefferson College in Pennsylvania. By 1858, the young doctor had opened an office at Pitt and King Streets to ply his trade and was subsequently appointed by City Council as Physician to the Poor. [11]

Nov. 6 Election Day, 1860

On election day, Edgar Snowden Sr. rallied “Conservative Men, Whigs and Union Men,” imploring them in ALL CAPS to vote for the Constitutional Unionist Presidential hopeful. “Do your duty, Union men one and all, let us urge upon you to go to the polls today, and should the Union be dissolved, you will have the proud satisfaction of having done your duty.”

Snowden again used the opportunity to berate “Northern papers” and “Northern politicians” who had resisted and ignored the Fugitive Slave Law and wanted to staunch the bleeding in Kansas by ending the popular vote for slavery. Snowden claimed these northerners “aggravated the southern mind,” and were doing a “great injustice to the South.”

In Alexandria, 16 voters chose Abraham Lincoln, 141 went for Douglas (the Northern Dems’ choice), 565 sided with Breckenridge (the Southern Dem’s choice) and 1,012 voted for Constitutional Unionist John Bell. Virginia and two other border states were the only states Bell won. [12]

Abraham Lincoln President Elect

Many in the South were convinced Lincoln’s victory would bring an end to what they believed to be their “constitutional right” to enslave people and after his election, panic spread. In the weeks and months that led up to the March 4 inauguration, a series of actions forged the momentum toward war. [13]

The volunteer militias present in Alexandria since Brown’s execution stepped up their vigilance. The Mount Vernon Guards, Alexandria Riflemen, and Alexandria Artillery drilled regularly and opened their armories nightly. [14]

Exactly one month after Lincoln was elected, on the 6th of December, Frank Wise and Edgar Warfield gathered their friends at the American Hall Armory on Cameron Street to organize a new confederate militia.

On Dec. 18, Rep. John Chittenden, the father of the Constitutional Unionist Party, offered a series of amendments to the Constitution intended to make slavery permanent and irrevocable. He called it a compromise. Two days later, on Dec. 20, 1860, South Carolina seceded from the Union and Chittenden’s legislation died soon after.

With the help of Alexandria’s Col. Montgomery Corse, Wise and Warfield’s militia became official in early January. They chose the name Old Dominion Rifles and designed Cadet Gray uniforms that cost recruits $22 a piece. Among the founding ranks were several future city leaders, including Arthur Herbert, Delaware Kemper, William Fowle, Jr., Douglass Forrest, James Grimes, Thomas Fitzhugh and Harold Snowden. [15]

Virginia’s Secession Debate

The General Assembly announced a Secession Convention and told localities to elect delegates to represent them. On January 15, 1861, more than 100 Alexandrians asked Edgar Snowden, Sr. to become a candidate, because they believed he was “capable of taking calm views” and at the same time “firmly upholding” regardless of the risk “the rights and honor of the State.”

Snowden agreed to be put forward. [16]

On Monday, Jan. 28, Alexandrians crowded into Liberty Hall at Market Square to “exhaust all honorable means of settling our national difficulties before breaking up our glorious union.” Two of the candidates for delegate to the Secession Convention - George W. Brent, who was against secession, and David Funsten, an enthusiastic secessionist - were at the event, according to the Gazette. Snowden, however, was not mentioned. [17]

The majority of the rowdy audience were upset with South Carolina for seceding and wanted to remain in the United States. But a few outspoken secessionists riled the crowd. “J.T. Johnson'' tried to put forward a resolution supporting secession - decorum dissolved, fists flew, and the politicians slipped away. A few days later, Snowden and several other “pro-union” candidates met and decided to throw their support behind Brent. Who won handily on Feb. 4, securing 1,119 votes to Funsten’s 438 from about 65 percent of Alexandrians who were able to vote. [18]

By the time Brent won, five more states had chosen to secede, but at the close of the polls, Alexandrians were hopeful, hoisting Old Glory above their heads as they paraded through town, stopping by the presses to visit Edgar Jr. before calling on his father at the City Hotel. It was written that “many private dwellings were brilliantly illuminated in honor of the triumph and fire crackers went off.” [19]

Once in Richmond, it was clear a majority of the delegates attending the Secession Convention wanted to remain in the United States. The meetings dragged on for weeks as the secessionists tried and failed to get a majority vote.

Back in Alexandria, on March 6, 1861, the Constitutional Unionist Party swept local elections. Edgar Snowden, Jr. was reelected to the Common Council, but switched from representing the First Ward to the Fourth Ward. He served alongside William Massy, J.B. Smoot and James Atkinson.

The fever brought on by approaching war was becoming impossible to avoid as four militias combined into the Alexandria Battalion stomped around the city every day. Boys too young to join up organized their own club and marched through the streets with wooden guns.

The Vote That Changed Alexandria Forever

Despite South Carolina’s attack on Fort Sumpter on April 12, Virginia Unionists maintained their majority at the state convention. Their hold didn’t slack until President Lincoln issued a call for states to send volunteer soldiers to quell the Palmetto revolt. Alarmed, Union delegates sent an envoy to meet with President Lincoln to test whether Virginia would be required to send men to fight South Carolina.

Just a month earlier, at Lincoln's inaugural address, the President appealed to the region to step back from the brink, “In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war,” once attacked, he warned, he would have no choice but to respond, adding, “You have no oath registered in Heaven to destroy the government, while I shall have the most solemn one to ‘preserve, protect and defend it.”

Secession was illegal and to keep the Union together, President Lincoln would have to use force - he asked the states to send soldiers for just 90 days. The Virginia Unionists left the meeting with the president crestfallen. No longer able to fight the secessionists, enough delegates caved and approved the Ordinance of Secession on April 17, 1861.

The next day, Edgar Snowden Sr. switched gears and began making the case for secession. Edgar Jr. and the City Council beefed up the police force and created a committee of safety. Harold Snowden and the Old Dominion militia prepared for war. [20]

“We are gratified to be able to state, since the appearance of Lincoln’s Proclamation, calling for 75,000 troops to invade the South, the expression of sentiment is well nigh unanimous in favor of the maintenance of Southern Rights,” the Senior Snowden wrote on April 18.

There was no mistaking what he meant by “Southern Rights,” either. “The interests, views, and feelings of the Border Slave States are so homogeneous – they being all Southern States –just as much Southern States as South Carolina and Florida; “going” with them being just as much going with the South as ‘going” with Alabama or Mississippi – all of them equally concerned in the matter of slavery, and none of them dependent upon or recognizing either Cotton, or Sugar, or Rice, as their “King” …and they being all alike animated with a determination to maintain their rights against all aggressions, and especially against the course and policy of the present judicially blinded and monstrously wicked administration in power at Washington; these Border Slave States thus situated, we say, we presume can act together with perfect harmony and accord; and acting together, they can resist and repel, if any attempt at aggression should be made upon them, all hostile efforts, and secure the safety and integrity of their own citizens and soil, while they maintain the rights of the whole South.” (The italics are consistent with how Snowden printed this editorial in the paper.)[21]

In the weeks leading up to Alexandria’s vote, the Gazette reported about the various troops from northern states arriving in Washington, D.C., as well as, the South’s military buildup; articles on the workings of the U.S. Congress resided beside reports on the new Confederate Congress. As tensions increased, the senior Snowden whipped voters imploring them to show a united front on May 23 with an unanimous citywide call for secession. He referred to supporters of secession as “thinking people” implying with pressure, that those who were loyal to the United States were not intellectuals. [22]

Daily life became increasingly uncomfortable for Alexandrians who supported the U.S. as secessionists “looked down upon Union men with scorn.” Unionists were forced to meet secretly. They were treated with derision in the city streets and shops. [23]

At the same time, Alexandria was awash in the uniforms of boys and men who expected a vote to secede, they patrolled the streets and slept in barracks. On May 20, three days before the scheduled vote, Harold Snowden enlisted in the Confederate Army.

A Fait Accompli

Historians have indicated that on May 23, 1861, fewer than expected showed up at the polls. “The low turnout reflected the towns dwindling population, and no doubt confirmed reports that a number of Unionists had been intimidated from going to the polls,” wrote Historian James G. Barber in Alexandria in the Civil War. [24]

A Maine paper claimed that a “respectable citizen from Fairfax County” said that voters were being bullied by Captain Throckmorton and 20 armed “ruffians” who first went to Fairfax “for the purpose of controlling the election,” and then to Alexandria. The Gazette did not report on any intimidation at the polls. [25]

Alexandria City had a population of 12,682 - of those 9,851 were white, of which 4,732 were male and 2,905 older than 15. With a vote age of 21 or older, we can only be sure that 2,412 white men could vote. With that in mind, 1,089 ballots were cast, of which 980 were for secession. This represents about 40 percent of eligible voters. Less than 1000 white men chose rebellion for approximately 11,800 Alexandrians, about 9,000 of whom were white women and children and 2,800 Free and enslaved Black Alexandrians - none of whom were eligible to vote.

Again, 980 white men chose secession for 11,800 Alexandrians who had no opportunity to voice their choice, and in so doing, this minority doomed their neighbors to four long years of anticipated military occupation and ravages of war. [26]

On Thursday, while writing for the Friday morning paper, Snowden Sr. praised Alexandria’s “unanimity” at the polls - a unanimity of just 40 percent of all eligible voters, a minority of a minority, adding the rationalization: “The unconstitutional course of the federal government, the entire hopelessness of any remedy in the Union, left to the Commonwealth no other alternative.”

But there was a choice and the 106 white men in Alexandria who voted, with a not-so-secret ballot, to stay in the Union made that clear. [27]

At the polls that May day, voters also selected representatives for a new confederate government. Edgar Snowden Jr. ran for Virginia’s illegal House of Delegates. He lost (310-739) to a prominent businessman and experienced councilman, W.G. Cazenove. Two years later, Harold Snowden would beat Cazenove and go on to represent the city in exile. Edgar Jr. continued to serve on the Common Council until November when Alexandria’s unionists unseated secessionists.

In the Gazette stamped Friday Morning, May 24, next to the result of the vote, were orders for confederate militias to report “without delay” to Col. Wm. B. Blair. The preparation to fight Alexandria’s neighbors across the Potomac had begun in earnest. For Alexandria’s Free African Americans it must have felt like 1846 all over again, unable to vote and control their fate, they could do nothing to stop the city’s reunion with Virginia - a state that made it illegal to be both Black and free.

Ellen Eslinger described Virginia’s harsh anti-Black legal apparatus this way, “By the end of the antebellum period, various laws affected nearly every aspect of life, from basic rights such as where a person could live to trivial matters such as smoking on a public street. Black freedom was burdened with legal constraints that would have been utterly unthinkable if they had applied to white Americans.” [28]

Utterly unthinkable, except in a time of war.

The Day After The Vote

At 5 a.m., Union forces appeared on the wharfs under a flag of truce. The intention to set up a military post in town was laid bare. Citizens and militia were given until 9 a.m. to leave Alexandria.

At the direction of Col. Terrett, Alexandria’s eager soldiers gathered at the Lyceum. The Old Dominion Riflemen, Harold Snowden and about 700 men, a little more than half the white males of fighting age, joined the march up Duke Street to get the train to Manassas. [29]

On Saturday, May 25 Snowden published an “Extra” edition of the paper announcing that Federal Troops had taken control of the city, many citizens had fled, businesses were closed and the mail had been halted.

Residents of Washington crossed the bridge to gawk - everyone “who could command a vehicle has visited the captured city of Alexandria.” The New York Times correspondent reported that white locals looked “sullen and disaffected,” yet he detected subtle smiles on the faces of Black residents. [30]

After the U.S. Army entered the city on Friday morning, a series of events unfolded, in addition to the well known story of the killing of Col. Ellsworth inside the Marshall House by committed secessionist James Jackson.

Upon arrival, Col. Orlando B. Wilcox asked City Council for stables and forage for the horses of the calvary. Edgar Snowden Jr. and the majority of secessionists on City Council refused.
The military arrested a number of men who were carrying concealed weapons.
On Saturday night, soldiers found “several hundred muskets, rifles and revolvers,” and “six hundred rounds of ammunition,” hidden by secessionists in a theater.
At least four spies were arrested.

Alexandrians shot at U.S. soldiers.
On Saturday night, Col. Wilcox ordered his men to sleep on their arms and told Alexandrians they “could have peace if they desired it, but if any more firing was done by the rebels,” there would be retribution. [31]

By Sunday morning, it was clear to Col. Wilcox, he could not trust Alexandrians and it would be necessary to impose order.

Martial Law Declared

Wilcox approached the Snowdens on Sunday, May 26 and asked them to use their presses to print the Order of Martial Law. After Edgar and his son refused, Wilcox ordered his men to occupy the office and use the machinery at both the Gazette and the Virginia Sentinel to print a one-sided “proclamation” that said, “The citizens are assured that they will be protected in their persons, property and slaves. All public property will be respected, unless the United States forces should be attacked.”

The U.S. Army further promised to keep the peace, soldiers were expected to behave and Alexandrians were given a way to seek justice if and when they did not. The sale of spirits was declared illegal as was engaging in conspiracy against the United States. The military wouldn’t interfere with regular policing, but, and this was the most onerous aspect for Alexandrians, residents would be required to get a pass to leave town. [32]

A few days after Martial Law was declared, the Gazette office “ was completely sacked,” (according to Edgar Snowden Jr.) the presses were broken, desks opened, notes, bonds and certificates “stolen or destroyed.” It was blamed upon a group of drunken soldiers who also accosted the presses at the Virginia Sentinel office on Royal Street. [33]

By the end of May 1861, the Gazette’s presses ran cold, Harold Snowden was ensconced in the Confederate Army and Edgar Jr. remained on a City Council that had little-to-no authority.

A Summer of Untold Resistance

The summer may have been mostly quiet, but much is lost to history since neither the Gazette nor the Sentinel were in print. Just a few incidents made it into Washington papers.

In July, as Confederate soldiers were marched through Alexandria, several ladies “furnished them with presents.”

John L. Emmerson (alias Lt. Hill) was arrested as a spy, he was a native of Alexandria.
Alexandrians messed with U.S. soldiers, “The tampering with the soldiers by the secession residents has become so bold within the last few days that Gen. Runyon issued an order for the arrest” of all suspects - Evening Star, July 30, p.3

In August, Mrs. Lyles was caught secreting letters to Confederate camps.

Local police were suspended.
Three prominent citizens, B. Wheat, W.C. Taylor and Dr. J.B. Johnson were arrested for conspiracy.

Collusion between local sympathizers and rebels was likely much more endemic, but since Alexandria’s only surviving paper “of record” was sympathetic to the south the history we know is distorted. [34]

Unionists

In September 1861, Alexandrians loyal to the Union started a political club and encouraged people to take the Oath of Allegiance to the U.S. Government. Their organization quickly grew to nearly 500 members. They nominated and elected S. Ferguson Beach to represent Alexandria in the U.S. Congress.

While Alexandria was under the control of Union forces, the City Council retained authority to tax, fine, license and collect in order to run the corporation. The Common Council had continued to meet over the summer months.

Unionist citizens started asking questions about city officials who had been elected before the vote to secede and who were not offering to take the Oath of Allegiance. Some complained that the Common Council had voted to use their hard earned money (in the form of tax dollars) to “arm and equip troops who were making war upon the government.” [35]

The Gazette’s presses roared back to life on October 7, 1861. W.F. Carne partnered with Edgar Snowden Jr. to produce The Local News, according to the Evening Star’s Oct. 9, 1861 issue. The scaled down paper, published daily at 3:30 p.m., contained “all the local news of any interest whatsoever, with a condensed summary of the stirring incidents which mark the present era every day.”

On Oct. 14, The Local News reported that a Volunteer Association for the Relief of the Poor had organized. It was made up of secessionists, including the Mayor, Edgar Snowden, Jr. and other members of city government. Instead of taking in donations, the group decided to work with the city’s Trustees of the Poor giving the confederates control over who could be given provisions, money and support, “it was agreed that the committees in charge of donations, exchange with the Trustees of the Poor lists of beneficiaries.” Edgar Snowden, Jr. was responsible for connecting the needy in Ward Four with resources. [36]

In an effort to save money, at the Oct. 22 meeting of the City Council, the police, whom the military had rendered useless, were disbanded and certain city employees made redundant. [37]

The recognized “Restored Government of Virginia” headed up by Gov. Francis Pierpont directed Alexandria to hold new elections. Council members were required to take the Oath of Allegiance or vacate their positions. The Union men nominated candidates in preparation for a November 20 election.[38]

The Board of Alderman and a majority of the Common Council protested. Mayor Price asked attorney’s H.O. Coughton and I. Louis Kinzer, to provide a legal assessment (all three of whom were involved in the Volunteer Relief Association).

In two long columns of the Nov. 15 issue of the Local News, the lawyers wholeheartedly disagreed with the loyalists and argued only the Virginia legislature could legitimize the city charter and elections. The main problem with their argument rested on where legal power lay - the Restored Government of Virginia in Wheeling, or a rebel legislature in Richmond that swore loyalty to a new nation - the Confederate States of America.

Unionists mocked the council's outrage.

Our fathers would have “shed their last drop of blood” for the United States, U.S. Rep. Ferguson Beach said, adding, they would have thrown the secessionists out of office for seeking to “destroy” the government they founded. [39]

On Nov. 20, a mere 141 people voted, it was later stated that most of the unionists filling the ranks of the club had taken the oath too late to qualify to vote. Edgar Snowden Jr.’s tenure as councilman ended four months prematurely. [40]

Judge Freese congratulated the new councilmembers, “The tables had at last turned, and loyal citizens were to hold the power and have control.”[41]

At the first meeting of the Council, they set to work to restore the finances that their predecessors had left in shambles. Eventually, the new government would require merchants to take the oath of allegiance to purchase new licenses. Many shop keepers had not yet bothered because the Confederate blockade made it impossible to do business. [42]

While council convened, the recently ousted, including Edgar Snowden Jr., met at former Mayor William Price’s place on Pitt Street, under the guise of the Volunteer Relief Association.

1862

Martial Law Trumps Civil Liberties

By the start of 1862, Alexandria was being governed at least partially by pro-union locals. The U.S. Forces occupying the city partnered with the now friendly Common Council and allowed local police to look after ordinary crimes. Businesses reopened and more people took the Oath of Allegiance. But the military apparatus held ultimate authority, a part of which ran a vigorous campaign to root out residents suspected of rebel sympathies.

Edgar Jr. and his reporting in The Local News continued to attract the notice of such authorities. At times, Snowden spent inches of ink on rebel news, while in other editions, confederate reports were sprinkled among stories about the U.S. Congress, updates on military actions and ads for local entertainment. From Jan. 21-Feb. 10, The Local News reported on elections for the Confederate Congress, carried news from the halls of Virginia’s legislature, and speculated whether England or France or both would recognize the Confederate States of America and President Jefferson Davis. Occasionally, there were brief items that seemed to be written in code, such as,

“The Legislature of Virginia yesterday, went into session for the purpose of considering an important communication from the Governor upon a subject in regard to which it is understood the State and Confederate authorities are entirely agreed. Its purport will not transpire at present,” which ran on Saturday, Feb. 8, 1861.

The next day, a kerfuffle occurred at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church on S. Pitt Street, in which, Rev. K.J. Stewart was arrested for omitting from the litany a customary prayer for the health of the U.S. President. But members of the 8th Illinois Cavalry, who were under the command of Col. John Farnsworth, a man known to look for opportunities to harass secessionists, were in the congregation that morning. His nephew, Capt. Elon J. Farnsworth was among them. He arrested Rev. Stewart and made him walk through town to a detention center. Upon learning of the arrest, the Military Governor of Alexandria, Gen. Montgomery immediately released the clergyman and denounced the 8th Illinois' behavior. [43]

On Monday, Feb. 10, the paper ran a straight news article about the events that took place at the church as well as a detailed, angry letter signed by men who attended the service. In his editorial, Edgar Snowden Jr. called out the military for this “unjust and unjustifiable act.” [44]

In the same paper, Gen. Montgomery appealed to residents with “secession proclivities” to stop their “offensive behavior” warning them it would not continue to be tolerated. [45]

That night, still stinging from Gen. Montgomery’s reversal and chastisement, Farnsworth and the 8th Illinois Cavalry set fire to the Gazette building. As soon as news reached Gen. Montgomery, he ordered “everyone in the area” to fight the blaze and save the building and the presses. Members of the 88th Pennsylvania successfully put out the flames, but not before the print shop and two buildings next door were reduced to a smoldering heap of ash. [46].

Gen. Montgomery applied to have the 8th Illinois transferred. While the Unionist City Council, that had been given permission to “restrict newspapers not favorable to the Lincoln Administration from entering the city,” instead, took the Gazette’s side and launched an investigation into the disastrous fire. [47]

Then, while embers and tempers were still sizzling, on Wednesday, Feb. 26, U.S. Detectives for the War Department arrested Edgar Snowden, Jr. and 26 members of the Volunteer Relief Association. Their homes and offices were searched and personal papers vetted. Officers found enough evidence to put Snowden and the other suspects in prison.

At 3 p.m. on Feb. 28th, Alexandria’s leading confederates found themselves deposited upon the docks of Washington. From there, they were marched through the city to the Old Capitol Prison, attracting “much attention as they passed along the avenue - many of them being well known in this city,” according to the Evening Star on March 1.

On March 5, while many of those who had been in charge of the city before Nov. 20, 1861 sat in their cold, dank, cells, a second election for Alexandria’s Common Council was held. Less than 200 voters reelected Mayor Lewis McKenzie and returned the Unionists to what little power they were allowed. [48]

Snowden and the other members of the Volunteer Relief Association remained incarcerated for 20-27 days. When they were released it was in batches until just two, Henry Peel and H.O. Cloughton, were left at the military facility. [49]

A few weeks after Edgar Jr.’s return, the Snowden’s secured space at 104 King Street, above French’s Bookstore. On May 13, 1862, they brought the presses back online and The Alexandria Gazette banner returned, Edgar Snowden Jr. topping the masthead. Edgar Sr. attended to the business side of the newspaper in an office on the second floor of 76 King street.

The Growth and Crowding of Alexandria

When Gen. Slough arrived in Alexandria in August 1862, the Military Governor found “a reign of terror” ravaging Alexandria. “The streets were crowded with intoxicated soldiery; murder was of an almost hourly occurrence, and disturbances, robbery and rioting were constant.” [50]

A sizable portion of the white people had left Alexandria after the secession vote. Then troops moved in by the thousands and camped near, in and around the city sometimes for days, others for weeks or months. Larger abandoned and sometimes commandeered homes became hospitals or barracks or offices for military personnel. Northerners also arrived to work on the railroads and offer aid in the hospitals and elsewhere. [51]

At first hundreds, then thousands of freedom seekers made their way to Alexandria and the District of Columbia. By December, 7,000 formerly enslaved were living in both cities. At that time, these refugees were called contrabands (a term often used derogatorily by the press). Each year of the war, more arrived seeking protection behind Union lines. The U.S. military was not prepared and city resources were strained by the throngs. They carried nothing with them, but the clothes on their backs and they were hungry. There wasn’t enough food, shelter or jobs and many died soon after arriving.

Alexandria had an established community of Free Black residents who did what they could to help, including building schools to teach reading and writing so the formerly enslaved might become self-sufficient.

Thousands of freedom seekers and thousands of stories went unrecorded in the pages of the Gazette.

Instead, when acknowledged at all, Snowden complained about the camps crammed with makeshift shelters encroaching on town lines. Ignoring the alarm expressed by aid workers who found multiple families “packed into small, filthy spaces, freezing in the winter and sweltering in the summer. Disease was rampant, and there was little food or medicine,” according to Untold History: The African American Community of Mercy Street, by Audrey Davis.

Snowden blamed the refugees for the troubles afflicting the city. In the Dec. 22 issue of the Gazette, he described a house fire on St. Asaph Street, “The house in which the fire originated, was taken by the Military authorities several months ago and used as a soldier's barracks for some time, but has been recently occupied as quarters for “contrabands and was by the carelessness of some of these, set on fire.” [52]

1863

Alexandria at the Front

Multiple family members of Edgar Snowden Jr. and his wife Clarence were fighting for the Confederate cause. His wife’s little brother Heath John Brent enlisted in April 1862 when he was barely 17-years-old. By 1863, he was fighting with the 38th in Company A.

Clarence’s older brother Courtney Brent, a member of the Confederate Cavalry, Virginia 6 Company F, started the year in the Old Capital Prison in Washington, D.C. [53]

Meanwhile, Clarence’s brother-in-law Dr. M.M. Lewis was the regimental surgeon for the 17th Virginia Infantry, serving beside her other brother-in-law, Harold Snowden, the regiment’s assistant surgeon. They and other soldiers from Alexandria fell under the command of Gen. Corse’s Brigade, Pickett’s Division, 1st Corps of the Army of Northern Virginia. [54]

In the Spring of 1863, while in the field Harold decided to run for Virginia’s rebel House of Delegates. Since the Fall of 1861, William Casenove had been the city’s representative at the statehouse. When Casenove made a campaign stop at the camp of the 17th, the Alexandria men “called on the doctor (whom they almost idolized) to make a speech,” Edgar Warfield wrote in his memoir, adding, “We arranged some boxes for him to stand upon and the speech and meeting were a great success.”

On Friday morning, June 5, 1863, The Richmond Whig announced that Harold Snowden was Alexandria’s representative to the Virginia House of Delegates (C.S.A.). [55]

In Richmond

Snowden obtained a furlough from the military and joined fellow legislators in Richmond in September. He was assigned to Schools and Colleges and the Committee on Lunatic Asylums. While he served, much of the agenda was dedicated to the war. Bills regarding railroads, compensation for state employees, and many aspects of slavery, also dominated the legislative calendar. During sessions in 1863 and 1864, Snowden and other lawmakers agreed to:

Use general funds to pay for the transporting of, selling of or execution of enslaved Black people.
Allow the Governor to call on enslavers to lend Virginia Black men (ages 18-55) to build fortifications for public defense. The Assembly agreed to pay enslavers $20 a month for each man, but the enslaved received no pay. The state also promised to compensate enslavers if the men died in the state’s care.
Allow the Courts, officers of the courts and local authorities to sell the enslaved if jails were destroyed by war, or if it cost too much to incarcerate them.

Update tax codes regarding Free and enslaved Black people.
Require the Commissioners of Revenue to record the names, age and sex of the slaves and their owner’s name for preservation at the office of the auditor of public accounts - this would help produce an accurate count of those who might escape during the conflict. [56]

The legislature also thought it important to provide “relief” for the families of soldiers living within enemy lines, such as those Alexandrians who were supported by the Volunteer Relief Association. The law included a provision that let “proper agents” hold the state aid for the families if the money couldn’t be distributed because of the presence of enemy forces. [57]

In Alexandria

Around the same time Harold Snowden won a seat in the rebel legislature, the U.S. Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, was growing more and more concerned about the secessionists in Washington’s backyard. On June 29, the Provost Marshall told Alexandrians they would be “removed” to City Point, Va. if they didn’t take the Oath of Allegiance within 48 hours. [58]

Edgar Jr. continued to refuse to show allegiance to the United States. On July 8th he wrote to the Gazette’s subscribers, “Having been ordered, along with many other of my fellow citizens, by military authority, to leave the place of my nativity and my home, my connection with the Gazette will be severed, temporarily at least. I can do no less than return to those who have heretofore generously supported me in my labors, my heartfelt thanks and assure them of my constant gratitude. My lot and that of my fathers has been peculiarly hard. He has lost since the commencement of the present troubles the earnings of a lifetime, and I, all of my labor since manhood. In his future efforts to support himself and his family, I cannot doubt, that, even under the most adverse circumstances he will be sustained, by those in whose midst he was born and has lived – whilst I must seek for my support among those with whom my lot may be cast.” — Edgar Snowden Jr.

The military order was withdrawn and no one was sent away, however, Cassius Lee, (relative of Snowden) who had been arrested three times on charges of espionage decided to leave anyway and moved to Long Island, New York. [59]

By September Edgar Jr. again heard from Union forces. Military Governor Rollin C. Gale wrote,

“Sir: Observing in your issue of this evening an article boldly headed “Virginia Legislature,” which article contains the proceedings of the Confederate Legislature of Virginia, and hence, is a public recognition upon your part of a State Government, in Virginia, opposed to the Federal Government, the General Commanding directs me to inform you that the repetition of this act will be visited with a suspension of your paper. The existence of a paper in Alexandria known to be hostile to the Government he represents, will be tolerated so long only as there appears nothing in it offensive to loyal people.”

The effect of the reproach lasted but a few weeks, by October 2, Snowden was again reporting news from the legislature and on Oct. 6, 1863, he also covered the rebel Gov. Letcher’s proclamation calling for more volunteers to join the confederate cause.

More Growth

The population of Alexandria swelled to around 18,000 people, most of whom were recently liberated African Americans. Snowden wrote, “We have already mentioned the change in appearance in the suburbs of the town, by the erection of numerous “shanties,” on lots which for years past have been vacant. These frail tenements are still going up daily. Several hundred must have been built within the last three or four weeks and they are all occupied.”[60]

The issue didn’t go away, Snowden continued to harp on it throughout the war years, and instead of writing about the great needs of a recently freed people to drum up support for Alexandria’s new residents, he instead “wistfully stated that older residents wished that so many of these contrabands had not selected the outskirts of their city as the place to erect their shanties.” [61]

1864-65

Snowden Family Connection to The Raiders

John Mosby, known as the Gray Ghost, was a Confederate Colonel who led calvary raids throughout Northern Virginia and the Shenandoah Valley. He led gangs of raiders who employed unconventional tactics attacking patrols and disrupting lines of supply and communication and generally vexing the U.S. military. During the summer of 1864, Mosby upped his game and left behind a wake of embarrassment and death.

Clarence Snowden’s brother, Courtney Brent, was an acting major with Mosby. Which may have something to do with Union forces targeting Edgar Jr. for arrest in November 1864. Snowden was assigned to ride the trains on the Manassas Railroad with U.S. soldiers in an effort to safeguard them “against the forays by Confederate raiders.” He rode the rails through the holidays and went home on New Year’s Day 1865. [62]

Upon his return, Edgar Snowden, Jr, revived the Gazette, but this time, chose to publish in the late afternoon to avoid competing with morning papers in Washington, D.C. and Baltimore. The Gazette continued to be an afternoon paper well into the 21st century. [63]

On March 25, 1865, just two weeks before Lee’s surrender ended hostilities, Clarence Snowden’s beloved little brother, Heath, died fighting for the South, outside of Petersburg, Va.

Conclusion

It is important to hold our own interpretation of history to account. The Snowdens, like most Alexandrians, understandably chafed under the military occupation of Alexandria. But through a different lens, it becomes apparent there is more to discover about the rationalizations and justifications accepted to date about theirs and Alexandria’s wartime fate. There were people in Alexandria who made different choices than the Snowdens, but theirs were not preserved in the pages of the Gazette that buttress city archives.

In reality, a minority of Alexandrians who voted to secede and about half of the white males of fighting age went to war against the United States. But, the voices of those who voted to stay in the Union, and those who fought for it, along with the points of view of several thousand Black Alexandrians were not recorded. The Snowdens and the Gazette have had an outsized voice in promoting one side of history as the whole. In their nostalgic rush toward a past framed by white men, many Alexandrians forgot the truth.

By Tiffany D. Pache, Alexandria Community Remembrance Project Coordinator, December, 2023.

Part 1 - From the December 2023 ACRP Newsletter

End Notes

Recap

Union, a pen name used by Edgar Snowden Sr. “What Has Endangered the Union,” Alexandria Gazette, Aug. 24, 1850.

Dave Roos, “Why the Whig Party Collapsed,” History.com, Jan. 8, 2021.

“Edgar Snowden, Jr. Obituary,” Alexandria Gazette, Jul. 29, 1892.

Ancestry, Geneanet Community Trees Index, Brent Family, located on ancestry.com.

Ancestry.com. 1860 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2009. Images reproduced by FamilySearch.

Edgar Warfield, A Confederate Soldiers Memoirs, Masonic Home Press, Inc., Richmond, 1936. Military Companies in Alexandria, in the memoir he said the Alexandria Riflemen arrived in Harper’s Ferry Sunday night and were already there when Robert E. Lee arrived, p. 15, however, the Gazette recorded on the 19th of Oct. that the team left at 3 p.m. the previous day on the Steamer George Page.

Alexandria Gazette, Oct. 19, pp. 2, 3; Oct. 20, p.2, Oct. 21, Oct. 22, pp. 2,3 and Oct. 24, p.2.

Edgar Warfield, A Confederate Soldiers Memoirs, Military Companies in Alexandria. Upon the return of the Riflemen in November, an intense anxiety hung heavily over the city, they could taste the coming conflict, and a number of men formed a Home Guard. Also, an article in the Washington Star quoted in the Alexandria Gazette on Nov. 30, 1859 due to the “intensity of the feeling” that “irrepressible conflict” loomed, decided to form a Home Guard.

1860

The American Presidency Project, 1860, University of California Santa Barbara.

Alexandria Gazette, Dec. 13, 1859, p. 2

Dr. Snowden advertised his office in the Gazette beginning in Nov. 1858. Although some news accounts say that Harold joined the paper in 1859, the masthead did not change until September 25, 1860 and on Sept. 27 he tendered his resignation for Physician to the Poor to the City Council.

Information provided in a museum exhibit about the history of West Virginia.

“Lincoln Interviewed,” Jan. 16, 1861 Alexandria Gazette, p. 3; 16 Alexandrians voted for Lincoln, 1,012 voted for Bell, 565 for J. Breckenridge (D) and 141 for S. Douglas (D) a total of 1734 white male votes, approximately 70 percent of eligible voters in Alexandria.

James G. Barber, Alexandria in the Civil War, Second Edition, 1988, p.4.

Edgar Warfield, A Confederate Soldiers Memoirs, p.17, 1936.

Alexandria Gazette, Jan. 16, 1861

Alexandria Gazette, Jan. 29, 1861; David Funsten’s brother Orville led a militia raid on Harpers Ferry to capture the armory while Virginia’s Secession Convention was still debating whether or not to secede.

Alexandria Gazette, Friday, Feb. 1, 1861.

Barber; Alexandria Gazette, Feb. 2, 1861.

The Vote that Changed The South Forever

Barber, p. 7.

Editorial, Alexandria Gazette, April 18, 1861, p.2.

Alexandria Gazette, May 6, 1861

“Unionist Meeting,” Local News, Nov. 21, 1861. These comments were made after the election in November when the secessionists were unseated by those loyal to the U.S.