West Virginians: Smart Cookies

Hunter Lesser is to West Virginia what I am to Jackson Ward.

He lives there, he loves it, he sings its praises. And today he was putting some historical perspective on it at the Library of Virginia.

"Virginia Divided: The Forgotten First campaign" centered on how Western Virginia was a proving ground for statesmen and soldiers in the early years of the Civil War.

And despite West Virginia jokes to the contrary, Lesser was a smart man.

Greeting attendees was a slide that said "Cookies for the front row."

But since the front row can only hold so many people he began his talk by passing around a package of Chips Ahoy for all to enjoy.

Already it was my kind of lecture.

Talking about how Western Virginia was divided by geography (Wheeling was a long way from Richmond), culturally (not many mountain folk had slaves) and economically (that area had far more ties to Ohio and Pennsylvania than the South), Lesser made a case for that part of the state's eventual secession from Virginia.

He spoke of how McClellan became an immediate star in those early battles in West Virginia mainly because of 19th century Twitter.

That is, because McClellan set up the first telegraph on a battlefield he was able to send out his own glowing press releases to the War Department.

It worked and he went from leading the Army of Western Virginia to heading up the Army of the Potomac.

Sometimes it pays to be self-aggrandizing.

Lee, however, got off to a slow start out there and became known as "The Great Evacuator," which sounds totally disgusting to me and "Granny Lee" before learning a few lessons and applying them to the rest of the war effort.

Not surprisingly, the Civil War literally pitted family members against each other in Western Virginia since 60% of the area favored the Union and 40% the Confederacy.

Many towns had both a Federal sheriff and a Confederate sheriff.

Stonewall Jackson and his sister, long close because of being orphaned at a young age, were two such people.

His sister sided with the Union and became a nurse, claiming she could nurse the wounded as fast as Stonewall could shoot them.

But my favorite takeaway was that West Virginia was the only state to form by seceding from a Confederate state and during the Civil War, too.

And that funky panhandle that juts along the Pennsylvania border?

That was kept there solely to keep the B & O Railroad out of Confederate hands.

Lesser closed the lecture by suggesting we visit historic West Virginia, his birthplace and home, and a place of great beauty in his opinion.

I'm sure it's no Jackson Ward, but I have to appreciate the guy's passion for his place.